OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L. E. L.) in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1832/Storrs, Windermere Lake

Storrs Hall
16
* STORRS, WINDERMERE LAKE.
* Artist: Harwood - Engraved by: Tombleson
STORRS, WINDERMERE LAKE.
I would I had a charmed bark,  To sail that lovely lake; Nor should another prow but mine  Its silver silence wake. No oar should cleave its sunny tide;  But I would float along, As if the breath that filled my sail  Were but a murmured song.
Then I would think all pleasant thoughts;  Live early youth anew, When hope took tones of prophecy,  And tones of music too; And coloured life with its own hues—  The heart’s true Claude Lorraine— The rich, the warm, the beautiful,  I’d live them once again.
Kind faces flit before my eyes,  Sweet voices fill my ear, And friends I long have ceased to love,  I’ll still think loved, and here. With such fair phantasies to fill,  Sweet Lake, thy summer air; If thy banks were not Paradise,  Yet should I dream they were.
The calm and picturesque scenery of the Lake of Windermere might awake a thousand far more romantic visions than that of the return of the first warm feelings of youth. Shut out as it were from the world, and enshrined in delicious seclusion; here might the weary heart dream itself away, and find the freshness of the spring-time of the spirit return upon it. Here, at the mansion of Colonel John Bolton—a circumstance which gives interest to the plate—did the late Mr. Canning retire from the whirl of public affairs; and, to use the words of Fisher’s Illustrations of Lancashire, "here was restored, in some measure, the elasticity of a mind, whose lofty energies were ultimately, and for our country we may say prematurely, exhausted in the preservation of a nation's welfare."
# Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L. E. L.) in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1832/Skeletal Group in the Rameswur, Caves of Ellora

45
* SKELETAL GROUP IN THE RAMESWUR, CAVES OF ELLORA.
* Artist: G. Cattermole - Engraved by: W. Kelsall
SKELETON GROUP IN THE RAMESWUR, CAVES OF ELLORA.
SUPPOSED TO REPRESENT THE NUPTUALS OF SIVA AND PARVATI.
He comes from Kilas, earth and sky, Bright before the deity; The sun shines, as he shone when first His glory over ocean burst. The vales put forth a thousand flowers, Mingling the spring and summer hours; The Suras* fill with songs the air, The Genii and their lutes are there; By gladness stirred, the mighty sea Flings up its waves rejoicingly; And Music wanders o'er its tide, For Siva comes to meet his bride.
The above lines are a paraphrase of a translation from the Siva-Pooraun. It goes on to mention, besides the signs of rejoicing I have enumerated, that "The dwellers upon earth stocked the casket of their ideas with the jewels of delight;" also, that "the eyes of the devotees flamed like torches," and that "Siva set off like a garden in full blow." Among the guests who attended his wedding were "Brahma, who came on his goose"—" the Kerokee and other serpents all drest in habits of ceremony." Query, What habits of ceremony did the serpents wear? Vide Maurice. Captain Sykes mentions, that one of the compartments represent Siva and Parvati playing at dice, her attitude expressing "unsuccess or denial." May not this allude to their celebrated quarrel, so often mentioned by Hindoo writers. The tale is as follows. Siva and Parvati parted, owing to a quarrel at dice. They severally performed rigid acts of devotion; but the fires they kindled blazed so vehemently as to threaten a general conflagration. The other deities in great alarm supplicated him to recall his consort, but the angry god answered, that she must come of her own free choice. The river goddess prevailed on Parvati to return, on condition that his love for her was restored. Camdeo, the Indian Cupid, then wounded Siva with one of his arrows, and, for his pains, was reduced to ashes by a flash from Siva's eye. The shaft, however, had lost none of its honied craft. Parvati, as the daughter of a mountaineer, appeared before her immediately enamoured husband; her conquest once secured, she assumed her natural form. Siva, in the joy of reconciliation, decreed, that Camdeo should be known again as the son of Crishna.Asiatic Researches.
* Good spirits.
# Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L. E. L.) in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1832/The City of Delhi

