John Brett. Portrait of Christina Rossetti. 1857.
The Bijou

The Bijou;

or Annual of Literature and the Arts

compiled by William Fraser

London: William Pickering,

1828

pp. pp. 89-90
[Page 89]page image and link
To a Friend, , On Sending a Fancy Drawing, After Promising Her Own Picture in the Character of a Gypsey
By Lady Caroline Lamb
THE glowing tints beneath thy care 1
Have traced a form divinely fair, 2
Have given it charms and beauties rare, 3
And shown the power of art; 4
But in the ideal head I trace, 5
No features of the gypsey's face, 6
The living smile, the nameless grace, 7
That nature doth impart. 8

Here roving looks, and eyes of fire, 9
Awake the soul of young desire; — 10
The spells — which Beauty may inspire, 11
By thee are well exprest. 12
But soon the varying tints will fade, 13
And time with leaden hand shall shade, 14
The colours that once vivid played 15
In thy bright eye and breast! 16

[Page 90]page image and link
So hope that paints our morning sky, 17
When viewed with youth's unclouded eye; 18
So pleasures airy dreams must fly 19
O'erpowered with care and gloom. 20
For life's a fearful passing dream, 21
And those that gay and thoughtless seem, 22
Alike sail down its swelling stream 23
To meet the general doom. 24