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THE DYING SWAN.

’TWAS on a river’s verdant side,
about the close of day,
A dying Swan with music try’d
To chase her cares away.

And tho’ she ne’er had strain’d her throat,
Nor tun’d her voice before,
Death ravish’d with so sweet a note,
a while his stroke forebore.

Farewel tho’ she cry’d, ye silver streams,
Ye purling waves adieu,
Where Phoebus us’d to dart his beams,
and bless both me and you.

Farewel ye tender whistling reeds,
Soft scenes of happy love;
Farewel, ye bright enamell'd meads,
where I was wont to rove.

With you I must no more converse;
look, yonder setting sun
Waits, while I these notes rehearse,
and then he must be gone.

Mourn not, my kind and constant mate,
We'll meet again below;
It is the kind decree of Fate,
and I with pleasure go.