see Old Delhi
67
* DELHI.
* Artist: W. Purser - Engraved by: W. Miller
THE CITY OF DELHI.
Thou glorious city of the East, of old enchanted times, When the fierce Genii swayed all Oriental climes, I do not ask from history a record of thy fame, A fairy page has stamped for me thy consecrated name.
I read it when the crimson sky came reddening thro' the trees, The twilight is the only time to read such tales as these; Like mosque, and minaret, and tower, the clouds were heaped on high, I almost deemed fair Delhi rose, a city in the sky.
What sympathy I then bestowed upon her youthful king! I fear I now should be less moved by actual suffering; All sorrow has its selfishness; tears harden as they flow, And in our own we half forget to share in others' wo.
I can recall how well I seemed to know the princely tent, Where painted silk, and painted plume, their gorgeous colours blent, The conquests blazoned on the walls, the roof of carved stone, And the rich light, that at midnight, over the dark woods shone.
The lovely princess, she who slept in that black marble tomb, Her only pall, her raven hair, that swept in midnight gloom; The depths of that enchanted sleep, had seemed the sleep of death Save that her cheek retained its rose, her lip its rose-like breath.
Gone! gone! I think of them no more, unless when they are brought As by this pictured city here, in some recalling thought; Far other dreams are with me now, and yet, amid their pain, I wish I were content to dream of fairy tales again.
"We never meet with friends like the friends of our
Youth—when we have lost them."
# Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L. E. L.) in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1832/The Deaf Schoolmaster

14
* THE DEAF SCHOOLMASTER.
* Artist: Henry Meyer - Engraved by: H. Meyer
THE DEAF SCHOOLMASTER.
He cannot hear the skylark sing, The music of the wild bee’s wing; The murmur of the plaining bough; A gentle whisper fairy low; The noise of falling waters near— All these have left his mournful ear. A sad, sad silence, whose worst power Is felt in others’ gladdest hour. But, ah, to what can it not move Th' unconquerable strength of love! See how he bends above the page, For him—the child of his old age. The ear is deaf, the eye is dim, Yet anxious and alive for him. How deep and tender is the debt, Whose seal on that young heart is set; Little, perchance, may be the aid, Not so the fondness which essayed To help amid this learned coil, And smooth the youthful student's toil. Mid all the sorrow and the crime, Man's destiny from earliest time; Mid all that can debase, degrade, How beautiful this earth is made, By pure affection, deep and dear, Affection like that pictured here!
# Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L. E. L.) in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1832/The Carclaze Tin Mine, Cornwall

57
* CARCLAZE TIN MINE, NEAR ST. AUSTLE.
* Artist: T. Allom - Engraved by: W. LePetit
THE CARCLAZE TIN-MINE, CORNWALL.
Those stately galleys cut the seas, Their wings the mighty oars; And the sun set o'er their purple sails, When touched those ships our shores.
They are from far Phœnicia, Whose princely merchants sweep, Like conquerors of the winds and waves, Over the subject deep.
They have been east and west to seek The wealth of the wide world;
Mid Indian isles of gems and spice, Those sails have been unfurled.
In Africa for ivory, For the red gold in Spain; Ours is a wild and barren isle, Why do they cross the main?
They come to find the precious ores, That British mountains yield; To point to British enterprise, Its future glorious field.
A savage race, yet from their trade Rose England's commerce—now, What land but knows her red-cross flag? What sea but knows her prow?
Riches, and intellect, and peace, Have marked the favoured strand: God keep thee in prosperity, My own sea-girdled land!
The produce of the Tin and Copper Mines early attracted the Phœnicians to our coast. Tin was then one of the precious metals, and used for personal adornment; and the barter must have been as profitable, as civilized people always made their dealings with savages. Knowledge usually turns ignorance to profit. The Carclaze Mine is reported to have been worked above four hundred years.
# Les Misérables/Volume 5/Book Third

Chapters:
* Chapter 1: The Sewer and Its Surprises
* Chapter 2: Explanation
* Chapter 3: The "Spun" Man
* Chapter 4: He Also Bears His Cross
* Chapter 5: In the Case of Sand, as in That of Woman, There Is a Fineness Which Is Treacherous
* Chapter 6: The Fontis
* Chapter 7: One Sometimes Runs Aground When One Fancies That One Is Disembarking
* Chapter 8: The Torn Coat-Tail
* Chapter 9: Marius Produces on Some One Who Is a Judge of the Matter, the Effect of Being Dead
* Chapter 10: Return of the Son Who Was Prodigal of His Life
* Chapter 11: Concussion in the Absolute
* Chapter 12: The Grandfather
# Landon in The Improvisatrice; and Other Poems/II

