Poems, on Various Subjects. By James Orr. Belfast: Smyth & Lyons, 1804.   72-73.

ELEGY.
ON THE DEATH OF A. M‘CRACKEN,
"Basely murdered."

Ah! how can man, thus idolizing life,
    In false futurity repose his trust;
While heartfelt pain, and desolating strife,
    Each hour o’erthrows his brothers of the dust?

Rever’d M‘Cracken! when with thee, my friend!
    I last ey’d Nature from the mountain grand,
I little thought, that ere an hour should end,
    Thy frame should writhe beneath th’ assassin’s hand.

While proud vice prosper’d, penury and pain,
    Fell harpies! haunted thee through life’s sad scenes:
To wretched worth untimely death is gain--
    But massacre and gore were dreadful means.

Stern justice soon shall crush the slaves who slew
    The brave old sage, who ne’er shun’d foe that fac’d--
Avenge him, Erin! firm he fought for you--
    Avenge him, Heaven! the worlds you fram’d, he trac’d.

His friendless orphans!--God! how could they view
    The spectacle that shock’d th’ uninjur’d throng?
Descend fond sprite! and on their hearts renew
    The mild monitions of thy prudent tongue.

Mute is his tongue--ne’er, ne’er shall it exert
    Its godlike pow’rs, defining truth and taste;
His dextrous hand lies nerveless and inert;
    His noble heart the reptile soon shall waste.

Yet friends and fav’rites, oft shall strew with flow’rs
    The gore-stained grave, where rests the man of woe;
And Locke, and Newton, in etherial bow’rs
    Shall teach his shade whate’er he long’d to know.