They ask'd admission at that vessel's side:

"The mail! the mail!" the imperious Triton cried. "We seek a passage to our native shore!"

"Hand up

the mail!" he answer'd with a roar.

"But here are passengers—a female one—

"The mail I want,” responded Neptune's son. “There take the mail!" (the devil take your manners, And Fate embark us under gentler banners!) "Thanks, very sorry! now shove off!" he cried! “Shove off!” and left us on the weltering tide! For this, thou vapouring punt of evil name, We wish thee—a good voyage all the same !

SAN JOÃO DA FOZ, OPORTO,

September, 1837.

CLOUDS.

LINES SENT TO A FRIEND, AFTER WATCHING WITH HER ONE SUMMER'S EVENING THE PASSAGE OF CLOUDS AT DIFFERENT ALTITUDES SUCH AS ARE HERE DESCRIBED.

FAIR is Earth, a goodly substance-fair with things

of every hue;

But yon vapour-world is fairer, haunting the cerulean

blue.

First the rain-clouds float above me, slow, like caravans of freight;

Higher are the central sailers; then the cirri, higher

yet.

These are eastward slowly wending; o'er her grave their shadows pass,

While, in rapid retrocession, westward flies the central

mass.

*

*The passage of clouds at different altitudes in different and even opposite directions, swayed by different currents of air, is quite a common, if not commonly observed, characteristic of them; but I ought not to say it is not commonly observed, for every seaman, and every shepherd, and every other habitual sky-gazer, must be familiar with it. The three several fleets of clouds yesterday sailed just as I have described them. The chapter on clouds in Mr. Ruskin's "Modern Painters" probably suggested something of the above.

But the highest and the brightest, linger in their stately march:

These are they that bear the Angels, near the zenith

And

of the arch;

among them, poised or wafted, sit the Spirits of the Blest,

Looking down on us, the mourners, of their presence dispossest.

Oh for wings, that I might seek Her! Something whispers She is there,

Yonder, up among the brightest of those floating isles

of air.

GRASMERE CHURCH-YARD, 1848.

ON A PORTRAIT BY COMERFORD.

UNJUST to Nature, though not all untrue,
A skilful hand these cherish'd features drew ;
The general lines with faithful touch it gave,
And so secured some triumph o'er the grave.

But with the lineaments of age, to trace
The fine expression of benignant grace,
And yet to mingle with the charm serene
The venerable dignity of mien,—
Impart the loftiness, yet not impair
The courtly softness by the regal air;

To give the eye the temper'd light that spread
A sort of glory round the reverend head;—
This was beyond the artist; all it could
His pencil furnish'd; and the work is good.
But memory's power a better likeness gives;
She still by that among her offspring lives;
Regret recals her, till her form appears—
Seen through the pensive mist of filial tears-
Such as she was ere life's last flame declined,
Cloudless of brow, and passionless of mind!
Such as she was when kindred seraphs came,
Her gentle spirit for the skies to claim.

THE MAGDALEN.

PAINT me a Magdalen

With violets in her hair,

Such as

she gave her Lover

Near his aching heart to wear—

On that frail Lover's bosom

As she had fared, to fare;

To love him and to lose him

When crush'd and wither'd there.—

Just when to heaven upturning
Her dark eyes bright with tears,
She bade farewell for ever
To passion's hopes and fears;-
To all the mortal yearning

That woman's bosom sears,

And scores her heart with burning

Whose traces last for years :