Where are the years with pleasure gay? How bright their course! how short their stay!-- Where are the crowns, that round my head A double glory vainly spread? Where are the beauties wont to move, The grace, converting awe to love? Alas, had fate design'd to bless, Its equal hand had giv'n me less!
Why did the regal garb array A breast that tender passions sway? A soul of unsuspicious frame, Which leans with faith on friendship's name-- Ye vanish'd hopes! ye broken ties! By perfidy, in friendship's guise, This breast was injur'd, lost, betray'd-- Where, where shall Mary look for aid?
How could I hope redress to find Stern rival! from thy envious mind? How could I e'er thy words believe? O ever practis'd to deceive! Thy wiles abhorr'd shall please alone Cold bosoms, selfish as thy own; While ages hence, indignant hear The horrors of my fate severe.
Have not thy unrelenting hands Torn nature's most endearing bands? Whate'er I hop'd from woman's name, The ties of blood, the stranger's claim; A sister-queen's despairing breast On thee securely lean'd for rest; On thee! from whom that breast has bled With sharper ills than those I fled,
Oh, skill'd in every baser art! Tyrant! to this unguarded heart No guilt so black as thine belongs, Which loads my length'ning years with wrongs. Strike then at once, insatiate foe! The long, premeditated blow; So shall thy jealous terrors cease, And Mary's harrass'd soul have peace.
As roam'd a pilgrim o'er the mountain drear, On whose lone verge the foaming billows roar; The wail of hopeless sorrow pierc'd his ear, And swell'd at distance on the sounding shore.
The mourner breath'd her deep complaint to night, Her moan she mingled with the rapid blast; That bar'd her bosom in its wasting flight, And o'er the earth her scatter'd tresses cast!
"Ye winds, she cried, still heave the lab'ring deep, "The mountain shake, the howling forest rend; "Still dash the shiv'ring fragment from the steep, "Nor for a wretch like me the storm suspend.
"Ah, wherefore wish the rising storm to spare? "Ah, why implore the raging winds to save? "What refuge can the breast where lives despair "Desire but death? what shelter but the grave?
"To me congenial is the gloom of night, "The savage howlings that infest the air; "I unappall'd can view the fatal light, "That flashes from the pointed lightning's glare.