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A HUMAN SKULL,

DISCOVERED IN A WASTE AND LONELY FIELD.

THOU tenant of unhallowed ground,

Lone dweller in a nameless grave,

What ages may have circled round,
Since Time thee birth and being gave!

Though thou art now an empty skull,
Yet there is much I long to know,

Of what thou sawest and once could tell,
When moving on this earth below:

What king did Scotia's sceptre sway?
Was he his subjects' scourge or shield?
How passed thy youthful years away,
On rural plain, or martial field?

Or lived'st thou in that troublous time

When faithful hearts were tried by fire,

When pure religion was a crime,

Which kings pursued with vengeance dire ?

Perhaps 'twas thine their wrath to feel,

When persecution poured her flood,

A witness in the cause, to seal
Thy testimony with thy blood.

Thou wert, perhaps, a purblind fool,
Devoted to a bigot creed;

Or some proud tyrant's reckless tool,
To perpetrate a ruthless deed.

Hadst thou a selfish heart and cold,
A worshipper at Mammon's shrine?
Or was thy soul to pleasure sold,

A reveller, given to mirth and wine?

Were thine the low delights of sense,

The venal bliss that gold could buy? Didst thou, the slave of indolence, On lap of sloth supinely lie?

Wert thou by poverty oppressed?

Of friends and home perhaps bereft; By many scorned, by none caressed, The grave thy only refuge left?

Didst thou on others bliss bestow,
Thy heart responding sorrows sigh,
Thy hand relieving want and woe,
Wiping the tear from misery's eye?

Hast thou a husband's feelings proved?
Oh! was it thine, bereaved, to mourn
For her, far more than life beloved,
Untimely from thy bosom torn?

Did fate thy lingering lamp of life
Extinguish, when its oil was dry?
Or wert thou victim in the strife,

When thy young heart with hope beat high?

Oh! mouldering skull, couldst thou relate
What wisdom, wit, or worth was thine;
How warmly thou couldst love and hate,
How great in art or science shine.

Perhaps with holy, heavenly love,

Thou couldst the glowing heart inspire;

Teach it to rise to realms above,

A cabinet of worth wert thou?

Or toy-shop, filled with fancies vain? Or wert thou still the same as nowAn empty skull-devoid of brain ?

But haply, formed in finer mould,
'Twas thine to crown a temple fair,
Which men delighted to behold,

In beauty rich, beyond compare ;

Unheedful now thy cold dull ear,

And deaf to the deceiver's art;

Alas! no more 'tis thine to hear

The flattering tale that thrilled the heart.

I fain would ask, could'st thou reply,
Thy fate, when living, I would know;
Did sunbright summer cheer thy sky?
Or wintery clouds of gloom and woe?

Say, wert thou blessed in wedded love?
Was thine a calm domestic life?
Didst thou the soft endearments prove,

That charm the mother and the wife?

Or didst thou pine in beauty's bloom,
Alone, like some neglected flower?

Or sink untimely in the tomb,

The victim of a spoiler's power?

Ah me! this lone sequestered spot,
Where thou to sleep alone art laid,
May indicate thy hapless lot,

By ruthless, villain man betrayed!

Whate'er thou wert, thy frame is dust;
But has thy deathless spirit rest?

Has it a place among the just,

Who" die in Jesus, and are bless'd?"

While thus I mused, methought a sound
Proceeded from the mouldy shell;

A death-like stillness reigned around,
As on my ear these accents fell:

"What I have been, it boots not thee
To learn, though it were mine to show ;
What I am now, soon thou must be,
Must sleep as sound, and lie as low.

"Dost thou rejoice in youth and health?
Does strength and vigour nerve thy arm?
Hast thou been bless'd with treasured wealth?
Or has thy tongue the skill to charm?

"In Pleasure's green and fairy bowers
Hast thou a thoughtless wanderer strayed?

Dost thou with Beauty pass thy hours,
And linger in Love's myrtle shade ?

"Art thou a philosophic sage,

Who, patient o'er the midnight oil, Delight'st to pore on learning's page, And gather intellectual spoil?

"Youth, health, and strength will soon be o'er; Pleasure will smile in vain, to save,

Not Knowledge, with her treasured lore,

Can charm the dull insatiate grave.