ON CAPTAIN RICHARD PINDER,
Beneath wide ocean's distant wave he sleeps, While widow'd love, in silent anguish weeps; Till that dread day, when from their wat❜ry bed, The raging sea shall render up its dead.
All those we love decay, we die in part,
String after string is sever'd from the heart;
Till loossen'd life, at last but breathing clay,
Without one pang is glad to fall away.
Unhappy he who latest feels the blow,
Whose eyes have wept o'er every friend laid low;
Dragg'd lingering on from partial death to death,
Till dying, all he can, resigns his breath.
Should nature mourn the rigid doom that gave, To youth and innocence an early grave;
Since freed from human ills a numerous train, The child and husband's loss is her eternal gain.
Cross Canonby_church-yard.
Here lies interr'd a chaste and virtuous wife,
Who smil'd at death, and calm resign'd her life;
The soul dismantl'd of its cumbrous clay,
To bliss eternal now has wing'd its way;
Long live her offspring, grant thou power divine,
And all the mother in her children shine.
In her was all affection could require,
All duty ask'd, all friendship could require;
Humanity was hers and strength of mind,
With every milder exercise combin'd,
While virtue eager to complete the whole,
Diffus'd her magic colouring o'er her soul,
ON LIEUTENANT PEARSON, HAWKSDALE.
Required to pass thro' life's eventful day,
How soon its pageant duties fade away,
A chequer'd hue, our earthly passage wears,
And virtue's blossoms are obscured by tears.
Here clasp'd in death's oblivious slumber sleeps,
The valued friend o'er whom affection weeps;
But hark! the trumpet sounds the clarion's ring,
Hope springs to meet our Prophet and our King,
A Saviour's hallow'd love shall pierce the clod,
And bid the pure in heart behold their God.
Castle-carrick church-yard.
MARY, Wife of THOMAS DIXON.
In ample currents let my sorrows flow,
And burst in all the sentiments of woe;
I've lost a friend to me sincerely dear,
My sole support of ev'ry joy lies here;
Below this stone remote from noise and strife,
The tender mother and the loving wife;
Reclines her head upon this hap of clay,
Her sudden death snatch'd all my joys away,
Her infant babe who never saw the light,
Lock'd in her arms remains in constant night;
Oft has she wip'd away the widow's tear,
And made the orphan's grateful smile appear;
Now the pure soul is from the body flown,
Confin'd in dust the body lies alone;
But shall awake at the last powerful voice,
And with the saints in triumph shall rejoice.
ON MARY BOWMAN, BURDOSWALD.
Unpitying death, and the destroyer time,
Here fix'd my period ere I reach'd my prime ;
Cropt as a flow'r I wither'd in my bloom,
Tho' flattering hope had promis'd years to come.
All things are right that God has done,
Then marvel not I'm called so young.
The following Epitaph was formerly in
Sir Rowland Vaux, that sometime was the lord of Triermain,
Is dead, his body clad in lead, and lies low under this
Ev'n as we, ev'n so was he, on earth a levan man,
Ev'n as he, ev'n so maun we, for all the craft we can.
ON ISAAC AND SARAH FORSTER.
Ah! death at thy command we fall,
The old and young alike obey thy call;
No strength or beauty can thy power withstand,
Could youth or goodness made thee relent,
Thou had'st not here these helpless captives sent.
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