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'Twas for your pleasure you came hereYou shall go back for mine."

Ah, luckless speech, and bootless boast
For which he paid full dear;

For, while he spake, a braying ass
Did sing most loud and clear;

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Whereat his horse did snort, as he
Had heard a lion roar,
And gallop'd off with all his might,
As he had done before.

Away went Gilpin, and away

Went Gilpin's hat and wig:

He lost them sooner than at first-
For why?-they were too big.

Now mistress Gilpin, when she saw
Her husband posting down

Into the country far away,

She pull'd out half-a-crown;

And thus unto the youth she said,
That drove them to the Bell,

"This shall be yours, when you bring back My husband safe and well.”

The youth did ride, and soon did meet
John coming back amain;

Whom in a trice he tried to stop
By catching at his rein;

But not performing what he meant,
And gladly would have done,
The frighted steed he frighted more,

And made him faster run.

Away went Gilpin, and away
Went postboy at his heels,

The postboy's horse right glad to miss.
The lumb'ring of the wheels.

Six gentlemen upon the road
Thus seeing Gilpin fly,

With postboy scampering in the rear,

Thus raised the hue and cry:

"Stop thief! stop thief! a highwayman !

None one of them was mute ;

And all and each that pass'd that way
Did join in the pursuit.

And now the turnpike-gates again
Flew open in short space;
The toll-men thinking, as before,
That Gilpin rode a race.

And so he did, and won it too,
For he got first to town;

Nor stopp'd till where he had got up
He did again get down.

Now let us sing, long live the king,
And Gilpin, long live he;

And when he next doth ride abroad,
May I be there to see !

THE CAST-AWAY.

OBSCUREST night involved the sky;

The Atlantic billows roared,
When such a destined wretch as I,
Washed headlong from on board,
Of friends, of hope, of all bereft,
His floating home for ever left.

No braver chief could Albion boast,
Than he, with whom he went,

Nor ever ship left Albion's coast

With warmer wishes sent.

He loved them both, but both in vain, Nor him beheld, nor her again.

Not long beneath the whelming brine,
Expert to swim, he lay :

Nor soon he felt his strength decline.
Or courage die away;

But waged with death a lasting strife,
Supported by despair of life.

He shouted; nor his friends had failed
To check the vessel's course,
But so the furious blast prevailed,
That, pitiless perforce,

They left their outcast mate behind,
And scudded still before the wind.

Some succour yet they could afford;
And, such as storms allow,

The cask, the coop, the floated cord,
Delayed not to bestow.

But he, they knew, nor ship nor shore,
Whate'er they gave, should visit more.

Nor, cruel as it seemed, could he
Their haste himself condemn,
Aware that flight, in such a sea,
Alone could rescue them;

Yet bitter felt it still to die
Deserted, and his friends so nigh.

He long survives, who lives an hour
In ocean, self-upheld :

And so long he, with unspent power,
His destiny repelled :

And ever as the minutes flew,
Entreated help, or cried "Adieu !"

At length, his transient respite past,
His comrades, who before

Had heard his voice in every blast,

Could catch the sound no more.
For then by toil subdued, he drank
The stifling wave, and then he sank.

No poet wept him; but the page
Of narrative sincere,

That tells his name, his worth, his age,

Is wet with Anson's tear.

And tears by bards or heroes shed
Alike immortalize the dead.

I therefore purpose not, or dream,
Descanting on his fate,
To give the melancholy theme
A more enduring date;

But misery still delights to trace
Its semblance in another's case.

No voice divine the storm allayed,
No light propitious shone,

When snatched from all effectual aid
We perished, each alone:

But I beneath a rougher sea,

And whelmed in deeper gulfs than he.

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TOLL for the Brave!

The brave that are no more!

All sunk beneath the wave
Fast by their native shore !

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