A creature to whom light remain'd
From Eden still, but alter'd, stain'd,
And o'er whose brow not Love alone

A blight had, in his transit, sent,
But other, earthlier joys had gone,
And left their foot-prints as they went.

Sighing, as through the shadowy Past, Like a tomb-searcher, Memory ran, Lifting each shroud that Time had cast

O'er buried hopes, he thus began :

(11)

FIRST ANGEL'S STORY.

'Twas in a land, that far away

Into the golden orient lies,

Where Nature knows not Night's delay,
But springs to meet her bridegroom, Day,
Upon the threshold of the skies.
One morn, on earthly mission sent,
And mid-way choosing where to light,
I saw, from the blue element—
Oh beautiful, but fatal sight!—
One of earth's fairest womankind,
Half veil'd from view, or rather shrined
In the clear crystal of a brook;

Which, while it hid no single gleam
Of her young beauties, made them look
More spirit-like, as they might seem
Through the dim shadowing of a dream.

Pausing in wonder I look'd on,

While, playfully around her breaking

The waters, that like diamonds shone,
She moved in light of her own making.
At length, as slowly I descended

To view more near a sight so splendid,
The tremble of my wings all o'er

(For through each plume I felt the thrill) Startled her, as she reach'd the shore

Of that small lake—her mirror still—
Above whose brink she stood, like snow
When rosy with a sunset glow.
Never shall I forget those eyes!—
The shame, the innocent surprise
Of that bright face, when in the air
Uplooking, she beheld me there.

It seem'd as if each thought, and look,

And motion were that minute chain'd Fast to the spot, such root she took, And-like a sunflower by a brook,

With face upturn'd-so still remain'd!

In pity to the wondering maid,

Though loth from such a vision turning, Downward I bent, beneath the shade

Of my spread wings to hide the burning

Of glances, which-I well could feel

For me, for her, too warmly shone ; But, ere I could again unseal

My restless eyes, or even steal

One side-long look, the maid was gone

Hid from me in the forest leaves,

Sudden as when, in all her charms

Of full-blown light, some cloud receives
The Moon into his dusky arms.

"Tis not in words to tell the power, The despotism that, from that hour, Passion held o'er me-day and night

I sought around each neighbouring spot, And, in the chase of this sweet light,

My task, and Heaven, and all forgotAll, but the one, sole, haunting dreamn Of her I saw in that bright stream.

Nor was it long, ere by her side

I found myself, whole happy days, Listening to words, whose music vied With our own Eden's seraph lays,

When seraph lays are warm'd by love,
But wanting that, far, far above!—
And looking into eyes where, blue
And beautiful, like skies seen through
The sleeping wave, for me there shone
A Heaven, more worshipp'd than my own.
Oh what, while I could hear and see
Such words and looks, was Heaven to me?
Though gross the air on earth I drew,
Twas blessed, while she breathed it too;
Though dark the flowers, though dim the sky,
Love lent them light, while she was nigh.
Throughout creation I but knew

Two separate worlds-the one, that small,
Beloved, and consecrated spot

Where LEA was-the other, all

The dull, wide waste, where she was not!

But vain my suit, my madness vain ;
Though gladly, from her eyes to gain
One earthly look, one stray desire,
I would have torn the wings that hung
Furl'd at my back, and o'er that Fire

Unnamed in Heaven their fragments flung;