EPIGRAM, On a Lawyer's desiring one of the tribe to look with respect to a Gibbet. THE lawyers may revere that tree EPIGRAM, On the Author's intention of going to Sea. FORTUNE and Bob, e'er since his birth, She fairly kick'd him from the earth EPIGRAM, Written extempore, at the desire of a gentleman who was rather ill-favoured, but who had a family of beautiful children. SCOTT and his children emblems are Of real good and evil; His children are like cherubims, But Scott is like the devil. LINES, Addressed to Mr R. Fergusson on his Recovery from severe Depression of Spirits. BY MR WOODS. AND may thy friends the joyful news believe? Yes! it is true-again I see thee smile; No words can justice to their joy afford, So when some river, trembling with the storm, Which sudden does its beauteous face deform, Its wonted course no longer can maintain, W. THE VANITY OF HUMAN WISHES, An Elegy, occasioned by the untimely Death of Robert Fergusson. BY THE LATE JOHN TAIT, ESQ. Quis desiderio sit pudor, aut modus, Cantos, Melpomene: cui liquidam pater Hor. DARK was the night—and silence reign'd o'er all; No mirthful sounds urg'd on the ling'ring hour: The sheeted ghost stalk'd ghastly through the hall, And every breast confess'd chill horror's power: Slumb'ring I lay; I mus'd on human hopes"Vain, vain, (I cried), are all the hopes we form; When winter comes, the sweetest floweret drops, And oaks themselves must bend before the storm." While thus I spake, a voice assail'd my ear, 'Twas sad 'twas slow-it fill'd my mind with dread! "Forbear, (it cried), thy moral lays forbear, Or change the strain, for FERGUSSON is dead! Have we not seen him sporting on these plains? Have we not heard him strike the Muses' lyre? Have we not felt the magic of his strains, Which often glow'd with fancy's warmest fire Have we not hop'd these strains would long be heard? Have we not told how oft they touch'd the soul? And has not Scotia said, her youthful Bard Might spread her fame even to the distant pole? But vain, alas! are all the hopes we rais'd; Death strikes the blow-they sink-their reign is o'er ; And these sweet songs, which we so oft have prais'd These mirthful strains shall now be heard no more. This, this proclaims how vain are all the joys The high-born hopes even of the Muses' train." I heard no more. The cock, with clarion shrill, Loudly proclaim'd the approach of morning near The voice was gone-but yet I heard it still- "Perhaps, (I cried), ere yonder rising sun Oft then, O mortals! oft this dreadful truth Should be proclaim'd—for fate is in the sound, That genius, learning, health, and vigorous youth, May, in one day, in death's cold chains be bound." |