As once, if not with light regard,
I read aright that gifted bard,
(Him whose school above the rest
His loveliest Elfin Queen has blest,)
...
1.
W H I L E, lost to all his former Mirth,
Britannia's Genius bends to Earth,
...
Thou, to whom the world unknown
With all its shadowy shapes, is shown;
Who seest, appalled, the unreal scene,
While fancy lifts the veil between:
...
S T R O P H E.
WHO shall wake the Spartan Fife,
And call in solemn Sounds to Life,
...
S T R O P H E.
O THOU, who sit'st a smiling Bride
By Valour's arm'd and awful Side,
...
SCENE, a Mountain in Circassia TIME, Midnight
In fair Circassia, where, to love inclined,
Each swain was blest, for every maid was kind!
...
Thou who such weary Length hast past,
Where wilt thou rest, mad Nymph, at last?
Say, wilt thou shroud in haunted Cell,
Where gloomy Rape and Murder dwell?
...
O Thou, who bad'st thy Turtles bear
Swift from his Grasp thy golden Hair.
and sought'st thy native Skies:
When War, by Vultures drawn from far,
...
In earliest Grece to Thee with partial Choice,
The Grief-full Muse addrest her infant Tongue;
The Maids and Matrons, on her awful Voice,
Silent and pale in wild Amazement hung.
...
SCENE, a forest TIME, the Evening
In Georgia's land, where Tefflis' towers are seen,
In distant view along the level green,
...