and the tomb;
    A moist eternal wind the sails consume,
    Of sighs, of hopes, and of desire besides. 
    A shower of tears, a fog of chill disdain
    Bathes and relaxes the o’er-wearied cords,
    With error and with ignorance entwined;
    My two loved lights their wonted aid restrain;
    Reason or Art, storm-quell’d, no help affords,
    Nor hope remains the wish’d-for port to find.

    CHARLEMONT.

      My lethe-freighted bark with reckless prore
    Cleaves the rough sea ’neath wintry midnight skies,
    My old foe at the helm our compass eyes,
    With Scylla and Charybdis on each shore,
    A prompt and daring thought at every oar,
    Which equally the storm and death defies,
    While a perpetual humid wind of sighs,
    Of hopes, and of desires, its light sail tore. 
    Bathe and relax its worn and weary shrouds
    (Which ignorance with error intertwines),
    Torrents of tears, of scorn and anger clouds;
    Hidden the twin dear lights which were my signs;
    Reason and Art amid the waves lie dead,
    And hope of gaining port is almost fled.

    MACGREGOR.

SONNET CLVII.

Una candida cerva sopra l’ erba.

THE VISION OF THE FAWN.

      Beneath a laurel, two fair streams between,
    At early sunrise of the opening year,
    A milk-white fawn upon the meadow green,
    Of gold its either horn, I saw appear;
    So mild, yet so majestic, was its mien,
    I left, to follow, all my labours here,
    As miners after treasure, in the keen
    Desire of new, forget the old to fear. 
    “Let none impede”—­so, round its fair neck, run
    The words in diamond and topaz writ—­
    “My lord to give me liberty sees fit.” 
    And now the sun his noontide height had won
    When I, with weary though unsated view,
    Fell in the stream—­and so my vision flew.

    MACGREGOR.

      A form I saw with secret awe, nor ken I what it warns;
    Pure as the snow, a gentle doe it seem’d, with silver horns: 
    Erect she stood, close by a wood, between two running streams;
    And brightly shone the morning sun upon that land of dreams! 
    The pictured hind fancy design’d glowing with love and hope;
    Graceful she stepp’d, but distant kept, like the timid antelope;
    Playful, yet coy, with secret joy her image fill’d my soul;
    And o’er the sense soft influence of sweet oblivion stole. 
    Gold I beheld and emerald on the collar that she wore;
    Words, too—­but theirs were characters of legendary lore. 
    “Caesar’s decree hath made me free; and through his solemn charge,
    Untouch’d by men o’er hill and glen I wander here at large.” 
    The sun had now, with radiant brow, climb’d his meridian throne,
    Yet still mine eye untiringly gazed on that lovely one. 
    A voice was heard—­quick disappear’d my dream—­the spell was broken. 
    Then came distress:  to the consciousness of life I had awoken.