Florence! with what idolatry  I ’ve lingered in thy radiant halls, Worshipping, till my dizzy eye  Grew dim with gazing on those walls,
Where Time had spared each glorious gift By Genius unto Memory left! And when seen by the pale moonlight, More pure, more perfect, though less bright, What dreams of song flashed on my brain, Till each shade seemed to live again; And then the beautiful, the grand, The glorious of my native land, In every flower that threw its veil Aside, when wooed by the spring gale; In every vineyard, where the sun, His task of summer ripening done, Shone on their clusters, and a song Came lightly from the peasant throng;— In the dim loveliness of night, In fountains with their diamond light,
In aged temple, ruined shrine, And its green wreath of ivy twine;— In every change of earth and sky, Breathed the deep soul of poesy.    As yet I loved not;—but each wild, High thought I nourished raised a pyre For love to light; and lighted once By love, it would be like the fire The burning lava floods that dwell In Etna’s cave unquenchable.
One evening in the lovely June,  Over the Arno’s waters gliding, I had been watching the fair moon  Amid her court of white clouds riding;—
I had been listening to the gale,  Which wafted music from around, (For scarce a lover, at that hour,  But waked his mandolin’s light sound),— And odour was upon the breeze, Sweet thefts from rose and lemon trees.   They stole me from my lulling dream,  And said they knew that such an hour Had ever influence on my soul,  And raised my sweetest minstrel power. I took my lute,—my eye had been Wandering round the lovely scene, Filled with those melancholy tears, Which come when all most bright appears,
And hold their strange and secret power, Even on pleasure’s golden hour. I had been looking on the river, Half-marvelling to think that ever Wind, wave, or sky, could darken where All seemed so gentle and so fair: And mingled with these thoughts there came  A tale, just one that Memory keeps— Forgotten music, still some chance  Vibrate the chord whereon it sleeps!
# Landon in The Improvisatrice; and Other Poems/Love

LOVE.
She prest her slight hand to her brow, or pain Or bitter thoughts were passing there. The room Had no light but that from the fireside, Which showed, then hid her face. How very pale It looked, when over it the glimmer shone! Is not the rose companion of the spring? Then wherefore has the red-leaved flower forgotten Her cheek? The tears stood in her large dark eyes— Her beautiful dark eyes—like hyacinth stars, When shines their shadowy glory through the dew That summer nights have wept:—she felt them not, Her heart was far away! Her fragile form,
Like the young willow when for the first time The wind sweeps o'er it rudely, had not lost Its own peculiar grace; but it was bowed By sickness, or by worse than sickness—sorrow! And this is Love! Oh! why should woman love; Wasting her dearest feelings, till health, hope, Happiness, are but things of which henceforth She'll only know the name? Her heart is seared: A sweet light has been thrown upon its life, To make its darkness the more terrible. And this is Love!
# Landon in The Improvisatrice; and Other Poems/Header

This collection has been specifically arranged to give an insight into how the Other Poems section was assembled, it being a combination of previously published work with new material.
Poems by Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L. E. L.) in The Improvisatrice; and Other Poems with poems from earlier sources linked to The Literary Gazette compiled by Peter J. Bolton
# Landon in The Improvisatrice; and Other Poems/Hindoo Girl

THE HINDOO GIRL'S SONG.
Playful and wild as the fire-flies' light, This moment hidden, the next moment bright; Like the foam on the dark-green sea, Is the spell that is laid on my lover by me. Were your sigh as sweet as the sumbal's sigh, When the wind of the evening is nigh; Were your smile like that glorious light, Seen when the stars gem the deep midnight; Were that sigh and that smile for ever the same— They were shadows, not fuel, to love's dull'd flame.
Love once formed an amulet, With pearls, and a rainbow, and rose-leaves set. The pearls were pure as pearls could be, And white as maiden purity; The rose had the beauty and breath of soul, And the rainbow-changes crowned the whole. Frown on your lover one little while, Dearer will be the light of your smile; Let your blush, laugh, and sigh ever mingle together, Like the bloom, sun, and clouds of the sweet spring weather. Love never must sleep in security, Or most calm and cold will his waking be.
# Landon in The Improvisatrice; and Other Poems/Home

