[ 326 ] [SEPT. 



THE SEPARATION. 



AND have I received your last letter ? 



And is it then thus that we part ? 

 Can you coldly declare, " It is better ?" 



Oh, Alfred ! how changed is that heart ! 

 I cannot yet credit the story 



They tell, as the cause of my woe ; 

 You once were my pride and my glory, 



And can you indeed sink so low ? 



Why is it you thus have neglected 



That love you so eagerly sought ! 

 Alas ! I but little suspected 



You ever could set it at nought. 

 The promise you gave to that mother 



Who watched o'er the days of our youth, 

 The vows you then breathed to another, 



Should bind you to reason and truth. 



Both brought up from childhood together, 



We shared all our smiles and our tears ; 

 I called you in infancy, " Brother I" 



That spell has been broken by years ; 

 Though never, till now, had I reason 



To grieve that 'twas only a name ; 

 I almost yet fancy it treason 



To think that you feel not the same. 



Or can I, indeed, have mistaken 



Your manners and letters of late ? 

 Can it be that I am not forsaken ? 



Dear Alfred, on you hangs my fate. 

 But, no your last note is yet lying 



Still wet with the tears I have shed ; 

 You say, " there is no use in sighing ;" 



Say, rather, " affection has fled !" 



I shrink from that cruel conviction, 



As deeply it strikes on my heart ; 

 At first it but seemed a wild fiction 



Too well I now know we must part. 

 And is it then, Alfred, for ever 



We thus bid each other adieu? 

 Can ties, which time only should sever, 



So soon be unheeded by you ? 



'Tis said that you covet a title- 

 That fortune is now, too, your aim ; 



Deserve I from you this requital ? 

 I hear it with sorrow and shame. 



Yet why should I listen to any, 

 Who add to the blow you have dealt ? 



So cruel ! no tongue of the many 

 Can heighten the grief I have felt. 



Bereft of my parents, and friendless, 



I yet had one blessing in store ; 

 I trusted your love would be endless 



You swore it I asked for no more. 

 It is not my wish, by upbraiding, 



To raise painful thoughts of the past; 

 Though daily my own hopes are fading 



May your's ever bloom to the last ! 



