To know that we have walked among mankind More sinn'd against than sinning! Happy then To muse on many a sorrow overpast,

And think the business of the day is done, And as the evening of our lives shall close, The peaceful evening, with a Christian's hope Expect the dawn of everlasting day.

Lisbon, 1796.

VI.

ON MY OWN MINIATURE PICTURE,

TAKEN AT TWO YEARS OF AGE.

AND I was once like this! that glowing cheek
Was mine, those pleasure-sparkling eyes; that brow
Smooth as the level lake, when not a breeze
Dies o'er the sleeping surface!.. Twenty years
Have wrought strange alteration! Of the friends
Who once so dearly prized this miniature,
And loved it for its likeness, some are gone
To their last home; and some, estranged in heart,
Beholding me, with quick-averted glance
Pass on the other side. But still these hues
Remain unalter'd, and these features wear
The look of Infancy and Innocence.
I search myself in vain, and find no trace
Of what I was: those lightly arching lines
Dark and o'erhanging now; and that sweet face
Settled in these strong lineaments!.. There were
Who form'd high hopes and flattering ones of thee,
Young Robert! for thine eye was quick to speak
Each opening feeling: should they not have known,
If the rich rainbow on a morning cloud
Reflects its radiant dyes, the husbandman
Beholds the ominous glory, and foresees
Impending storms!.. They augured happily,

That thou didst love each wild and wonderous tale Of faery fiction, and thine infant tongue

Lisp'd with delight the godlike deeds of Greece And rising Rome; therefore they deem'd, forsooth, That thou shouldst tread Preferment's pleasant path. Ill-judging ones! they let thy little feet

Stray in the pleasant paths of Poesy,

And when thou shouldst have prest amid the crowd,
There didst thou love to linger out the day,
Loitering beneath the laurel's barren shade.
SPIRIT OF SPENSER! was the wanderer wrong?

Bristol, 1796.

VII.

ON THE DEATH OF A FAVOURITE OLD SPANIEL.

AND they have drown'd thee then at last! poor Phillis! The burden of old age was heavy on thee,

And yet thou should'st have lived! What though thine eye

Was dim, and watch'd no more with eager joy
The wonted call that on thy dull sense sunk
With fruitless repetition, the warm Sun

Might still have cheer'd thy slumbers; thou didst love
To lick the hand that fed thee, and though past
Youth's active season, even Life itself

Was comfort. Poor old friend, how earnestly
Would I have pleaded for thee! thou hadst been
Still the companion of my boyish sports;
And as I roam'd o'er Avon's woody cliffs,
From many a day-dream has thy short quick bark
Recall'd my wandering soul. I have beguiled
Often the melancholy hours at school,
Sour'd by some little tyrant, with the thought
Of distant home, and I remember'd then
Thy faithful fondness; for not mean the joy,
Returning at the happy holydays,

I felt from thy dumb welcome. Pensively
Sometimes have I remark'd thy slow decay,
Feeling myself changed too, and musing much

On many a sad vicissitude of Life.

Ah, poor companion! when thou followedst last Thy master's parting footsteps to the gate Which closed for ever on him, thou didst lose Thy truest friend, and none was left to plead For the old age of brute fidelity.

But fare thee well! Mine is no narrow creed;
And HE who gave thee being did not frame
The mystery of life to be the sport

Of merciless Man. There is another world
For all that live and move.. a better one!
Where the proud bipeds, who would fain confine
INFINITE GOODNESS to the little bounds

Of their own charity, may envy thee.

Bristol, 1796.