No more my mournful eye
Can aught of her espy,

But the sad sacred earth where her dear relics lie.

O shades of Hagley, where is now your boast?

Your bright inhabitant is lost. You she preferr'd to all the gay resorts Where female vanity might wish to shine, The pomp of cities, and the pride of courts. Her modest beauties shunn'd the public eye: To your sequester'd dales

And flower-embroider'd vales

From an admiring world she chose to fly : With Nature there retired, and Nature's God,

The silent paths of wisdom trod, And banish'd every passion from her breast, But those, the gentlest and the best, Whose holy flames with energy divine The virtuous heart enliven and improve, The conjugal and the maternal love.

Sweet babes, who, like the little playful fawns,

Were wont to trip along these verdant

Whate'er your ancient sages taught, Your ancient bards sublimely thought, And bade her raptured breast with all your spirit glow ?

Nor then did Pindus or Castalia's plain,

Or Aganippe's fount your steps detain, Nor in the Thespian valleys did you play;

Nor then on Mincio's bank

Beset with osiers dank,

Nor where Clitumnus rolls his gentle
stream,

Nor where through hanging woods
Steep Anio pours his floods,

Nor yet where Meles or Ilissus stray.
Ill does it now beseem,

That, of your guardian care bereft, To dire disease and death your darling should be left.

Now what avails it that in early bloom, When light fantastic toys

Are all her sex's joys,

With you she search'd the wit of Greece and Rome;

And all that in her latter days
To emulate her ancient praise
Italia's happy genius could produce;
Or what the Gallic fire

Bright sparkling could inspire,

By all the Graces temper'd and refined; Or what in Britain's isle,

Most favour'd with your smile,

The powers of Reason and of Fancy join'd To full perfection have conspired to raise ? Ah! what is now the use

Of all these treasures that enrich'd her

mind,

To black Oblivion's gloom for ever now consign'd.

At least, ye Nine, her spotless name
'T is yours from death to save,
And in the temple of immortal Fame
With golden characters her worth engrave.
Come then, ye virgin-sisters, come,
And strew with choicest flowers her

hallow'd tomb:

But foremost thou, in sable vestment clad,
With accents sweet and sad,
Thou, plaintive Muse, whom o'er his Laura's

urn

Unhappy Petrarch call'd to mourn;

O come, and to this fairer Laura pay A more impassion'd tear, a more pathetic

lay.

Tell how each beauty of her mind and face Was brighten'd by some sweet peculiar grace!

How eloquent in every look Through her expressive eyes her soul distinctly spoke !

Tell how her manners, by the world refined, Left all the taint of modish vice behind,

And made each charm of polish'd courts

agree

With candid Truth's simplicity,
And uncorrupted Innocence!
Tell how to more than manly sense

She join'd the softening influence
Of more than female tenderness :
How, in the thoughtless days of wealth and
joy,

Which oft the care of others' good destroy, Her kindly-melting heart,

To every want and every woe, To guilt itself when in distress, The balm of pity would impart, And all relief that bounty could bestow! Ev'n for the kid or lamb that pour'd its life Beneath the bloody knife,

Her gentle tears would fall, Tears from sweet Virtue's source, to all.

benevolent

But, in the midst of all its blooming

pride,

A sudden blast from Apenninus blows,
Cold with perpetual snows:

The tender blighted plant shrinks up its leaves, and dies.

Arise, O Petrarch, from th' Elysian bowers,
With never-fading myrtles twined,
And fragrant with ambrosial flowers,
Where to thy Laura thou again art join'd;
Arise, and hither bring the silver lyre,
Tuned, by thy skilful hand,

To the soft notes of elegant desire,
With which o'er many a land

Was spread the fame of thy disastrous
love;

To me resign the vocal shell,
And teach my sorrows to relate

Their melancholy tale so well,
As may ev'n things inanimate,
Rough mountain oaks, and desert rocks, to
pity move.

What were, alas! thy woes compared to

mine?

To thee thy mistress in the blissful

band

Of Hymen never gave her hand;

The joys of wedded love were never thine :

In thy domestic care

She never bore a share,

Nor with endearing art

Would heal thy wounded heart

Of every secret grief that fester'd there: Nor did her fond affection on the bed

Of sickness watch thee, and thy languid

head

Whole nights on her unwearied arm

sustain,

And charm away the sense of pain:

Nor did she crown your mutual flame With pledges dear, and with a father's tender

name.

O best of wives! O dearer far to me
Than when thy virgin charms
Were yielded to my arms,

How can my soul endure the loss of thee?

How in the world, to me a desert grown,
Abandon'd and alone,
Without my sweet companion can I
live?

Without thy lovely smile,

The dear reward of every virtuous toil, What pleasures now can pall'd Ambition give?

Ev'n the delightful sense of well-earn'd

praise,

Unshared by thee, no more my lifeless thoughts could raise.

For my distracted mind What succour can I find?

Rise then, my soul, with hope elate, And seek those regions of serene delight, Whose peaceful path and ever-open gate No feet but those of harden'd Guilt shall miss.

There death himself thy Lucy shall restore, There yield up all his power ne'er to divide you more.

Lord Lyttelton.-Born 1709, Died 1773.

907.-ODE ON A DISTANT PROSPECT OF ETON COLLEGE.

Ye distant spires, ye antique towers,
That crown the watery glade,
Where grateful science still adores
Her Henry's holy shade;

And ye, that from the stately brow
Of Windsor's heights the expanse below
Of grove, of lawn, of mead survey;
Whose turf, whose shade, whose flowers
among

Wanders the hoary Thames along
His silver-winding way!

