Suggested by a Scene in the Memoirs of the Empress Josephine.

In sorrow's stern and settled gloom,
The father sat—the silent tomb
Enclosed his earthly joy and pride;
His son, his only son had died.
His bosom heaved no natural sighs—
No tears relieved his burning eyes;
Alive to love's sweet voice no more,
The look of dark despair he wore:
Unmoved and hopeless, heeding not
Soft words of comfort, he forgot
That yet a source of joy remained—
That earth a blessing still contained.
Fair Buonaparte the mourner sought,
By pure maternal feelings taught—
Saw with an angel's pitying eye
His deep and hopeless agony.
She led, in all her beauty's pride,
His blooming daughter to his side;
To her kind heart his babe she press'd,
And kneeling thus before Decrest,
Seemed a bright spirit from above
Sent on some embassy of love.
Surprised and startled at the view,
Across his brow his hand he drew,
While tears, the balmy dew of grief,
Gave to his bursting heart relief—
And conscious, once again he blessed,
And clasped his children to his breast.
Yes, Josephine-'twas thine to feel
The joys of sympathy—to heal
The wounded heart,—while he whose fate
Heaven linked with thine, was called the great,
Thine was true greatness of the soul,
Swayed by pure virtue's soft control:
Patient in sorrow—meek in power—
Beloved e'en to thy latest hour—
Thou hadst a bliss he could not know,—
Thou ne'er hadst caused a tear to flow.1
While victory's wreath his temples bound,
Thou wast with brighter honors crowned;
For by the poor thy name was blessed,
And thy sweet influence confessed
By him whose proud, ambitious mind,
Scarce earth's vast empire had confined.
Thou wast his solacer in care,
His triumphs thou didst fondly share—
And even when exiled from his throne,
Thy faithful heart was all his own.
A happier lot than his was thine!
Brighter thy name on Mem'ry's shrine!—
Whilst blood-stained laurels o'er him wave,
Love placed the marble on thy grave!2

E. A. S.

1 In her last hours she said, that "she had never caused a single tear to flow."

2 Her tomb was erected by her children.

For the Southern Literary Messenger.

TO CLAUDIA.

Oh! dost thou remember that gladsome hour,
When I bowed the knee to thee,
And feigned the love of thy captive knight,
In playful mimicry?—
When the chiding word, on thy trembling lip,
Died, faintly murmuring, there,
And the ill-feigned smile, on thy blushing cheek,
Was drown'd in a bursting tear?
Ah! little thou think'st of the years of pain
I've paid for that giddy hour,
And the anxious thoughts that have ever lain
In its memory's magic power:
Yet, with all its sorrow, and all its care—
Its dreary and hopeless woe—
I'd not, its luxury of despair,
For the wide world's hopes forego.
'Tis my bosom's dearest and purest shrine,
And fountain of holiest thought,
Where all that is sacred or divine,
Is in deep devotion brought.
That smile and tear are the relics there—
Embalmed in tears of mine—
And the image that claims each fervent prayer,
Is that bright, fair form of thine.
Thou wast then just op'ning to life's gay bloom,
Like springtide's sweetest gleam;
And I played with thee, without thought of gloom,
Or of startling "Love's young dream."
'Twas the last glad hour of my mirthful youth—
My parting hour with thee—
And of thy sweet smile of light and truth,
'Twas the last I'll ever see.
Since, many a care-cloud of dark'ning blight
Hath shaded my youthful brow;
And many a sorrow of deadly weight,
Lies cold on my bosom now.
I've tested the falsehood of life's whole scope,
And heed not the clouds that lower;
But, mid all the wrecks of my early hope,
I cling to that parting hour.
Oft, from the dance, and its wild delight,
The world, and its hollow glee,
I've fled to the silence of moonlit night,
To live o'er that hour with thee.
'Tis the one bright spot in this wide, wide waste,
That blooms in its beauty yet;
And to that I'll turn, while life shall last,
From the world's whole love and hate.