"Fair rounds of radiant points invest his hair; Celestial odours breathe through purpled air; And wings, whose colours glitter'd on the day, Wide at his back, their gradual plumes display. The form ethereal bursts upon his sight, And moves in all the majesty of light." A passage of similar brilliance occurs in "Piety, or the Vision"-- "A sudden splendour seem'd to kindle day; A breeze came breathing in; a sweet perfume, _Blown from eternal gardens_, fill'd the room, And in a void of blue, that clouds invest, Appear'd a daughter of the realms of rest." Such passages themselves are enough to prove Parnell a true poet. * * * * * PARNELL'S POEMS. HESIOD; OR, THE RISE OF WOMAN. What ancient times, those times we fancy wise, Have left on long record of woman's rise, What morals teach it, and what fables hide, What author wrote it, how that author died,-- All these I sing. In Greece they framed the tale; (In Greece, 'twas thought a woman might be frail); Ye modern beauties! where the poet drew His softest pencil, think he dreamt of you; And warn'd by him, ye wanton pens, beware How Heaven's concern'd to vindicate the fair. 10 The case was Hesiod's; he the fable writ-- Some think with meaning--some, with idle wit: Perhaps 'tis either, as the ladies please; I waive the contest, and commence the lays. In days of yore, no matter where or when, 'Twas ere the low creation swarm'd with men, That one Prometheus, sprung of heavenly birth (Our author's song can witness), lived on earth. He carved the turf to mould a manly frame, And stole from Jove his animating flame. 20 The sly contrivance o'er Olympus ran, When thus the Monarch of the Stars began: 'Oh versed in arts! whose daring thoughts aspire To kindle clay with never-dying fire! Enjoy thy glory past, that gift was thine; The next thy creature meets, be fairly mine: And such a gift, a vengeance so design'd, As suits the counsel of a God to find; A pleasing bosom cheat, a specious ill, Which, felt, they curse, yet covet still to feel.' 30 He said, and Vulcan straight the sire commands To temper mortar with ethereal hands; In such a shape to mould a rising fair, As virgin-goddesses are proud to wear; To make her eyes with diamond-water shine, And form her organs for a voice divine. 'Twas thus the sire ordain'd; the power obey'd; And work'd, and wonder'd at the work he made; The fairest, softest, sweetest frame beneath, Now made to seem, now more than seem, to breathe. 40