On Revisiting Harrow [1]
1.
Here once engaged the stranger's view
Young Friendship's record simply trac'd;
Few were her words,--but yet, though few,
Resentment's hand the line defac'd.
2.
Deeply she cut--but not eras'd--
The characters were still so plain,
That Friendship once return'd, and gaz'd,--
Till Memory hail'd the words again.
3.
Repentance plac'd them as before;
Forgiveness join'd her gentle name;
So fair the inscription seem'd once more,
That Friendship thought it still the same.
4.
Thus might the Record now have been;
But, ah, in spite of Hope's endeavour,
Or Friendship's tears, Pride rush'd between,
And blotted out the line for ever.
September, 1807.
[Footnote 1:
"Some years ago, when at Harrow, a friend of the author engraved on a
particular spot the names of both, with a few additional words, as a
memorial. Afterwards, on receiving some real or imaginary injury, the
author destroyed the frail record before he left Harrow. On revisiting
the place in 1807, he wrote under it these stanzas."
-THE END-
George Gordon Lord Byron's poem: On Revisiting Harrow
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