Hemans Miscellaneous Poetry 1/Epitaph on Mr W—A Celebrated Mineralogist
[1]
EPITAPH ON MR W——,
A CELEBRATED MINERALOGIST. 1
Stop, passenger! a wondrous tale to list—
Here lies a famous Mineralogist.
Famous indeed! such traces of his power,
He's left from Penmaenbach to Penmaenmawr,
Such caves, and chasms, and fissures in the rocks,
His works resemble those of earthquake shocks;
And future ages very much may wonder
What mighty giant rent the hills asunder,
Or whether Lucifer himself had ne'er
Gone with his crew to play at foot-ball there.
His fossils, flints, and spars, of every hue,
With him, good reader, here lie buried too—
Sweet specimens! which, toiling to obtain,
He split huge cliffs, like so much wood, in twain
We knew, so great the fuss he made about them,
Alive or dead, he ne'er would rest without them;
So, to secure soft slumber to his bones,
We paved his grave with all his favourite stones.
His much-loved hammer's resting by his side;
Each hand contains a shell-fish petrified:
His mouth a piece of pudding-stone incloses,
And at his feet a lump of coal reposes:
Sure he was born beneath some lucky planet!—
His very coffin-plate is made of granite.
Weep not, good reader! he is truly blest
Amidst chalcedony and quartz to rest:
Weep not for him! but envied be his doom,
Whose tomb, though small, for all he loved had room:
And, O ye rocks!—schist, gneiss, whate'er ye be,
Ye varied strata!—names too hard for me—
Sing, "Oh, be joyful!" for your direst foe
By death's fell hammer is at length laid low.
Ne'er on your spoils again shall W—— riot
Clear up your cloudy brows, and rest in quiet—
He sleeps—no longer planning hostile actions,
As cold as any of his petrifactions;
Enshrined in specimens of every hue,
Too tranquil e'en to dream, ye rocks, of you.
EPITAPH
ON THE HAMMER OF THE AFORESAID MINERALOGIST.
Here in the dust, its strange adventures o'er,
A hammer rests, that ne'er knew rest before.
Released from toil, it slumbers by the side
Of one who oft its temper sorely tried;
No day e'er pass'd, but in some desperate strife
He risk'd the faithful hammer's limbs and life:
Now laying siege to some old limestone wall,
Some rock now battering, proof to cannon-ball
Now scaling heights like Alps or Pyrenees,
Perhaps a flint, perhaps a slate to seize;
But, if a piece of copper met his eyes,
He'd mount a precipice that touch'd the skies,
And bring down lumps so precious, and so many,
I'm sure they almost would have made—a penny!
Think, when such deeds as these were daily done,
What fearful risks this hammer must have run.
And, to say truth, its praise deserves to shine
In lays more lofty and more famed than mine:
Oh! that in strains which ne'er should be forgot,
Its deeds were blazon'd forth by Walter Scott!
Then should its name with his be closely link'd,
And live till every mineral were extinct.
Rise, epic bards! be yours the ample field—
Bid W——'s hammer match Achilles' shield:
As for my muse, the chaos of her brain,
I search for specimens of wit in vain;
Then let me cease ignoble rhymes to stammer,
And seek some theme less arduous than the hammer;
Remembering well, "what perils do environ"
Woman or "man that meddles with cold iron."
- ↑ 1 "Whilst on the subject of Conway, it may not be amiss to introduce two little pieces of a very different character from the foregoing, [Lines to Mr Edward the Harper,] which were written at the same place, three or four years afterwards, and will serve as a proof of that versatility of talent before alluded to. As may easily be supposed, they were never intended for publication, but were merely a jeu d’esprit of the moment, in good-humoured raillery of the indefatigable zeal and perseverance of one of the party in his geological researches."—Memoir, p. 20.