DIRGE

For him who shall deserve it.

Stay your walk ye weeping throng,
Rest the bier in solemn show:
Hush awhile your funeral song :
Bear not hence the sight of woe.

We were met beneath this tree

Wreaths for Freedom's feast to twine,

Here to coil the dance of glee,

Here to quaff the sparkling wine;

Here to shout the names of those

Whom a nation's thank pursues ; Here to swell the songs we chose Virtuous daring to diffuse.

This was he who won our feast,
And in victory's bosom fell;
Honour'd be the Hero's rest,

Praise beside his tomb shall dwell,

On his sable pall ye bear

The steel in fields of blood he shook, Leave the holy weapon here;

Hang it high on Freedom's oak.

Youths that seek the battle's strife,
Grasping this incrimson'd steel,

Shall swear like him to value life
Only for their country's weal.

Patriot shades, who hover nigh, When the priest his corse has blest, Guide his spirit to your sky,

He with patriot shades shall rest;

Thence the whitening bones to view
Of the bands our tyrants led,
Thence with looks of scorn pursue
Who from Freedom's banners fled.

Onward walk, ye weeping throng,
Lift the bier in mournful show:
Chaunt away your funeral song:

We have paid the debt to woe.

To Mr. OPIE,

On his having painted for me the picture of MRS. TWISS.

Hail to thy pencil! well its glowing art
Has traced those features painted on my heart:
Now, tho' in distant scenes she soon will rove,
Still shall I here behold the friend I love;
Still see that smile" endearing, artless, kind,"
The eye's mild beam that speaks the candid mind,
Which, sportive oft, yet fearful to offend,
By humour charms, but never wounds a friend.
But in my breast contending feelings rise,
While this lov'd semblance fascinates my eyes;
Now pleas'd, I mark the painter's skilful line,
Now joy, because the skill I mark was thine :
And while I prize the gift by thee bestow'd,
My heart proclaims I'm of the giver proud.
Thus pride and friendship war with equal strife,
And now the FRIEND exults, and now the wIFE.
AMELIA OPIE, 1799.

The OAK of our FATHERS.

Alas for the Oak of our Fathers that stood
In its beauty, the glory and pride of the wood!

It and it flourish'd for many an age, grew

And many a tempest wreak'd on it its rage,

But when its strong branches were bent with the blast, It struck its roots deeper and flourish'd more fast.

Its head tower'd high, and its branches spread round, For its roots were struck deep, and its heart it was sound; The bees o'er its honey-dew'd foliage play'd,

And the beasts of the forest fed under its shade.

The Oak of our Fathers to Freedom was dear,
Its leaves were her crown, and its wood was her spear.
Alas for the Oak of our Fathers that stood

In its beauty, the glory and pride of the wood!

There crept up an ivy and clung round the trunk,
It struck in its mouths and its juices it drunk ;
The branches grew sickly deprived of their food,
And the Oak was no longer the pride of the wood.

The foresters saw and they gather'd around,

Its roots still were fast, and its heart still was sound;
They lopt off the boughs that so beautiful spread,
But the ivy they spared on its vitals that fed.

No longer the bees o'er its honey-dews play'd,
Nor the beasts of the forest fed under its fhade;
Lopt and mangled the trunk in its ruin is seen,
A monument now what its beauty has been.

The Oak has received its incurable wound

They have loosened the roots, tho' the heart may be sound; What the travellers at distance green-flourishing see, Are the leaves of the ivy that ruined the tree.

Alas for the Oak of our Fathers that stood
In its beauty, the glory and pride of the wood!

R. S.