Here oft he sung of warlike deeds,
That stain'd Avona red;

Who, in a bed of whisp'ring reeds,
Conceal'd his timid head.

Here soar'd the bard to foreign climes,
Advent'rous like the stork;

And daring sung the bloody crimes
Of Lancaster and York.

Then, oft as silence led the hours,

At eve retiring here,

He gather'd artless meadow flowers
For poor OPHELIA's bier.

In the last half dozen stanzas of this poem, Shakspeare is supposed to have made Guy's Cliff his favorite retirement; an idea justified by his romantic mind, and the contiguity of the spot to Stratford upon Avon, his native place.

STONELEIGH ABBEY.

Here let me rest in this sweet solitude,
Where knaves and parasites shall ne'er intrude,
No bacchanals are here, to give pretence
For wild excess, or ruinous expence.

In yon delicious wood I love to hear,

Though strange may seem the notes, a welcome cheer.

To live at home, contemplative, to scorn
Not hate mankind; to be as 'twere new born,
This is my warmest wish, sweet Poesy,
Then will I dwell with woman, nature, Thee!
Is not this better than among the crowd
To fret, and gaze, and cringe before the proud;
To mix in politics, and play the fool.

A would-be-Gracchus, or Corruptions tool?
Stoneleigh Abbey, May 6, 1817.

tue.

From Chandos Leigh's "Domestic Verses," (Privately Printed.)

AFTER leaving Guy's Cliff, the next great object of interest in the environs of Leamington, is Stoneleigh Abbey, now the envied seat of the Muses, as well as of every natural beauty and benevolent virChandos Leigh, Esq. the heir apparent of T. H. Leigh, Esq. the present noble possessor of this princely pile, having proved himself by several public, exclusive of some privately, printed productions, no mean aspirant in the Byron school of

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poetry. Should his maturer poems prove as superior to the lays of the wayward child, as his juvenile productions do to the poems of George Gordon, Lord Byron, a Minor, his name will stand high indeed; and his presence prove the noblest charmof a retreat where every thing is charming, Stoneleigh (or Stonley,) anciently called, according to Dugdale, Staneli, (a stoney place), lies five miles north-east from Leamington. In visiting it, the reader will leave Lillington on his right, and turning up a lane, about a mile beyond, a finger post will point out the road through the village of Ashow to the abbey, or you may keep straight on by Blackdon mill, till you pass Chesford bridge: taking the first turning to the right, it will lead you by a new road to the Porter's Lodge; at which place the visitor will learn whether the Abbey can be seen or not; this is the best road.

In the little retired and tranquil village of Stonley, there is an ancient church, of Saxon, or early Norman architecture, containing some very fine specimens of the round arches of the former, and the pointed windows of the latter. The Tower, which has much romantic irregularity in its formation, and is richly mantled with Ivy, presents a very picturesque object from its different points of view. The Vault of the Leigh family.