BENEATH the chancel's hallow'd stone,
Exposed to every rustic tread,
To few, save rustic mourners, known,
My brother, is thy lowly bed.
Few words, upon the rough stone graven,
Thy name-thy birth-thy youth declare--
Thy innocence-thy hopes of Heaven-
In simplest phrase recorded there.
No 'scutcheons shine, no banners wave,
In mockery, o'er my brother's grave.
The place is silent-rarely sound
Is heard those ancient walls around;
Nor mirthful voice of friends that meet
Discoursing in the public street,
Nor hum of business dull and loud,
Nor murmur of the passing crowd,
Nor soldier's drum, nor trumpet's swell,
From neighbouring fort or citadel,-
* This poem was written when the author was an Eton boy, and of course abounds with faults of composition. He has, however, thought it better to leave these than to correct them.
No sound of human toil or strife
To death's lone dwelling speaks of life
Nor breaks the silence still and deep
Where thou, beneath thy burial stone,
Art laid" in that unstartled sleep
The living eye hath never known."
The lonely sexton's footstep falls
In dismal echoes on the walls,
As, slowly pacing through the aisle,
He sweeps the unholy dust away,
And cobwebs, which must not defile
Those windows on the Sabbath day;
And, passing through the central nave,
Treads lightly on my brother's grave.
But when the sweet-toned Sabbath chime,
Pouring its music on the breeze,
Proclaims the well-known holy time
Of prayer, and thanks, and bended knees; When rustic crowds devoutly meet,
And lips and hearts to God are given,
And souls enjoy oblivion sweet
Of earthly ills, in thoughts of Heaven;
What voice of calm and solemn tone
Is heard above thy burial stone?
What form, in priestly meek array,
Beside the altar kneels to pray?
What holy hands are lifted up
To bless the sacramental cup?
Full well I know that rev'rend form,
And if a voice could reach the dead,
Those tones would reach thee, though the worm,
My brother, makes thy heart his bed;
That Sire, who thy existence gave,
Now stands beside thy lowly grave.
It is not long since thou wert wont
Within these sacred walls to kneel;
This altar, that baptismal font,
These stones which now thy dust conceal,
The sweet tones of the Sabbath bell,
Were holiest objects to thy soul;
On these thy spirit loved to dwell,
Untainted by the world's control.
My brother, those were happy days,
When thou and I were children yet;
How fondly memory still surveys
Those scenes, the heart can ne'er forget!
My soul was then, as thine is now,
Unstain'd by sin, unstung by pain;
Peace smiled on each unclouded brow-
Mine ne'er will be so calm again.
How blithely then we hail'd the ray
Which usher'd in the Sabbath day!
How lightly then our footsteps trod
Yon pathway to the house of God!
For souls, in which no dark offence
Hath sullied childhood's innocence,
Best meet the pure and hallow'd shrine,
Which guiltier bosoms own divine.
I feel not now as then I felt,
The sunshine of my heart is o'er; The spirit now is changed which dwelt Within me, in the days before.
But thou wert snatch'd, my brother, hence,
In all thy guileless innocence;
One Sabbath saw thee bend the knee
In reverential piety-
For childish faults forgiveness crave—
The next beam'd brightly on thy grave.
The crowd, of which thou late wert one,
Now throng'd across thy burial stone;
Rude footsteps trampled on the spot
Where thou lay'st mould'ring and forgot;
And some few gentler bosoms wept
In silence, where my brother slept.
I stood not by thy fev'rish bed,
I look'd not on thy glazing eye,
Nor gently lull'd thy aching head,
Nor view'd thy dying agony:
I felt not what my parents felt,
The doubt the terror-the distress-
Nor vainly for my brother knelt—
My soul was spared that wretchedness. One sentence told me, in a breath, My brother's illness-and his death! And days of mourning glided by, And brought me back my gaiety; For soon in childhood's wayward heart
Doth crush'd affection cease to smart.
Again I join'd the sportive crowd
Of boyish playmates, wild and loud;
I learnt to view with careless eye
My sable garb of misery;
No more I wept my brother's lot,
His image was almost forgot;
And ev'ry deeper shade of pain
Had vanish'd from my soul again.
The well-known morn I used to greet
With boyhood's joy at length was beaming, And thoughts of home and raptures sweet
every eye but mine were gleaming;
But I, amidst that youthful band
Of beating hearts and beaming eyes,
Nor smiled nor spoke at joy's command,
Nor felt those wonted ecstasies:
I loved my home, but trembled now
To view my father's alter'd brow;
I fear'd to meet my mother's eye,
And hear her voice of agony;
I fear'd to view my native spot,
Where he who loved it-now was not.
The pleasures of my home were fled-
My brother slumber'd with the dead.
I drew near to my father's gate-
No smiling faces met me now—
I enter'd-all was desolate-
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