Occasioned by putting him on shore at the Island of Sapola, for theft
Since Nature taught you, Tray, to be a thief,
What blame have you, for working at your trade?
What if you stole a handsome round of beef;
Theft, in your code of laws, no crime was made.
The ten commandments you had never read,
Nor did it ever enter in your head:
But art and Nature, careful to conceal,
Disclos'd not even the Eighth—Thou shalt not steal.
Then to the green wood, caitiff, haste away:
There take your chance to live—for Truth must say,
We have no right, for theft, to hang up Tray.
[376] First published in the National Gazette, Nov. 3, 1791. Sapola Island is one of the sea-islands of McIntosh County, Georgia, forty-two miles southwest of Savannah. The somewhat unusual proceeding of putting a worthless dog on shore, instead of the more common expedient of killing him at once, is only another evidence of the poet's kindly heart. Text from the edition of 1809.
TO LYDIA[377]
"Tu procul a patria, ah dura! inculta deserta,
Me sine, sola videbis——
Virg. Eclog.
Thus, safe arrived, she greets the strand,
And leaves her pilot for the land;
But Lydia, why to deserts roam,
And thus forsake your floating home!
To what fond care shall I resign
The bosom, that must ne'er be mine:
With lips, that glow beyond all art,
Oh! how shall I consent to part!—