 | The Poetical Works of John Scott |  |
231
ODE XXIII. TO DISEASE.
Disease! Man's dread, relentless foe,
Fell source of fear, and pain, and woe!
O say, on what ill-fated coast
They mourn thy tyrant reign the most?
On Java's bogs, or Gambia's sand,
Or Persia's sultry southern strand;
Or Egypt's annual-flooded plain,
Or Rome's neglected, waste domain;
Or where her walls Byzantium rears,
And mosques and turrets crescent-crown'd,
And from his high serail the sultan hears
The wide Propontis' beating waves resound .
Fell source of fear, and pain, and woe!
O say, on what ill-fated coast
They mourn thy tyrant reign the most?
On Java's bogs, or Gambia's sand,
Or Persia's sultry southern strand;
Or Egypt's annual-flooded plain,
Or Rome's neglected, waste domain;
Or where her walls Byzantium rears,
And mosques and turrets crescent-crown'd,
And from his high serail the sultan hears
The wide Propontis' beating waves resound .
232
I'll ask no more—Our clime, tho' fair,
Enough thy tyrant reign must share;
And lovers there, and friends, complain,
By Thee their friends and lovers slain:
And yet our Avarice and our Pride
Combine to spread thy mischiefs wide;
While that the captive wretch confines,
To hunger, cold, and filth resigns,—
And this the funeral pomp attends
To vaults, where mouldering corses lie,—
Amid foul air thy form unseen ascends,
And like a vulture hovers in the sky .
Enough thy tyrant reign must share;
And lovers there, and friends, complain,
By Thee their friends and lovers slain:
And yet our Avarice and our Pride
Combine to spread thy mischiefs wide;
While that the captive wretch confines,
To hunger, cold, and filth resigns,—
And this the funeral pomp attends
To vaults, where mouldering corses lie,—
Amid foul air thy form unseen ascends,
And like a vulture hovers in the sky .
| The Poetical Works of John Scott | |