• Hast thou not seen some lover pale,
When evening brought the pensive hour,
Step slowly o'er the shadowy vale,
And stop to pluck the fragrant flower?
Those flowers he surely means to strew On lost affection's lowly cell, Tho' there, as fond remembrance grew, Forgotten from the hand they fell.
Has not for thee the fragrant thorn Been taught its first rose to resign, With vain, though pious fondness borne, To deck thy Nancy's honoured shrine ?
'Tis nature pleading in the breast, Fair memory of her works to find; And when to fall she yields the rest, She claims the monumental mind.
Why else the o'ergrown paths of time Would thus the lettered sage explore, With pain these crumbling ruins climb, And on the doubtful sculpture pore?
Why seeks he with unwearied toil,
Thro' death's dim walks to urge his way,
Reclaim his long asserted spoil,
And lead oblivion into day?
'Tis nature prompts, by toil or fear
Unmoved, to range thro' death's domain;
The tender parent loves to hear
Her children's story told again.'
On beds of snow the moon-beam slept,
And chilly was the midnight gloom,
When by the damp grave Ellen wept-
Sweet maid! it was her Lindor's tomb !
A warm tear gushed; the wintry air
Congealed it as it flowed away :
All night it lay an ice-drop there,
At morn it glittered in the ray.
An Angel, wandering from her sphere,
Who saw this bright, this frozen gem,
To dew-eyed Pity brought the tear,
And hung it on her diadem.
But he, the favourite and the flower,
Most cherished since his natal hour,
His mother's image in fair face,
The infant love of all his race,
His martyred father's dearest thought,
My latest care, for whom I sought
To hoard my life, that his might be
Less wretched now, and one day free;
He, too, who yet had held untired
A spirit natural or inspired—
He, too, was struck, and, day by day,
Was withered on the stalk away.
Oh God! it is a fearful thing
To see the human soul take wing
mood:-
any shape, in any
In
I've seen it rushing forth in blood,
I've seen it on the breaking ocean,
Strive with a swoln convulsive motion,
I've seen the sick and ghastly bed
Of sin, delirious with its dread;
But these were horrors-this was woe
Unmixed with such-but sure and slow:
He faded, and so calm and meek,
So softly worn, so sweetly weak,
So tearless, yet so tender-kind,
And grieved for those he left behind;
With all the while a cheek whose bloom
Was as a mockery of the tomb,
Whose tints as gently sink away
As a departing rainbow's ray-
An eye of most transparent light,
That almost made the dungeon bright,
And not a word of murmur-not
A groan o'er his untimely lot,-
A little talk of better days,
A little hope my own to raise,
For I was sunk in silence-lost
In this last loss, of all the most;
And then the sighs he would suppress,
Of fainting nature's feebleness,
More slowly drawn, grew less and less;
I listened, but I could not hear-
I called, for I was wild with fear;
I knew 'twas hopeless, but my dread
Would not be thus admonished;
I called and thought I heard a sound-
I burst my chain with one strong bound,
I only stirred in this black spot,
And rushed to him:-I found him not,
I only lived-I only drew
The accursed breath of dungeon dew;
The last the sole the dearest link
Between me and the eternal brink,
Which bound me to my failing race,
Was broken in this fatal place.
One on the earth, and one beneath-
My brothers-both had ceased to breathe:
I took that hand which lay so still,
Alas! my own was full as chill;
I had not strength to stir, or strive,
But felt that I was still alive-
A frantic feeling,-when we know,
That what we love shall ne'er be so.
I know not why
I could not die,
I had no earthly hope-but faith,
And that forbade a selfish death.
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