THE

GRAVE OF HOPE;

An Elegy.

WHY, belov'd of Heav'n, celestial Peace!
Amidst thy verdant olives dost thou mourn?
Alas! thy songs of joy and gladness cease,
Thy tears descend on Virtue's silent urn.

What loss must Britain and her sons deplore?
See ev'ry eye is dim, the nation weeps;
Alas! the hope of England is no more,

Cold in the grave our Royal Charlotte sleeps.

Enraptur'd, we beheld her for awhile,
Radiant in beauty, innocence, and youth,
For heav'n seem'd beaming in her artless smile,
And her pure bosom was the shrine of truth.

Then, as we gaz'd on her exalted worth,
Fancy would oft anticipate the scene,

When (but alas, she was too good for earth,)
The British Isles should hail her as their Queen!

Who that had seen her in domestic life,
Withheld the tribute of applause sincere?
Who can deny the daughter and the wife,
So early lost, the tribute of a tear?

Each home-felt virtue, ev'ry charm that binds The willing spirit in love's golden chain, Blending the hopes and joys of kindred minds, Still grac'd her soul, whom we lament in vain.

She was as lovely as the budding rose, O'ersprinkl'd with the pearly dews of morn, When Zephyr wafts its fragrance as it blows; And oh, she was a rose without a thorn!

But roses fade and wither in an hour,
The great, the good, the beautiful, must die!
And England's rose, and beauty's fairest flow'r,
Has faded while it charm'd the ravish'd eye.

It seems but yesterday, when we survey'd
Our Princess, as a friendly spirit giv'n,
The poor and the disconsolate to aid,
Zealous in charity, with help from heav'n!

The ag'd, the broken-hearted, the distress'd,
In her benevolence forgot their cares,
Their benefactress at the altar bless'd,
And for their Princess offer'd grateful pray'rs.

Heav'n smil❜d approving-while she dwelt below, O'ershadow'd her with wings of grace and love, And calls her now from earth and all its woe, To shine an angel in the courts above!

We fondly mark'd, with each revolving year,
The growth of the perfections we admir'd,
Till fitted for a brighter, purer sphere,
She, like a vision, from our hopes retir❜d.

Oh, momentary hopes, in grief to end!
Oh, disappointed wishes, quickly past!
From its proud orbit fated to descend,

The Sun of Brunswick has shone out its last!

Of late, Imagination, sportively

Soaring upon her many-colour'd wings,

Might in thy joyous bow'rs, O Claremont! see

The future father of a line of kings.

But now, reverse severe; 'tis her's to range
Among the tombs in melancholy guise;
Since songs of joy to woeful dirges change;
Since heav'n has snatch'd our angel to the skies,

Oh! spectacle to move the dull cold heart,
Of sordid feelings ne'er till now beguil'd!
Behold where Death, with his unerring dart,
Smote at one blow the mother and the child!

The mother, on her bed of death, appears
Like a majestic lily withering,

The royal infant (flow! flow fresh, my tears!)
Like the pale flow'r, the earliest born of spring,

Sad is the prospect to each feeling mind, And ah, each feeling mind must sorrow taste With his, that in one fatal hour resign'd

All that illum'd for him life's dreary waste.