The Works of the Right Honourable Sir Chas. Hanbury Williams ... From the Originals in the Possession of His Grandson The Right Hon. The Earl of Essex and Others: With Notes by Horace Walpole ... In Three Volumes, with Portraits |
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| I. |
AN ODE
ON THE
DEATH OF MATZEL,
A FAVOURITE BULL-FINCH:
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 | II. |
| III. |
 | The Works of the Right Honourable Sir Chas. Hanbury Williams |  |
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AN ODE ON THE DEATH OF MATZEL, A FAVOURITE BULL-FINCH:
Addressed to Philip Stanhope, Esq. to whom the Author had given the Reversion of it when he left Dresden.
I
TRY not, my Stanhope, 'tis in vainTo stop your tears, to hide your pain,
108
Give sorrow and revenge their scope,
My present joy, your future hope,
Lies murder'd in his cage.
II
Matzel's no more, ye graces, loves,Ye linnets, nightingales and doves,
Attend th' untimely bier;
Let ev'ry sorrow be exprest,
Beat with your wings each mournful breast,
And drop the nat'ral tear.
III
In height of song, in beauty's pride,By fell Grimalkin's claws he died—
But vengeance shall have way:
On pains and torture I'll refine;
Yet, Matzel, that one death of thine,
His nine will ill repay.
109
IV
For thee, my bird, the sacred Nine,Who lov'd thy tuneful notes, shall join
In thy funereal verse:
My painful task shall be to write
Th' eternal dirge which they indite,
And hang it on thy hearse.
V
In vain I lov'd, in vain I mournMy bird, who, never to return,
Is fled to happier shades,
Where Lesbia shall for him prepare
The place most charming, and most fair
Of all th' Elysian glades.
VI
There shall thy notes in cypress groveSoothe wretched ghosts that die for love;
There shall thy plaintive strain
Lull impious Phædra's endless grief,
To Procris yield some short relief,
And soften Dido's pain.
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VII
Till Proserpine, by chance, shall hearThy notes, and make thee all her care,
And love thee with my love;
While each attendant's soul shall praise
The matchless Matzel's tuneful lays,
And all his songs approve.
| The Works of the Right Honourable Sir Chas. Hanbury Williams | |