BETA

Sonnet

On the Death of His Late Majesty.

Ward of the Law !— dread Shadow of a
King !1
Whose Realm had dwindled to one stately
room ;2
Whose universe was gloom immers’d in
gloom,3
Darkness as thick as Life o’er Life could fling,4
Yet haply cheered with some faint glimmering5
Of Faith and Hope; if thou by nature’s doom6
Gently has sunk into the quiet tomb,7
Why should we bend in grief, to sorrow cling,8
When thankfulness were best ?— Fresh-flow-
ing tears,9
Or, where tears flow not, sigh succeeding sigh,10
Yield to such after-thought the sole reply11
Which justly it can claim. The Nation hears12
In this deep knell—silent for threescore years,13
An unexampled voice of awful memory !14