HOME.
I left my home;—'twas in a little vale, Sheltered from snow-storms by the stately pines; A small clear river wandered quietly, Its smooth waves only cut by the light barks Of fishers, and but darkened by the shade The willows flung, when to the southern wind They threw their long green tresses. On the slope Were five or six white cottages, whose roofs Reached not to the laburnum's height, whose boughs Shook over them bright showers of golden bloom.
Sweet silence reigned around:—no other sound Came on the air, than when the shepherd made The reed-pipe rudely musical, or notes From the wild birds, or children in their play Sending forth shouts or laughter. Strangers came Rarely or never near the lonely place.... I went into far countries. Years past by, But still that vale in silent beauty dwelt Within my memory. Home I came at last. I stood upon a mountain height, and looked Into the vale below; and smoke arose, And heavy sounds; and through the thick dim air Shot blackened turrets, and brick walls, and roofs Of the red tile. I entered in the streets: There were ten thousand hurrying to and fro; And masted vessels stood upon the river,
And barges sullied the once dew-clear stream. Where were the willows, where the cottages? I sought my home; I sought and found a city, Alas! for the green valley!
# Landon in The Improvisatrice; and Other Poems/IV

Lorenzo!—when next morning came For the first time I heard thy name! Lorenzo!—how each ear-pulse drank  The more than music of that tone! Lorenzo!—how I sighed that name,  As breathing it, made it mine own!
I sought the gallery: I was wont  To pass the noontide there, and trace Some Statue’s shape of loveliness—  Some Saint, or Nymph, or Muse’s face. There in my rapture I could throw  My pencil and its hues aside, And, as the vision past me, pour  My song of passion, joy, and pride. And he was there,—Lorenzo there!  How soon the morning past away, With finding beauties in each thing  Neither had seen before that day! Spirit of Love! soon thy rose-plumes wear The weight and the sully of canker and care: Falsehood is round thee; Hope leads thee on, Till every hue from thy pinion is gone.
But one bright moment is all thine own, The one ere thy visible presence is known; When, like the wind of the South, thy power, Sunning the heavens, sweetening the flower, Is felt, but not seen. Thou art sweet and calm As the sleep of a child, as the dew-fall of balm. Fear has not darkened thee; Hope has not made The blossoms expand, it but opens to fade. Nothing is known of those wearing fears Which will shadow the light of thy after-years. Then art thou bliss:—but once throw by The veil which shrouds thy divinity; Stand confessed,—and thy quiet is fled! Wild flashes of rapture may come instead, But pain will be with them. What may restore The gentle happiness known before?
I owned not to myself I loved,—  No word of love Lorenzo breathed; But I lived in a magic ring,  Of every pleasant flower wreathed. A bright blue was on the sky, A sweeter breath in music’s sigh; The orange shrubs all seemed to bear Fruit more rich, and buds more fair. There was a glory on the noon, A beauty in the crescent moon, A lulling stillness in the night, A feeling in the pale starlight. There was a charmed note on the wind,  A spell in Poetry’s deep store— Heart-uttered words, passionate thoughts,  Which I had never marked before.
‘Twas as my heart’s full happiness Poured over all its own excess.   One night there was a gorgeous feast  For maskers in Count Leon’s hall; And all of gallant, fair, and young,  Were bidden to the festival. I went, garbed as a Hindoo girl;  Upon each arm and amulet, And by my side a little lute  Of sandal-wood with gold beset. And shall I own that I was proud To hear, amid the gazing crowd, A murmur of delight, when first  My mask and veil I threw aside? For well my conscious cheek betrayed  Whose eye was gazing on me too!
And never yet had praise been dear, As on that evening, to mine ear, Lorenzo! I was proud to be Worshipped and flattered but for thee!
# Landon in The Literary Gazette 1823/Cupid Riding a Peacock

