AN ELEGY,

ON THE DEATH OF MR. BUCKINGHAM ST. JOHN.*

May 1771.

THE world now yields to night's returning sway, The deeper gloom leads on the solemn hour, And calls my steps, beneath the moon's pale ray, To roam in sadness on the sea-beat shore.

Now glide th' inconstant shadows o'er the plain, The broad moon swimming through the broken The gleam of waters brightens on the main, [clouds; And anchor'd navies lift their wavering shrouds.

* Mr. St. John was one of the author's earliest and most intimate friends. For two years they had lodgings in the same chambers, during their residence, as graduates, at Yale-College. He was drowned in his passage from New-Haven to Norwalk, May 5th 1771. At the time of his death, he was one of the Tutors in that Universi

ty.

Deep silence reigns, save on the moory ground

The long reed rustling to the passing gales, The noise of dashing waves and hollow sound Of rushing winds, that murmur through the sails. Far hence, ye pleasures of a mind at ease,

The smiling charm that rural scenes can yield, When spring, led jocund by the soft'ning breeze, Wakes the glad morn and robes the dewy field! Far be the giddy raptures of the gay,

The midnight joys licentious youth can share,
While Ruin, smiling o'er her destined prey,
In sweet allurements hides the deadly snare.
Mine be the music of the rolling wave,

These moon-light shadows and surrounding gloom;
Mine the lone haunts of contemplation grave,
That lift the soul to scenes beyond the tomb.

For here, while midnight holds her silent reign,
Creative fancy calls her airy throng,

Soft melancholy wakes the soothing strain,

And friendship prompts and grief inspires the song.

As through these mournful glooms I stretch my sight, Mid sounds of death, that bid the soul attend, Mid empty forms and fleeting shapes of night,

Slowly I view a white-robed shade ascend,

That says,
"I once was St. John!* from the bounds
Of deeps unknown beneath the dreary wave,
Where ever-restless floods, in nightly rounds,

Roll their dark surges o'er my wat❜ry grave; "From realms which, ne'er to mortal sight display'd, The gates of dread eternity surround, In night conceal'd and death's impervious shade, My voice returns-attend the warning sound. "O thou attend, who flush'd with early bloom,

In life's new spring and vernal sweetness gay, Mindless of fate, that must thy branch entomb,

Spread'st thy green blossoms to the morning ray! "With thee how late, how like, alas! to thee, To mortal joys, by opening youth beguiled, I stretch'd my airy wish, and follow'd free,

Where pleasure triumph'd and where fancy smiled.

* The surname, St. John, was always pronounced by that family, both here and in England, not as two words, but as one, with the accent on the first syllable. The name of Lord Bolingbroke was Henry St. John. Pope thus addresses him,

" Awake my St. John! leave all meaner things"—

Essay on Man.

Oh all-accomplished St. John! deck thy shrine."

"If but a wreath of mine,

Epilogue to the Satires.

"Then while fond hope her glitt'ring pinions spread,

Pointing to climes beyond th' Atlantic wave, E'en then unnoticed o'er my destined head,

Hung death's dire form and seal'd me for the grave. "How vain the thought, for many a joyous morn To taste of rapture, unallay'd by woe;

At once from life and every pleasure torn,

From all I wish'd and all I loved below!

"The faithless morning on our opening sails
Smiled out serene and smooth'd our gliding way,
While the gay vessel, fann'd by breathing gales,
Play'd on the placid bosom of the sea.

"When lo, descending on the darkening wind,
Burst the dire storm-and feeble to sustain
"The rushing blasts in warring fury join'd,
The frail skiff sinks beneath the surging main.

"And see, afar the oarless boat conveys
The rescued sailors to the distant shore;
Alone, of aid bereft, with one last gaze,

I sunk in deeps, and sunk to rise no more.

"In that sad hour what fearful scenes arise,

What pangs distress, what unknown fears dismay, When future worlds disclosing on our eyes,

The trembling soul forsakes her kindred clay!

"Before the awful bar, th' almighty throne,

In dread I've stood th' Eternal Judge to see; And fix'd in bliss, or doom'd to ceaseless moan,

Have heard the long, the unreversed decree:

"Nor earth must know the rest."-Where art thou

In youthful joys my partner and my friend? [now, Of those blest hours thy fortune gave below, Of all our hopes, is this the fatal end?

Ah, what avail'd that energy of mind,

The heights of science and of arts t' explore, That early led, where genius unconfined

Spreads her glad feast and opes her classic store!

Ah what avail'd, in earthly bliss so frail,
The fame gay-dawning on thy rising years!
Ah what avail'd,-for what could then avail?
Thy friend's deep sorrows or thy country's tears!
In pleasure's paths by vivid fancy led,

Mid every hope, that blooming worth could raise, The wings of death, with fatal horror spread, Blank'd the bright promise of thy future days.

So from the louring west the sable clouds
Rush on the sun and dim his orient ray,
And hateful night, in glooms untimely, shrouds
Th' ascending glories of the vernal day.