THE CONFESSIONAL.

.

When thou hast met with careless hearts and cold,
Hearts that young love may touch, but never hold,-
Not changeless, as the loved and left of old-

Remember me-remember me-
1 passionately pray of thee!

LADY E. S. WORTLEY.

THOUGHT of thee - I thought of thee,

On ocean many a weary night When heaved the long and sullen sea,

With only waves and stars in sight. We stole along by isles of balm,

We furl'd before the coming gale,
We slept amid the breathless calm,

We flew beneath the straining sail -
But thou wert lost for years to me,
And, day and night, I thought of thee!

be

I thought of thee - I thought of thee,

In France - amid the gay saloon, Where eyes, as dark as eyes may

Are many as the leaves in June Where life is love, and even the air

Is pregnant with impassion'd thought,
And
song

and dance and music are
With one warm meaning fraught -
My half-snared heart broke lightly free,
And, with a blush, I thought of thee.

I thought of thee — I thought of thee,

In Florence - where the fiery hearts Of Italy are breathed away

In wonders of the deathless arts; Where strays the Contadina down

Val d'Arno with a song of old;
Where clime and woman seldom frown,

And life runs over sands of gold ;
I stray'd to lone Fiesolé
On many an eve, and thought of thee.

I thought of thee - I thought of thee,

In Rome, — when on the Palatine Night left the Cæsars' palace free

To Time's forgetful foot and mine; Or, on the Coliseum's wall,

When moonlight touch'd the ivied stone, Reclining, with a thought of all

That o'er this scene has come and gone The shades of Rome would start and flee Unconsciously – I thought of thee.

I thought of thee - I thought of thee,

In Vallombrosia's holy shade, Where nobles born the friars be

By life's rude changes humbler made. Here Milton framed his Paradise ;

I slept within his very cell ; And, as I closed my weary eyes,

I thought the cowl would fit me well The cloisters breathed, it seem'd to me, Of heart's-ease - but I thought of thee.

I thought of thee - I thought of thee,

In Venice, - on a night in June; When, through the city of the sca,

Like dust of silver slept the moon. Slow turn’d his oar the gondolier,

And, as the black barks glided by,
The water to my leaning car

Bore back the lover's passing sigh -
It was no place alone to be –
I thought of thee - I thought of thee.

I thought of thee — I thought of thee,

In the Ionian isles — when straying With wise Ulysses by the sea

Old Homer's songs around me playing; Or, watching the bewitch'd caique,

That o'er the star-lit waters flew,
I listen’d to the helmsman Greek,
Who
sung

the song that Sappho knew The poet's spell, the bark, the sea, All vanish'd as I thought of thee.

I I thought of thee - I thought of thee,

In Greece when rose the Parthenon Majestic o'er the Egean sca,

And heroes with it, one by one; When, in the grove of Academe,

Where Lais and Leontium stray'd
Discussing Plato's mystic theme,

I lay at noontide in the shade
The Egean wind, the whispering tree,
Had voices - and I thought of thee.

I thought of thee - I thought of thee,

In Asia on the Dardanelles ; Where swiftly as the waters flee,

Each wave some sweet old story tells ; And, seated by the marble tank

Which sleeps by Ilium's ruins old, (The fount where peerless Helen drank,

And Venus laved her locks of gold,) (6) I thrill'd such classic haunts to see, Yet even here — I thought of thee

I thought of thee - I thought of thee,

Where glide the Bosphor's lovely waters, All palace-lined from sea to sea ;

And ever on its shores the daughters
Of the delicious East are seen,

Printing the brink with slipper'd feet;
And oh, the snowy folds between,
What

eyes of heaven your glances meet ! Peris of light no fairer be – Yes - in Stamboul — I thought of thee.

I've thought of thee - I've thought of thee,

Through change that teaches to forget; Thy face looks up from every sea,

In every star thine eyes are set, Though roving beneath Orient skies,

Whose golden beauty breathes of rest;
I envy every bird that flics

Into the far and clouded West:
I think of thee-- I think of theé!
Oh, dearest! hast thou thought of me?

THOUGHTS

WIIILE MAKING A GRAVE FOR A NEW-BORN CHILD.

Room, gentle flowers! my child would pass to heaven!
Ye look'd not for her yet with your soft eyes,
O watchful ushers at Death's narrow door!
But lo! while you delay to let her forth,
Angels, beyond, stay for her! One long kiss
From lips all pale with agony, and tears,
Wrung after anguish had dried up with fire
The
eyes
that
wept, were the

cup

of life
Held as a welcome to her. Weep! oh, mother!
But not that from this cup of bitterness
A cherub of the sky has turn'd away.

1

One look upon thy face e re thou depart!
My daughter! It is soon to let thee go!
My daughter! With thy birth has gush'd a spring
I knew not of filling my heart with tears,
And turning with strange tenderness to thee -
A love – oh, God! it seems so - which must flow
Far as thou fleest, and 'twixt heaven and me,
Henceforward, be a bright and yearning chain
Drawing me after thee! And so, farewell!
'Tis a harsh world, in which affection knows
No place to treasure up its loved and lost
But the lone grave.