Page:Waverley Novels, vol. 22 (1831).djvu/23

“And when you first to me made suit,
 How fair I was you oft would say!
And proud of conquest, pluck’d the fruit,
 Then left the blossom to decay.

“Yes! now neglected and despised,
 The rose is pale, the lily’s dead;
But he that once their charms so prized,
 Is sure the cause those charms are fled.

“For know, when sick’ning grief doth prey,
 And tender love’s repaid with scorn,
The sweetest beauty will decay,—
 What floweret can endure the storm?

“At court, I’m told, is beauty’s throne,
 Where every lady’s passing rare,
That Eastern flowers, that shame the sun,
 Are not so glowing, not so fair.

“Then, Earl, why didst thou leave the beds
 Where roses and where lilies vie,
To seek a primrose, whose pale shades
 Must sicken when those gauds are by?

“’Mong rural beauties I was one,
 Among the fields wild flowers are fair;
Some country swain might me have won,
 And thought my beauty passing rare.

“But, Leicester, (or I much am wrong,)
 Or ’tis not beauty lures thy vows;
Rather ambition’s gilded crown
 Makes thee forget thy humble spouse.

“Then, Leicester, why, again I plead,
 (The injured surely may repine,)—
Why didst thou wed a country maid,
 When some fair princess might be thine?