* * * * *
And Memory, too, with her dreams shall come,
Dreams of a former, happier day,
When heaven was still the spirit's home,
And her wings had not yet fallen away.
Glimpses of glory ne'er forgot,
That tell, like gleams on a sunset sea,
What once hath been, what now is not.
But oh! what again shall brightly be!"
SONG OF THE NUBIAN GIRL.
O Abyssinian tree,
We pray, we pray to thee;
By the glow of thy golden fruit
And the violet hue of the flower,
And the greeting mute
Of thy boughs' salute
To the stranger who seeks thy bow.
O Abyssinian tree!
How the traveller blesses thee
When the light no moon allows,
And the sunset hour is near,
And thou bend'st thy boughs
To kiss his brows.
Saying, "Come, rest thee here."
O Abyssinian tree!
Thus bow thy head to me!
THE SUMMER FÊTE.
TO THE HONORABLE MRS. NORTON.
For the groundwork of the following Poem I am indebted to a memorable Fête, given some years since, at Boyle Farm, the seat of the late Lord Henry Fitzgerald. In commemoration of that evening—of which the lady to whom these pages are inscribed was, I well recollect, one of the most distinguished ornaments—I was induced at the time to write some verses, which were afterwards, however, thrown aside unfinished, on my discovering that the same task had been undertaken by a noble poet,[1] whose playful and happy jeu d'esprit on the subject has since been published. It was but lately, that, on finding the fragments of my own sketch among my papers, I thought of founding on them such a description of an imaginary Fête as might furnish me with situations for the introduction of music.
Such is the origin and object of the following Poem, and to MRS. NORTON it is, with every feeling of admiration and regard, inscribed by her father's warmly attached friend,