T. F. Young

“ IS THERE ROOM FOR THE POET? Is there room for the poet, fair Canada's sons.
To live his strange life, and to warble his songs,
To follow each current of thought as it runs,
And to sing of your victories, glories and wrongs?
Is there room for the poet, ye senators grave?
Ye orators, statesmen and law-makers, say;
May he of the calling so gentle e'er crave
Your patronage, and of your kindness a ray?
Ye toilers in cities, ye workers in fields,
Who handle the hammer, the pen or the plow,
Can the poet implicitly trust, as he yields
His heart, and his hopes, and his name to you now? ”

“ But it is scarcely too much to say, that the only real benefit, conferred on Egyptian literature, by that expedition, was the discovery of a huge broken block, of black stone, in digging for the foundations of Fort St. Julian, near Rosetta, which the British army had afterwards the honour of bringing to this country, as a proud trophy of their gallantry and success. It is not to a want of ability, nor of industry, nor of accuracy, nor of fidelity, in the Egyptian Commission, that so total a failure is to be attributed ”

“ Can never gauge the mighty strain,
That burst the genial poet's heart.
It is enough for us to know
The songs he sang for Scotland's sake,
Which winds of time can never blow
Into oblivion's silent lake.
O Burns! thy life was sad, we know,
Thy sensitive and fertile mind
Had to withstand full many a blow,
Dealt by the ignorant and blind.
But let us do thee justice here,
Tho' distant from thy native shore,
For all thy faults repress the sneer,
And thy great qualities explore. ”

“ Grey’s Greek manuscript are of a nature scarcely less remarkable than its preservation and discovery: it relates to the sale, not of a house or a field, but of a portion of the Collections and Offerings made from time to time on account, or for the benefit, of a certain number of Mummies, of persons described at length, in very bad Greek, with their children and all their households. ”

“ Or by the turf fire, upon Erin's old sod,
Each Irishman, kneeling in humble devotion,
Would love all his brothers, while praying to God.
Oh Erin, mavourneen! Let Love's joyous fingers
Strike out from your harps, one glad, resonant strain,
And, if one discordant, harsh, jarring note lingers,
Oh, strike for your country, together again!
And then, when your hands and your hearts are united,
When you kneel at one shrine, when you bow to one law.
With a sea of glad brightness, your isle shall be
lighted,
While thunders the chorus, of Erin-go-bragh. ”

“ Although the discovery of the general import of the hieroglyphics has by no means excited any great sensation in this country, yet the activity of the various collectors resident in Egypt seems to have been in some measure stimulated by it. Important additions have been made, or are about to be made, to the Egyptian department of the British Museum; and in France, the magnificent liberality of the Government, together with the insatiable curiosity of some affluent individuals, has held out ample encouragement to the commercial antiquarian. ”

“ When nature rises, with respect, to greet
The lord of day on his majestic seat,
Like some great personage of high degree,
Who cometh forth his subjects all to meet,
Like him, but yet more glorious far than he,
He comes with splendor bright, to shed o'er land and
sea.
With stately, slow and solemn march he comes,
And gradually pours forth his brilliant rays,
Unheralded by sounding brass or drums,
His blazing glory on our planet plays,
And sendeth healing light thro' darken'd ways.
His undimm'd splendor maketh mortals quail,
And e'en, at times, it fiercely strikes and slays ”

“ Ennobles, soothes and lends a joy to life—
A pow'r, which counteracts the trickster's wile
And blunts the edge of slander undeserv'd and vile.
From where the fierce Atlantic waters rage,
Unto the mild Pacific's fertile shore,
Small villages to cities rise and wage
A steady war; but not a war of gore—
A friendly rivalry exists, no more,
Save in the far North-West, where savage clan
Ungrateful rise, and make a serious sore,
Whose pains increas'd, as eastward far it ran,
And plac'd the British race beneath the Frenchman's ban. ”

“ Champollion, and from the singular good fortune of Mr. George Grey, I cannot resist the natural inclination, to make a public claim to whatever credit may be my due, for the labour that I have bestowed, on an attempt to unveil the mystery, in which Egyptian literature has been involved for nearly twenty centuries. ”

“ Sound up, ye harps and all.
Let music's loud and sweetest strain
Beat from our hearts each ill;
Let thoughts of those assuage our pain,
Who are around us still.
Oh, winsome maid, oh, hearty youth,
I urge you on to glee,
For, in your innocence and truth,
You all are dear to me.
Nor youth, nor age should cherish gloom,
And voices oft should sing,
So give the gladsome voices room,
And let the joy-bells ring. ”

“ The general inference, to be derived from an examination of the names now discovered, is somewhat more in favour of an extensive employment of an alphabetical mode of writing, than any that could have been deduced from the pillar of Rosetta, which exhibits, indeed, only foreign names, and affords us therefore little or no information respecting the mode of writing the original Egyptian names of the inhabitants. ”

“ Oh, Erin! I love thee in spite of thine errors,
And now for thee, Erin, my heart is forlorn,
Disturb'd as thou art by such various terrors,
Thou beautiful isle, where my kindred were born.
E'en now, in my thoughts, I can climb thy steep
mountains,
Or roam through thy valleys, where green shamrocks
grow,
Or over thy meadows, where hedges of hawthorn
Stand gracefully clipp'd, an impassable row. ”