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ANSWER

ΤΟ

A POETICAL EPISTLE

FROM AN

INTIMATE FRIEND.

"I do not think my sister so to seek, Or so unprincipled in virtue's book

"And that sweet peace which goodness bosoms ever.

MILTON

YE

Es, even amid these wilds forlorn, Where shivering on the naked spray, The drooping songsters seem to mourn The languid sun's declining ray;

While Nature faints in Winter's icy arms,

My DELIA'S tender strain my pensive bosom warms.

Ah! why does still that well-known strain
In sadly-plaintive numbers flow?
Must time and friendship mix in vain

Their lenient balm to soothe thy woe:

Ye Powers, who piety and truth reward,
Why could not these your spotless votary guard!

While round thy cradle Pity's doves

Fond hovering pour'd their tender moan, And all the pure and guiltless loves

Exulting, hail'd thee for their own:

They fled, repell'd by Wisdom's frown severe,

While Patience hush'd the babe, and wip'd its tendertear.

Cease, then, dear partner of

my breast, Whose every joy and grief are mine; And hush each gloomy care to rest,

For virtue's purest rays are thine :

Her cheering beams should gild thy languid hours,
As flow'rets shine, refresh'd by morning showers.

Oh! why with selfish sorrow mourn,
And frequent pour the lonely tear;
While beams of heavenly light adorn
The parted soul, so justly dear.
Enough to Nature's weakness now is given,

Let faith take wing, and seek her native heaven.

Nor mourn thy banish'd EDWIN's fate, Though far remov'd from hope and thee; Nor pining view with vain regret

Unerring Wisdom's stern decree.

Though filial love thy tenderest sorrows claim, And every virtue brighten EDWIN's name.

While Wisdom sways thy EDWIN's breast,
And fancy strews his path with flowers,
Although by hopeless love deprest,

The pensive pleasures haunt his bowers.
And where the myrtle and the willow twine,
He rears a mossy seat, and fondly calls it thine.

When filial duty sway'd thy heart,

And bade thee EDWIN'S Vows decline, With sad reluctance see him part,

And every tender wish resign:

With weeping admiration I beheld,

And sadly triumph'd while my friend excell❜d.

Let Grecia boast the duteous dame

Whose breast sustain'd her captive sire;

The Muses consecrate her name,

And crowds her pictur'd form admire: With conscious pride, heroic maid, I see The Grecian daughter far outshone by thee!

The milky stream spontaneous flow'd,
No warring passions were at strife,
Her being to her sire she ow'd,

And Nature cry'd-Preserve his life!
But sure a more exalted meed is thine,

Whose struggling heart has bled at duty's shrine !

TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS

THE DUKE OF YORK,

WITH AN

INVALID SOLDIER'S PETITION.

By a concurrence of odd circumstances, partly owing to his ignorance of the English language, the poor man who is the subject of this address, missed getting his certificate for the Chelsea pension when his regiment was disbanded; but being in pretty easy circumstances, he married, took a farm, and put up quietly with the privation. Growing into years, however, and finding his cattle diminish in proportion as his family increased, he was advised to set earnestly about obtaining the object here solicited. Twa officers were yet living who happened to be beisde him when he fell, in consequence of his wound, on the heights of Abram. They signed his Petition, and the Muse seconded it, just thirty years after that event took place, by the following poem sent inclosed to Her Royal Highness the DUCHESS OF YORK. The humane reader will be pleased to hear, that the application proved successful.

FROM the recesses of this wild domain,
Where artless truth and simple manners reign,

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