The Poetical Works of Anna Seward :: :: University of Virginia Library

Where roses flaunt beneath some pleasant cave,
Too charming Pyrrha, what enamour'd boy,
Whose shining locks the breathing odours lave,
Woos thee, exulting in a transient joy?
For whom the simple band dost thou prepare,
That slightly fastens back thy golden hair?

Alas! how soon shall this devoted youth
Love's tyrant sway, and thy chang'd eyes deplore,
Indignant curse thy violated truth,
And count each broken promise o'er and o'er,
Who hopes to meet, unconscious of thy wiles,
Ingenuous looks, and ever facile smiles!

He, inexperienc'd mariner! shall gaze
In wild amazement on the stormy deep,

230

Recall the flattery of those sunny days,
That lull'd each ruder wind to calmest sleep.
'Twas then, with jocund hope, he spread the sail,
In rash dependence on the faithless gale.

Ah wretch! to whom untried thou seemest fair!
By me, who late thy halcyon surface sung,
The walls of Neptune's fane inscrib'd, declare
That I have dank and dropping garments hung,
Devoted to the God, whose kind decree
Snatch'd me to shore, from an o'erwhelming sea.

Horace alludes to the custom of the Roman mariners after a shipwreck—that of suspending their garments, which had been drenched in the storm, in the temple of Neptune, together with a votive tablet, on which the circumstances of the danger and escape, were nainted.