LINES
_Addressed to a Gentleman who had been a Prisoner to the Indians, and was ransomed by the merchants of Detroit._
When furious, eager, and athirst for blood, The panting Savage roams the howling wood; Could grace of form his kindled ire a.s.suage, Or polish"d manners mitigate his rage: Or moral worth his rugged spirit move To the soft touch of sympathy and love.
This pow"r, engaging stranger, had been thine, In whom united worth and sense combine; But, ah! estrang"d to all the charms of art, To every gentle virtue of the heart, When the fell Savage, in that dreadful shade Where midnight darkness added horror spread.
Stole silent through the deep surrounding gloom, Intent to finish thy unhappy doom, Had not some favouring power repell"d the stroke, His force averted, and his purpose broke.
With Mitchel, hapless youth! thy corse had lain, Pale and unburied on that fatal plain; Where torn from early life"s alluring charms, When hope incites us, and when pleasure warms; Unnoted, cold, the wretched sufferer lies, And sleep eternal seals his weeping eyes.
Where now the prospects youth and fortune gave, A life of honour, a distinguish"d grave?
In hopeless dark oblivion sunk away, The faint short radiance of a winter"s day!
But thou, preserv"d by ruling heaven"s decree, A fairer, happier fate attends on thee; Thine be a life of honourable ease, Still pleas"d and tranquil, as secure to please, The duteous children, the unblemish"d wife, And all the dear regards of social life; And in thy tranquil days serene decline; The peace of conscious rect.i.tude be thine.
MATILDA.
MONTREAL.
+For the New-York Weekly Magazine.+
TO EMMA.
"To all the council that we two have shar"d, "The sister vows, the hours that we have spent, "When we have chid the hasty footed time "For parting us:----Oh! and is all forgot?"
SHAKESPEARE"S MIDSUMMER NIGHT"S DREAM.
Yes! "tis too true--forgotten all The hallow"d joys of friendship"s shrine; Insensate to her gentle call, The heart that own"d her power divine.
The bright illusive hopes that charm"d My soul--all glide in clouds away; No more this heart with rapture warm"d, Shall bless the beam of rising day.
Nor dewy eve, nor Cynthia"s light, Reflected on the gliding wave, Nor spring"s sweet buds, nor flow"rets bright, With glowing hues, can pleasure give.
The lonely heart no pleasure knows, Pleasure can never be my lot; To Emma still my heart will turn, And fondly ask, "Is all forgot."
The sister vows, the swift-wing"d hours, Illum"d by friendship"s brightest beam; When fancy cull"d her fairest flowers, And Emma ever was my theme.
Are all forgot!----oblivion throws Her dusky shade o"er pleasures flown; But sad remembrance lifts the veil, To view the scenes of rapture gone.
Yet Emma, dear ungrateful maid, Though thou art fickle, I am not: Nor till I sink in death"s dark shade, Shall Emma"s image be forgot.
CLARA.
PEARL-STREET, _Sept. 1, 1796_.
_For the +New-York Weekly Magazine+._
LINES
_On the Death of a young Lady who fell a victim to the effects of Lightning._
Charm"d by the vocal notes of plumag"d birds, Almyra to the grove one morn had stray"d: Nor thought to sleep in death where lowing herds And sportive lambs with pleasing freedom play"d.
Beneath a lofty tree, whose shades composed, O"ercome by heat, Almyra sunk in sleep; When lo! the clouds with glowing rage opposed, And roaring thunders bid the heavens to weep.
Amid these scenes the fair-one op"d her eyes, Her home afar was seen, to which she hied; To steal concealment from th" inclement skies, But, by the lightning"s rage she fell--and died!
How impious "tis for man to ask why heav"n, Who rules aright amid the whirling storm, Should s.n.a.t.c.h away the object it had given, And let obnoxious worms destroy that form.
Then let me pause--and think, alas! how soon The hand of that same G.o.d may sweep me down; Although with health I"m blest, but ere the noon, Some pitying Bard may say--"his spirit"s gone!"
LUCIUS.
PINE-STREET, _Sept. 7, 1796_.
NEW-YORK: _+Printed by JOHN BULL, No. 115, Cherry-Street+, where every Kind of Printing work is executed with the utmost Accuracy and Dispatch.--+Subscriptions+ for this +Magazine+ (at 2s. per month) are taken in at the Printing-Office, and by E. MITCh.e.l.l, Bookseller, No. 9, Maiden-Lane._
_UTILE DULCI._
THE NEW-YORK WEEKLY MAGAZINE; or, Miscellaneous Repository.
+Vol. II.+] +Wednesday, September 14, 1796.+ [+No. 63.+
A PEEP INTO THE DEN OF IDLENESS.
Yonder! under those ragged rocks, where the baleful yews waving their sable branches of mournful cypress throws an awful gloom; a den dark and ghastly opens its horrid mouth! "Tis there idleness is lodged, the great thief of time, and destroyer of innocence and human felicity.
What a dreadful cave!----how it yawns amid the noisome lakes and s.h.a.ggy bushes! Vice and sin breed here; like monsters they hiss with impudence, and howl with too late repentance. Security and Carelessness, Sloth and Ignorance, joined hand in hand, stalk around. Hark how their mingled yells echo, in the caverns of the rocks, and drive downy footed Silence far away! Prodigality and Wantonness hover aloft, and call their votaries to the scene of irrevocable loss, and to the prison of unavoidable destruction, which at a little distance opens before them: there crowds led on by Error, and intoxicated with Folly sport to ruin.
But what frightful figure is that now emerging from the cave!---Riot and Noise attend him, and Bacchus (jolly G.o.d), and Venus, (bewitching queen) appear in the rear. That figure is Idleness, for defiance appears in his looks, and temerity and effrontery are stampt in indelible characters on his brow. Ebriety too with flushed cheeks and staggering gait appears in the group, whilst light-footed Mirth, led on by Gaiety, dance to the warbling notes of the birds of pleasure.