Poems, chiefly pastoral :: :: University of Virginia Library

Tenants of liberty on Britain's plain,
With flock's enrich'd, a vast unnumber'd store!
'Tis gone, the mighty George's golden reign!
Your Pan, your great defender, is no more.

216

II

The nymphs that in the sacred groves preside,
Where Albion's conq'ring oaks eternal spring,
In the brown shades their secret sorrows hide,
And, silent, mourn the venerable King.

III

Hark! how the winds, oft bounteous to his will,
That bore his conq'ring fleets to Gallia's shore,
After a pause, pathetically still,
Burst in loud peals, and thro' the forests roar.

IV

On Conquest's cheek the vernal roses fail,
Whilst laurel'd Victory distressful bows!
And Honour's fire etherial burns but pale,
That late beam'd glorious on our George's brows.

V

The Muses mourn—an ineffectual band!
Each sacred harp without an owner lies;
The Arts, the Sciences, dejected stand,
For, ah! their patron, their protector dies.

VI

Beauty no more the toy of fashion wears,
(So late by Love's designful labour drest)
But from her brow the glowing diamond tears,
And with the sable cypress veils her brest.

217

VII

Religion lodg'd high on her pious pile,
Laments the fading state of crowns below;
Whilst Melancholy fills the vaulted isle
With the slow music of a nation's woe.

VIII

The dreary paths of unrelenting fate,
Must monarchs mix'd with common mortals try?
Is there no refuge?—are the good, the great,
The gracious, and the god-like, doom'd to die?

IX

Must the gay court be chang'd for horror's cave;
Must mighty Kings that kept the world in awe,
Conquer'd by time, and the unpitying grave,
Submit their laurels to Death's rig'rous law?

X

If in the tent retir'd, or battle's rage,
Britannia's sighs shall reach great Fred'rick's ear,
He'll drop the sword, or close the darling page,
And pensive pay the tributary tear.

XI

Then shall the monarch weigh the moral thought,
(As he laments the parent, friend, ally)
The solemn truth by sage reflection taught,
That, spight of glory, Fred'rick's self shall die.

218

XII

The parent's face a prudent painter hides,
While death devours the darling of his age:
Nature the stroke of pencil'd art derides,
When grief distracts with agonizing rage.

XIII

So let the Muse her sablest curtain spread,
By sorrow taught her nerveless power to know:
When nations cry, their king, their father's dead,
The rest is dumb, unutterable woe!

XIV

But see—a sacred radiance beams around,
And with returning hope a people cheers:
Look at yon youth, with grace imperial crown'd:
How awful! yet how lovely in his tears!

XV

Mark how his breast expands the filial sigh,
He droops, distrest, like a declining flower,
'Till Glory, from her radiant sphere on high,
Hails him, to hold the regal reins of power.

219

XVI

The sainted sire to realms of bliss remov'd,
(Like the fam'd phœnix) from his pyre shall spring
Successive Georges, gracious, and belov'd,
And good and glorious as the parent King.

Frederick King of Prussia.

In a picture representing the sacrifice of Iphigenia, Apelles, despairing to represent the natural distraction of a parent on so affecting an occasion, drew the figure of Agamemnon with a veil thrown over his face.