TO THE MEMORY OF RAISLEY CALVERT
CALVERT! it must not be unheard by them Who may respect my name, that I to thee Owed many years of early liberty. This care was thine when sickness did condemn Thy youth to hopeless wasting, root and stem– That I, if frugal and severe, might stray Where’er I liked; and finally array My temples with the Muse’s diadem. Hence, if in freedom I have loved the truth; If there be aught of pure, or good, or great, 10 In my past verse; or shall be, in the lays Of higher mood, which now I meditate;– It gladdens me, O worthy, short-lived, Youth! To think how much of this will be thy praise. 1806.