A light gleam’d as I pass’d the stair. A pausing foot, a flash of dress, And a sweet voice. ‘Is Felix there?’ ‘July, Love!’ ‘Says Papa so?’ ‘Yes!’ CANTO III. The Country Ball. PRELUDES. I. _Love Ceremonious_. KEEP your undrest, familiar style For strangers, but respect your friend, Her most, whose matrimonial smile Is and asks honour without end. ’Tis found, and needs it must so be, That life from love’s allegiance flags, When love forgets his majesty In sloth’s unceremonious rags. Let love make home a gracious Court; There let the world’s rude, hasty ways Be fashion’d to a loftier port, And learn to bow and stand at gaze; And let the sweet respective sphere Of personal worship there obtain Circumference for moving clear, None treading on another’s train. This makes that pleasures do not cloy, And dignifies our mortal strife With calmness and considerate joy, Befitting our immortal life. II. _The Rainbow_. A stately rainbow came and stood, When I was young, in High-Hurst Park; Its bright feet lit the hill and wood Beyond, and cloud and sward were dark; And I, who thought the splendour ours Because the place was, t’wards it flew, And there, amidst the glittering showers, Gazed vainly for the glorious view. With whatsoever’s lovely, know It is not ours; stand off to see, Or beauty’s apparition so Puts on invisibility. III. _A Paradox_. To tryst Love blindfold goes, for fear He should not see, and eyeless night He chooses still for breathing near Beauty, that lives but in the sight. THE COUNTY BALL. 1 Well, Heaven be thank’d my first-love fail’d, As, Heaven be thank’d, our first-loves do! Thought I, when Fanny past me sail’d, Loved once, for what I never knew, Unless for colouring in her talk, When cheeks and merry mouth would show Three roses on a single stalk, The middle wanting room to blow, And forward ways, that charm’d the boy Whose love-sick mind, misreading fate, Scarce hoped that any Queen of Joy Could ever stoop to be his mate. 2