O, rivers, forests, hills, and plains! Oft have ye heard my canty strains : But now, what else for me remains But tales of woe; And frae my een the drapping rains Maun ever flow. Mourn, spring, thon darling of the year! Thy gay, green, flow'ry tresses shear, For him that's dead! Thou, autumn, wi' thy yellow hair, In grief thy sallow mantle tear! Thou, winter, hurling thro' the air The roaring blast, Wide o'er the naked world declare The worth we've lost! Mourn him, thou sun, great source of light? Mourn, empress of the silent night! And you, ye twinkling starnies bright, My Matthew mourn! For through your orbs he's ta'en his flight, O, Henderson! the man! the brother! And art thou gone, and gone for ever! And hast thou crost that unknown river, Life's dreary bound! Like thee, where shall I find another, The world around! Go to your sculptur'd tombs, ye great, In a' the tinsel trash o' state! But by thy honest turf I'll wait, Thou man of worth! And weep the ae best fellow's fate E'er lay in earth. THE EPITAPH. Stop, passenger! my story's brief, If thou uncommon merit hast, Yet spurn'd at fortune's door, man; A look of pity hither cast, For Matthew was a poor man. If thou a noble sodger art, That passest by this grave, man, There moulders here a gallant heart; For Matthew was a brave man. If thou on men, their works and ways, Canst throw uncommon light, man; Here lies wha weel had won thy praise, For Matthew was a bright man. If thou at friendship's sacred ca' If thou art staunch without a stain, For Matthew was a true man. If thou hast wit, and fun, and fire, If ony whiggish whingin sot, To blame poor Matthew dare, man; May dool and sorrow be his lot, For Matthew was a rare man. LAMENT OF MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS ON THE APPROACH OF SPRING. Now nature hangs her mantle green On every blooming tree, And spreads her sheets o' daisies white Now Phoebus chears the crystal streams, But nought can glad the weary wight Now lav'rocks wake the merry mforn, The merle, in his noontide bow'r, Now blooms the lily by the bank, I was the queen o' bonnie France, Fu' lightly rase I in the morn, And never ending care. But as for thee, thou false woman, Grim vengeance, yet, shall whet a sword The weeping blood in woman's breast Nor th' balm that draps on wounds of woe My son my son! may kinder stars And may those pleasures gild thy reign, And where thou meet'st thy mother's friend, O soon, to me, may summer-suns Nae mair, to me, the autumn winds And the next flow'rs, that deck the spring, TO ROBERT GRAHAM, ESQ. OF FINTRA Late crippl'd of an arm, and now a leg, About to beg a pass for leave to beg; Dull, listless, teas'd, dejected, and deprest, (Nature is adverse to a cripple's rest); Will generous Graham list to his poet's wail? (It soothes poor misery, harkening to her tale), And hear him curse the light he first survey'd, And doubly curse the luckless rhyming trade. Thou, nature, partial nature, I arraign; Of thy caprice maternal I complain. The lion and the bull thy care have found, One shakes the forests, and one spurns the ground; But O! thou bitter step-mother and hard, And half an ideot too, more helpless still. Critics-appall'd, I venture on the name, His heart, by causeless wanton malice wrung, By blockhead's daring into madness stung; His well-won bays, than life itself more dear, By miscreants torn, who ne'er one sprig must wear; Foil'd, bleeding, tortur'd, in the unequal strife, The hapless poet flounders on through life; |