So at the couch where infant beauty sleeps.
Her silent watch the mournful mother keeps.

Health shall prolong to many a festive hour
The social pleasures of his humble bower.

Lo! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps, Her silent watch the mournful mother keeps;

She, while the lovely babe unconscious lies,

Smiles on her slumb'ring child with pensive eyes,

And weaves a song of melancholy joy

Sleep, image of thy father, sleep, my boy:

No ling'ring hour of sorrow shall be thine;

No sigh that rends thy father's heart and mine; Bright as his manly sire, the son shall be

In form and soul; but ah! more blest than he!

Thy fame, thy worth, thy filial love, at last,

Shall sooth this aching heart for all the past

With many a smile my solitude repay,

And chace the world's ungenerous scorn away.

"And say, when, summon'd from the world and thee, I lay my head beneath the willow tree,

Wilt thou, sweet mourner! at my stone appear,

And sooth my parted spirit ling'ring near?
Oh, wilt thou come, at ev'ning hour, to shed
The tears of Memory o'er my narrow bed;
With aching temples on thy hand reclin'd,

Muse on the last farewel I leave behind;

Breath a deep sigh to winds that murmur low,

And think on all my love, and all my woe?”

So speaks Affection, ere the infant

Can look regard, or brighten in reply.

eye

But when the cherub lip hath learnt to claim

A mother's ear by that endearing name;

Soon as the playful innocent can prove
A tear of pity, or a smile of love,

Or cons his murm'ring task beneath her care,
Or lisps with holy look his ev'ning prayer,

Or gazing, mutely pensive, sits to hear

The mournful ballad warbled in his ear;
How fondly looks admiring Hope the while,

At every artless tear, and every smile!

How glows the joyous parent to descry

A guileless bosom, true to sympathy!

Where is the troubled heart, consign'd to share

Tumultuous toils, or solitary care,

Unblest by visionary thoughts that stray

To count the joys of Fortune's better day?

Lo, nature, life, and liberty relume

The dim-ey'd tenant of the dungeon gloom;

A long lost friend, or hapless child restor❜d,

Smiles at his blazing hearth and social board;
Warm from his heart the tears of rapture flow,
And Virtue triumps o'er remember'd woe.

Chide not his peace, proud Reason! nor destroy

The shadowy forms of uncreated joy,

That urge the lingering tide of life, and pour
Spontaneous slumber on his midnight hour.

Hark! the wild maniac sings, to chide the gale

That wafts so slow her lover's distant sail

She, sad spectatress, on the wintry shore

;

Watch'd the rude surge his shroudless corse that bore;