ELEGANT EXTRACTS. PART VI. Ballads, Songs, and Sonnets. THE PRINCESS ELIZABETH. A Ballad. ALLUDING TO A STORY RECORDED OF HER WHEN SHE WAS PRISONER AT WOODSTOCK, 1554. WILL you hear how once repining Each ambitious thought resigning, While the nymphs and swains, delighted, Thus the royal maiden cried: 'Bred on plains, or born in valleys, Who would bid those scenes adieu? Stranger to the arts of Malice, Who would ever courts pursue? VOL. III. CC 'Malice never taught to treasure, 'How can they of humble station Which allows them all to love? ( Love, like air, is widely given; Power nor Chance can these restrain; Truest, noblest gifts of Heaven! Only purest on the plain! 'Peers can no such charms discover, 'Never yet did courtly maiden Would indulgent Heaven had granted All the empire I had wanted Then had been my shepherd's heart. 'Then with him o'er hills and mountains, Free from fetters, might I rove; Fearless taste the crystal fountains, Peaceful sleep beneath the grove. Rustics had been more forgiving, None had envied me when living, SHENSTONE. JEMMY DAWSON. A Ballad. WRITTEN ABOUT THE TIME OF HIS EXECUTION, IN THE YEAR 1745. COME listen to my mournful tale, t Ye tender hearts and lovers dear! And pity every plaint-but mine. A brighter never trod the plain; One tender maid, she loved him dear; But curse on party's hateful strife, O, had he never seen that day! Which gives the brave the keenest wound. How pale was then his true love's cheek, When Jemmy's sentence reach'd her ear! For never yet did Alpine snows So pale or yet so chill appear. With faltering voice she, weeping, said— 'Yet might sweet mercy find a place, 'The gracious prince that gave him life Should learn to lisp the giver's name. 'But though he should be dragg'd in scorn To yonder ignominious tree, He shall not want one constant friend O! then her mourning coach was call'd; She had not loved her favourite more. She follow'd him, prepared to view Which she had fondly loved so long, And stifled was that tuneful breath Which in her praise had sweetly sung: And sever'd was that beauteous neck Round which her arms had fondly closed, And mangled was that beauteous breast On which her lovesick head reposed: And ravish'd was that constant heart She did to every heart prefer; For though it could its king forget, 'Twas true and loyal still to her. Amid those unrelenting flames She bore this constant heart to see, So sad, so tender, yet so true. SHENSTONE. |