“See her, with parent patriot care, The infant orphan-mind prepare, Assur’d, without Instruction’s aid, The proudest nation soon will show A wasted form, a hectic glow, A robb’d, diseas’d, revolting, shade.
“See her with Prince-like spirit pour On genuine worth her ample store[17]; See her, by ev’ry gentle art, Protect the plant she loves to rear, And, as she bathes it with a tear, Grateful it twines around her heart.
“And there are more, of kindred mind;”— When, with a face more bland and kind, The Sage, in soften’d tone, replied: “’Twas Error made to me the den More grateful than the haunts of men; Henceforth mankind shall be my pride.”
[17] This alludes to a munificent donation of a very handsome fortune, which this Lady presented, without any claim of consanguinity or connexion, to a young Lady of great merit.
_To the Tune of “Oh! Lady fair! where art thou going_?”
Sing, bird of grief! still eve descending, And soothe a mind with sorrow rending; Ne’er may I see the blush of morrow, But close this night the sigh of sorrow;
Then, if some wand’rer here directed Shall find my mossy grave neglected, May he replace the weed that’s growing With the nearest flow’r that’s blowing!
_Keeping the Hotel de Lion Blanc, at Dantzig_.
The sign of the house should be chang’d, I’ll be sworn, Where enchanted we find so much beauty and grace; Then quick from the door let the _lion_ be torn, And an _angel_ expand her white wings in his place.
UPON SEEING A BEAUTIFUL INFANT SLEEPING ON THE BOSOM OF ITS MOTHER.
Upon its native pillow dear, The little slumb’rer finds repose; His fragrant breath eludes the ear— A zephyr passing o’er a rose.
(Love’s little throne!) shalt thou be torn; Time hovers o’er thy downy nest, To crown thy baby-brow with thorn.
Ah! thoughtless! couldst thou now but see On what a world thou soon must move, Or taste the cup prepar’d for thee Of grief, lost hopes, or widow’d love,
Ne’er from that breast thou’d’st raise thine head, But thou would’st breathe to Heav’n a pray’r To let thee, ere thy blossom fade, In one fond sigh exhale thee there.
_The deserted Palace of the late Queen Dowager Juliana Maria_[18].
Bless’d are the steps of Virtue’s queen! Where’er she moves fresh roses bloom; And, when she droops, kind Nature pours Her genuine tears in gentle show’rs, That love to dew the willow green That over-canopies her tomb.