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ho, to dumb Forgetfulness a prey,
is pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd,
the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
or cast one longing ling'ring look behind?

ome fond breast the parting soul relies,
›me pious drops the closing eye requires;
from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
v'n in our Ashes [3] live their wonted Fires (1).

Variation:-Awake and faithful to her wonted fires.

us (says Mr. Mason) it stood in the first and some following ediand I think rather better; for the authority of Petrarch does not oy the appearance of quaintness in the other: the thought, however, ther obscurely expressed in both readings. He means to say, in prose, that we wish to be remembered by our friends after our , in the same manner as when alive we wished to be remembered em in our absence.

(1) Ev'n in our ashes live their wonted fires.

Ch'i veggio nel pensier, dolce mio fuoco,
Fredda una lingua, & due begli occhi chiusi
Rimaner doppo noi pien di faville.

Petrarch, Son. 169.

of dawn

oary-headed Swain may say, we seen him at the peep ith hasty steps the dews away, the sun upon the upland lawn [4].

e foot of yonder nodding beech, eathes its old fantastic roots so high, length at noontide would he stretch, e upon the brook that babbles by.

On the high brow of yonder hanging lawn.
s first manuscript, followed this stanza:

e we seen the greenwood side along,
o'er the heath we hied, our labour done,
e woodlark pip'd her farewell song,
vistful eyes pursue the setting sun.

(says Mr. Mason) that he rejected this stanza, as it e sort of Doric delicacy, which charms us peculiarly Poem, but also completes the account of his whole Evening scene being omitted, we have only his is Noon-tide repose."

[blocks in formation]

"The next with dir

"Slow thro' the

"him borne Approach and re "lay

"Grav'd on t

"thorn."

Page!

❝ love.

e morn I miss'd him on the custom'd hill, Along the heath and near his fav'rite tree; nother came; nor yet beside the rill,

Nor up

the lawn, nor at the wood was he;

"he next with dirges due in sad array Slow thro' the church-way path we saw "him borne.

Approach and read (for thou can'st read) the

lay

"Grav'd on the stone beneath yon aged "thorn."

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