MY BEAUTY DARK.

The heroine of this piece was a young lady who became the author's wife, upon an acquaintance originally formed by the administration of the ordinance of baptism to her in infancy.

My beauty dark, my glossy bright,
Dark beauty, do not leave me;
They call thee dark, but to my sight
Thou 'rt milky white, believe me.

'Twas at the tide of Candlemas,*
Came tirling at my door,
The image of a lovely lass
That haunts me evermore.

Beside my sleeping couch she stood,
And now she mars my rest;
Still as I try the solemn mood,
She hunts it from my breast.

At lecture and at study

That ankle white I span,
Its sandal slim, its lacings trim,-
A fay I seem to scan.

Thy beauty's like a drift of spray
That dashes to the side,
Or like the silver-tail'd that play
Their gambols in the tide.

Evidently a Valentine morning surprise.

As heaps of snow on mountain brow
When shed the clouds their fleece,
Or churn of waves when tempest raves,
Thy swelling limbs in grace.

Thy eyes are black as berries,
Thy cheeks are waxen dyed,
And on thy temple tarries

The raven's dusk, my pride!

Gives light below each slim eye-brow
A swelling orb of blue,

In April meads so glance the beads,
In May the honey-dew.

Dark, tangled, deep, no drifted heap,
But sheaf-like, neatly bound
Thy tresses seem, in braids, or stream
As bright thine ears around.

Those raven spires of hair, that fair,
That turret-bosom's shine!

False friends! from me that banish'd thee,
Who fain would call thee mine.

No lilts I spin, their love to win,

The viol strings I shun,

But lend thine ear and thou shalt hear

My wisdom, dearest one!

ROBERT MACKAY.

THE HIGHLANDER'S HOME SICKNESS.

We have been favoured by Mr William Sinclair with the following spirited translation of Mackay's first address to the fair-haired Anna, the heroine of the "Forsaken Drover" (vol. i. p. 315). In the enclosures of Crieff, the Highland bard laments his separation from the hills of Sutherland, and the object of his love.

EASY is my pillow press'd

But, oh! I cannot, cannot rest;
Northwards do the shrill winds blow-
Thither do my musings go!

Better far with thee in groves,

Where the young deers sportive roam,

Than where, counting cattle droves,
I must sickly sigh for home.
Great the love I bear for her

Where the north winds wander free,

Sportive, kindly is her air,

Pride and folly none hath she!

Were I hiding from my foes,

Aye, though fifty men were near,
I should find concealment close
In the shieling of my dear.

Beauty's daughter! oh, to see

Days when homewards I'll repair—
Joyful time to thee and me—
Fair girl with the waving hair!

Glorious all for hunting then,

The rocky ridge, the hill, the fern;
Sweet to drag the deer that's slain
Downwards by the piper's cairn!
By the west field 'twas I told

My love, with parting on my tongue;
Long she 'll linger in that fold,
With the kine assembled long!

Dear to me the woods I know,
Far from Crieff my musings are;
Still with sheep my memories go,
On our heath of knolls afar :
Oh, for red-streak'd rocks so lone!

Where, in spring, the young fawns leap, And the crags where winds have blownCheaply I should find my sleep.

END OF VOL. II.

GLOSSARY.