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The Poetical Works of Thomas Moore

Collected by Himself. In Ten Volumes
  

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At length a murmur, all but mute.
So faint it was, came from the lute
Of a young melancholy maid,
Whose fingers, all uncertain play'd
From chord to chord, as if in chase
Of some lost melody, some strain
Of other times, whose faded trace
She sought among those chords again.
Slowly the half-forgotten theme
(Though born in feelings ne'er forgot)
Came to her memory—as a beam
Falls broken o'er some shaded spot;—
And while her lute's sad symphony
Fill'd up each sighing pause between;
And Love himself might weep to see
What ruin comes where he hath been—
As wither'd still the grass is found
Where fays have danced their merry round—

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Thus simply to the listening throng
She breath'd her melancholy song:—