Pressed me to earth again. Sense fled her home; I saw not, felt not more!

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Long time, methought, In that deep trance I lay; a voice dispelled Its power, a voice melodious, though stern, Commanding, yet most sweet,- -no echo dared Mock its majestic tones, no ripple stirred The unopposing air; Slumber in haste Unbound her chains, and fled in fear away At its dread summons. Wake, arise, behold, Why sleepest thou? I sprung upon my feetThe earth was firm beneath me-life once more Throbbed at my heart-I saw, felt, breathed again! But what a change! An age had rolled away During that mystic sleep-the snows of time Trembled around my brow-its breath had dried The dews of youth-no longer jocund Health Sat on her rosy throne-deep furrows wound Their paly course o'er her deserted home, And the dim eye, robbed of its early fires, Flashed with uncertain lustre. Once I strove, Forgetful of the change, to stand erect

As I had stood in days when Hope was young;
But tottered 'neath the weight of many years;
And stooped to bear my burden! And that Hall!
It was the same, I knew it e'en amid

Most fearful desolation! Yes, the same
Whose glories but as yesterday had thrilled

My soul with keenest rapture. Ah! how changed!
The melody of life was still. I gazed

Fearfully round-the golden fretted roof,
Once rich with pendant crystals' perfumed light,
Now torn by many a wound, displayed the glare
Of palest moonbeams, laving haggard walls
To which rank ivy clung; no music now,
Or tremulously sweet, or swelling loud
Into triumphant peals, swept o'er the heart,
Dimming the eye with tears, or breathing soul
Into love's gaze, or waking passion's flame.
Upon her icy throne, sole ruler there,
Eternal Silence sat with marble frown,
Unmoved save by the throbbing of life's pulse
Within my feeble frame, and the thick dews
Stealthily dropping from the mouldering walls,
Amid the clammy leaves; no odours sweet
Lingered upon the air, the steam of death
As from an open vault hung o'er the scene-
Sickening the sense; no beauty smiled soft smiles,
No stately heroes strode exulting by

The petty Gods o'the hour. 'Mid the wreck
I marked a broken sword, edgeless with rust,

A casque half eaten by the slimy worm,
And crawling things that revelled gaily there;
A crown of laurel blasted by the kiss
Of yellow-lipped Corruption, at a touch
It crumbled into dust; all, all was cold,
And desolate, and still! I could not gaze
Longer upon the ruin. Thought recalled
With touching truth each glory of the past—

Then pointing to the present, burst at once
The fountains of the heart. I hid my

And wept aloud!

face

Again that wondrous voice

Rolled o'er the surges of my clamorous grief

And hushed the storm within. "Why dost thou weep?
Seek'st thou the ancient glory? Have thy wish:
Youth shall return to thee, and giant strength
Dwell in thy frame; again the eager fire

Of life's young hours shall kindle in thine eye,
Thy step again be firm. Go! grasp the sword!
Lead on mad crowds to triumph; beauty's smile
Shall be thy guerdon-noblest minstrelsy

Shall swell thy fame; nations shal. hail thee 'Great :'
Go forth! enthusiast of by-gone days,

When might was right, and power absolved from sin;
Go forth! and win the laurel; but behold!

This is the end,-oblivion and the worm.
Thy glory dies at eventide, and knows
No resurrection in a brighter world,

Where mourners' tears are dried, and dearest friends
Drink of the fountain of Eternal love

And never part again. Oh! shame! those tears
Disgrace thy better nature. Would'st thou win
The honour that decays not? Then no more
Haunt with sad step the ruins of the Past,
"Till fancy peoples it with beauteous forms,
And thrilling melodies it never knew
Wake to the fairer light of wiser times.
Sigh not for other days, redeem thine own,
And in thy brother's welfare seek thy fame!
The world may not applaud thee;-some will scorn,
Many misunderstand thee. Fear them not:
Conscience shall cheer thee, and the smile of God
Make glad thy path. Thy triumphs few may know,
But they shall live when time shall be no more,'
And war and falsehood perish in the light
Of everlasting righteousness and peace."

