Could I forsake the cause of Freedom’s holy band!
IX.
“But shame—but flight—a recreant’s name to prove,
To hide in exile ignominious fears;
Say, e’en if this I brooked,—the public love
Thy father’s bosom to his home endears:
And how could I his few remaining years,
My Gertrude, sever from so dear a child?”
So, day by day, her boding heart he cheers;
At last that heart to hope is half beguiled,