822 OUE HYMNS :
midnight lamp, gave him a first place in the University ; but alas ! wasted his too frail hody, and he died before completing his twenty-third year.
From amidst the severe satire of his " English Bards and Scotch Reviewers," Byron turns aside thus adequately to celebrate in song this affecting event :
" Unhappy White, when life was in its spring, And thy young muse just waved her joyous wing, The spoiler swept that soaring lyre away, Which else had sounded an immortal lay ! Oh, what a noble heart was here undone, When science" self destroyed her favourite son.
- * * *
" Twas thine own genius gaTe the final blow, And helped to plant the wound that laid thee low : So the struck eagle stretched upon the plain, No more through rolling clouds to soar again, Viewed his own feather on the fatal dart, And winged the shaft that quivered to his heart."
Kirke White s poems, published in 1804, did not receive much attention, but served to introduce him to Southey, whose work, " The Remains of Henry Kirke White," has become a favourite with the public. Besides the " Clifton Grove," 1802, dedicated to the Duchess of Devonshire, Kirke White s most important production is the " Christiad," an unfinished epic. The ten hymns of Kirke White, given by Dr. Collyer in his collection, 1812, are believed to be all that he wrote. There are two of his hymns in the " New Congregational Hymn Book," Nos. 627 and 984. They are not distinguished by any marks of great poetic genius.
" Oft in sorrow, oft in woe." No. 627.
Dr. Collyer gives this hymn of the same length, but differently, in his "Hymns," 1812, with the following note : "The muti lated state of this hymn, which was written on the back of one of the mathematical papers of this excellent young man, and which came into my hands a mere fragment, rendered it necessary for
�� �
