Oft did the harvest to their fickle yield, Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke; How jocund did they drive their team afield! How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy ftroke! Let not ambition mock their useful toil, Their homely joy, and destiny obfcure; Nor grandeur hear with a difdainful fmile, The fhort and fimple annals of the poor. The boasts of heraldry, the pomp of power, And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er Awaits alike th' inevitable hour, The paths of glory, lead but to the grave. Forgive, ye proud, the involuntary fault, If memory to these no trophies raise, Where thro' the long-drawn ifle and fretted vault, The pealing anthem fwells the note of praise. Can ftoried urn, or animated buft

gave,

Back to its manfion call the fleeting breath?
Can honour's voice provoke the filent duft,
Or Flatt'ry footh the dull cold car of death?
Perhaps in this neglected fpot is laid
Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire,
Hands that the reins of empire might have fway'd,
Or wak'd to extafy the living lyre.

But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page
Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll;
Chill penury reprefs'd their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of pureft ray ferene, The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear: Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, And wafte its sweetness on the defart air.

Some village-HAMPDEN that with dauntless breaft The little tyrant of his fields withstood: Some mute inglorious MILTON here may rest, Some CROMWELL guiltless of his country's blood. Th' applause of lift'ning fenates to command, The threats of pain and ruin to despise, To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land, And read their hist'ry in a nation's eyes

Their lot forbad: nor circumfcrib'd alone Their growing virtues, but their crimes confin'd; Forbad to wade through slaughter to a throne, And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,

The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
Or heap the shrine of luxury and pride
With incenfe, kindled at the mufe's flame.

Far from the madding crowd's ignoble ftrife,
Their fober wishes never learn'd to ftray;
Along the cool fequefter'd vale of life,
They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.

Yet ev❜n these bones from infult to protect
Some frail memorial still erected nigh,
With uncouth rhimes and shapeless sculpture deck'd,
Implores the paffing tribute of a figh.

Their name, their years, spelt by th' unletter'd

mufe,

The place of fame and elegy fupply,

And many a holy text around fhe ftrews,
That teach the ruftic moralift to dye.

For who to dumb forgetfulnefs a prey,
This pleafing anxious being e'er refign'd,
Left the warm precincts of the chearful day,
Nor caft one longing, ling'ring look behind?

On fome fond breaft the parting foul relies, Some pious drops the clofing eye requires; E'en from the tomb the voice of nature cries, Still in their ashes live their wonted fires.

For thee, who mindful of th' unhonour'd dead Doft in these lines their artlefs tale relate; If chance, by lonely contemplation led, Some kindred spirit fhall enquire thy fate,

Haply fome hoary-headed fwain may fay, • Oft have we feen him at the peep of dawn Brushing with hafty dews away,

6

To meet the fun upon the upland lawn.

There at the foot of yonder nodding beech • That wreathes its old fantastic roots fo high, • His liftlefs length at noontide wou'd he stretch, And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

Hard by yon wood, now finiling as in scorn, • Mutt'ring his wayward fancies he would rove, Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn, 'Or craz'd with care, or crofs'd in hopeless love.

• One morn I mifs'd him on the cuftom'd hill, Along the heath, and near his fav'rite tree; • Another came; nor yet befide the rill,

Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he.
The next with dirges due in fad array,

'Slow thro' the church-way path we saw him borne. Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay, Grav'd on the stone beneath yon aged thorn.

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• There scatter'd oft, the earliest of the year, By hands unseen, are show'rs of violets found; The red-breaft loves to build and warble there, And little footsteps lightly print the ground.

"Here refts his head upon the lap of earth "A youth to fortune and to fame unknown : "Fair Science frown'd not on his humble birth, "And Melancholy mark'd him for her own.

Large was his bounty, and his foul fincere, "Heav'n did a recompence as largely fend: "He gave to misʼry (all he had) a tear ;

He gain'd from heav'n ('twas all he wish'd) a friend. "No farther feek his merits to disclose, "Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, "(There they alike in trembling hope repofe) "The bofom of his father and his God.

ON THE DEATH OF

FREDERIC PRINCE OF WALES.

WRITTEN AT PARIS, BY DAVID LORD VISCOUNT STORMONT, OF CH. CH. OXON.

L

ITTLE I whilom deem'd my artless zeal Should woo the British Muse in foreign land To ftrains of bitter argument, and teach

The mimic Nymph, that haunts the winding verge
And oozy current of Parifian Seine,

To fyllable new founds in accents strange.
But fad occafion calls: who now forbears
The laft kind office? who but confecrates
His off'ring at the shrine of fair Renown
To gracious FREDERIC rais'd; tho' but compos'd
Of the wafte flourets, whofe neglected hues
Chequer the lonely hedge, or mountain slope ?

Where are thofe hopes, where fled th' illufive fcenes That forgeful fancy plan'd, what time the bark Stem'd the falt wave from Albion's chalky bourn? Then filial Piety and parting Love

Pour'd the fond pray'r; "Farewell, ye lefs'ning "cliffs,