Now Phoebus cheers the crystal streams, And glads the azure skies;
But nought can glad the weary wight
That fast in durance lies.
Now lav'rocks wake the merry morn, Aloft on dewy wing;
The merle, in his noontide bow'r, Makes woodland echoes ring; The mavis mild wi' many a note, Sings drowsy.day to rest: In love and freedom they rejoice, Wi' care nor thrall opprest.
Now blooms the lily by the bank, The primrose down the brae! The hawthorn's budding in the glen, And milk-white is the slae:
The meanest hind in fair Scotland
May rove their sweets amang; But I, the Queen of a' Scotland, Maun lie in prison strang.
I was the Queen o' bonnie France, Where happy I hae been; Fu"lightly rase I in the morn, As blythe lay down at e'en:
And I'm the sov'reign of Scotland, And mony a traitor there; Yet here I lie in foreign bands, And never ending care.
But as for thee, thou false woman, My sister and my fae,
Grim vengeance, yet, shall whet a sword That thro' thy soul shall gae:
The weeping blood in woman's breast Was never known to thee;
Nor th' balm that draps on wounds of woe
Frae woman's pitying e'e.
Upon thy fortune shine;
And may those pleasures gild thy reign, That ne'er wad blink on mine!
God keep thee frae thy mother's faes, Or turn their hearts to thee:
And where thou meet'st thy mother's friend, Remember him for me!
O! soon, to me, may summer-suns Nae mair light up the morn!
Nae mair, to me, the autumn winds
Wave o'er the yellow corn!
And in the narrow house o' death
Let winter round me rave;
And the next flow'rs that deck the spring, Bloom on my peaceful grave!
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 mis'ry hearkening 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,
Thou giv'st the ass his hide, the snail his shell, Th' envenom'd wasp, victorious, guards his cell. Thy minions, kings defend, control, devour, In all th' omnipotence of rule and power.- Foxes and statesmen, subtile wiles ensure; The cit and polecat stink, and are secure. Toads with their poison, doctors with their drug, The priest and hedgehog in their robes, are snug. Ev'n silly woman has her warlike arts, Her tongue and eyes, her dreaded spear and darts.
But Oh! thou bitter step-mother and hard, To thy poor, fenceless, naked child-the Bard! A thing unteachable in world's skill,
And half an idiot too, more helpless still. No heels to bear him from the op'ning dun; No claws to dig, his hated sight to shun; No horns, but those by luckless Hymen worn, And those, alas! not Amalthea's horn: No nerves, olfact'ry, Mammon's trusty cur, Clad in rich dulness' comfortable fur, In naked feeling, and in aching pride, He bears th' unbroken blast from ev'ry side; Vampyre booksellers drain him to the heart, And scorpion critics cureless venom dart.
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