While others wish thee wise and fair,
A maid of spotless fame,

I'll breathe this more compendious prayer—
May'st thou deserve thy name!

III.

Thy mother's name—a potent spell,

That bids the virtues hie

From mystic grove and living cell

Confess'd to fancy's eye;—

IV.

Meek quietness without offence;
Content in homespun kirtle;

True love; and true love's innocence,

White blossom of the myrtle!

V.

Associates of thy name, sweet child!

These virtues mayst thou win ;

With face as eloquently mild,

To say, they lodge within.

VI.

So, when her tale of days all flown,

Thy mother shall be mist here;

When Heaven at length shall claim its own,

And angels snatch their sister;

VII.

Some hoary-headed friend, perchance,

May gaze with stifled breath;

And oft, in momentary trance,

Forget the waste of death.

VIII.

E'en thus a lovely rose I view'd,

In summer-swelling pride;

Nor mark'd the bud that, green and rude, Peep'd at the rose's side.

IX.

It chanced, I pass'd again that way,
In autumn's latest hour,

And wond'ring saw the selfsame spray
Rich with the selfsame flower.

X.

Ah, fond deceit ! the rude green bud,
Alike in shape, place, name,

Had bloom'd, where bloom'd its parent stud,
Another and the same!

LINES

WRITTEN AT SHURTON BARS, NEAR BRIDGE-WAter, septemBER, 1795, IN ANSWER TO A LETTER FROM BRISTOL.

Good verse most good, and bad verse then seems better Received from absent friend by way of Letter.

For what so sweet can laboured lays impart

As one rude rhyme warm from a friendly heart ?-ANON.

N

OR travels my meandering eye

The starry wilderness on high;

Nor now with curious sight

I mark the glow-worm, as I pass,
Move with "

green radiance"

An emerald of light.

through the grass,

O ever present to my view!
My wafted spirit is with you,
And soothes your boding fears:
I see you all oppressed with gloom
Sit lonely in that cheerless room—
Ah me! You are in tears!

Beloved Woman! did you fly
Chilled Friendship's dark disliking eye,
Or Mirth's untimely din?
With cruel weight these trifles press
A temper sore with tenderness,
When aches the Void within.

But why with sable wand unblest
Should Fancy rouse within my

breast

Dim-visaged shapes of Dread?
Untenanting its beauteous clay
My Sara's soul has wing'd its way,
And hovers round my head!

I felt it prompt the tender dream,
When slowly sank the day's last gleam;
You roused each gentler sense,
As sighing o'er the blossom's bloom
Meek evening wakes its soft perfume
With viewless influence.

And hark, my Love! The sea-breeze moans Through yon reft house! O'er rolling stones In bold ambitious sweep,

The onward-surging tides supply

The silence of the cloudless sky

With mimic thunders deep.

Dark reddening from the channelled Isle1 (Where stands one solitary pile

Unslated by the blast)

The watchfire, like a sullen star,
Twinkles to many a dozing tar
Rude cradled on the mast.

Even there-beneath that light-house towerIn the tumultuous evil hour

Ere Peace with Sara came,

Time was, I should have thought it sweet
To count the echoings of my feet,
And watch the storm-vexed flame.

1 The Holmes, in the Bristol Channel.

And there in black soul-jaundiced fit
A sad gloom-pampered Man to sit,
And listen to the roar :

When mountain surges bellowing deep
With an uncouth monster leap
Plunged foaming on the shore.

Then by the lightning's blaze to mark
Some toiling tempest-shattered bark;
Her vain distress-guns hear;
And when a second sheet of light
Flash'd o'er the blackness of the night-
To see no vessel there!

But Fancy now more gaily sings;
Or if awhile she droop her wings
As sky-larks 'mid the corn,

On summer fields she grounds her breast:
The oblivious poppy o'er her nest
Nods, till returning morn.

O mark those smiling tears, that swell The opened rose! From heaven they fell, And with the sun-beam blend.

Blest visitations from above,

Such are the tender woes of Love
Fostering the heart they bend!

When stormy Midnight howling round
Beats on our roof with clattering sound,
To me your arms you'll stretch:
Great God! you'll say-To us so kind,
O shelter from this loud bleak wind
The houseless, friendless wretch!