Elate of Heart and confident of Such was the sad and gloomy hour Fame, From vales where Avon sports, the Prepared the l'oison's death-cold power. Minstrel came, When anguish'd care of sullen brow Already to thy lips was rais'd the bowl, 60 Thy fixed eyes she bade thee roll Thy native cot she held to view, With generous joy he views th' ideal | And mark thy mother's thrilling tear, gold: He listens to many a Widow's prayers, She made thee feel her deep - drawn. sigh, And many an Orphan's thanks he And all her silent agony of Woe. hears; He soothes to peace the care-worn And from thy Fate shall such distress ensue? He bids the Debtor's eyes know Ah! dash the poison'd chalice from thy And Liberty and Bliss behold: hand! 70 And thou had'st dash'd it at her soft But that Despair and Indignation rose, The dread dependence on the low-born Told every Woe, for which thy breast might smart, Neglect and grinning scorn and Want combin❜d Recoiling back, thou sent'st the friend of Pain To roll a tide of Death thro' every freezing vein. 'Tis hard on Bagshot Heath to try What tho' around thy drowsy head 96 Curst road! whose execrable way Was darkly shadow'd out in Milton's lay, When the sad fiends thro' Hell's. sulphureous roads Took the first survey of their new abodes; Or when the fall'n Archangel fierce What time the Bloodhound lured by Thro' all Confusion's quagmires floundering went. Nor cheering pipe, nor Bird's shrill note Thou mightier Goddess, thou demand'st my lay, Born when earth was seized with cholic ; Or as more sapient sages say, Compell'd their beings to enshrine And hog and devil mingling grunt and yell Seized on the ear with horrible obtrusion ; Then if aright old legendaries tell, Wert thou begot by Discord on Confusion! What though no name's sonorous power Sable clerk of Tiverton. And oft where Otter sports his stream, 'Tis thou who pour'st the scritch-owl note ! Transported hear'st thy children all Scrape and blow and squeak and squall, And while old Otter's steeple rings, Clappest hoarse thy raven wings! Yet here her pensive ghost delights to stay; Oft pouring on the winds the broken. lay And hark, I hear her-'twas the passing blast. I love to sit upon her tomb's dark grass, Then Memory backward rolls Time's shadowy tide; The tales of other days before me glide: With eager thought I seize them as they pass; For fair, tho' faint, the forms of Memory gleam, Like Heaven's bright beauteous bow reflected in the stream. ? 1790. |