[From Poems; by Rev Robert Brown, 1826]

LINES ON VIEWING PEEL CASTLE BY MOONLIGHT.

I ENVY not the man who, while
The moon, as now, her radiance lends
To yonder small romantic isle,
Can eye unpleased the moss-clad pile
That from its verge ascends.

Never so beautifully shone
Those walls beneath the lunar light
As now, when mouldering, roofless, lone,
And silent, save but for the moan
That speaks the breezes' flight.

Thus never does the grove display
So sweet a scene, as when we view
Its leaves beginning to decay,
When summer's lively tint gives way
To autumn's graver hue.

Thus Christians loveliest too appear,
When from the pale decaying frame
The spirit flies without a fear,
Without a groan, or sigh, or tear,
To Him from whom it came.

		Peel Castle
Any comments, errors or omissions gratefully received The Editor HTML Transcription © F.Coakley , 2008