Yet bitter, oft-times bitter, was the pang
When of thy loss I thought, beloved Wife!
On thee too fondly did my memory hang,
And on the joys we shared in mortal life,-
The paths which we had trod-these fountains,
flowers;

My new-planned cities, and unfinished towers.

But should suspense permit the Foe to cry,
'Behold they tremble !-haughty their array,
Yet of their number no one dares to die?'
In soul I swept the indignity away:

Old frailties then recurred :-but lofty thought,
In act embodied, my deliverance wrought.

And Thou, though strong in love, art all too weak

In reason, in self-government too slow;

I counsel thee by fortitude to seek

Our blest re-union in the shades below.

The invisible world with thee hath sympathised; Be thy affections raised and solemnised.

Learn by a mortal yearning to ascend-
Seeking a higher object. Love was given,
Encouraged, sanctioned, chiefly for that end;
For this the passion to excess was driven-
That self might be annulled: her bondage prove
The fetters of a dream, opposed to love."

Aloud she shrieked! for Hermes re-appears! Round the dear Shade she would have clung'tis vain:

The hours are past-too brief had they been

years;

And him no mortal effort can detain:

Swift, toward the realms that know not earthly

day,

He through the portal takes his silent way, And on the palace-floor a lifeless corse She lay.

By no weak pity might the Gods be moved; She who thus perished, not without the crime Of lovers that in reason's spite have loved, Was doomed to wear out her appointed time, Apart from happy Ghosts-that gather flowers Of blissful quiet 'mid unfading bowers.

-Yet tears to human suffering are due; And mortal hopes defeated and o'erthrown Are mourned by man, and not by man alone, As fondly he believes.-Upon the side Of Hellespont (such faith was entertained) A knot of spiry trees for ages grew

From out the tomb of him for whom she

died;

And ever, when such stature they had gained That Ilium's walls were subject to their view,

The trees' tall summits withered at the sight; A constant interchange of growth and blight!*

WHO HAD BEEN REPROACHED FOR TAKING LONG WALKS IN THE COUNTRY.

DEAR Child of Nature, let them rail!
-There is a nest in a green dale,

A harbour and a hold,

Where thou, a Wife and Friend, shalt see
Thy own heart-stirring days, and be
A light to young and old.

*For the account of these long-lived trees, see Pliny's Natural History, lib. xvi. cap. 44; and for the features in the character of Protesilaus, see the Iphigenia in Aulis of Euripides. Virgil places the Shade of Laodamia in a mournful region among unhappy Lovers,

It comes.

His Laodamia

There, healthy as a shepherd-boy,
And treading among flowers of joy
Which at no season fade,

Thou, while thy babes around thee cling,
Shalt show us how divine a thing

A Woman may be made.

Thy thoughts and feelings shall not die, Nor leave thee, when grey-hairs are nigh, A melancholy slave;

But an old age serene and bright,

And lovely as a Lapland night,
Shall lead thee to thy grave.

1803.

THE PRIMROSE OF THE ROCK.

A Rock there is whose lonely front
The passing traveller slights;

Yet there the glow-worms hang their lamps.
Like stars, at various heights;

And one coy Primrose to that Rock

The vernal breeze invites.

What hideous warfare hath been waged,
What kingdoms overthrown,
Since first I spied that Primrose-tuft
And marked it for my own;
A lasting link in Nature's chain
From highest heaven let dowr.!

The flowers, still faithful to the stems,
Their fellowship renew;

The stems are faithful to the root,

That worketh out of view;

And to the rock the root adheres

In every fibre true.