WRITTEN BY COURTNEY MELMOTH, ESQ.,
ON THE DEATH OF EMINENT ENGLISH POETS.
THE TEARS OF GENIUS.
THE village bell tolls out the note of death, And through the echoing air the length'ning sound, With dreadful pause, reverberating deep, Spreads the sad tidings o'er fair Auburn's vale. There, to enjoy the scenes her bard had praised In all the sweet simplicity of song, GENIUS, in pilgrim garb, sequester'd sat, And herded jocund with the harmless swains; But when she heard the fate-foreboding knell, With startled step, precipitate and swift, And look pathetic, full of dire presage, The church-way walk beside the neigb'ring green, Sorrowing she sought; and there, in black array, Borne on the shoulders of the swains he loved, She saw the boast of Auburn moved along.
Touch'd at the view, her pensive breast she struck,
And to the cypress, which incumbent hangs,
With leaning slope and branch irregular,
O'er the moss'd pillars of the sacred fane,
The brier-bound graves shadowing with funeral gloom,
Forlorn she hied; and there the crowding wo
(Swell'd by the parent) press'd on bleeding thought,
Big ran the drops from her maternal eye,
Fast broke the bosom-sorrow from her heart, ·
And pale Distress sat sickly on her cheek,
As thus her plaintive Elegy began:
'And must my children all expire?
Shall none be left to strike the lyre?
Courts Death alone a learned prize?
Falls his shafts only on the wise?
Can no fit marks on earth be found,
From useless thousands swarming round?
What crowding ciphers cram the land.
What hosts of victims, at command!
Yet shall the ingenious drop alone?
Shall Science grace the tyrant's throne?
Thou murd❜rer of the tuneful train,
I charge thee with my children slain!
Scarce has the sun thrice urged his annual tour,
Since half my race have felt thy barbarous power;
Sore hast thou thinn'd each pleasing art,
And struck a muse with every dart;
Bard after bard obey'd thy slaughtering call,
Till scarce a poet lives to sing a brother's fall.
Then let a widow'd mother pay
The tribute of a parting lay;
Tearful, inscribe the monumental strain,
And speak aloud her feelings and her pain!
'And first, farewell to thee, my son,' she cried,
'Thou pride of Auburn's dale - sweet bard, farewell!
Long for thy sake the peasant's tear shall flow,
And many a virgin bosom heave with woe;
For thee shall sorrow sadden all the scene,
And every pastime perish on the green;
The sturdy farmer shall suspend his tale,
The woodman's ballad shall no more regale,
No more shall Mirth each rustic sport inspire,
But every frolic, every feat, shall tire.
No more the evening gambol shall delight,
Nor moonshine-revels crown the vacant night;
But groups of villagers (each joy forgot)
Shall form a sad assembly round the cot.
Sweet bard, farewell! and farewell, Auburn's bliss, The bashful lover, and the yielded kiss:
The evening warble Philomela made,
The echoing forest, and the whispering shade,
The winding brook, the bleat of brute content,
And the blithe voice that "whistled as it went:"
These shall no longer charm the ploughman's care,
But sighs shall fill the pauses of despair.
'GOLDSMITH, adieu; the "book-learn'd priest" for thee
Shall now in vain possess his festive glee,
The oft-heard jest in vain he shall reveal,
For now, alas! the jest he cannot feel.
But ruddy damsels o'er thy tomb shall bend,
And conscious weep for their and virtue's friend;
The milkmaid shall reject the shepherd's song,
And cease to carol as she toils along:
All Auburn shall bewail the fatal day,
When from her fields their pride was snatch'd away.
And even the matron of the cressy lake,
In piteous plight, her palsied head shall shake,
While all adown the furrows of her face
Slow shall the lingering tears each other trace.
And, oh, my child! severer woes remain
To all the houseless and unshelter'd train!
Thy fate shall sadden many an humble guest,
And heap fresh anguish on the beggar's breast;
For dear wert thou to all the sons of pain,
To all that wander, sorrow or complain :
Dear to the learned, to the simple dear,
For daily blessing mark'd thy virtuous year;
The rich received a moral from thy head,
And from thy heart the stranger found a bed:
Distress came always smiling from thy door;
For God had made thee agent to the poor,
Had form'd thy feelings on the noblest plan,
To grace at once the poet and the man.'
DARK as the night, which now in dunnest robe
Ascends her zenith o'er the silent globe,
Sad Melancholy wakes, a while to tread,
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