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Faft by the ftream, that bounds your just domain, And tells you were ye have a right to reign,

A nation dwells, not envious of your throne, Studious of peace, their neighbours', and their own. Ill-fated race! how deeply muft they rue

Their only crime, vicinity to you!

The trumpet founds, your legions swarm abroad,
Through the ripe harvest lies their destined road;
At every ftep beneath their feet they tread
The life of multitudes, a nation's bread!
Earth feems a garden in its loveliest drefs
Before them, and behind a wilderness.
Famine, and peftilence, her firft-born fon,
Attend to finish what the sword begun ;
And echoing praises, such as fiends might earn,
And folly pays, refound at your return.

A calm fucceeds-but plenty, with her train
Of heart-felt joys, fucceeds not foon again,
And years of pining indigence must show
What fcourges are the gods that rule below.

Yet man, laborious man by flow degrees,
(Such is his thirft of opulence and ease)
Plies all the finews of induftrious toil,
Gleans up the refufe of the general spoil,
Rebuilds the towers, that fmoked upon the plain,
And the fun gilds the fhining fpires again.

Increafing commerce and reviving art

Renew the quarrel on the conquerors part;
And the fad leffon must be learned once more,
That wealth within is ruin at the door.
What are ye, monarchs, laurelled heroes, fay,
But Etnas of the fuffering world ye fway?
Sweet nature, ftripped of her embroidered robe,
Deplores the wasted regions of her globe;
And ftands a witnefs at truth's awful bar,
To prove you there, deftroyers as ye are.

Oh place me in fome heaven-protected ifle,
Where peace, and equity, and freedom fmile;
Where no volcano pours his fiery flood,
No crefted warrior dips his plume in blood;
Where power fecures what induftry has won;
Where to fucceed is not to be undone;
A land, that diftant tyrants hate in vain,
In Britain's ifle, beneath a George's reign!

ON THE RECEIPT OF

MY MOTHER'S PICTURE

OUT OF NORFOLK.

THE GIFT OF MY COUSIN ANN BODHAM.

OH that thofe lips had language! Life has paffed
With ine but roughly fince I heard thee laft.
Thofe lips are thine-thy own sweet smiles I see,
The fame, that oft in childhood folaced me;
Voice only fails, else, how diftin&t they say,
"Grieve not, my child, chafe all thy fears away!"
The meek intelligence of thofe dear eyes
(Bleft be the art that can immortalize,

The art that baffles time's tyrannic claim
To quench it) here fhines on me ftill the fame.
Faithful remembraucer of one fo dear,

Oh welcome gueft, though unexpected here!
Who biddeft me honour with an artless song,
Affectionate, a mother loft fo long.

I will obey, not willingly alone,

But gladly, as the precept were her own:
And, while that face renews my filial grief,
Fancy fhall weave a charm for my relief,

Shall fteep me in Elyfian reverie,

A momentary dream, that thou art fhe.

My mother! when I learned that thou waft dead, Say, waft thou confcious of the tears I fhed?

Hovered thy fpirit o'er thy forrowing fon,
Wretch even then, life's journey just begun ?
Perhaps thou gavest me, though unseen, a kiss;
Perhaps a tear, if fouls can weep in blifs-
Ah that maternal smile! it anfwers-Yes..
I heard the bell tolled on thy burial day,
I faw the hearfe, that bore thee flow away,
And, turning from my nursery window, drew
A long, long figh, and wept a laft adieu !

But was it fuch? It was.-Where thou art gone
Adieus and farewells are a found unknown.

:

May I but meet thee on that peaceful shore,

The parting found fhall pafs my lips no more!
Thy maidens, grieved themselves at my concern,
Oft gave me promise of a quick return.
What ardently I wished, I long believed,
And, disappointed ftill, was ftill deceived.
By disappointment every day beguiled,
Pupe of to-morrow even from a child.
Thus many a fad to-morrow came and went,
Till, all my ftock of infant forrow spent,

I learned at laft fubmiffion to my lot,

But, though I lefs deplored thee, ne'er forgot.

Where once we dwelt our name is heard no more,
Children not thine have trod my nursery floor;
And where the gardener Robin, day by day,
Drew me to school along the public way,
Delighted with my bauble coach, and wrapt
In fcarlet mantle warm, and velvet capt,
'Tis now become a hiftory little known,
That once we called the paftoral house our own.
Short lived poffeffion! but the record fair,
That memory keeps of all thy kindness there,
Still outlives many a ftorm, that has effaced

A thousand other themes lefs deeply traced.
Thy nightly vifits to my chamber made,

That thou mightest know me safe and warmly laid;
Thy morning bounties ere I left my home,

The bifcuit, or confectionary plum;

The fragrant waters on my cheeks beftowed

By thy own hand, till fresh they fhone and glowed;
All this, and more endearing ftill than all,

Thy conftant flow of love, that knew no fall,
Ne'er roughened by thofe cataracts and breaks,

That humour interpofed too often makes;
All this ftill legible in memory's page,

And ftill to be fo to my lateft age,

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