The Poetical Works of Horace Smith :: :: University of Virginia Library

'Tis well to see these accidental great,
Noble by birth, or Fortune's favour blind,
Gracing themselves in adding grace and state
To the more noble eminence of mind,
And doing homage to a bard
Whose breast by Nature's gems was starr'd,
Whose patent by the hand of God himself was sign'd.

While monarchs sleep, forgotten, unrevered,
Time trims the lamp of intellectual fame,
The builders of the pyramids, who rear'd
Mountains of stone, left none to tell their name.

122

Though Homer's tomb was never known,
A mausoleum of his own,
Long as the world endures his greatness shall proclaim.

What lauding sepulchre does Campbell want?
'Tis his to give, and not derive renown.
What monumental bronze or adamant,
Like his own deathless lays can hand him down?
Poets outlast their tombs: the bust
And statue soon revert to dust;
The dust they represent still wears the laurel crown.

The solid Abbey walls that seem time-proof,
Form'd to await the final day of doom;
The cluster'd shafts and arch-supported roof,
That now enshrine and guard our Campbell's tomb,
Become a ruin'd shatter'd fane,
May fall and bury him again,
Yet still the bard shall live, his fame-wreath still shall bloom.

123

Methought the monumental effigies
Of elder poets that were grouped around,
Lean'd from their pedestals with eager eyes,
To peer into the excavated ground
Where lay the gifted, good, and brave,
While earth from Kosciusko's grave Fell on his coffin-plate with freedom-shrieking sound.

And over him the kindred dust was strew'd
Of Poets' Corner. O misnomer strange!
The poet's confine is the amplitude
Of the whole earth's illimitable range,
O'er which his spirit wings its flight,
Shedding an intellectual light,
A sun that never sets, a moon that knows no change.

Around his grave in radiant brotherhood,
As if to form a halo o'er his head,

124

Not few of England's master spirits stood,
Bards, artists, sages, reverently led
To wave each separating plea
Of sect, clime, party, and degree,
All honouring him on whom Nature all honours shed.

To me the humblest of the mourning band,
Who knew the bard through many a changeful year,
It was a proud sad privilege to stand
Beside his grave and shed a parting tear.
Seven lustres had he been my friend,
Be that my plea when I suspend
This all-unworthy wreath on such a poet's bier.

He was buried in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey, his pall being supported by six noblemen.

“And Freedom shriek'd as Kosciusko fell.”—Campbell.