Page images
PDF
EPUB

Then raising her voice to a strain 2

The sweetest that ear ever heard,'''''

She sung
Wherever her glory appear'd.

of the slave's broken chain!

Some clouds which had over us hung

[ocr errors]

Fled, chas'd by her melody clear, movi

And methought while she Liberty sung,

'Twas Liberty only to hear.

Thus swiftly dividing the flood,

To a slave-cultur'd island we came,

[ocr errors]

Where a Demon, her enemy, stood&bul Oppression his terrible name.

'1 107

In his hand, as the sign of his sway, surel A scourge hung with lashes he bore,

And stood looking out for his prey

From Africa's sorrowful shore.

But soon as approaching the land

That goddess-like woman he view'd,

The scourge he let fall from his hand,

With blood of his subjects imbrued. I saw him both sicken and die,

And the moment the monster expir'd Heard shouts that ascended the sky From thousands with rapture inspir'd.

Awaking, how could I but muse

At what such a dream should betide?

But soon my ear caught the glad news

Which serv'd my weak thought for a guideThat Britannia, renown'd o'er the waves

For the hatred she ever has shown

To the black-sceptred rulers of slaves, i
Resolves to have none of her own.

[merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

VERSES

PRINTED AT THE BOTTOM OF THE

YEARLY BILL OF MORTALITY

OF THE TOWN OF NORTHAMPTON,

Dec. 21, 1787.

Pallida Mors æquo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas
Regumque turres.

Pale Death with equal foot strikes wide the door
Of royal halls and hovels of the poor.

WHILE thirteen moons saw smoothly run
The Nen's barge-laden wave,

All these, life's rambling journey done,
Have found their home-the grave.

Was man (frail always) made more frail Than in foregoing years?

Did famine, or did plague prevail,

That so much death appears?

No; these were vigorous as their sires,

Nor plague nor famine came;

This annual tribute Death requires,

And never waves his claim.

Like crowded forest-trees we stand,
And some are mark'd to fall;

The axe will smite at God's command,
And soon shall smite us all.

Green as the bay-tree, ever green,

With its new foliage on,

The gay, the thoughtless, have I seen; I pass'd-and they were gone.

Read, ye that run, the awful truth
With which I charge my page;

A worm is in the bud of youth,

And at the root of

age.

II.

2 E

No present health can health insure

For yet an hour to come;

No med'cine, though it often cure,

Can always balk the tomb.

And oh! that (humble as my lot,
And scorn'd as is my strain *)

These truths, though known, too much forgot,

[blocks in formation]

So prays your Clerk, with all his heart;

And, ere he quits the pen,

Begs you for once to take his part,

And answer all-Amen!

*John Cox, Parish Clerk of Northampton.

« PreviousContinue »