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| HERE, in the fruitful vales of Somerset, | |
| Was Emma born, and here the maiden grew | |
| To the sweet season of her womanhood, | |
| Beloved and lovely, like a plant whose leaf | |
| And bud and blossom all are beautiful. | 5 |
| In peacefulness her virgin years were passed; | |
| And, when in prosperous wedlock she was given, | |
| Amid the Cumbrian mountains far away | |
| She had her summer bower. ’T was like a dream | |
| Of old romance to see her when she plied | 10 |
| Her little skiff on Derwent’s glassy lake; | |
| The roseate evening resting on the hills, | |
| The lake returning back the hues of heaven, | |
| Mountains and vales and waters, all imbued | |
| With beauty, and in quietness; and she, | 15 |
| Nymph-like, amid that glorious solitude | |
| A heavenly presence, gliding in her joy. | |
| But soon a wasting malady began | |
| To prey upon her, frequent in attack, | |
| Yet with such flattering intervals as mock | 20 |
| The hopes of anxious love, and most of all | |
| The sufferer, self-deceived. During those days | |
| Of treacherous respite, many a time hath he, | |
| Who leaves this record of his friend, drawn back | |
| Into the shadow from her social board, | 25 |
| Because too surely in her cheek he saw | |
| The insidious bloom of death; and then her smiles | |
| And innocent mirth excited deeper grief | |
| Than when long-looked-for tidings came at last, | |
| That, all her sufferings ended, she was laid | 30 |
| Amid Madeira’s orange-groves to rest. | |
| O gentle Emma! o’er a lovelier form | |
| Than thine earth never closed; nor e’er did heaven | |
| Receive a purer spirit from the world. | |
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