The lay of an Irish harp :: :: University of Virginia Library

Nor scare my cheery dream away?
And did a smile so lightly play
O'er those lips, in slumbers clos'd,
When every thrilling sense repos'd?
Yes! 'twas a cheery dream that stole
Its vision o'er my sleepless soul.

Methought that wand'ring wild with thee
(As oft in childhood's careless glee
We fondly stray'd, to danger blind,
Our arms, our hearts, as closely twin'd),

Methought we reach'd an hallow'd grove,
It seem'd the sacred haunt of Love,
Where, pointing to the orient day,
An odour-breathing structure lay;
On rosy shafts was rear'd the bower,
And many a sweet though transient flower,
And many a bud and wreathy band,
Twin'd by Nature's tasteful hand,
In rich luxuriance closely wed,
Form'd a sweetly simple shed,
To canopy the thoughtless brow
Of youth, in life's first ardent glow;
And as methought we loitering stray'd,
Delighted in th' Elysian shade,
We saw approach th' enchantress Youth,
Led by Simplicity and Truth,

With bounding step, and careless air,
Laughing eye, and flowing hair;
Blest and blessing beyond measure,
Grasping every transient pleasure;
Pleas'd with life as with a toy,
Pursuing still the urchin joy;
At cold Caution's precept smiling,
Time of every care beguiling,
Till with all her jocund train
She reach'd her own delicious fane,
And around the hallow'd bower
The Virtues throng'd to own her power,
And Innocence, and Peace serene,
And Confidence with candid mien,
And infant loves, and harmless wiles,
And frolic sports, and rosy smiles,

And young delights, and laughing pleasures,
Offer'd there their tribute treasures;
And Health, by ruddy Temp'rance led,
Around her dearest blessings shed;
Whilst Youth, on Hope's fair breast reclin'd,
Her arm round Expectation twin'd,
Blushing view'd the Graces bland
Lead chasten'd Passion by the hand;
And Genius swept his lyre to prove
The soul of life was Youth and Love.

Oh thou! whose blessings still are mine,
Delightful Youth! thy powers divine
Protract to life's maturer day,
And all thy “ling'ring blooms delay.”
And when I pass thy golden hour,
And watch thy last declining flow'r

Fade o'er my brow, thy soul-sent blush
Change to a sickly hectic flush,
And each warm life-illumin'd ray
In my dimming eye decay;
When all thy transient spells are flown
(Which now, alas! are all my own),
When all thy sorceries expire,
Yet still, oh! still with fond desire
Back may each with'ring spirit flee
To live in memory with thee,
To catch thy fire's reflected beams,
And feel thy joys again in dreams.

Rousseau, in that affecting and delicate manner which is all his own, exquisitely describes the delicious feelings that accompany those moments vibrating between waking consciousness and the senseless torpidity of sleep—moments, of which Locke treated as a logician and a philosopher, and which Martial delineated as a voluptuary and a poet.

“Thus lifeless yet with life how sweet to lie!
Thus without dying oh how sweet to die!”
(Translated by Peter Pindar, Esq.)

Of the tye which binds me to this dearest object of my heart's best affections, I may say with Tasso,

“------Conforme ear létate;
Ma il pensier; piu conforme.”

It is perhaps scarcely justifiable to force a detail of private feeling on public attention, but Nature will sometimes get the start of Authorship, and she who writes from the HEART, may insensibly forget she is writing for the WORLD.