vy-mantled wall,
In a lone corner, where the earth
Presents a rising green mound, all
Of her who lov'd and gave me birth

Lies buried deep. No trophied stone,
Or graven verse denotes the spot:
Her worth her epitaph alone,
The green-sward grave her humble lot.

How silent sleep the virtuous dead!
For them few sculptured honours rise,
No marble tablet here to spread
A fame--their every act implies.

No mockery here, nor herald's shield,
To glitter o'er a bed of clay;
But snow-drops and fresh violets yield
A tribute to worth pass'd away.

Tread lightly, ye who love or know
En life's young road a parent's worth,
Who yet are strangers to the woe
Of losing those who gave you birth,

~325~~

Who cherish'd, fondled, fed, and taught
From infancy to manhood's pride,
Directing every opening thought,
Teaching how Reason's power should guide.

Ye rich and bold, ye grave and gay,
Ye mightiest of the sons of men,
Wealth, honours, fame shall sink away,
And all be equalized again;

Save what the sculptor may pourtray,
And any tyrant, fool, or knave
Who has the wealth, may in that way
His name from dull oblivion save;

That is, he may perpetuate
His worthlessness, his frauds, and crimes;
No matter what his tomb relate,
His character lives with the times.

Shade of my parent! couldst thou hear
The voice of him, thine only child,
Implore thy loss with filial tear,
And deck thy grave with sonnets wild,

'Twould all thy troubles past repay,
Thy anxious cares, thy hopes and fears,
To find as time stole life away,
Thy mem'ry brighten'd with his years.

Yes, sacred shade! while mem'ry guides
This ever wild eccentric brain,
While reason holds or virtue chides,
Still will I pour the filial strain.

"What," said my old friend Horace Eglantine, after reading this tribute
to parental worth, "Bernard Blackmantle moralizing; our Spy turned
~326~~monody-maker, writing epitaphs, and elegies, and odes to spirits
that have no corporal substance, when there are so m