1 JUNE 1867, Page 14

PYGMALION'S STATUE. 0 that story of the statue !— Statue,

shaped with art so rare That your sculptor gazing at you Loved, in spite of the despair, Till sweet Art took Nature's breath, Lent you life, and gave you death! While he sighed, " Ah, fond beginner, .. If indeed your hands wrought well, Beauty should catch life within her, Bird-like break its ivory shell !"- One more touch—her breast behold ! Tremulous in the garment's fold.

But while fear and rapture mingled, And the swift sin-prise of seeing How those shuddering pulses tingled With the first faint flush of being, Out he bilista• With sudden cry,— " She will change, grow old, and die !"

So to gain her was to lose her, So to quicken was to kill,—

Love sleeps heart-enshrined ; but, use her, She will wake to perish still.

Yet would I—who would not ?—choose So to gain and so to lose.