TO ISABELLE.

O STAY not here, my fair Isabelle,

For the dews of heaven are falling,

And the lonely craik, mid the sweet blue bells,
To his gentle mate is calling.

The evening star burns bright on high,
Thousands around us are rolling!
And the dulcet tones of the vesper bell
From afar are faintly tolling.

The waterfalls and the rocky shoals

Of the Clyde are sounding loudly,

While the moon looks down from her radiant throne
On all the world so proudly.

The fox howls loud on the distant fell,
The owl screams lonely and weary;
Then stay here no longer, my fair Isabelle,
For oh, it is cold and dreary!

PHILLIS THE FAIR.

Tune-"Robin Adair."

WHILE larks with little wing
Fanned the pure air,
Tasting the breathing spring,
Forth I did fare;

Gay the sun's golden eye

Peeped o'er the mountains high :

Such thy morn! did I cry,

Phillis the fair.

In each bird's ceaseless song
Glad did I share;

While yon wild flowers among,

Chance led me there;

DOWN WINDING NITH I DID WANDER.

Sweet to the opening day,

Rosebuds bent the dewy spray ;
Such thy bloom! did I say,
Phillis the fair.

Down in a shady' walk,
Doves cooing were;
I marked the cruel hawk,
Caught in a snare;
So kind may fortune be,
Such make his destinie,

He who would injure thee,

Phillis the fair.

47

So much for namby-pamby. I may after all try my hand on it in Scots verse, there I always find myself most at home.

BURNS.

Burns is understood to have in "Phillis the Fair," represented the tender feelings which Clarke entertained towards Miss Philadelphia M'Murdo, one of his pupils. This lady afterwards became Mrs. Norman Lockhart, of Carnwath.

R. CHAMBERS.

DOWN WINDING NITH I DID WANDER.

Tune "The Muckin' o' Geordie's Byre."

ADOWN winding Nith I did wander

To mark the sweet flowers as they spring,
Adown winding Nith I did wander,

Of Phillis to muse and to sing.

Chorus-Awa' wi' your belles and

your beauties,
They never wi' her can compare;
Wha ever has met wi' my Phillis,
Has met wi' the queen o' the fair.

The daisy amused my fond fancy,
So artless, so simple, so wild;

Thou'rt emblem, said I, o' my Phillis!
For she is simplicity's child.

The rosebud's the blush o' my charmer,
Her sweet balmy lip when it's press'd;
How fair and how pure is the lily,

But fairer and purer her breast.

Yon knot of gay flowers in the arbour,
They ne'er wi' my Phillis can vie;
Her breath is the breath o' the woodbine,
Its dewdrop o' diamond her eye.

Her voice is the song of the morning,

That wakes through the green spreading grove,
When Phoebus peeps over the mountains,
On music, and pleasure, and love.

But beauty! how frail and how fleeting-
The bloom of a fine summer day!
While worth in the mind o' my Phillis

Will flourish without a decay.

BURNS.

Mr. Clarke begs of you to give Miss Phillis a corner in your book, as she is a particular flame of his. She is a Miss Phillis M'Murdo, sister to "Bonnie Jean." They are both pupils of his.

BURNS TO MR. THOMPSON.

"Phillis the Fair," during her happy married life, resided with her husband in Carnwath House, and there became the mother of a numerous family. She was much admired for her beauty and personal attractions, and esteemed and beloved for her kindly sympathies for all in distress. This was the estimation in which she was held by the people of Carnwath; and the following inscription upon her tombstone in St. Mary's Aisle was the genuine expression of her husband's feelings on her untimely death after a short illness :

THIS TABLET IS INSCRIBED BY

NORMAN LOCKHART, ESQ.,

TO RECORD, HOWEVER INADEQUATELY,
HIS DEEP SENSE OF THE MANIFOLD VIRTUES
WHICH ADORNED THE CHARACTER OF
PHILADELPHIA BARBARA M'MURDO,

HIS BELOVED WIFE;

WHO, AFTER BEING ENABLED BY DIVINE GRACE,

TO DISCHARGE IN AN ENDEARING AND EXEMPLARY MANNER
THE DUTIES OF A WIFE AND PARENT,

FELL ASLEEP IN JESUS, SEPTEMBER 5TH, 1825,
TO BE FOR EVER WITH THE LORD.

ON A SPRIG OF HEATHER FROM HOME.

O see how soon the flowers of life decay,
How soon terrestrial pleasures fade away;
The star of comfort, for a season given,

First shone on earth, then sets to rise in heaven.

But mourn not as of life bereft her doom,
Nor sorrowing water with thy tears her tomb;
Redeemed by God from sin, released from pain,
To her to live was Christ, to die was gain.

ON A SPRIG OF HEATHER FROM HOME.

BY AN EMIGRANT FROM COVINGTON.

How many scenes of childhood's days
Pass through my mind in close review,
Though thirty years have passed, I ween,
Since I was where this heather grew.

Sad memories crowd around my heart,
Sweet heather, as I gaze on you,
Of that dear land across the sea-

My birth-place-where this heather grew.

The castle old, its garden wild,

Where still rare flowers in spring peep through The grass that lined the half-filled moat,

And gowans with this heather grew.

The tales our father loved to tell

Of barons bold and vassals true,

Who chased the deer o'er moss and fell
And moorland, where this heather grew.

The dovecot, built long years ago,
From which at morn the pigeons flew ;
The
grey old kirk, whose Sabbath bell
Sounds sweetly where this heather

D

grew.

49

The stately trees, the sweetbriar hedge,
Which o'er the air such fragrance threw;
The blackberry copse, the school, the verge,
The moss, where once this heather grew.

The haunted saugh, the stories told

Of ghosts and goblins not a few ;

The witch rowan tree, 'neath which the thyme
Bloomed sweetest where this heather grew.

The dear old Clyde, the bubbling springs,
From which such cooling draughts we drew;
The broomy knowes, the fairy rings

On moors, where once this heather grew.

I think I hear the quaint old rhyme,

Which to our childish minds seemed true,
Of Tinto, with her top of mist,

And at whose foot the heather grew.

Full many of that kindred band,

Who crossed with me the ocean blue,
Alas! are laid in their cold graves,
Far, far from where this heather grew.

Though in this land I've happy been,
With many friends both tried and true,
My memory will forever cling

To home, where once this heather grew.

H. W.

The writer of these lines is evidently an emigrant from Covington, the scenery of which is very well depicted, and his feelings well-expressed. Covington has sent a great number of enterprising spirits across the Atlantic-the Prentices and Purdies-and have founded no less than sixteen Covingtons in the United States.