Classic Poem

Why, Mr. Wanhope that is lately dead,
Liv'd then below this roof that's overhead;
And lived here till his death—it was his own—
A single life, retired and little known.
And some folk thought, what others could not find,
That he was sometimes flighty in his mind;
Lost in the love of one he could not win,
Some ne'er forgotten maid of high-born kin:
For till the last, whene'er his mem'ry brought
The young man's idol to the old man's thought,
He roam'd bewilder'd out by field and lane,
Forlorn in wordless thought like one insane;
And when he died some others' hands set free
From trusty wardship of a lock and key,
A writing of his youth, that show'd in part
The ne'er forgotten sorrows of his heart.