1822.] 
With light reflected on the walls, 
Which thro’ the gothic window falls, 
And gleams upon the ghastly tomb, 
And shews the tenants of the gloom 
That living mortal’s hasty tread 
Might trace the records of the dead ; 
Aad sighing, breatlie a thought, revere, 
*¢ So end the ties of kindred here.” 
But see, with falt’ring step, and slow, 
With staff in hand, weak, bending low, 
An aged matron, homeward led, 
Heaven’s lamp nocturnal round her shed ; 
For she with wayward gait and look 
Must cross the well-known bubbling brook 
Where sprights and fags ("tis said of yore) 
Do hold their seeret midnight hour ; 
- Whose tale runs round the blazing hearth, 
And wide amazement doth impart 
Among the trembling list’ners pale, 
Who fear the whisp’ring of the gale, 
And closer draw, encircled, near, 
The inmates of a groundless fear. 
But oh! what soft and musive eye 
Can sean the wonders of the sky ; 
Can snatch a glance thro’ all the spheres, 
And catch the rays of thousand years, 
Bat feels the daring of his wing 
Hath touch’d a theme too high to sing ? 
Thou rapt Enthusiasm come, 
Ecstatic breathings on thy tongue, 
Bring with thee all thy sister tribe, 
Enraptur’d Joy and Love beside; 
With holy Rapture’s heav’nly measure, 
The bard’s delight and speechless pleasure. 
Like to the minstrel’s early song 
That swells in numbers wild and strong, 
Stephensiana.—WNo. VF. 
39 
Unconscious of the rules of art, 
His song’s the language of his heart ; 
Still glide along thou pensive orb, 
And all my inmost soul absorb ; 
Still let me hear thy whisper’d talk, 
As thro’ the realms of night you walk ; 
When o’er the starry plains you climb, 
Or highest zenith soar sublime ; 
Or up the giddy height you fly, 
The soothing traveller of the sky. 
Whether I view thee from the yale, 
I hear thy soft persuasive tale, 
Or from the dizzy mountain’s side, 
Could trace thy solemn footsteps wide 
A charm’d enthusiast could rove 
O’er mountain steep or rocky delve ; 
And then to hear the sweetest sound 
Re-echo’d by the hills around, 
Of dying music in the gale, 
The sweet enchantress of the vale ; 
That as I press the hanging steep, 
My ravish’d soul would inward leap, 
And starting list the gentle sigh, 
The breathing softness of the sky, 
While pure abstraction wraps the soul, 
And the fix’d eye revolves the whole : 
While the mind’s soft respiration 
Thus recites her invocation : 
O heavenly lamp! suspended high, 
The hanging crystal of the sky, 
Whose pensive stealing eye-lids shed 
A pleasing sadness round my head ; 
Upon thy vot’ry lone reclin’d 
Shed thy timely influence kind ; 
And thou, O Moon! shall ever be 
My chief delight to muse on thee, 
STEPHENSIANA. ; 
No. V. 
The late ALEXANDER STEPHENS, Esq. of Park House, Chelsea, devoted an active 
and well-spent life in the collection of Anecdotes of his contemporaries, and generally 
entered in a book the collecting of the passing day ;—these collections we have purchased, 
and propose to present a selection from them to our readers. As Editor of the Annual 
Obituary, and many other biographical works, he may probably have incorporated 
many of these scraps ; but the greater part are unpublished, and all stand alone as cabi- 
net pictures of men and manners, worthy of a place in a literary miscellany. 
ARTHUR ONSLOW. 
abl 1S celebrated speaker of the House 
of Commons, for the purpose of re- 
laxing himself from the multiplied cares 
of his office, was in the habit of passing 
his evenings at a respectable country 
public-house, which for nearly a cen- 
tury was known by the name of the 
Jew’s-harp-house, situated about a 
quarter of a mile north of Portland- 
place. We dressed himself in plain 
attire, and preferred taking his seat in 
the chimney corner of the kitchen, 
where he took part in the vulgar jokes, 
and ordinary concerns of the. landlord, 
his family and customers. He conti- 
nued this practice for a year or two, 
and much ingratiated himself with his 
host and his family, who, not knowing 
his name, called him “ the gentleman,”’ 
but, from his familiar manners, treated 
himas oneof themselves. It happened, 
however, one day, that the landlord 
was walking along Parliament-street, 
when he met the speaker in state, going 
up with an address to the throne, anc 
looking narrowly at the chief person- 
age, he was astonished and confounded 
at recognising the features of the gen- 
tleman, his constant customer. He 
hurried home, and communicated. the 
extraordinary intelligence to his wife 
and 
