SONNET, TO A FRIEND WHO ASKED, HOW I FELT WHEN THE NURSE FIRST PRESENTED MY INFANT TO ME. Charles! my slow heart was only sad, when first And hanging at her bosom (she the while So for the Mother's sake the Child was dear, THE VIRGIN's CRADLE-HYMN. COPIED FROM A PRINT OF THE VIRGIN, IN A CATHOLIC VILLAGE IN GERMANY. Dormi, Jesu! Mater ridet, Si non dormis, Mater plorat, Blande, veni, somnule. ENGLISH. Sleep, sweet babe! my cares beguiling: If thou sleep not, mother mourneth, EPITAPH, ON AN INFANT. Its balmy lips the Infant blest And such my Infant's latest sigh! MELANCHOLY.* A FRAGMENT. Stretch'd on a moulder'd Abbey's broadest wall, The dark green Adder's Tongues was there; That pallid cheek was flush'd: her eager look And her bent forehead work'd with troubled thought. A mystic tumult, and a fateful rhyme * First published in the Morning Chronicle, in the year 1794. SA botanical mistake. The plant, I meant, is called the Hart's Tongue; but this would unluckily spoil the poetical effect. Cedat ergo Botanice. TELL'S BIRTH-PLACE. IMITATED FROM STOLBERG. Mark this holy chapel well! I. The Birth-place, this, of WILLIam Tell. II. Here first, an infant to her breast, Him his loving mother prest; And kiss'd the babe, and bless'd the day, And pray'd as mothers use to pray. III. "Vouchsafe him health, O God! and give The child thy servant still to live!" But God had destined to do more Through him, than through an armed power. IV. God gave him reverence of laws, Yet stirring blood in Freedom's cause A spirit to his rocks akin, The eye of the Hawk, and the fire therein! |