Literary Gazette, 25th January, 1823, Pages 60
CUPID RIDING A PEACOCK.
All the colours glistening
On the rainbow of the spring,
Mingled with the deeper hue
Of the grass green emerald too,
Are upon that bird, whose neck
Crimson wreaths of roses deck,—
Mounted by a Boy, whose lip
Is such as the bee would sip
For the first rosebud in May.
 Love, upon a summer day,
Bade the Graces link a chain
Of sweet flowers, for a rein
Round the peacock's glorious wing.
Forth he rode; then, like the king
Of bright colours, smiles, and blooms,
Sunny darts and golden plumes.
 Oh this is not that sweet love
Own companion to the dove;
But a wild and wandering thing,
Varying as the lights that fling
Radiance o'er his peacock's wing.
I do weep, that Love should be
Ever linked with Vanity.
# Landon in The Literary Gazette 1823/Female Head 2

Literary Gazette, 3rd May 1823, Page 286
The Female Head on the left of “the Hours."
A dream of saddest beauty: one pale smile
Its light upon the blue-veined forehead shed,
As Love had lingered there one little while,
Robbed the cheek of its colour, and then fled;
Yet leaving a sweet twilight shade, which said
There had been sunshine once. Alas! the bloom,
The light, the hope, at Love's shrine offered!
Yet all in vain,—that altar is a tomb
Of broken hearts, its oracle but words of doom!
L.E. L.
# Landon in The Literary Gazette 1823/Fragment 3

Literary Gazette, 16th August 1823, Page 524
FRAGMENT.
Oh it is veriest vanity to love!—
Lovers are misers, who hoard up a store
Of wealth that cannot profit them, but turns
To weariness or waste. And what is love,
So sought with deep anxiety till won?
Beautiful disappointment when once gained.
 We are now seated by a green turf grave:
The white rose, which hangs o'er it droopingly,
Parched by the summer, for which yet it pined
Throughout the winter, is the history
Of its cold tenant. She was a fair girl,
The very flower of Andalusian maids;
No one so often heard the light guitar
Steal on her midnight; and tho' rarely gold
Or pearls bound her dark tresses, there were few
Of nobler birth, or of more Indian wealth.
So very young, so beautiful, 'twas like
The sudden fading of a bud in spring—
On which there is no mark of blight or worm,
When her place was found vacant in the dance, And her soft voice was missed; when it was said
That in a convent's solitude she hid
The light and bloom of her sweet April time.
They did not know how youth's best pleasures pall
When the heart is not in them, or how much
Of happiness is in those secret thoughts
Which each hides from the other. Isabel Lived but in one deep feeling, for she loved—
Loved with that wild and intense love which dwells
In silence, secrecy, and hopelessness,
And deemed a cloister was the fittest shade
For unrequited tenderness; and love,
Nourished by blushes and by passionate tears,
Grew like a fairy flower, until it filled
The solitary heart with fancied beauty.—
They say there is a destiny in love:
'Twas so with Isabel. Some one had breathed
The secret cause that turned her from the world;
She had been loved although she knew it not,
And vow and veil of the dark convent cell
Were changed for bridal ones.
Alas, the vanity of these warm feelings!
A little while, and hers was happiness;
But this low grave, where rests the broken heart, May tell how short it was. The heart which made
A world itself of visionary hopes, Might never bear the chill realities,
All that affection has to learn and brook
When its first colouring is departed. Love,
I can but liken thee to the red bloom
Upon the apple,—making the outside bright,
But reaching not the core! L. E. L.
# Landon in The Literary Gazette 1823/Female Head 1

Literary Gazette, 8th February 1823, Page 91
UNKNOWN FEMALE HEAD.
I know not of thy history, thou sad
Yet beautiful faced Girl:—the chesnut braid
Bound darkly round thy forehead, the blue veins
Wandering in azure light, the ivory chin Dimpled so archly, have no characters
Graven by memory; but thy pale cheek,
Like a white rose on which the sun hath looked
Too wildly warm, (is not this passion's legend?)
The drooping lid whose lash is bright with tears,
A lip which has the sweetness of a smile
But not its gaiety—do not these bear
The searched footprints sorrow leaves in passing
O'er the clear brow of youth?—It may but be
An idle thought, but I have dreamed thou wert
A captive in thy hopelessness: afar
From the sweet home of thy young infancy,
Whose image unto thee is as a dream
Of fire and slaughter, I can see thee wasting,
Sick for thy native air, loathing the light
And cheerfulness of men; thyself the last
Of all thy house, a stranger and a slave!