For the Southern Literary Messenger.
The following lines were found, written in a "delicate bird-quill hand," on a blank leaf on the Petrarch of one, among the prettiest of my fair cousins. The authoress perhaps caught a certain quaintness of expression from the strained verses of the Italian lover; but the idea I am inclined to believe original, notwithstanding the assertion "This was stolen from Boccacio," with which the lines are capped. Stevens, the Puck of commentators, asks "What has truth or nature to do with sonnets?" and Byron echoes the question. There may be some truth in this, though the opinion of the first sprung from hatred towards Malone, and that of the latter from chagrin at his own want of success. If the proper characteristic of the sonnet be an artificial quaintness, my cousin has succeeded admirably,—which I presume Mr. White will have too much gallantry to deny.
THE CREATION OF THE ANTELOPE.
| The tone of coming Ariel's voice was sweet To wise Prospero; he had flown the girth Of this green sphere, and gifts from wave and earth Were bound with flowers upon his pinions fleet, As singing came he to his master's feet. Four aspen leaves plucked in the shivering north— The Palmiste bough and fruit—of eastern birth— And leaf of Abelè—a thorny sheet— Were there: And in a cask of quaint device Was pent the flash thrown from the gaudy plume Of Sopor's empress-bird, of thousand dyes— Then by this flash begot—from glamour's womb, Gleamed into being two most gorgeous eyes Like those twin stars that lit creation's gloom. And hoofs most delicate the wise man wrought Of Ariel's gift of restless aspen leaves: And skilfully as slim Tarantul' weaves The curtain to her silken couch, soon brought The sheet of Abelè to beauty: naught Torn from Earth's Edens by his wily thieves So soothed their master as this gem of leaves! With downy softness from his magic caught, It lay a snowy skin. Next of the bough And fruit pluck'd from the Palmiste's sinewy stem, A neck and graceful head formed he: Life's glow Then tinged each vein. "'Tis done—gleam thou bright gem," Pleased Prospero said, "on Hemalaya's brow, A living jewel to his diadem!" |
E. D.
For the Southern Literary Messenger.