Ah, happy hills! ah, pleasing shade!
Ah, fields beloved in vain!

Where once my careless childhood stray'd,
A stranger yet to pain:

I feel the gales that from ye blow
A momentary bliss bestow,
As, waving fresh their gladsome wing,
My weary soul they seem to soothe,
And, redolent of joy and youth,
To breathe a second spring.

Say, Father Thames, for thou hast scen
Full many a sprightly race,
Disporting on thy margent green,

The paths of pleasure trace,
Who foremost now delight to cleave
With pliant arm thy glassy wave:
The captive linnet which inthral

What idle progeny succeed

To chase the rolling circle's speed,
Or urge the flying ball?

While some on earnest business bent
Their murmuring labours ply
'Gainst graver hours, that bring constraint
To sweeten liberty;

Some bold adventurers disdain
The limits of their little reign,
And unknown regions dare descry:

Still as they run, they look behind;
They hear a voice in every wind,
And snatch a fearful joy.

Gay hope is theirs, by fancy fed,

Less pleasing when possess'd; The tear forgot as soon as shed, The sunshine of the breast. Theirs buxom health of rosy hue, Wild wit, invention ever new,

And lively cheer of vigour born;

The thoughtless day, the easy night, The spirits pure, the slumbers light, That fly the approach of morn.

Alas! regardless of their doom,
The little victims play;

No sense have they of ills to come,
Nor care beyond to-day;

Yet see how all around 'em wait

The ministers of human fate,

And black Misfortune's baleful train.

Ah! show them where in ambush stand,

To seize their prey, the murth'rous band; Ah, tell them they are men!

These shall the fury passions tear,
The vultures of the mind,
Disdainful Anger, pallid Fear,

And Shame that skulks behind;

Or pining Love shall waste their youth,

Or Jealousy with rankling tooth,
That inly gnaws the secret heart;
And Envy wan, and faded Care,
Grim-visaged comfortless Despair,
And Sorrow's piercing dart.
Ambition this shall tempt to rise,

Then whirl the wretch from high,
To bitter Scorn a sacrifice,

And grinning Infamy.

The stings of Falsehood those shall try,
And hard Unkindness' alter'd eye,
That mocks the tear it forced to flow;
And keen Remorse with blood defiled,
And moody Madness laughing wild
Amid severest woe.

Lo! in the vale of years beneath
A grisly troop are seen,

The painful family of Death,

More hideous than their queen :

This racks the joints, this fires the veins,
That every labouring sinew strains,
Those in the deeper vitals rage:
Lo! Poverty, to fill the band,
That numbs the soul with icy hand,
And slow-consuming Age.

To each his sufferings: all are men,
Condemn'd alike to groan;
The tender for another's pain,

The unfeeling for his own.

Yet, ah! why should they know their fate,

Since sorrow never comos too late,

And happiness too swiftly flies?

Thought would destroy their paradise. No more; where ignorance is bliss, "Tis folly to be wise.

Gray.-Born 1716, Died 1771.

908.-HYMN TO ADVERSITY. Daughter of Jove, relentless power, Thou tamer of the human breast, Whose iron scourge, and torturing hour, The bad affright, afflict the best!

When first thy sire to send on earth

Virtue, his darling child, design'd, To thee he gave the heavenly birth,

And bade to form her infant mind. Stern rugged nurse, thy rigid lore With patience many a year she bore: What sorrow was, thou bad'st her know, And from her own she learn'd to melt at others' woe.

Scared at thy frown terrific, fly

Self-pleasing Folly's idle brood,

Wild Laughter, Noise, and thoughtless Joy,
And leave us leisure to be good.
Light they disperse, and with them go

The summer friend, the flattering foe;
By vain Prosperity received,

To her they vow their truth, and are again believed.

Wisdom, in sable garb array'd,

Immersed in rapturous thought profound, And Melancholy, silent maid,

With leaden eye, that loves the ground,
Still on thy solemn steps attend:
Warm Charity, the general friend,
With Justice, to herself severe,

And Pity, dropping soft the sadly-pleasing tear.

Oh, gently on thy suppliant's head,

Dread goddess, lay thy chastening hand! Not in thy gorgon terrors clad,

Nor circled with the vengeful band (As by the impious thou art seen),

With thundering voice, and threatening mien,
With screaming Horror's funeral cry,
Despair, and fell Disease, and ghastly Poverty.

Thy form benign, oh goddess! wear,
Thy milder influence impart,
Thy philosophic train be there,

To soften, not to wound, my heart.
The generous spark extinct revive;
Teach me to love and to forgive;
Exact my own defects to scan,

What others are, to feel, and know myself a

man.

Gray.-Born 1716, Died 1771.

909.-THE BARD.

"Ruin seize thee, ruthless king,
Confusion on thy banners wait:

Though fann'd by conquest's crimson wing,
They mock the air with idle state.
Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail,
Nor e'en thy virtues, tyrant, shall ava

She-wolf of France, with unrelenting fangs, That tear'st the bowels of thy mangled mate,

From thee be born, who o'er thy country hangs

The scourge of heaven! What terrors round him wait!

Amazement in his van, with Flight combined, And Sorrow's faded form, and Solitude behind.

Mighty victor, mighty lord,

Low on his funeral couch he lies!

No pitying heart, no eye afford

A tear to grace his obsequies.

Is the sable warrior fled ?

Thy son is gone. He rests among the dead. The swarm, that in thy noontide beam were born?

Gone to salute the rising morn.

Fair laughs the morn, and soft the zephyr blows,

While proudly riding o'er the azure realm, In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes;

Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm ;

Regardless of the sweeping whirlwind's sway, That, hush'd in grim repose, expects his evening prey.