MODERNIZED FROM THE "MONK'S TALE" IN CHAUCER.

_(For the Mirror.)_


Of Uggolino, Pisa's hapless Count,
How shall my Muse the piteous tale relate!
Near to that city, on a gentle mount,
There stands a tow'r--within its donjon grate
They lock'd him up, and, dreadful to recount,
With him three tender babes to share his fate!
But five years old the eldest of the three--
Oh! who could rob such babes of liberty!

Doom'd was the Count within that tow'r to die,
Him Pisa's vengeful bishop did oppose;
With covert speech and false aspersions sly
He stirr'd the people, till they madly rose,
And shut him in this prison strong and high;
His former slaves are now his fiercest foes.
Coarse was their food, and scantily supplied,
A prelude to the death these captives died.

And on a luckless day it thus befell--
About their surly jailer's wonted hour
To bring them food, he enter'd not their cell,
But bolted fast their prison's outer door.
This on the County's heart rang like a knell--
Hope was excluded from this grizzly tow'r.
Speechless he sat, despair forbade to rave--