INTRODUCTORY.
xxv
fragment from the pen of the lovely sufferer. It leaves too painful a sensation upon the mind to admit a comment."
It only remains for us to add to this slight sketch, that the author of this volume of poems died in 1825, just a month before her seventeenth birthday. The following inscription appears on a modest marble monument erected over her remains in the family burial-ground at Plattsburg:—
LUCRETIA M. DAVIDSON
WAS BORN SEPT. 27, 1808,
AND
DIED AUGUST 27, 1823,
AGED 16 YEARS AND 11 MONTHS
"Here innocence and beauty lies, whose breath
Was snatched by early, not untimely death."—Pope.
Was snatched by early, not untimely death."—Pope.
On another side of the stone appear these beautiful lines from the pen of Mr. Bryant:—
"In the cold, moist earth we laid her,
When the forests cast the leaf,
And we wept that one so lovely
Should have a life so brief;
When the forests cast the leaf,
And we wept that one so lovely
Should have a life so brief;
"Yet not unmeet it was that one,
Like that young friend of ours,
So gentle and so beautiful,
Should perish with the flowers."
Like that young friend of ours,
So gentle and so beautiful,
Should perish with the flowers."
The opposite side of the marble bears these words:—
"This monument was raised as a testimony of affection by her mourning father."
