TO---
Yet brood deep feelings in the youngling breast,
Though undeveloped, natural as speech;
And my own tropic isle this truth impressed,
That Nature teaches more than man may teach.
'Twas on an orange-tree, just within reach
Of childish hands, a bird had built her nest,
A mother-bird; and ne'er more impious breach
Than mine upon that blissful home of rest,
On sleeping town did night-sped warrior make;
And memory yet recals the mournful song
Which the reft parent, for her nestlings' sake,
Poured, round her ruined dwelling hovering long;
While every touch, that did her grief impart,
Dropt, like a precept, on my conscious heart.