* * * * *
I turn aside; and, in the pause, might start
As Mem'ry's elbow leans upon Time's Chart,
Which shows, alas! how soon all men must glide
Over meridians on life's ocean tide--
Meridians showing how both youth and sage
Are sailing northward to the zone of age:
On to an atmosphere of gloom I wist,
Where mariners are lost in melancholy mist.
But gayer thoughts, like spring-tide swallows, dart
Through youth's brave mind and animate its heart.
* * * * *
But Indolence is seen a pallid Ruth--
A timid gleaner in the fields of youth--
A wretched gath'rer of the scattered grain
Left by the reapers who have swept the plain;
But with no Boaz standing by the while,
To watch its figure with approving smile.
[Footnote 5: (From a Poem pronounced before the Phi Beta Kappa
Society and graduating classes of William and Mary College, July 4th,
1858.)]