Oh, what is Beauty's power? It flourishes and dies; Will the cold earth its silence break, To tell how soft, how smooth a cheek Beneath its surface lies? Mute, mute is all O'er Beauty's fall; Her praise resounds no more when mantled in her pall. The most beloved on earth Not long survives to-day; So music past is obsolete, And yet 'twas sweet, 'twas passing sweet, But now 'tis gone away. Thus does the shade In memory fade, When in forsaken tomb the form beloved is laid. Then since this world is vain, And volatile, and fleet, Why should I lay up earthly joys, Where rust corrupts, and moth destroys, And cares and sorrows eat? Why fly from ill With anxious skill, When soon this hand will freeze, this throbbing heart be still. Come, Disappointment, come! Thou art not stern to me; Sad Monitress! I own thy sway, A votary sad in early day, I bend my knee to thee. From sun to sun My race will run, I only bow, and say, My God, thy will be done! On another paper are a few lines, written probably in the freshness of his disappointment. I dream no more--the vision flies away, And Disappointment.... There fell my hopes--I lost my all in this, My cherish'd all of visionary bliss. Now hope farewell, farewell all joys below; Now welcome sorrow, and now welcome woe. Plunge me in glooms.... ON THE DEATH OF DERMODY THE POET. Child of Misfortune! Offspring of the Muse! Mark like the meteor's gleam his mad career; With hollow cheeks and haggard eye, Behold he shrieking passes by: I see, I see him near: That hollow scream, that deepening groan; It rings upon mine ear. Oh come, ye thoughtless, ye deluded youth, Who clasp the syren pleasure to your breast, Behold the wreck of genius here, And drop, oh drop the silent tear For Dermody at rest: His fate is yours, then from your loins Tear quick the silken vest. Saw'st thou his dying bed! Saw'st thou his eye, Once flashing fire, despair's dim tear distil; How ghastly did it seem; And then his dying scream: Oh God! I hear it still: It sounds upon my fainting sense, It strikes with deathly chill. Say, didst thou mark the brilliant poet's death; Saw'st thou an anxious father by his bed, Or pitying friends around him stand: Or didst thou see a mother's hand Support his languid head: Oh none of these--no friend o'er him The balm of pity shed. Now come around, ye flippant sons of wealth, Sarcastic smile on genius fallen low; Now come around who pant for fame, And learn from hence, a poet's name Is purchased but by woe: And when ambition prompts to rise, Oh think of him below.