previous next

62. lady Washington's Lamentation. December, 1799.1

When Columbia's brave sons called my hero to lead 'em,
To vanquish their foes and establish their freedom,
I rejoiced at his honor — my fears I dissembled;
At the thought of his danger, my heart, how it trembled:
O my Washington! O my Washington! O my Washington!
All was hazardous.

The contest decided with peace to the nation;
My hero retired 'mid the loud acclamation
Of men without number, and praise without measure;
My own heart exulted in transports of pleasure.
O my happiness! O my happiness! O my happiness!
How precarious!

Our Freedom, with order, by Faction rejected,
A new Constitution our country erected;
My hero was raised to preside over the Union,
And his cares intercepted our blissful communion:
O my happiness! O my happiness! O my happiness!
How precarious!

Declining the trust of his dignified station,
With joy to the seat of his dear estimation,
Surrounded with honors, he humbly retreated;
Sweet hopes, softly whispered, my bliss was completed,
O my happiness! O my happiness! O my happiness!
How precarious!

When the pangs of disease had fatally seized him,
My heart would have yielded its life to have eased him;
I prayed the Most High if for death He designed him,
That he would not permit me to loiter behind him.
O my Washington! O my Washington! O my Washington!
All was dubious.

When hope was all fled, and I saw him resigning
His soul to his God without dread or repining,
What, my heart, were thy feelings, lamenting, admiring,
To see him so nobly, so calmly expiring?
O my Washington! O my Washington! O my Washington!
Has forsaken us!

When I followed his corpse with grief unconfined,
And saw to the tomb his dear relics consigned,
When I left him in silence and darkness surrounded,
With what pangs of fresh anguish my bosom was wounded.
O my Washington! O my Washington! O my Washington!
Has forsaken us!

His aspect so noble, pale grave-clothes disfigured,
And his conquering arm despoiled of its vigor;
On those lips, which dropped wisdom, is silence imposed,
And those kind, beaming eyes forever are closed.
O my Washington! O my Washington! O my Washington!
Has forsaken us!

1 Copied from an original, January 9th, 1808, and presented by a lady of Richmond, Va., to Miss Susan McCain, (Mrs. S. M. Bell,) of Lunenburg County, Virginia.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

hide Places (automatically extracted)

View a map of the most frequently mentioned places in this document.

Sort places alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a place to search for it in this document.
Washington (United States) (15)
Richmond (Virginia, United States) (1)
Lunenburg (Virginia, United States) (1)
Columbia (South Carolina, United States) (1)
hide People (automatically extracted)
Sort people alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a person to search for him/her in this document.
Washington (1)
Susan McCain (1)
S. M. Bell (1)
hide Dates (automatically extracted)
Sort dates alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a date to search for it in this document.
January 9th, 1808 AD (1)
December, 1799 AD (1)
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: