University of Virginia Library

ELEGY ON G. M. B.

ADDRESSED TO LADY B.

Thy child was lull'd on death's cold couch to sleep.
Years since have pass'd, and yet I see thee weep;
Yet, yet, by busy memory kept alive,
The heart-struck mother's griefs, alas! survive.
Is there no blessed spell, no opiate blest,
To cheat a mother's memory to rest?
Look on the lovely treasures that remain
Let these seduce thee from regrets so vain.
Oh no: by links too powerful are allied
The joy for these that live, the woe for him that died.
In life's young season, when the world was new,
And love adorn'd it with enchantment's hue,
He, the first pledge which love awoke to light,
Was more than angel in thy partial sight.
Ah! who can tell the youthful mother's joy,
When first her arms received her infant boy?
When first she saw, what fancy help'd to trace,
The father's features in his little face,
When first she gave her first maternal kiss,
Ah! what are words to paint a mother's bliss!
Fed from thy breast, in charms the infant grew,
Fresh as the May-morn flower that drinks the dew.
Then, as the term of boyhood just began,
How well the Boy gave promise of the Man;
When, warm for enterprise, and pall'd with ease,
The gallant child went forth, and dared the seas!
What serves it here in long detail to tell
The proving chances that the child befell;
Each toil and watch endured by day and night,
Each rough assault of tempest or of fight;
To tell what lands he saw; how oft he bore
Some classic relic from the famous shore:
How oft return'd (ah why again to roam?)
To taste the dear felicity of home;
And pause awhile from ocean's rude alarms;
The harbour of his rest a mother's arms.
I saw, ere last the wanderer left thy side,
This cherish'd object of thy pain and pride.
I saw him clad with beauty as a vest,
His graceful form the graceful mind express'd.
I mark'd that mind, so young, yet so matured
By painful trial, manfully endured.
Talent's strong sun had forced the vernal shoot,
At once it bore the blossom and the fruit;
Then friendship too, in sympathy with thee,
Was idly dreaming what the youth would be.
A Hero, diadem'd with glory's crown,
To gild his ancient name with new renown.
Where is he now? thus gifted and thus fair,
Could not the hand of Heaven the stroke forbear?
So good, so young, so beautiful and brave,
Was it not hard to doom him to the grave?
To bid disease assail with jealous tooth
The rich unfolding roses of his youth,
And blighting them, the mother's hope to blight,
The hope that promised such a long delight?
Yet, it were something still if o'er the clay
Of him thus early snatch'd from life away,
Maternal love but now and then might keep
A little sacred interval to weep.
Alas! fond mother! this too is denied;
Far, far away, from home, from thee, he died.
Minorca's air received his latest breath;
Its earth too gave his narrow cell of death.
To dew his fading cheek with pious tear,
No parent, brother, sister, tended near:
No sister, brother, parent, e'er must weep
Beside the bed wherein his ashes sleep.
Child of the Ocean! had the troubled wave,
Thine own proud element, become thy grave,
When all thy soul with generous rage was warm'd,
Hadst thou been struck while gallant battle storm'd.
Then by thy fall had fame at least been bought:
So whispers fancy to a mother's thought.
Delusion! could that mother's thought have borne
The bosom gash'd, the limb asunder torn,
The life-blood, none perhaps its tide to check,
Effusive o'er the horror-drenched deck,
The form convulsed, the shriek of torment wild,
The last dull moaning of her dying child?
No, no, though doom'd to fall, poor boy, 'twas well
That not in battle's hideous fray he fell.
Thy tears, fond mother, though so long they flow,
Are not the rash impiety of woe.
Rebellion brands not the afflicted mind—
Regret may deeply mourn, yet be resign'd:
And heaven, in mercy to a mother's grief,
Permits those tears to lend a sad relief.
Perchance at times 'tis e'en allow'd thy boy
To quit for thee his Paradise of joy!
Perchance, e'en now, the disembodied saint
Is hovering near, to silence grief's complaint,
Breathe comfort to his mother's aching heart,
And act at once the son's and angel's part.
I do believe, that when the good ascend,
To live the empyreal life that ne'er shall end,
'Tis not denied them in that world to meet
Those for whose sakes e'en this bad world was sweet;
That friends and kindred are allow'd above
Each to know each again, in purer love;
That in the presence of the Great Adored,
Again the spouse may meet the spouse deplored;
Sister and brother form the ring again,
And parted lovers bind the broken chain;
Fathers amidst their gather'd children rest,
And tender mothers bless them and be blest.
I do believe, to mothers such as thou
Will Heaven this perfect blessedness allow.
While seraphs up to heaven thy soul translate,
Thy child shall meet thee at the Golden Gate;
Shall bid thee welcome to the Promised Land,
Shall guide thee in through all the glorious band;
While all the angels clap their wings with joy,
And hail ye both, the mother and her boy!
And these, yet left to her who gave them birth,
To cheer her further sojourn upon earth,
These, who with youth elate and blind to care
Now round thee wanton, shall rejoin thee there.
There too, where never the high heart is rack'd,
Where never cares the noble mind distract,
Where feeling, fancy, genius unrepress'd
May thrill, expand, exalt the unburthen'd breast,
There shall the generous lyre, that here below
Wafts scarce a note beside the note of woe,
No more by sorrow warp'd, by envy jarr'd,
Breathe all the lofty spirit of the bard,
Whom, while thine offspring listen to that lyre,
Their eyes and hearts shall know, and bless their sire.