O'ER the glad waters of the darkblue sea,

Our thoughts as boundless, and our souls as free,

Far as the breeze can bear, the billows foam,

Survey our empire, and behold our home!

These are our realms, no limits to their sway;

Our flag the sceptre all who meet obey.

Ours the wild life in tumult still to range

From toil to rest, and joy in every change.

Oh! who can tell? not thou, luxurious slave!

Whose soul would sicken o'er the heaving wave;

DEEP in the wave is a coral grove, Where the purple mullet and goldfish rove;

Where the sea-flower spreads its leaves of blue,

That never are wet with falling dew, But in bright and changeful beauty shine

Far down in the green and glassy brine.

The floor is of sand, like the mountain drift,

And the pearl-shells spangle the flinty snow:

From coral rocks the sea-plants lift Their boughs, where the tides and billows flow;

The water is calm and still below, For the winds and the waves are absent there,

And the sands are bright as the stars that glow

In the motionless fields of upper air: There with its waving blade of

green,

The sea-flag streams through the silent water,

And the crimson leaf of the dulse is

seen

To blush like a banner bathed in slaughter:

There with a light and easy motion The fan coral sweeps through the clear deep sea;

And the yellow and scarlet tufts of

ocean

Are bending like corn on the upland

lea;

And life, in rare and beautiful forms, Is sporting amid those bowers of

stone.

Where He the huge sea-monsters wracks,

That lift the deep upon their backs,
Unto an isle so long unknown,
And yet far kinder than our own?
He lands us on a grassy stage,
Safe from the storms, and prelate's
rage:

He gave us this eternal spring
Which here enamels every thing,
And sends the fowls to us in care
On daily visits through the air.
He hangs in shades the orange bright,
Like golden lamps in a green night,
And does in the pomegranates close
Jewels more rich than Ormus shows:
He makes the figs our mouths to
meet,

And throws the melons at our feet;
But apples, plants of such a price,
No tree could ever bear them twice.
With cedars chosen by his hand
From Lebanon he stores the land;
And makes the hollow seas that roar
Proclaim the ambergris on shore.
He cast (of which we rather boast)
The gospel's pearl upon our coast;
And in these rocks for us did frame
A temple where to sound his name.
Oh! let our voice his praise exalt
Till it arrive at heaven's vault,
Which then perhaps rebounding may
Echo beyond the Mexique bay.'
Thus sung they in the English boat
A holy and a cheerful note:
And all the way, to guide their
chime,

With falling oars they kept the time.
A. MARVELL.

CAVE OF STAFFA.

THANKS for the lessons of this spot,

fit school

For the presumptuous thoughts that would assign

Mechanic laws to agency divine, And, measuring heaven by earth, would overrule

Infinite power. The pillared vestibule,

Expanding yet precise, the roof embowed,

Might seem designed to humble man, when proud

Of his best workmanship by plan and tool.

Down-bearing with his whole Atlantic weight

Of tide and tempest on the structure's base,

And flashing upwards to its topmost height,

Ocean has proved its strength, and of its grace

In calms is conscious, finding for his freight

Of softest music some responsive place.

WORDSWORTH.