I
hope be able to come spend a month here.

I remain, my dear Charles,

Yours sincerely,

FRED. GRAYSON.

LORD BYRON.

A man of rank and of capacious soul,
Who riches had, and fame beyond desire,
An heir to flattery, to titles born,
And reputation and luxurious life;
Yet not content with his ancestral name,
Or to be known, because his fathers were,
He, on this height hereditary, stood,
And, gazing higher, purposed in his heart
To take another step. Above him, seemed
Alone, the mount of song, the lofty seat
Of canonized bards; and thitherward,
By nature taught, and native melody,
In prime of youth, he bent his eagle eye.
No cost was spared--what books he wished, he read;
What sage to hear, he heard; what scenes to see
He saw. And first in rambling school-boy days
Britannia's mountain walks and heath girt lakes,
And story telling glens, and founts, and brooks,
And maids as dew-drops pure and fair, his soul,
With grandeur filled, and melody, and love.
Then travel came and took him where he wished;
He cities saw, and courts, and princely pomp,
And mused alone on ancient mountain brows,
And mused on battle fields, where valor fought
In other days: and mused on men, grey
With years: and drank from old and fabulous wells,
And plucked the vine that first-born prophets plucked;
And mused on famous tombs, and on the wave
Of ocean mused, and on the desert waste,
The heavens and earth of every country; saw
Where'er the old inspiring genii dwelt,
Aught that could expand, refine the soul,
Thither he went, and meditated there.
He touched his harp and nations heard, entranced,
As some vast river of unfailing source.
Rapid, exhaustless, deep, his numbers flowed
And ope'd new fountains in the human heart
Where fancy halted, weary in her flight,
In other men, _his_ fresh as morning rose,
And soared untrodden heights, and seemed at home
Where angels bashful looked. Others, though great,
Beneath their arguments seemed struggling, while
He from above descending, stopped to touch
The loftiest thought, and proudly stooped as though
It scarce deserved his verse. With nature's self
He seemed an old acquaintance, free to jest
At will, with all her glorious Majesty;
He laid his hand upon "the ocean's wave,"
And played familiar with his hoary locks;
Stood on the Alps, stood on the Apennines,
And with the thunder tal