That spark unburied in its mortal frame,
With living light, eternal, and the same,
Shall beam on Joy's interminable years,
Unveiled by darkness-unassuaged by tears!
"Yet, on the barren shore and stormy deep,
One tedious watch is Conrad doomed to weep;
But when I gain the home without a friend,
And press the uneasy couch where none attend,
This last embrace, still cherished in my heart,
Shall calm the struggling spirit ere it part;
Thy darling form shall seem to hover nigh,
And hush the groan of life's last agony !
"Farewell! when strangers lift thy father's bier, And place my nameless stone without a tear; When each returning pledge hath told my child That Conrad's tomb is on the desert piled; And when the dream of troubled Fancy sees Its lonely rank grass waving in the breeze; Who then will soothe thy grief, when mine is o'er? Who will protect thee, helpless Ellenore? Shall secret scenes thy filial sorrows hide, Scorned by the world, to factious guilt allied? Ah! no; methinks the generous and the good Will woo thee from the shades of solitude! O'er friendless grief compassion shall awake, And smile on innocence, for Mercy's sake!"
Inspiring thought of rapture yet to be,
The tears of love were hopeless, but for thee!
If in that frame no deathless spirit dwell,
If that faint murmur be the last farewell,
If Fate unite the faithful but to part,
Why is their memory sacred to the heart?
Why does the brother of my childhood seem
Restored a while in every pleasing dream?
Why do I joy the lonely spot to view,
By artless friendship blessed when life was new?
Eternal HOPE! when yonder spheres sublime
Pealed their first notes to sound the march of Time,
Thy joyous note began-but not to fade.
When all the sister planets have decayed;
When wrapt in fire the realms of ether glow,
And Heaven's last thunder shakes the world below;
Thou, undismayed, shalt o'er the ruins smile,
And light thy torch at Nature's funeral pile.
HE last, the fatal hour is come,
That bears my love from me;
I hear the dead note of the drum,
I mark the gallows' tree!
The bell has tolled: it shakes my heart;
The trumpet speaks thy name;
And must my Gilderoy depart
To bear a death of shame?
No bosom trembles for thy doom;
No mourner wipes a tear;
The gallows' foot is all thy tomb,
The sledge is all thy bier.
Oh, Gilderoy! bethought we then
So soon, so sad to part,
When first in Roslin's lovely glen
You triumphed o'er my heart?
Your locks they glittered to the sheen,
Your hunter garb was trim;
And graceful was the ribbon green
That bound your manly limb!
Ah! little thought I to deplore
Those limbs in fetters bound,
Or hear upon the scaffold floor
The midnight hammer sound.
Ye cruel, cruel, that combined
The guiltless to pursue;
My Gilderoy was ever kind,
He could not injure you!
A long adieu! but where shall fly
Thy widow all forlorn,
When every mean and cruel eye
Regards my woe with scorn?
Yes they will mock thy widow's tears,
And hate thine orphan boy;
Alas! his infant beauty wears
The form of Gilderoy.
Then will I seek the dreary mound
That wraps thy mouldering clay,
And weep and linger on the ground,
And sigh my heart away.
N the green banks of Shannon, when Sheelah was nigh,
No blithe Irish lad was so happy as I ;
No harp like my own could so cheerily play,
And wherever I went was my poor dog Tray.
When at last I was forced from my Sheelah to part,
She said (while the sorrow was big at her heart),
"Oh! remember your Sheelah when far, far away;
And be kind, my dear Pat, to our poor dog Tray."
Poor dog! he was faithful and kind, to be sure,
And he constantly loved me, although I was poor;
When the sour-looking folks sent me heartless away,
I had always a friend in my poor dog Tray.
When the road was so dark, and the night was so cold,
And Pat and his dog were grown weary and old,
How snugly we slept in my old coat of grey,
And he licked me for kindness-my poor dog Tray.
Though my wallet was scant, I remembered his case,
Nor refused my last crust to his pitiful face;
But he died at my feet on a cold winter day,
And I played a sad lament for my poor dog Tray.
Where now shall I go, poor, forsaken, and blind?
Can I find one to guide me, so faithful, and kind?
To my sweet native village, so far, far away,
I can never more return with my poor dog Tray.
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