from The Bijou Literary Annual, 1828 - Humble Love, By William Fraser

The Bijou;

London: William Pickering,

Humble Love

By William Fraser

A valley green and interlaced with flowers,	1
Bright with the vernal sun and April showers,	2
Was consecrate to their fond youthful love; —	3
And, while their gentle flocks around them fed,	4
Their's was the talk of Love untutored;—	5
And oft her beauty would he praise in song,	6
In strains as soothing as the tender dove; —	7
For sweeter measures never swept along	8
Th'Ennean bright- enamelled plains, ere Dis	9
Bore Ceres' offspring to his bower of bliss: —	10

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Oh!happy lovers — pure and undefiled —	11
With hearts unsullied — thoughts to heaven allied;	12
And bosoms like to some sweet scented stream,	13
Around whose banks the roses fondly blooj,	14
(Tho' for a season — such is Beauty's doom!)	15
And bright shapes — such as youthful Poets dream,	16
There gladly dance, and feed the waves with showers	17
Of budding gems, and ordour-breathing flowers! —	18

Oh! had your lot been, haply, cast among	19
The gay tricked bevies ofthe city's throng,	20
Ye might have followed, with bedazzled eyes,	21
The lures outspread by Vice within her halls,	22
Full teeming with low crouching votaries;	23
Ye might have battened in the sensual stalls,	24
Where vilde Indulgnce — all ashamedhg — hies. —	25
Out on the erimes and sins of Capitals!	26
For in their wilderness all silent stalks	27
Gaunt wolfish care — and red- eyed Hatred walks	28
And Anger burns, and fevered Envy toils	29
To heap upon her overteeming fane	30
Fresh fathered plunder, and the gory spoils	31
Of white- robed Innocence, and Virtue slain;	32
And crested Pride hath in loud mockery trod,	33
Aping the semblance of a mighty God;	34
And beautous Honor panic- stricken fled;	35
While boldly followeth the minion Shame,	36
Usurper base of Modesty long dead,	37
And tromping forth its foul degraded name!	38

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But for my simple lover they are gone! —	39
That valley now is mute — and desolate;	40
No sound is heard of pipe by shepherd blown —	41
No lightly carolled — joyous songs prevail —	42
Save when the eve- consenting nightingale	43
Gives a sweet requiem to their early fate! —	44
Far in the shady dell there lies a mound	45
Laved by a stream — and bright with flowers around	46
And there the Rustics made their earlygrave! —	47
Desease came o'er the youth — and his hot blood	48
In fiery eddies boiled — until he stood	49
A victim marked by Death's relentless hand —	50
And then he fell — whom neither art could save	51
Nor medicinal herb! — and she — the good —	52
And beautiful, his loss could not withstand: —	53
For what of joy could this dull world impart—	54
Pale grew her cheek — and broke her tender heart!	55

Peace to their slumbers — tho' no funeral stone —	56
Pageant, nor gilded 'scutcheon deck their grave —	57
Yet few among those hills have mourned — will mourn	58
The bright, the beautiful, the young, the brave: —	59
More precious tears — that love and virtue own —	60
Than splendour's train, and pomp — and heart of	61
stone!	62