But oh the crash!-the hideous shock !-the million

sparks around!

Her hindmost hoofs had struck the crest of that prodigious

mound!

Wild shriek'd the headlong Desert-Born-or else 'twas

demons' mirth,

One second more, and Man and Mare roll'd breathless on

How long it was I cannot tell ere I revived to sense,
And then but to endure the pangs of agony intense;
For over me lay powerless, and still as any stone,
The Corse that erst had so much fire, strength, spirit, of

its own.

My heart was still-my pulses stopp'd-midway 'twixt

life and death,

With pain unspeakable I fetch'd the fragment of a breath, Not vital air enough to frame one short and feeble sigh, Yet even that I loath'd because it would not let me die. Oh! slowly, slowly, slowly on, from starry night till morn, Time flapp'd along, with leaden wings, across that waste forlorn!

I cursed the hour that brought me first within this world

of strife

A sore and heavy sin it is to scorn the gift of life—

But who hath felt a horse's weight oppress his labouring breast?

Why any who has had, like me, the NIGHT MARE on his chest.

LOVE LANE.

IF I should love a maiden more,
And woo her ev'ry hope to crown,
I'd love her all the country o'er,

But not declare it out of town.

One even, by a mossy bank,
That held a hornet's nest within,

To Ellen on my knees I sank,

How snakes will twine around the shin!

A bashful fear my soul unnerv'd,
And gave my heart a backward tug ;
Nor was I cheer'd when she observ❜d,
Whilst I was silent,-" What a slug!

At length my offer I preferr'd,

And Hope a kind reply forebode—

Alas! the only sound I heard

Was, “What a horrid ugly toad!"

I vow'd to give her all

my heart,

To love her till my life took leave,
And painted all a lover's smart—
Except a wasp gone up his sleeve!

But when I ventur'd to abide

Her father's and her mother's grants—

Sudden, she started up, and cried,

66

"O dear! I am all over ants!"

Nay, when beginning to beseech
The cause that led to my rebuff,
The answer was as strange a speech,
A "Daddy-Longlegs sure enough!"

I spoke of fortune-house,-and lands,

And still renew'd the warm attack,—

'Tis vain to offer ladies hands

That have a spider on the back!

'Tis vain to talk of hopes and fears,
And hope the least reply to win,
From any maid that stops her ears
In dread of earwigs creeping in!

'Tis vain to call the dearest names Whilst stoats and weazels startle by— As vain to talk of mutual flames,

To one with glow-worms in her eye!

What check'd me in my fond address, And knock'd each pretty image down? What stopp'd my Ellen's faltering Yes? A caterpillar on her gown!