III. Yet, I feel my heart is breaking, When I think I stray from thee, Round the world that quiet seeking Which I fear is not for me. Farewell, Bessy! IV. Calm to peace thy lover's bosom Can it, dearest! must it be? Farewell, Bessy! TRIFLE S. LINES On the Death of Mr. P-rc-v-l. In the dirge we sung o'er him no censure was heard, Unembitter'd and free did the tear-drop descend; We forgot in that hour how the statesman had err’d, And wept for the husband, the father, and friend. Oh! proud was the meed his integrity won, And generous indeed were the tears that we shed, When in grief we forgot all the ill he had done, And, though wrong'd by him living, bewail'd him when dead. Even now, if one harsher emotion intrude, 'Tis to wish he had chosen some lowlier stateHad known what he was, and, content to be good, Had ne'er, for our ruin, aspired to be great. So, left through their own little orbit to move, His years might have rollid inoffensive away; His children might still have been bless'd with his love, And England would ne'er have been cursed with his sway. LINES On the Death of Sh-r-d-n. Principibus placuisse viris.- Hor. Yes, grief will have way—but the fast-falling tear Shall be mingled with deep execrations on those Who could bask in that spirit's meridian career, And yet leave it thus lonely and dark at its close : Whose vanity flew round him, only while fed By the odour his fame in its summer-time gave;Whose vanity now, with quick scent for the dead, Like the Ghole of the East, comes to feed at his grave Oh! it sickens the heart to see bosoms so hollow And spirits so mean in the great and high-born; |