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TO ALARIC A. WATTS, ESQ.
On receiving from him a copy of his ‘Poetical Sketches.’
There is a dear and lovely power
Dwells in the silence of the flower,
When the buds meet the caress
Of the bee in their loneliness:—
In the song the green leaves sing
When they waken and wave in spring;
In the voice of the April bird—
The first air music the year hath heard;
In the deep and glorious light
Of the thousand stars at night;
In the dreaming of the moon,
Bright in her solitary noon;
In the tones of the plaining brook;
In the light of a first-love look;
In each bright and beautiful thing
With aught of fine imagining,
That power is dwelling. Now need I
Name the bright spell of Poesy?
And, graceful Bard, it has breathed on thee
A breath of the life, which is melody,
And given thy lute the touching strain
Which the heart but hears to echo again!
Mine is not the hand that flings
Living or lasting offerings:
Wear thy laurel—not mine the lay
That either gives or takes away.
Others may praise thy harp,—for me
To praise, were only mockery;
The tribute I offer is such a one,
As the young bird would pour if the sun
Or the air were pleasant: thanks, not praise,—
Oh, not to laud, but to feel thy lays!
A COUNTRY CONVERSAZIONE.
Here a poet acting enthusiasm with a chapeau bras—there another dying of ennui to admiration—here a wit, cutting and slashing, right or wrong—there a man of judgment standing by, silent as the grave—all for notoriety.—Miss Edgeworth.
“Well, Mr.,” exclaimed worthy Mrs. Puffendorf, bursting into my breakfast room early one morning, knocking down a flower-stand, and treading on my cat, in the violence of her opening charge,—“Well, Mr.”
“Not quite well at present,” said I, (somewhat ruffled,) replacing the stand, and endeavouring to pacify poor puss.
“Oh, a fiddle-stick for such old-fashioned notions. Listen to me:—All the Blues are to be at the conversation on Thursday—all the Blues—only think!”
“A very fine-looking set of men: and are their horses to be accommodated also?”
After due expressions of wonder, pity, and astonishment at my ignorance, she proceeded to state, that she did not mean the Oxford Blues,
