Some coarser substance, unrefin'd, Plac'd for her lordly use thus far, thus vile, below. 'Where, where is Love's fond, tender throe, With lordly Honour's lofty brow, The pow'rs you proudly own? [prayers! Regardless of her tears, and unavailing Perhaps, this hour, in misery's squalid nest, She strains your infant to her joyless breast, And with a mother's fears shrinks at the rocking blast! 'O ye! who, sunk in beds of down, Whom friends and fortune quite disown' Stretch'd on his straw, he lays himself to sleep, w Flaky snow, And hail'd the morning with a cheer, A cottage-rousing craw. But deep this truth impress'd my mind— The heart, benevolent and kind, THE LAMENT, Occasioned by the unfortunate issue of a Friend's Amour. Alas! how oft does Goodness wound itself, And sweet Affection prove the spring of woe!-Home. O THOU pale orb, that silent shines, While care-untroubled mortals sleep! Beneath thy wan unwarming beam; I joyless view thy rays adorn For ever bar returning peace! No idly-feign'd poetic pains, My sad love-lorn lamentings claim; Encircled in her clasping arms, How have the raptur'd moments flown How have I wish'd for Fortune's charms, For her dear sake, and hers alone! O! can she bear so base a heart So lost to honour, lost to truth, As from the fondest lover part, The plighted husband of her youth! Alas! life's path may be unsmooth! Her way may lie through rough distress! Then, who her pangs and pains will soothe, Her sorrows share, and make them less? Ye winged hours that o'er us past, Enraptur'd more, the more enjoy'd, Your dear remembrance in my breast, My fondly treasur'd thoughts employ'd. That breast, how dreary now, and void, For her too scanty once of room! Ev'n ev'ry ray of hope destroy'd, And not a wish to gild the gloom! The morn that warns th' approaching day, That I must suffer, lingering, slow. And when my nightly couch I try, Or, if I slumber, Fancy, chief, From such a horror-breathing night! O thou bright queen, who o'er the expanse Observ'd us, fondly-wand'ring, stray! While love's luxurious pulse beat high, LAMENT, Written when the Author was about to leave his native country. C'ER the mist-shrouded cliffs of the lone mountain straying, Where the wild winds of winter incessantly rave, What woes wring my heart while intently sur[wave. veying The storm's gloomy path on the breast of the Ye foam-crested billows, allow me to wail, Ere ye toss me afar from my lov'd native shore; Where the flower which bloom'd sweetest in Coila's green vale, The pride o' my bosom, my Mary's no more. A detail of the circumstance on which this affecting Poem was composed will be found in Lockhart's Life of the Poet, p. 85. 7 First published in the Dumfrics Weekly Journal, July 5th, 1815. |