"Henry," she said, "by thy dear form subdued, See the sad relics of a nymph undone ! I find, I find this rising sob renew'd: I sigh in shades, and sicken at the sun. Amid the dreary gloom of night I cry, When will the morn's once pleasing scenes return? Yet what can morn's returning ray supply, But foes that triumph, or but friends that mourn ! Alas! no more that joyous morn appears The vocal birds that raise their matin strain, If through the garden's flowery tribes I stray, Where bloom the jasmines that could once allure, Hope not to find delight in us, they say, For we are spotless, Jessy; we are pure. Ye flowers that well reproach a nymph so frail; Was not so fragrant, and was not so fair. Now the grave old alarm the gentler young; And all my fame's abhorr'd contagion flee; Trembles each lip, and faulters every tongue, That bids the morn propitious smile on me. Thus for your sake I shun each human eye; Lest my sad fate should nourish pangs for you. Raise me from earth; the pains of want remove, Be but my friend; I ask no dearer name; Be such the meed of some more artful fair; Nor could it heal my peace, or chase my shame, That pity gave, what love refus'd to share. Force not my tongue to ask its scanty bread; Haply, when age has silver'd o'er my hair, Malice may learn to scorn so mean a spoil; Envy may slight a face no longer fair; And pity welcome to my native soil." She spoke nor was I born of savage race; Nor could these hands a niggard boon assign; Grateful she clasp'd me in a last embrace, And vow'd to waste her life in pray'rs for mine. I saw her foot the lofty bark ascend; I saw her breast with every passion heave; I left her-torn from every earthly friend; Oh! my hard bosom, which could bear to leave! Brief let me be; the fatal storm arose ; And see my youth's impetuous fires decay; FROM RURAL ELEGANCE. AN ODE TO THE LATE DUCHESS OF SOMERSET. WHILE orient skies restore the day, Ye rural thanes that o'er the mossy down Some panting, timorous hare pursue; Does nature mean your joys alone to crown?) Say, does she smooth her lawns for you? For you does echo bid the rocks reply, And, urg'd by rude constraint, resound the jovial : cry? See from the neighbouring hill, forlorn, He finds his labour'd crops a prey; And with no random curses loads the deed. Nor yet, ye swains, conclude, That nature smiles for you alone; Your bounded souls, and your conceptions crude, The proud, the selfish boast disown: Yours be the produce of the soil: Nor ever the defenceless train Of clinging infants ask support in vain ? But though the various harvest gild your plains, Does the mere landscape feast your eye? Or the warm hope of distant gains Far other cause of glee supply? Where Ariconium pours her gems profuse, Athirst ye praise the limpid stream, 'tis true: The limpid fountain murmurs not for you. Unpleas'd ye see the thickets bloom, Unpleas'd the spring her flowery robe resume; Unmov'd the mountain's airy pile, The dappled mead without a smile. O let a rural conscious Muse, For well she knows, your froward sense accuse : Forth to the solemn oak you bring the square, And span the massy trunk, before you cry, 'tis fair. Nor yet, ye learn'd, nor yet ye courtly train, She, where she pleases kind or coy, Then hither bring the fair ingenuous mind, Lo! not an hedge-row hawthorn blows, |