When some proud son of man returns to earth,
Unknown to glory, but upheld by birth,
The sculptor's art exhausts the pomp of woe,
And storied urns record who rests below;
When all is done, upon the tomb is seen,
Not what he was, but what he should have been:
But the poor dog, in life the firmest friend,
The first to welcome, foremost to defend,
Whose honest heart is still his master's own,
Who labors, fights, lives, breathes for him alone,
Unhonored falls, unnoticed all his worth,
Denied in heaven the soul he held on earth.
Ye! who perchance behold this simple urn,
Pass on,—it honors none you wish to mourn;
To mark a friend's remains these stones arise;
I never knew but one,—and here he lies.
Lord Byron, 1808.
THE DOG.
Poor friend and sport of man, like him unwise,
Away! Thou standest to his heart too near,
Too close for careless rest or healthy cheer;
Almost in thee the glad brute nature dies.
Go scour the fields in wilful enterprise,
Lead the free chase, leap, plunge into the mere,
Herd with thy fellows, stay no longer here,
Seeking thy law and gospel in men's eyes.
He cannot go; love holds him fast to thee;
More than the voices of his kind thy word
Lives in his heart; for him thy very rod
Has flowers: he only in thy will is free.
Cast him not out, the unclaimed savage herd
Would turn and rend him, pining for his God.
Emily Pfeiffer.