Last, Man arose, erect in youthful grace.
Heaven's hallow'd image stamp'd upon his face ;
And as he rose, the high behest was giv'n,

'That I alone of all the host of heav'n, Should reign Protectress of the godlike youth :' Thus the Almighty spake: he spake and call'd me Truth.”

THE POOR MAN'S PLAINT.

BUT now domestic cares employ

And busy every sense,

Nor leave one hour of grief or joy
But's furnish'd out from thence :

Save what my little babes afford,
Whom I behold with glee,
When smiling at my humble board,
Or prattling at my knee.

Nor that my Daphne's charms are flown,
These still new pleasures bring,

'Tis these inspire content alone;

"Tis all I've left of Spring.

MASON.

I wish not, dear connubial state,
To break thy silken bands;
I only blame relentless fate,

That every hour demands.

Nor mourn I much my task austere,
Which endless wants impose;
But oh! it wounds my soul to hear
My Daphne's melting woes!

For oft she sighs and oft she weeps,
And hangs her pensive head,
While blood her furrowed finger steeps,
And stains the passing thread.

When orient hills the sun behold,

Our labours are begun;

And when he streaks the west with gold,
The task is still undone.

WOODHOUSE.

THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB.

THE Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold: And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green,
That host with their banners at sunset were seen :
Like the leaves of the forest when autumn has blown,
That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.

For the angel of death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he pass'd;
And the eyes of the sleepers wax'd deadly and chill,
And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still.

And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,
But through it there roll'd not the breath of his pride :
And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,
And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.

And there lay the rider distorted and pale,

With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail;
And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,
The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.

And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,
And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;
And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

LORD BYRON.

ODE TO EVENING.

If aught of oaten stop, or pastoral song,
May hope, O pensive Eve, to soothe thine ear,
Like thy own brawling springs,

Thy springs, and dying gales;

O nymph reserv'd, while now the bright-hair'd sun,
Sits in yon western tent, whose cloudy skirts,
With brede etherial wove,

O'erhang his wavy bed:

Now air is hushed, save where the weak-ey'd bat,
With short shrill shriek flits by on leathern wing,
Or where the beetle winds

His small but sullen horn,

As oft he rises 'midst the twilight path,
Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum:

Now teach me, maid compos'd,

To breathe some soften'd strain,

Whose numbers, stealing through thy darkening vale, May not unseemly with its stillness suit;

As musing slow, I hail
Thy genial lov'd return!

For when thy holding-star arising shows
His paly circlet, at his warning lamp
The fragrant Hours, and Elves
Who slept in buds the day,

And many a Nymph who wreath'd her brows with sedge,'
And sheds with fresh'ning dew, and, lovelier still,
The pensive Pleasures sweet,
Prepare thy shadowy car.

Then let me rove some wild and heathy scene;
Or find some ruin, 'midst its dreary dells,
Whose walls more awful nod

By thy religious gleams.

Or, if chill blustering winds, or driving rain,
Prevent my willing feet, be mine the hut,
That from the mountain's side,

Views wilds, and swelling floods,

And hamlets brown, and dim-discover'd spires;
And hears their simple bell; and marks o'er all
Thy dewy fingers draw

The gradual dusky veil.

While Spring shall pour his showers, as oft he wont,
And bathe thy breathing tresses, meekest Eve!
While Summer loves to sport
Beneath thy ling'ring light;