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Songs, Ballads, and Other Poems

by the late Thomas Haynes Bayly; Edited by his Widow. With A Memoir of the Author. In Two Volumes

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IV. EVERGREEN TREE.

I love thee, evergreen tree!
Thou art what friendship should be;
But friendship oft is as brief
As the rose's delicate leaf.
In winter, brambles will show
Where summer's fair blossoms grow;
And sorrow too often turns
Love's roses into love's thorns!
Oh, Winter! dearly I love
Thy own dark evergreen grove;
Thy laurel the warrior wears,
It twines round the banner he bears:
Thy cypress deepens the gloom
That shades a conqueror's tomb;
Thy holly wreathed on the wall,
At Christmas, is dearer than all.