Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T14:16:17.246Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Appendix E - Attributed poems

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2020

Jane Austen
Edited by
Janet Todd  and
Linda Bree
Janet Todd
Affiliation:
Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge and University of Aberdeen
Get access

Summary

‘Sigh Lady Sigh’

The poem is written in pencil, in a hand similar in some respects to that of Jane Austen, across two pages of Ann Murry, Mentoria: or, The Young Lady's Instructor (1778, second edn 1780), including the title page. The lines seem to be original, but authorship is impossible to verify. The book was owned by Jane Austen in the 1790s and given by her to Anna Lefroy in 1801. It is now owned by the Jane Austen Memorial Trust at Chawton Cottage. See Introduction, p. cxxvii.

Sigh Lady sigh, hide not the tear thats stealing

Down thy young face now so pale & cheerless

Let not thy heart be blighted by the feeling

That presses on thy soul, of utter loneliness.

In sighs supprest & grief that's [ever?] weeping

Beats slow & mournfully [a mourning?] heart

A heart oer which decay & death are creeping

In which no sunshine can a gleam impart.

Thou art not desolate, tho’ left forsaken

By one in whom thy very soul was bound

Let Natures voice thy dreary heart awaken

Oh listen to the melodies around.

For Summer her pure golden tress is flinging

On woods & glades & silent gliding streams

With joy the very air around is ringing

Oh rouse thee from those mournful mournful dreams.

Go forth let not that voice in vain be calling

Join thy hearts voice to that which fills the air

For he who een a sparrow saves from falling

Makes thee an object of peculiar care.

‘On the Universities’

The manuscript is held in the HenryW. and Albert A. Berg Collection at theNewYork Public Library and is in JA's hand.However, shemust simply have copied out the poem, which appears in many collected volumes of verse and epigrams including in the ‘Epigrams’ section of the highly popular Elegant Extracts: or Useful and Entertaining Pieces of Poetry, selected for the Improvement of Youth (London: Charles Dilly, c.1789[?] and subsequent editions). See Introduction, pp. cxxvi–cxxvii.

No wonder that Oxford and Cambridge profound

In Learning and Science so greatly abound

Since some carry thither a little each day

and we meet with so few who bring any away.

Type
Chapter
Information
Later Manuscripts , pp. 577 - 578
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2008

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×