BILLOWY WATER.

ON THE BANKS OF A RIVER, AT MOON-LIGHT.

THESE lines appeared first, in Boston, in the Palladium. They were republished, in London, shortly after, in the Courier, without any notice of their transatlantick origin. This remark is intended, for those, who have known them, only as the lines in the Courier; or who have seen them, in some of our own newspapers, as "the production of an anonymous British bard."

BILL'WY water, roll along!

While, far, I mark thy various way;

At first, from gentle fountains, sprung;
Through meadows, wont to stray.

Softly there thy smooth tide flows;
Where, lighted, by the moon's pale beam,

The margin wild-flow'r fondly bows,

To kiss thy silv'ry stream.

Wavy soon thy waters grow, Nor longer softly, gently glide;

And other tiny streamlets flow,

To swell thy bustling pride.

Now thou quitt'st thy native shoals, Some deeper, bolder course to find. A river, now thy current rolls,

And leaves the stream behind.

Onward, to the ocean wide,

It pours, a torrent, loud and strong;

And bears, resistless, on its tide,

Its grav❜ly bed along,

There thy turbid wave is seen To hold, afar, its muddy way;

As if it scorn'd, with salt sea green,

To mix its waters grey.

So, the troubled *Arve pursues

His cloudy way, through limpid Rhone ;
Nor dies it, with his sable hues,

But holds his course alone.

Still, afar, as eye can strain,

Thy waves are seen, in tempest, tost;
Impetuous, rushing, midst the main,

Where all, in surge, is lost.

Bill'wy water, roll along!

While far I mark thy various way;

Thy murm'ring stream, thy torrent strong

Life's varying tide display.

First, its infant waters flow,

Through verdant dale, and flow'ry mead;

Where lilies of the valley blow,

And fairies softly tread.

Glassy now its bosom seems;

But Av'rice, soon, and bubbling Pride

Pour in their tributary streams;

And swell the little tide.

Swift the manly torrent pours,
In frothy billows, proudly tost,
And, 'midst life's troubled ocean, roars,

Till all, in noise, is lost.

* "BEFORE you enter the town of Sallenche, you must cross the Arve, which, at this season, is much larger than in winter, being swoln by the dissolving snows of the Alps."

"This river has its source at the parish of Argentiere, in the valley of Chamouni, is immediately augmented by torrents from the neighbouring Glaciers, and pours its chill turbid stream into the Rhone, soon after that river issues from the lake of Geneva."

"The contrast between these two rivers is very striking, the one being as pure and limpid as the other is foul and muddy."

"The Rhone seems to scorn the alliance, and keeps as long as possible unmingled with his dirty spouse."

"Two miles below the place of their junction, a difference and opposition between this ill-sorted couple is still observable: these, however, gradually abate by long habit, till at last, yielding to necessity, and to those unrelenting laws which joined them together, they mix in perfect union, aud flow in a common stream to the end of their course."

Moore's View of France, &c. Vol. I.

THE PLUNDERER'S GRAVE,