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 roll❜d 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 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 To think what a long line of titles may follow How proud they can press to the fun❜ral array Of one whom they shunn'd in his sickness and sor row : How bailiffs may seize his last blanket, to-day, Whose pall shall be held up by nobles, to-morrow! And Thou, too, whose life, a sick epicure's dream, cast: No, not for the wealth of the land that supplies thee With millions to heap upon Foppery's shrine ;No, not for the riches of all who despise thee, Though this would make Europe's whole opulence mine ; Would I suffer what-even in the heart that thou hast All mean as it is-must have consciously burn'd, |