Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, Some village Hampden, that, with dauntless breast, The applause of listening senates to command, And read their history in a nation's eyes, Their lot forbade: nor circumscribed alone The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide, With incense kindled at the muse's flame. Far from the maddening crowd's ignoble strife, They kept the noiseless tenor of their way. Yet even these bones from insult to protect, With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculptures deckt, Their name, their years, spelt by th' unlettered muse, And many a holy text around she strews, For who to dumb forgetfulness a prey This pleasing, anxious being e'er resigned, On some fond breast the parting soul relies, For thee, who, mindful of the unhonoured dead, Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate; Haply some hoary-headed swain may say, There, at the foot of yonder nodding beech, That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high, His listless length at noontide would he stretch, And pore upon the brook that babbles by. 66 Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn, Muttering his wayward fancies he would rove, Now drooping woeful wan, like one forlorn, Or crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless love. "One morn I missed him on th' accustomed hill, Along the heath, and near his favourite tree; Another came; nor yet beside the rill, Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he; "The next, with dirges due, in sad array, Slow through the church-way path we saw him borne ; Approach, and read, (for thou canst read,) the lay, THE EPITAPH. Here rests his head, upon the lap of earth, Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere; He gained from heaven, 't was all he wished, a friend. No farther seek his merits to disclose, Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, (There they alike in trembling hope repose,) The bosom of his Father and his God. THE BARD. GRAY. I. "RUIN seize thee, ruthless king! Though fanned by Conquest's crimson wing, Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail, To save thy secret soul from nightly fears, On a rock, whose haughty brow Frowns o'er old Conway's foaming flood, Robed in the sable garb of woe, With haggard eyes the poet stood; (Loose his beard, and hoary hair Streamed, like a meteor, to the troubled air,) "Hark! how each giant oak and desert cave To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft Llewellyn's lay. "Cold is Cadwallo's tongue, That hushed the stormy main : Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy bed: Mountains, ye mourn in vain 1 The hauberk was a texture of steel ringlets, or rings interwoven, forming a coat of mail, that sat close to the body, and adapted itself to every motion. 2 Gilbert de Clare, surnamed the Red, Earl of Gloucester and Hertford, son-in-law to King Edward. 8 Edmond de Mortimer, Lord of Wigmore. Modred, whose magic song Made huge Plinlimmon bow his cloud-top'd head. Smeared with gore, and ghastly pale: With me in dreadful harmony they join, II. "Weave the warp, and weave the woof, The shrieks of death, through Berkeley's roofs that ring," She-wolf of France, with unrelenting fangs, That tear'st the bowels of thy mangled mate, From thee be born, who o'er thy country hangs The scourge of Heaven." What terrors round him wait! 4 The shores of Carnarvonshire opposite to the Isle of Anglesea. 5 Edward the Second, cruelly butchered in Berkeley Castle. 6 Isabel of France, Edward the Second's adulterous queen. 7 Triumphs of Edward the Third in France. |