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Cease, fond nature, cease thy strife,
And let me languish into life!

II.

Hark! they whisper; angels say,
Sister spirit, come away!

What is this absorbs me quite ?
Steals my senses, shuts my sight,
Drowns my spirits, draws my breath ?
Tell me, my soul, can this be death?

III.

The world recedes; it disappears!
Heaven opens on my eyes! my ears
With sounds seraphic ring:
Lend, lend your wings! I mount! I fly!
O Grave! where is thy victory?
O Death! where is thy sting?

ELEGY

TO THE MEMORY OF AN UNFORTUNATE LADY.

WHAT beckoning ghost along the moonlight shade
Invites my steps, and points to yonder glade?
'Tis she!--but why that bleeding bosom gored?
Why dimly gleams the visionary sword?
Oh, ever beauteous, ever friendly! tell,
Is it, in heaven, a crime to love too well?
To bear too tender or too firm a heart,
To act a lover's or a Roman's part?
Is there no bright reversion in the sky,
For those who greatly think, or bravely die?
Why bade ye else, ye powers! her soul aspire
Above the vulgar flight of low desire?

Ambition first sprung from your blest abodes ;
The glorious fault of angels and of gods:
Thence to their images on earth it flows,
And in the breasts of kings and heroes glows.
Most souls, 'tis true, but peep out once an age,
Dull sullen prisoners in the body's cage:
Dim lights of life, that burn a length of years
Useless, unseen, as lamps in sepulchres;
Like Eastern kings a lazy state they keep,
And, close confined to their own palace, sleep.
From these perhaps (ere nature bade her die)
Fate snatch'd her early to the pitying sky.
As into air the purer spirits flow,

And separate from their kindred dregs below;
So flew the soul to its congenial place,
Nor left one virtue to redeem her race.

But thou, false guardian of a charge too good,
Thou, mean deserter of thy brother's blood!
See on these ruby lips the trembling breath,
These cheeks now fading at the blast of death:
Cold is that breast which warmed the world before,
And those love-darting eyes must roll no more.
Thus, if eternal justice rules the ball,

Thus shall your wives, and thus your children fall:
On all the line a sudden vengeance waits,
And frequent hearses shall besiege your gates;
There passengers shall stand, and pointing say,
(While the long funerals blacken all the way,)
Lo! these were they, whose souls the Furies steel'd,
And cursed with hearts unknowing how to yield.
Thus unlamented pass the proud away,
The gaze of fools, and pageant of a day!
So perish all, whose breast ne'er learn'd to glow
For others' good, or melt at others' woe.
What can atone (O ever-injured shade!)
Thy fate unpitied, and thy rites unpaid?
No friend's complaint, no kind domestic tear
Pleased thy pale ghost, or graced thy mournful bier.

By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed,
By foreign hands thy decent limbs composed,
By foreign hands thy humble grave adorn'd,
By strangers honour'd, and by strangers mourn'd!
What though no friends in sable weeds appear,
Grieve for an hour, perhaps, then mourn a year,
And bear about the mockery of woe

To midnight dances, and the public show?
What though no weeping loves thy ashes grace,
Nor polish'd marble emulate thy face?
What though no sacred earth allow thee room,
Nor hallow'd dirge be mutter'd o'er thy tomb?
Yet shall thy grave with rising flowers be drest,
And the green turf lie lightly on thy breast:
There shall the morn her earliest tears bestow,
There the first roses of the year shall blow;
While angels with their silver wings o'ershade
The ground, now sacred by thy reliques made.

So peaceful rests, without a stone, a name, What once had beauty, titles, wealth, and fame. How loved, how honour'd once, avails thee not, To whom related, or by whom begot;

A heap of dust alone remains of thee,
'Tis all thou art, and all the proud shall be!

Poets themselves must fall like those they sung,
Deaf the praised ear, and mute the tuneful tongue.
Even he, whose soul now melts in mournful lays,
Shall shortly want the generous tear he pays;
Then from his closing eyes thy form shall part,
And the last pang shall tear thee from his heart,
Life's idle business at one gasp be o'er,
The muse forgot, and thou beloved no more!

IMITATIONS OF ENGLISH POETS.

DONE BY THE AUTHOR IN HIS YOUTH.

I.

SPENSER.

THE ALLEY.

I.

In every town, where Thamis rolls his tyde,
A narrow pass there is, with houses low;
Where, ever and anon, the stream is eyed,
And many a boat soft sliding to and fro.
There oft are heard the notes of infant woe,

The short thick sob, loud scream, and shriller squall:
How can ye, mothers, vex your children so?

Some play, some eat, some NESTLE BY the wall,
And as they crouchen low, for bread and butter call.

II.

And on the broken pavement, here and there,
Doth many a stinking sprat and herring lie:
A brandy and tobacco shop is near,

And hens, and dogs, and hogs are feeding by;
And here a sailor's jacket hangs to dry.
At every door are sunburnt matrons seen,
Mending old nets to catch the scaly fry;

Now singing shrill, and scolding eft between;

Scolds answer foul-mouth'd scolds; bad neighbourhood I ween.

III.

The snappish cur (the passengers' annoy)

Close at my heel with yelping treble flies;

The whimpering girl, and hoarser-screaming boy
Join to the yelping treble, shrilling cries;
The scolding quean to louder notes doth rise,
And her full pipes those shrilling cries confound;
To her full pipes the grunting hog replies;
The grunting hogs alarm the neighbours round,

And curs, girls, boys, and scolds, in the deep bass are drown'd.

IV.

Hard by a sty, beneath a roof of thatch,
Dwelt Obloquy, who in her early days

Baskets of fish at Billingsgate did watch,

Cod, whiting, oyster, mackerel, sprat, or plaice:

There learn'd she speech from tongues that never cease.

Slander beside her, like a magpie, chatters,

With Envy (spitting cat), dread foe to peace;

Like a cursed cur, Malice before her clatters,

And vexing every wight, tears clothes and all to tatters.

V.

Such place hath Deptford, navy-building town,
Woolwich and Wapping, smelling strong of pitch;
Such Lambeth, envy of each band and gown,
And Twickenham such, which fairer scenes enrich,
Grots, statues, urns, and Jo-n's dog and bitch,
Ne village is without, on either side,

All up the silver Thames, or all adown ;

Ne Richmond's self, from whose tall front are eyed

Vales, spires, meandering streams, and Windsor's towery pride

G

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