But vain the charms that grac’d the maid,
  The eye where pity lov’d to reign,
The form where fascination play’d,
  The voice that breath’d enchantment, vain!

Unequal, all their syren power,
  To win from fate it’s frown away: 
When Bertram came in luckless hour
  To sigh, to flatter, to betray!

He came, inform’d in every art,
  That makes th’incautious virgin weep: 
Beguiles the unsuspecting heart,
  And lulls mistrust to silken sleep.

His tale she heard, nor thought the while,
  That falshood such a tale could tell: 
That dark deceit could e’er defile,
  The tongue that talk’d of truth so well.

He woo’d, he wept, ’till all was won,
  Then, as the spring-born zephyrs fly,
He fled, he left her, lost! undone! 
  In penitential tears to die.

Oh! could she live, condemn’d to feel,
  The insults of exulting scorn? 
Relentless as the three-edg’d steel! 
  Illicit pleasure’s eldest-born!

Who ’mid despair’s impervious gloom,
  Should bid her soul’s sad wand’rings cease: 
Th’extinguish’d spark of hope relume,
  And sooth the penitent to peace?

She saw her aged mother bow,
  Subdued by exquisite distress: 
For every hope was faded now,
  And life a weary wilderness.

She saw her in the cold earth laid,
  And not a tear was seen to start,
And not a sigh the pangs allay’d,
  That agoniz’d her bursting heart.

And when the mournful rite was done,
  A sculptur’d woe, she seem’d to move: 
As close she clasp’d her infant son,
  The pledge of faithless Bertram’s love.

While slow she pac’d the lone church-yard,
  With pity’s accents, soft and sad,
We strove to win her fix’d regard,
  But vainly strove, for Ann was mad!

’Lorn, listless, like a wither’d flower,
  Blown o’er the plain by every blast,
Impell’d by fancy’s fitful power,
  The lovely, luckless, victim past.

’Till, left alone, the wood she sought,
  Where first her Bertram’s vows she heard,
And first with soft affection fraught,
  His vows return’d, to Heaven prefer’d.

Each scene she trac’d, to memory dear,
  Tho’ memory lent a feeble ray,
Reason’s benighted bark to steer,
  Thro’ dark distraction’s stormy way.

At length, where yon translucent tide,
  Meanders slow the meads among: 
Reclining on its sedgy side,
  Thus to her sleeping babe she sung: 

“Sweet cherub! on the green bank rest,
  And balmy may thy slumbers be;
For tempests tear thy mother’s breast,
  Alas! it cannot pillow thee.

“I’ll wander ’till thy sire I’ve found,
  I’ll lure his footsteps where you lie;
While mantling waters murmur round,
 And wild-winds sing your lullaby.

“Haply, shalt thou, his scorn subdue,
  Thy helpless innocence to save;
But if unmov’d, he turns from you,
  I’ll lead him to my mother’s grave