Upon his curled head behind
It seems in careless play to lie,*
Yet presses gently, half inclin'd

To bring his lip of nectar nigh!

O happy maid! too happy boy!
The one so fond and faintly loath,
The other yielding slow to joy—

Oh, rare indeed, but blissful both!

Imagine, love, that I am he,

And just as warm as he is chilling; Imagine too that thou art she,

But quite as cold as she is willing:

So may we try the graceful way

In which their gentle arms are twin'd,

And thus, like her, my hand I lay
Upon thy wreathed hair behind;

And thus I feel thee breathing sweet,
As slow to mine thy head I move;

And thus our lips together meet,

And thus I kiss thee-O my love!

* Somewhat like the fine symplegma of Cupid and Psyche at Florence, in which the position of Psyche's hand is most beautifully affectionate. See the Museum Florentinum, Tom. ii, Tab. 43, 44. I know of very few subjects in which poetry could be more interestingly employed, than in illustrating some of the ancient statues and gems.

..........λιβανοτω είκασεν, ότι απολλυμενον ευφραίνει.

ARISTOT. Rhetor. Lib. iii, Cap. 4.

THERE's not a look, a word of thine

My soul hath e'er forgot;

Thou ne'er hast bid a ringlet shine,
Nor given thy locks one graceful twine,
Which I remember not!

There never yet a murmur fell
From that beguiling tongue,
Which did not, with a lingering spell,
Upon my charmed senses dwell,

Like something heaven had sung!

Ah! that I could, at once, forget
All, all that haunts me so-

And yet, thou witching girl!-and yet,
To die were sweeter, than to let

The lov'd remembrance go!

No; if this slighted heart must see Its faithful pulse decay,

Oh! let it die, remembering thee,

And, like the burnt aroma, be
Consum'd in sweets away!

EPISTLE V.

ΤΟ

JOSEPH ATKINSON, ESQ.

From Bermuda.

March.

THE day-light is gone—but, before we depart,
Here's a brimmer of love to the friend of my heart,
To the friend who himself is a chalice, a bowl
In which heaven hath pour'd a rich bumper of soul!

'Twas thus, by the shade of a calabash-tree, With a few, who could feel and remember like me, The charm, that to sweeten my goblet I threw, Was a sigh to the past, and a blessing on you!

Oh! say, do you thus, in the luminous hour Of wine and of wit, when the heart is in flower, And shoots from the lip, under Bacchus's dew, In blossoms of thought ever springing and new!

P

Do you sometimes remember, and hallow the brim
Of your cup with a sigh, as you crown it to him,
Who is lonely and sad in these valleys so fair,
And would pine in elysium, if friends were not there!

Last night, when we came from the calabash-tree, When my limbs were at rest and my spirit was free, The glow of the grape and the dreams of the day Put the magical springs of my fancy in play, And oh!

-such a vision as haunted me then

I could slumber for ages to witness again!
The many I like, and the few I adore,

The friends, who were dear and beloved before,
But never till now so beloved and dear,

At the call of my fancy surrounded me here!
Soon, soon did the flattering spell of their smile
To a paradise brighten the blest little isle;*

* It is often asserted by the transatlantic politicians that this little colony (Bermuda) deserves more attention from the mother country than it receives, and it certainly possesses advantages of situation, to which we should not be long insensible, if it were once in the hands of an enemy. I was told by a celebrated friend of Washington, at New-York, that they had formed a plan for its capture towards the conclusion of the American War; "with the intention (as he expressed himself) of making it a nest of hornets for the annoyance of British trade in that part of the world." And there is no doubt it lies so fairly in the track to the West-Indies that an enemy might with ease convert it into a a very harassing impediment.