The coffee-room is open-- I mingle in its crowd,-- The dominos are noisy-- The hookahs raise a cloud; The flavor, none of Fearon's, That mingles with my dram, Reminds me you're in England, And I'm at Rotterdam. VII. Then here it goes, a bumper-- The toast it shall be mine, In schiedam, or in sherry, Tokay, or hock of Rhine; It well deserves the brightest, Where sunbeam ever swam-- "The Girl I love in England" I drink at Rotterdam! LINES ON SEEING MY WIFE AND TWO CHILDREN SLEEPING IN THE SAME CHAMBER.[14] [Footnote 14: Written at Coblenz, where Hood and his family were then settled, in November 1835.] And has the earth lost its so spacious round, The sky its blue circumference above, That in this little chamber there is found Both earth and heaven--my universe of love! All that my God can give me, or remove, Here sleeping, save myself, in mimic death. Sweet that in this small compass I behove To live their living and to breathe their breath! Almost I wish that, with one common sigh, We might resign all mundane care and strife, And seek together that transcendent sky, Where Father, Mother, Children, Husband, Wife, Together pant in everlasting life! STANZAS.[15] [Footnote 15: Assigned by Hood's son to the year 1835, but apparently only on conjecture.] Is there a bitter pang for love removed, O God! The dead love doth not cost more tears Than the alive, the loving, the beloved-- Not yet, not yet beyond all hopes and fears! Would I were laid Under the shade Of the calm grave, and the long grass of years,-- That love might die with sorrow:--I am sorrow; And she, that loves me tenderest, doth press Most poison from my cruel lips, and borrow Only new anguish from the old caress; Oh, this world's grief Hath no relief In being wrung from a great happiness. Would I had never filled thine eyes with love, For love is only tears: would I had never Breathed such a curse-like blessing as we prove; Now, if "Farewell" _could_ bless thee, I would sever! Would I were laid Under the shade Of the cold tomb, and the long grass forever! ODE TO RAE WILSON, ESQ. TO THE EDITOR OF THE _ATHENAEUM_. MY DEAR SIR--The following Ode was written anticipating the tone of some strictures on my writings by the gentleman to whom it is addressed. I have not seen his book; but I know by hearsay that some of my verses are characterized as "profaneness and ribaldry"--citing, in proof, the description of a certain sow, from whose jaw a cabbage sprout "Protruded, as the dove so staunch For peace supports an olive branch."