I saw from yonder silent cave,[12]

  Two Fountains running side by side;

The one was Memory's limpid wave,

  The other cold Oblivion's tide.

"Oh Love!" said I, in thoughtless mood,

  As deep I drank of Lethe's stream,

"Be all my sorrows in this flood

  "Forgotten like a vanisht dream!"

But who could bear that gloomy blank

  Where joy was lost as well as pain?

Quickly of Memory's fount I drank.

  And brought the past all back again;

And said, "Oh Love! whate'er my lot,

  "Still let this soul to thee be true—

"Rather than have one bliss forgot,

  "Be all my pains remembered too!"

* * * * *

The group that stood around to shade

The blushes of that bashful maid,

Had by degrees as came the lay

More strongly forth retired away,

Like a fair shell whose valves divide

To show the fairer pearl inside:

For such she was—a creature, bright

  And delicate as those day-flowers,

Which while they last make up in light

  And sweetness what they want in hours.

  So rich upon the ear had grown

Her voice's melody—its tone

Gathering new courage as it found

An echo in each bosom round—

That, ere the nymph with downcast eye

Still on the chords, her lute laid by,

"Another song," all lips exclaimed,

And each some matchless favorite named;

while blushing as her fingers ran

O'er the sweet chords she thus began:—