Page:Songs of the Affections.pdf/97

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THE TOMB OF MADAME LANGHANS.
89



THE TOMB

OF

MADAME LANGHANS.[1]




To a mysteriously consorted pair
This place is consecrate; to death and life,
And to the best affections that proceed
From this conjunction.
Wordsworth.




How many hopes were borne upon thy bier,
O bride of stricken love! in anguish hither!
Like flowers, the first and fairest of the year
Pluck'd on the bosom of the dead to wither;


  1. At Hindelbank, near Berne, she is represented as bursting from the sepulchre, with her infant in her arms, at the sound of the last trumpet. An inscription on the tomb concludes thus:—"Here am I, O God! with the child whom thou hast given me."