And since that hour the Fisherman Has toil’d and toil’d in vain! For all the night, the moony light Gleams on the specter’d main! And when the skies are veil’d in gloom, The Murd’rer’s liquid way Bounds o’er the deeply yawning tomb, And flashing fires the sands illume, Where the green billows play! Full thirty years his task has been, Day after day more weary; For Heav’n design’d, his guilty mind Should dwell on prospects dreary. Bound by a strong and mystic chain, He has not pow’r to stray; But, destin’d mis’ry to sustain, He wastes, in Solitude and Pain— A loathsome life away. _OLD BARNARD_, _A MONKISH TALE_. OLD BARNARD was still a lusty hind, Though his age was full fourscore; And he us’d to go Thro’ hail and snow, To a neighb’ring town, With his old coat brown, To beg, at his GRANDSON’s door! OLD BARNARD briskly jogged along, When the hail and snow did fall; And, whatever the day, He was always gay, Did the broad Sun glow, Or the keen wind blow, While he begg’d in his GRANDSON’s Hall. His GRANDSON was a Squire, and he Had houses, and lands, and gold; And a coach beside, And horses to ride, And a downy bed To repose his head, And he felt not the winter’s cold. Old BARNARD had neither house nor lands, Nor gold to buy warm array; Nor a coach to carry, His old bones weary Nor beds of feather In freezing weather, To sleep the long nights away. But BARNARD a quiet conscience had, No guile did his bosom know; And when Evening clos’d, His old bones repos’d, Tho’ the wintry blast O’er his hovel past, And he slept, while the winds did blow! But his GRANDSON, he could never sleep ’Till the Sun began to rise; For a fev’rish pain Oppress’d his brain, And he fear’d some evil And dream’d of the Devil; Whenever he clos’d his eyes!