And infant daughters passed away from earth

Like fruit-tree blossoms, beautiful and brief

In their career. The tablets in the church,

Recording ancestry through ages past,

Record as briefly the short time betwixt

Their birth and death. Thus he alone was left

The living centre, where the fervent love

Of two fond parents, could condense its rays.

From budding infancy, the tender care

And sweet affection of a mother’s breast,