Dear Native Grove! where'er my devious track, To thee will Memory lead the wanderer back. Whether in Arno's polish'd vales I stray, Or where "Oswego's" swamps obstruct the day; Or wander lone, where, wildering and wide, The tumbling torrent laves St. Gothard's side; Or by old Tejo's classic margent muse, Or stand entranced with Pyrenean views; Still, still to thee, where'er my footsteps roam, My heart shall point, and lead the wanderer home. When Splendour offers, and when Fame incites, I'll pause, and think of all thy dear delights, Reject the boon, and, wearied with the change, Renounce the wish which first induced to range; Turn to these scenes, these well known scenes once more, Trace once again old Trent's romantic shore, And tired with worlds, and all their busy ways, Here waste the little remnant of my days. But if the Fates should this last wish deny, And doom me on some foreign shore to die; Oh! should it please the world's supernal King, That weltering waves my funeral dirge shall sing; Or that my corse should, on some desert strand, Lie stretch'd beneath the Simoom's blasting hand; Still, though unwept I find a stranger tomb, My sprite shall wander through this favourite gloom, Ride on the wind that sweeps the leafless grove, Sigh on the wood-blast of the dark alcove, Sit a lorn spectre on yon well known grave, And mix its moanings with the desert wave. Footnotes: [1] The constellation Delphinus. For authority for this appelation, see Ovid's Fasti, B. xi. 113. [2] This part of the Trent is commonly called "The Clifton Deeps." [3] Germain is the traditionary name of her husband. TIME, A POEM.[1] Genius of musings, who, the midnight hour Wasting in woods or haunted forests wild, Dost watch Orion in his arctic tower, Thy dark eye fix'd as in some holy trance; Or when the vollied lightnings cleave the air, And Ruin gaunt bestrides the winged storm, Sitt'st in some lonely watchtower, where thy lamp, Faint blazing, strikes the fisher's eye from far, And, 'mid the howl of elements, unmoved, Dost ponder on the awful scene, and trace The vast effect to its superior source,-- Spirit, attend my lowly benison! For now I strike to themes of import high The solitary lyre; and, borne by thee Above this narrow cell, I celebrate The mysteries of Time! Him who, august, Was e'er these worlds were fashion'd,--ere the sun Sprang from the east, or Lucifer display'd His glowing cresset in the arch of morn, Or Vesper gilded the serener eve. Yea, He had been for an eternity! Had swept unvarying from eternity The harp of desolation--ere his tones, At God's command, assumed a milder strain, And startled on his watch, in the vast deep, Chaos's sluggish sentry, and evoked From the dark void the smiling universe.