He spurr'd his steed, he couch'd his lance,
And darted on the Bruce at once.

- As motionless as rocks, that bide
The wrath of the advancing tide,
The Bruce stood fast. — Each breast beat high,
And dazzled was each gazing eye.
The heart had hardly time to shrink,
The eye-lid scarce had time to wink,
While on the king, like flash of flame,
Spurr’d to full speed the war-horse came!
The partridge may the falcon mock,
If that slight palfrey stand the shock
But, swerving from the knight's career,
Just as they met, Bruce shunn'd the spear.
Onward the baffled warrior bore
His course

but soon his course was o'er !
High in his stirrups stood the king,
And gave his battle-axe the swing.
Right on De Boune, the whiles he pass’d,
Fell that stern dint- the first the last !
Such strength upon the blow was put,
The helmet crash'd like hazel-nut ;
The axe-shaft, with its brazen clasp,
Was shiver'd to the gauntlet grasp.
Springs from the blow the startled horse,
Drops to the plain the lifeless corse ;
First of that fatal field, how soon,
How sudden, fell the fierce De Boune ?

Scott.

EPITAPH ON AN INFANT.

ERE sin could blight, or sorrow fade,

Death came with friendly care ;
The opening bud to Heaven convey'd,
And bade it blossom there.

COLERIDGE. A WINTER NIGHT.

A WINTER night! the stormy wind is high,

Rocking the leafless branches to and fro ;

The sailor's wife shrinks as she hears it blow,
And mournfully surveys the starless sky:
The hardy shepherd turns out fearlessly

To tend his fleecy charge in drifted snow ;

And the poor homeless, houseless child of woe Sinks down, perchance, in dumb despair to die ! Happy the fire-side student; happier still

The social circle round the blazing hearth,

If, while these estimate aright the worth
Of every blessing which their cup may fill,
Their grateful hearts with sympathy can thrill
For every form of wretchedness on earth.

BARTON.

FUNERAL HYMN.

BROTHER, thou art

gone

before us,
And thy saintly soul is flown,
Where tears are wip'd from every eye,

And sorrow is unknown;
From the burden of the flesh,

And from care and fear releas'd;
Where the wicked cease from troubling,

And the weary are at rest.

The toilsome way thou st travell’d o'er,

And borne the heavy load,
But Christ has taught thy languid feet

To reach his blest abode ;

Thou’rt sleeping now, like Lazarus,

Upon his Father's breast,
Where the wicked cease from troubling,

And the weary are at rest.

Sin can never taint thee now,

Nor doubt thy faith assail,
Nor thy meek trust in Jesus Christ

And the Holy Spirit fail :
And there thou’rt sure to meet the good,

Whom on earth thou lovedst best,
Where the wicked cease from troubling,

And the weary are at rest.

“ Earth to earth,” and “dust to dust,”

The solemn priest hath said,
So we lay the turf above thee now,

And seal thy narrow bed :
But thy spirit, brother, soars away

Among the faithful blest,
Where the wicked cease from troubling,

And the weary are at rest.

And when the Lord shall summon us,

Whom he hath left behind,
May we, untainted by the world,

As sure a welcome find;
May each, like thee, depart in peace,

To be a glorious guest,
Where the wicked cease from troubling,
And the weary are at rest.

MILMAN. THE TRAVELLER AT THE SOURCE OF

THE NILE.

In sunset's light, o'er Afric thrown,

A wanderer proudly stood
Beside the well-spring, deep and lone,

Of Egypt's awful flood ;
The cradle of that mighty birth
So long a hidden thing to earth!

He heard its life's first murmuring sound,

A low mysterious tone,
A music sought, but never found,

By kings and warriors gone;
He listen'd- and his heart beat high-
That was the song of victory!

The rapture of a conqueror's mood

Rush'd burning through his frame-
The depths of that green solitude

Its torrents could not tame;
Though stillness lay, with eve's last smile,
Round those far fountains of the Nile.

A remarkable description of feelings thus fluctuating from triumph to despondency is given in Bruce's Abyssinian travels. The buoyant exultation of his spirits on arriving at the source of the Nile was almost immediately succeeded by a gloom, which he thus portrays : “ I was, at that very moment, in possession of what had for many years been the principal object of my ambition and wishes ; indifference, which, from the usual infirmity of human nature, follows, at least for a time, complete enjoyment, had taken place of it. The marsh, and the fountains of the Nile, upon comparison with the rise of many of our rivers, became now a trifling object in my sight. I remembered that magnificent scene in my own native country, where the Tweed, Clyde, and Annan rise in one hill. I began, in my sorrow, to treat the inquiry about the source of the Nile as a violent effort of a distempered fancy."

Night came with stars- across his soul

There swept a sudden change, Ev'n at the pilgrim's glorious goal

A shadow dark and strange Breath'd from the thought, so swift to fall O'er triumph's hour-and is this all ?

No more than this! what seem'd it now

First by that spring to stand ?
A thousand streams of lovelier flow

Bath'd his own mountain land!
Whence, far o'er waste and ocean track,
Their wild sweet voices call’d him back.

They calld him back to many a glade,

His childhood's haunt of play, Where brightly through the beechen shade

Their waters glanc'd away; They call’d him, with their sounding waves, Back to his father's hills and graves.

But, darkly mingling with the thought

Of each familiar scene,
Rose up a fearful vision, fraught

With all that lay between ;
The Arab's lance, the desert's gloom,
The whirling sands, the red simoom!

Where was the glow of power and pride ?

The spirit born to roam ?
His alter'd heart within him died

With yearnings for his home!
All vainly struggling to repress
That gush of painful tenderness.