304 LYRIC POEMS: This soul of-mine that dreadful wound has borne, Off from its side its dearest half is torn, j} The rest lies bleeding, and but lives to mourn. O infinite distress ! such raging grief Should command pity, and despair relief. Passion, methinks, should rise from all my groans, Give sense to rocks, and sympathy to stones. Ye dusky woods and echoing hills around, Repeat my cries with a perpetual sound : Be all ye flow'ry vales with thorns o'ergrown, Assist my sorrows, and declare your own ; Alas !your lord is dead. The humble'plain Must ne'er receive his courteous feet again. Mourn, ye gay smiling meadows, and be seen In wintry robes, instead of youthful green ; And bid the brook, that still runs warbling by, Move silent on, and weep his useless channel dry. Either methinks the lowing herd should come, And moaning turtles murmur o'er his tomb : The oak shall wither, and the curling bine Weep his young life out, while his arms aotwine Their amorous folds, and mix his bleeding soul with mine. T Ye.stately elms, in your long order mourns, Strip off your pride to dress your master's urn : Here gently drop your leaves, instead of tears: Ye elms, the reverend growth of ancient years, Stand tall and naked to the blustering rage Of the mad winds: thus it becomes your age To shew your sorrows. Often ye have seen Our heads reclin'd upon the risinggreen ; Beneath your sacred shade diffus'd we lay, Here Friendship reign'd with an unbounded sway : Either our souls their constant off'rings brought, The burdens of the breast and labours of the thought': Our opening bosoms on the conscious ground Spread -all the sorrows and the joys we found And mingled ev'ry care ; nor was it known Which of the pains and pleasures were our own ; Then with an equal hand and honest soul We share the heap, yet both possess the whole, And all the passions there thre' both our bosoms roll By turns We comfort, and by turns complain, And bear and ease by turns the sympathy of pain. Friendship! mysterious thing, what magic pow'rs Support thy sway, and charm these minds of outs? Bound to thy foot we boast our birth -right still, And dream of freedom, when we've lost our will, And'chang'd away our souls: At thy command We snatch new mie'ries from a foreign hand, To call them ours ; and, thoughtless of our ease, Plague the dear self that we were born to please. Thou tyranness of minds whose cruel throne Heaps on poor mortals sorrows not their own ; As though our mother nature could no more Find woes sufficient for each son she bore, Friendship divides the shares, and lengthens out the store. ' There was a long row of tall elms then standing where some pears after the lower garden was made.
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