representative of the convalescent feeling, I find direct reference to the beliefs which he had laboured to instil. My verses are written in a sort of metre which, in the hands of Collins, became flexible and exquisitely poetic, and which in those of Kirke White is at least pleasing, but of which we find poor enough specimens in the "Anthologies" of Southey, and which perhaps no one so limited in his metrical vocabulary, and so defective in his musical ear, as the writer of these chapters, should ever have attempted. SOLACE. No star of golden influence hailed the birth Of him who, all unknown and lonely, pours, As fails the light of eve, His pensive, artless song; Yea, those who mark out honour, ease, wealth, fame, As man's sole joys, shall find no joy in him; Yet of far nobler kind His silent pleasures prove. For not unmarked by him the ways of men; Nor yet to him the ample page unknown, Where, traced by Nature's hand, Is many a pleasing line. Oh! when the world's dull children bend the knee, Meanly obsequious, to some mortal god, It yields no vulgar joy Alone to stand aloof; Or when they jostle on wealth's crowded road, And swells the tumult on the breeze, 'tis sweet, Thoughtful, at length reclined, To list the wrathful hum. What though the weakly gay affect to scorn The loitering dreamer of life's darkest shade, Stingless the jeer, whose voice Comes from the erroneous path. Scorner, of all thy toils the end declare! If pleasure, pleasure comes uncalled, to cheer The haunts of him who spends His hours in quiet thought. And happier he who can repress desire, Than they who seldom mourn a thwarted wish; The vassals they of fate-- The unbending conqueror he, And thou, blest Muse, though rudely strung thy lyre, Its tones can guile the dark and lonesome day-- Can smooth the wrinkled brow, And dry the sorrowing tear. Thine many a bliss--oh, many a solace thine! By thee up-held, the soul asserts her throne, The chastened passions sleep, And dove-eyed Peace prevails. And thou, fair Hope! when other comforts fail-- When night's thick mists descend--thy beacon flames, Till glow the dark clouds round With beams of promised bliss. Thou failest not, when, mute the soothing lyre, Lives thy unfading solace: sweet to raise Thy eye, O quiet Hope, And greet a friend in heaven!-- A friend, a brother, one whose awful throne In holy fear heaven's mightiest sons approach: Man's heart to feel for man-- To save him God's great power! Conqueror of death, joy of the accepted soul, Oh, wonders raise no doubt when told of thee! Thy way past finding out,