O come and grace my Anna’s breast.
O! I should think—that fragrant bed
Might I but hope with you to share—
Years of anxiety repaid
By one short hour of transport there.
To her he appears to have been deeply attached. He moved her to Ashburton, and there visited her when he could escape from his literary labours in London, and there she faded, and was buried on 27 December, 1789. Gifford was stricken by her loss in the most sensitive part of the human heart, for over her grave he poured forth the pathetic lament:—
I wish I was where Anna lies,
For I am sick of lingering here,
And every hour affliction cries,
“Go, and partake her humble bier.”