EPITAPH

ON MRS. JANE CLERKE.

LO! where this silent marble weeps,
A friend, a wife, a mother sleeps:
A heart, within whose sacred cell
The peaceful virtues loved to dwell.
Affection warm, and faith sincere,
And soft humanity were there.
In agony, in death resign'd,

She felt the wound she left behind;

Her infant image here below

Sits smiling on a father's woe:

Whom what awaits, while yet he strays
Along the lonely vale of days?
A pang, to secret sorrow dear;

A sigh; an unavailing tear;

Till Time shall every grief remove,

With life, with memory, and with love.

E

EPITAPH

ON SIR WILLIAM WILLIAMS.

HERE, foremost in the dangerous paths of fame, Young Williams fought for England's fair

renown;

His mind each Muse, each Grace adorn'd his frame, Nor Envy dared to view him with a frown.

At Aix, his voluntary sword he drew,

There first in blood his infant honour seal'd; From fortune, pleasure, science, love, he flew, And scorn'd repose when Britain took the field.

With eyes of flame, and cool undaunted breast,
Victor he stood on Bellisle's rocky steeps-
Ah, gallant youth! this marble tells the rest,

Where melancholy friendship bends, and weeps.

THE DEATH OF HOEL.

AN ODE.

HAD I but the torrent's might,

With headlong rage and wild affright

Upon Deïra's squadrons hurl'd

To rush, and sweep them from the world!

Too, too secure in youthful pride,
By them, my friend, my Hoel, died,
Great Cian's son: of Madoc old
He ask'd no heaps of hoarded gold;
Alone in nature's wealth array'd,
He ask'd and had the lovely maid.

To Cattraeth's vale in glitt'ring row
Thrice two hundred warriors go :
Every warrior's manly neck
Chains of regal honour deck,
Wreath'd in many a golden link :
From the golden cup they drink
Nectar that the bees produce,
Or the grape's ecstatic juice.

Flush'd with mirth and hope they burn:
But none from Cattraeth's vale return,
Save Aëron brave, and Conan strong
(Bursting through the bloody throng),
And I, the meanest of them all,
That live to weep and sing their fall.

HAVE ye seen the tusky boar,
Or the bull, with sullen roar,
On surrounding foes advance?
So Caradoc bore his lance.

CONAN'S name, my lay, rehearse,
Build to him the lofty verse,
Sacred tribute of the bard,
Verse, the hero's sole reward.
As the flame's devouring force,
As the whirlwind in its course,
As the thunder's fiery stroke
Glancing on the shiver'd oak;
Did the sword of Conan mow
The crimson harvest of the foe.