* * * * *
ON THE MUCH LAMENTED DEATH OF MISS POLLY MARTIN,
WHO DIED IN THE 18th YEAR OF HER AGE.
Forgive a youth, although the effort’s vain,
Who dares to raise the sympathetic lay;
Though lost with Shenstone in th’ elegiac strain,
And loose unstrung reclines the lyre of Gray.
Yet when fair virtue animates the line,
Say, shall the muse withhold her wonted fire;
When cherubs drooping o’er the urn recline,
Shall she unwilling strike the golden lyre.
Here lies the maid who late the village charm’d
From whose remains the virgin lily springs,
Emblem of her who envy’s pow’r disarm’d,
While round her turf the mournful robin sings.
Chaunt your sweet vespers through the ambient air,
Ye wild companions of the tufted grove;
Sing how your Polly once was heavenly fair,
Form’d of compassion, tenderness and love.
Yet what avails the muse’s plaintive song,
Can she to life these loved remains restore,
These mouldering relics to the earth belong,
The young, the lovely Polly is no more.
Her placid eye, bright as the orient day,
Too finely wrought for such a world as this,
Was clos’d by saints, who bore her form away,
Serenely gliding through the realms of bliss.
By fancy form’d I view her from above,
Bending from clouds her parents to implore,
Breathing rich fragrance of seraphic love,
And soft pronouncing, “mourn for me no more.
“Look on religion’s wide-extended page,
“Where faith triumphant shews th’ uplifted cross;
“Let hope of future bliss thy grief assuage,
“Think Polly lives, no more deplore thy loss.”
SALEM, July 10, 1794,
Washington County, State of N.Y.
NEW-YORK: _+Printed by JOHN BULL, No. 115, Cherry-Street+, where every
Kind of Printing work is executed with the utmost Accuracy and
Dispatch.--+Subscriptions+ for this +Magazine+ (at 2s. per month) are
taken in at the Printing-Office, and by E. MITCHELL, Bookseller, No. 9,
Maiden-Lane._
* * * * *
* * * *
* * * * *
_UTILE DULCI._
THE NEW-YORK WEEKLY MAGAZINE;
or, Miscellaneous Repository.
+Vol. II.+] +Wednesday, November 2, 1796.+ [+No. 70.+