Awhile, from land to land he idly roved, And join'd life's movement with a heart unmoved. No more loud cities ring with Arden's name, Applaud his faults, and call his fashion "Fame!" Disgust with all things robes him as he goes, In that pale virtue, Vice, when weary, knows. Yet his, at least, one rescue from the past; His, one sweet comfort--Lucy's love at last! That bed of pain o'er which she had watch'd and wept-- That grave, where Love forgot its wrongs and slept-- That touching sorrow and that still remorse Unlock'd her heart, and gave the stream its course. From her own grief, by griefs more dark beguiled, Rose the consoling Angel in the Child! Yet still the calm disease, whose mute decay No leech arrests, crept gradual round its prey. Death came, came gently, on his daughter's breast, Murm'ring, "Remember where this dust should rest." They bear the last Lord of that haughty race Where winds the wave round Mary's dwelling-place; And side by side (oh, be it in the sky As in the earth!)--the long-divided lie! Doth life's last act one wrong at least repair-- His nameless child to wealth at least the heir? So Arden's will decreed--so sign'd the hand; So ran the text--not so Law rules the land: "I do bequeath unto my _child_,"[Y]--that word Alone on strangers has the wealth conferr'd. O'erjoy'd Law's heirs the legal blunder read, And Justice cancels Nature from the deed. O moral world! deal sternly if thou wilt With the warm weakness as the wily guilt, But spare the harmless! Wherefore shall the child Be from the pale which shelters Crime exiled? Why heap such barriers round the sole redress Which sin can give to sinless wretchedness? Why must the veriest stranger thrust aside Our flesh--our blood, because a name's denied? Give all thou hast to whomsoe'er thou please, Foe, alien, knave, as whim so Law decrees; But if thy heart speaks, if thy conscience cries-- "I give my child"--the law thy voice belies; Chicanery balks all effort that atones, And Justice robs the wretch that Nature owns! So abject, so despoil'd, so penniless, Stood thy love-born in the world's wilderness, O Lord of lands and towers, and princely sway! O Dust, from whom with breath has pass'd away The humblest privilege the beggar finds In rags that wrap his infant from the winds!