Appendix 11
To the Young Ladies at Spetisbury House these lines are addressed by their affectionate Father in Christ Ralph Southward
Health to the Queen and all her royal train
Of smiling Courtiers gentle be the reign
That …… the Fair let mirth and mutual love
Attend where’r they wander in the grove
What though the winter suns will not disclos
The snowy lilly or the blushing rose
I’ll pluck a garland from yon hanging wood
That nods applause o’re Stours meand’ring flood
No Nymphs so fair through all his winding bound
He meets as those who treads these hallow’d grounds
The shapely Fir that lifts its awful head
The Bay by f….ing hands immortal made
The box pale green, the laurell glossy hue
Shall all unite and ……. The mournful Yew
Shall cease to weep when destin’d to adorn
The brows that emulate the cheerful morn
O my fair friends while youthful vigour reigns
And pours the rapid tide along your veins
Let virtue guide your steps where’er you move
And early piety and heaven born love
While yet you dwell in Spetisburys calm abode
And is it hard to love an Infant God
But should som.. Fiend too vers’d in wily Arts
Pour the dread poison in your thoughtless hearts
Teach them to love corruption trust to lies
And fix on earth a sould? that claims the skies
Not Jeremia mourning o’er the woes
Of Salems sones led captive by her foes
Her temples burnt her walls with turrents crown’d
Pay? hostile rage level? with the ground
Should you my Friends thus blot my rising joy
Not Jeremias self should shed more tears than I
So some poor widow mourns an only son
Hope of her age who from her arm has run
To tempt the dangrous seas was all his taste
And seek a fortune through the ..try waste
Each flowing tide she seeks the winding shore
With eager looks the vessel to explore
The bark appears in thought she views? his charm
And fancy gives her darling to her arms
Short is her joy the adverse storms arise
And lift the foaming billows to the skies
The opening planks admit the briny waves
The vessel sinks and Ocean? is his grave
Ah what avails that to make him blest
She Aail’d? by day by night she lost her rest
Her cares her tears her labours all are vain
Her lies? a pray to monsters in the main
Enjoy my friends enjoy while yet you may
The passing pleasure of the short liv’d day
Another day shall com hour? soon unknown
To him who guides the plough or fills the throne
When sinking nature stretch’d on sorrows bed
Shall seek a Friend to hold her drooping head
When the pail cheeks shall vie with kindred clay
And the dark eye balls roll in vain for day
Blest in those moments if in all the past
You liv’d each day as if you liv’d your last
Then smiling hope shall cheer your latest breath
And past to bliss beyond the reach of death
Jane Beringtons horrid scratch May 14 1807
Spetisbury House