A time-piece stood on feet of burnish’d gold;
A stag’s-head crest adorn’d the pictured case,
Through the pure crystal shone the enamel’d face;
And while on brilliants moved the hands of steel,
It click’d from pray’r to pray’r, from meal to meal.
Here as the lady sat, a friendly pair
Stept in t’admire the view, and took their chair:
They then related how the young and gay
Were thoughtless wandering in the broad highway:
How tender damsels sail’d in tilted boats,