The joyous sun broke gently through the mist
Of early morn, waking sweet melodies

From happy birds, while the young summer flowers
Rich incense sent to heaven-the holy breeze
Stole through the casement lightly o'er my brow.
Startled, I woke: It was my own dear room!
The hall of glory,-its excited crowds,
Its ruins, and its silence, were no more:
Age cramped not yet my limbs, it was my home,
My much-loved home, wherein I stood; my books
Were there, my flowers, the smiles of those I loved-
Sweet faces and kind hearts! I thanked my God
That all was "but a dream." Yet still that voice
Made echo in my soul-I vowed to live
For usefulness-not glory; never more
To let a fond imagination veil

The face of truth, to duil in Fancy's world
Forgetful of the duties of the real;

I woke a wiser and a better man!

DELTA.

27

MR. VINCENT SLICKEY'S FIGHT AGAINST FATE.

MR. VINCENT SLICKEY was the son and heir of Mr. Philip Slickey, who was the son and heir of Mr. Peter Slickey. Both Mr. Peter Slickey and Mr. Philip Slickey were, in their time, tradesmen, and were never ashamed of their occupation; but Mr. Vincent Slickey had—or fancied he had a soul above grocery, and could not, by any means in the world, bring himself to the belief that he was pursuing his proper calling, or shining in his appropriate sphere, while supplying the householders of the neighbourhood of Bury-street, St. Mary Axe, with tea, coffee, sugar, and-at Christmas-time-plums.

At the period of which we are speaking, which is not many years ago, Mr. Vincent Slickey was assistant, or, to speak more properly, shopman to his father, the aforesaid Mr. Philip Slickey; and it was on one fine afternoon in May that Mr. Vincent Slickey was sitting in the little room, called by courtesy the parlour, which opened into the shop. He was reflecting; and his reflections ran upon his gloomy and uncongenial destiny. He had been reflecting for some time, and just as he had arrived at the conclusion-to which conclusion, by the bye, he had arrived some hundreds of times before-that he had strong grounds for an action for damages against Fate, for that the said Fate had maliciously interfered with his prospects and happiness-to wit, in that she had made him a grocer instead of a great man, just as he had come to this conclusion, a little girl walked into the shop, and after waiting patiently for a minute or two, while Vincent was deciding in his mind whether he ought to condescend to notice her, rapped the counter with a penny.

"There you are again," said Vincent, as he heard the summons, "There you are. Now isn't it a degrading thing that I should "have to wait upon a little, ragged, dirty child like that, for the sake "of the vile trash called money, when I have the proud consciousness within me that I was born for ever such great things? Isn't "it a degrading thing that I should be nailed down, as it were-like "a bad sixpence to a counter, when I ought to be soaring in the "atmosphere of Fame? Isn't it a degrading thing?"

There can be no doubt in the world that whatever this last thing was-it was a very degrading thing indeed,—but just at that moment the little girl rapped the counter again, and prevented Mr. Vincent Slickey from finishing his reflection; so being disturbed, Mr. Slickey condescended to walk, or rather to stalk, into the shop, and said in a grave tone,—

"What do you want, little girl?"

"An ounce of four-and-eightpenny black," was the reply.

The ounce of four-and-eightpenny black was abstractedly weighed from the cannister by Mr. Slickey, and he was beginning to reflect again, when the little girl inquired how much it came to.

"Three-pence halfpenny," said Mr. Vincent." Is there anything else ?"

"A quarter of a pound of sevenpenny moist," replied the girl. This being an article and a quantity very frequently in demand, Mr.

Slickey had only to turn round and get it from a shelf, where quarters of pounds of sevenpenny moist were always to be found ready weighed and packed up. After it was produced, the little girl said, "How much is it altogether?"

"Five-pence farthing," replied Mr. Slickey.

The five-pence farthing was paid, and the little girl departed.

