Where the vast strength this creature late possessed
Has fled to? how the bright sparkling fire,
Which flashed but now from those dim rayless eyes
Has been extinguished? Oh--he's dead you say.
I know it well:--but how, and by what means?
Was it the arm of chance that struck him down,
In height of vigor, and in pride of strength,
To stiffen in the blast? Come, come, tell me:
Nay shake not thus the head's that are enriched
With eighty years of wisdom, gleaned from books,
From nights of study, and the magazines
Of knowledge, which your predecessors left.
What! not a word!--I ask you, once again,
How comes it that the wond'rous essence,
Which gave such vigour to these strong nerved limbs
Has leaped from its enclosure, and compelled
This noble workmanship of nature, thus
To sink Into a cold inactive clod?
Nay sneak not off thus cowardly--poor fools
Ye are as destitute of information
As is the lifeless subject of my thoughts!

The _subject of my thoughts_? Yes--there he lies
As free from life, as if he ne'er had lived.
Where are his friends and where his old acquaintance
Who borrowed from his strength, when in the yoke,
With weary pace the steep ascent they climbed?
Where are the gay companions of his prime,
Who with him ambled o'er the flowery turf,
And proudly snorting, passed the way worn hack,