With these I may not urge my suit,
Of Summer's patient toil the fruit,
For mortal purpose given;

Nor may

it fit my sober mood

To sing of sweetly murmuring flood,
Or dyes of many-colour'd wood,
That mock the bow of heaven.

But know, 'twas mine the secret power,
That wak'd thee at the midnight hour,
In bleak November's reign;

'Twas I the spell around thee cast,
When thou didst hear the hollow blast

In murmurs tell of pleasures past,
That ne'er would come again :

And led thee, when the storm was o'er,
To hear the sullen ocean roar,

By dreadful calm opprest;

Which still, though not a breeze was there, Its mountain-billows heav'd in air,

As if a living thing it were,

That strove in vain for rest.

"Twas I, when thou, subdu'd by woe, Didst watch the leaves descending slow, To each a moral gave;

And as they mov'd in mournful train,
With rustling sound, along the plain,
Taught them to sing a seraph's strain
Of peace within the grave.

And then, uprais'd thy streaming eye,
I met thee in the western sky

༢

In pomp of evening cloud;

That, while with varying form it roll'd,
Some wizard's castle seem'd of gold,
And now a crimson'd knight of old,
Or king in purple proud.

And last, as sunk the setting sun,
And Evening with her shadows dun,
The gorgeous pageant past,
"Twas then of life a mimic show,
Of human grandeur here below,
Which thus beneath the fatal blow
Of Death must fall at last.

Oh, then with what aspiring gaze
Didst thou thy tranced vision raise
To yonder orbs on high,

And think how wondrous, how sublime
"Twere upwards to their spheres to climb,
And live, beyond the reach of Time,

Child of Eternity!

THE PAINT KING.

[From Allston's Poems.]

FAIR Ellen was long the delight of the young,

No damsel could with her compare;

Her charms were the theme of the heart and the tongue, And bards without number in extasies sung,

The beauties of Ellen the fair.

Yet cold was the maid; and though legions advanc'd
All drill'd by Ovidean art,

And languish'd and ogled, protested and danced,
Like shadows they came, and like shadows they glanced
From the hard polish'd ice of her heart.

Yet still did the heart of fair Ellen implore
A something that could not be found;

Like a sailor she seem'd on a desolate shore,

With nor house, nor a tree, nor a sound but the roar

Of breakers high dashing around.

From object to object still, still would she veer,
Though nothing, alas, could she find;

Like the moon, without atmosphere, brilliant and clear,
Yet doom'd, like the moon, with no being to cheer
The bright barren waste of her mind.

But rather than sit like a statue so stiller.

When the rain made her mansion a pound,"

Up and down would she go, like the sails of a mill,
And pat every stair, like a woodpecker's bill,
From the tiles of the roof to the ground.

One morn, as the maid from her casement inclin'd,
Pass'd a youth, with a frame in his hand;
The casement she clos'd-not the eye of her mind ;
For, do all she could, nó, she could not be blind;
Still before her she saw the youth stand.

"Ah, what can he do," said the languishing maid, Ah, what with that frame can he do?"

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And she knelt to the Goddess of Secrets, and pray'd, When the youth pass'd again, and again he display'd The frame and a picture to view.

"Oh, beautiful picture!" the fair Ellen cried,
"I must see thee again or I die.”

Then under her white chin her bonnet she tied,
And after the youth and the picture she hied,
When the youth, looking back, met her eye.

"Fair damsel," said he, (and he chuckled the while) "This picture I see you admire;

"Then take it, 1 pray you, perhaps 'twill beguile "Some moments of sorrow; (nay, pardon my smile) "Or, at least, keep you home by the fire."

Then Ellen the gift with delight and surprize

From the cunning young stripling receiv'd; But she knew not the poison that enter'd her eyes, When sparkling with rapture they gaz'd on her prize— Thus, alas, are fair maidens deceiv'd!

'Twas a youth o'er the form of a statue inclin'd,
And the sculptor he seem'd of the stone;
Yet he languish'd as tho' for its beauty he pin'd
And gaz'd as the eyes of the statue so blind
Reflected the beams of his own.

"Twas the tale of the sculptor Pygmalion of old; Fair Ellen remember'd, and sigh'd;

"Ah, could'st thou but lift from that marble so cold, "Thine eyes too imploring, thy arms should enfold, "And press me this day as thy bride."

She said: when, behold, from the canvas arose
The youth, and he stepp'd from the frame;
With a furious transport his arms did enclose
The love-plighted Ellen; and, clasping, he froze
The blood of the maid with his flame!

She turn'd and beheld on each shoulder a wing;

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Oh, heaven! cried she, who art thou?"

From the roof to the ground did his fierce answer ring, As frowning, he thunder'd "I am the PAINT-KING! "And mine, lovely maid, thou art now!"