"There's an occupation for you!" said Mr. Slickey, as he retired from the shop to the parlour again. (He always spoke as though he were addressing somebody.) "There's an occupation for you!" "Now just let me ask you this:-Is it an occupation fit for anything "above the grade of a jackass, to spend one's time in weighing out "ounces of four-and-eightpenny black, and quarters of sevenpenny "moist?" "Bah! I tell you I'm sick of it. I know I was meant to be "a great man, and why ai'nt I?-that's what I wish to be informed." The solution of this question appeared to be about as difficult as the passage of the Pons Asinorum; for though Mr. Vincent Slickey presented it to his mind in every possible shape, form, and aspect that his fancy could suggest, he could bring himself to no determination upon the matter, save and except his previous opinion that Fate had, from some cause or another unknown to him, conceived an antipathy against him, and was endeavouring to thwart him as far as possible. "Be it so then," said Mr. Slickey at last, with very great emphasis, "Be it so! Do what you will, I'll be a great man in spite of you!" So in his determination to be a great man Mr. Vincent Slickey sat himself down, and gazed out at window. It was a May afternoon; there was a tree opposite, and on the tree the sun was shining. There was nothing very remarkable in this; such scenes are frequent. But there are states of mind in which it takes but very little to affect us very powerfully-just as it happens that there are states of the stomach in which we are thoroughly intoxicated by that which, under ordinary circumstances, would not in the least overcome us. Mr. Slickey was in this excited condition, and therefore it was that the May afternoon and the sunshiny tree not only affected him powerfully, but actually caused him to resolve what track of greatness he should follow; and this was the process and order of Mr. Slickey's resolution: the sunshine suggested a poetic state of feeling; the poetic feeling gradually resolved itself into a survey of the state of poetry in the present day; and the survey of the state of poetry in the present day subsided by degrees into a perception on the part of Mr. Slickey of the fact, that true poetry was at an exceedingly low ebb. Out of this notion there gradually arose in Mr. Slickey's mind the belief that he, Mr. Vincent Slickey, the persecuted of Fate, was reserved-specially reserved-for the glorious task of bringing about a state of high-water again and he thus argued the point with himself:

"Look at Byron! he was a fine fellow certainly. Yes, yes, I'll "allow that: but he is so confoundedly unintelligible-at least I "can't understand him. Then there's Wordsworth: he's a good poet, mind you, but Lord bless me, he's a terrible twaddler some"times! Tom Moore too: good, certainly-but so indelicate! Quite shocking! ai'nt it? Now, isn't it possible, think you, to be as "powerful as Byron and more comprehensible; as clear as Wordsworth, and not so simple; as loving as Moore, and not quite so

"licentious? 'Gad! I think it is! and I'll tell you what-blow me "tight, if I don't try."

So how Mr. Slickey tried-what he produced, and what success he met with, it will be the business of the next chapter to relate.

CHAPTER II.

SHOWETH HOW MR. VINCENT SLICKEY HAD HIS FIRST ROUND WITH FATE, AND HOW FATE GOT DECIDEDLY THE BEST OF IT.

ON the morning which followed the afternoon spoken of in the previous chapter, Mr. Vincent Slickey got up. The time of his rising was half-past five o'clock; and the young genius, having taken a crust of bread, for the purpose of what he called staying his stomach, sallied forth in search of the poetic; for he had determined to commence his career as a poet that morning.

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There were then, as now, no fields nor rural scenes to speak of in the neighbourhood of St. Mary Axe, and so Mr. Vincent Slickey walked down Whitechapel to gather his poetical materials. But though he walked all the way to Mile-end Gate, and then round by the Commercial Road, home, he could not find a single fount of inspiration. There was Aldgate Pump, but he could get nothing out of that. There were the shops of the Hebrew butchers in Highstreet, but they were not open. There was Whitechapel Church; "Ah!" said Vincent, "the incumbent ought to be the poet of that; it will yield nothing to me." There was the workhouse, should he write about that? Paupers-Poor Laws-water soup. Bah! That would'nt do at any price. "I'm quite sure," said the young man, "there's very litte poetry in poverty." There was the turnpike. "For every ass or other beast,'" read Vincent as he passed through, a sum not exceeding two-pence.' The theme is not dignified enough." There was the " George" in the Commercial Road. "Let me see,' said Mr. Slickey, "this I think will do! I might write a poem on the Select Concert' given every Monday evening; and now I think of it, a very good subject it would make, that I'm sure you can't deny. I might make five books of it; Spenserian stanza-or perhaps the Don Juan' would be better. Book the First might be descriptive of the place itself. I might enlarge upon the dimensions of the room: I think it's 40 by 25, and 18 high; on the gilt mouldings-the raised platform for the orchestra-the chairs-the benches-the spittoonsthe organ (cost 200 guineas)—the cornices, et cetera, et cetera-and conclude with a powerful description of the chandelier and mirrors. Book the Second might comprise the landlord (Paul Bottledale), waiters, professional singers, and musicians. Book the Third, the terms of admission, time of commencement, and hour of conclusion, with an account of the various refreshments and entertainments. Book the Fourth might be devoted to the audience-their good humour, and noisiness; and here might be introduced some witty remarks relative to the courting, treating, rows, and so on, which occur during the evening. Book the last would of course give a kind of account, or history, or representation, of an evening's entertainment. I might there give a description of the turning out of the audience