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She ceased: and that
fair maiden heard the truth
With the fond passionate despair of youth,
Which, new to suffering, gives its sorrow vent
In outward signs and bursts of wild lament: -
"If this be so, then, mother, let me die
Ere yet the glow hath faded from my sky!
Let me die young; before the holy trust
In human kindness crumbles into dust;
Before I suffer what I have not earned,
Or see by treachery my truth returned;
Before the love I live for, fades away;
Before the hopes I cherished most, decay;
Before the withering touch of fearful change
Makes some familiar face look cold and strange,
Or some dear heart close knitted to my own,
By perishing, hath left me more alone!
Though death be bitter, I can brave its pain
Better than all which threats if I remain:
While my soul, freed from ev'ry chance of ill,
Soars to that God whose high mysterious will
Sent me, foredoomed to grief, with wandering feet,
To grope my way through all this fair deceit!"
Her parent heard the words with grieved amaze,
And thus returned, with calm reproving gaze: -
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