THE BULLFINCH. 137 



Oh ! do not think I mourn her not, 

 Who sweetly soothed my lonely lot. 

 Her sainted form no more I see : 

 I know not what my fate may be. 

 But ye who loved my mistress dear, 

 Will still her feathered favourite cheer, 

 And hang my cage in verdant bowers, 

 And wreathe its wires with fragrant flowers. 



And thou, whose form of youthful grace 

 Is hovering round my resting-place, 

 With glossy hair, and sparkling eye, 

 And voice that sounds so cheerily; 

 For thee my plaintive song I'll sing, 

 Till ruffled plumes and drooping wing 

 Proclaim my little life is fled, 

 And I am number'd with the dead; 

 No more with softly warbled trill, 

 To tell thee that I love thee still. 



Then, Mary, let thy bird be laid 

 Beneath the cedar's pleasant shade; 

 Nor let thy heart in after days 

 Lose all remembrance of my lays, 

 But listen to thy captive's prayer; 

 And when some wanderer of the air 

 Pours on thy ear his sweetest strain, 

 Think of thy feathered friend again. 



