His ghostly cheek, methinks, to rapture warms, As round Eblana's tow'rs he views Cherubic Peace her halcyon-calm diffuse, And the fair city swell with renovated charms. So hostile hate in vain assail, Tho' pride may prompt, or wealth allure, Bland Hospitality expand the gate, Where Welcome oft was wont, with aspect gay, GIBRALTAR. THE heav'n-rais'd bulwarks of imperial Troy And claim a fresher wreath ?-Spirit of War, For thou canst tell how dauntless Elliot fought, Each treach'rous wile he saw, each Spanish mine, Though palsy'd Famine stretch'd her meagre hand Purpling the wave below with awful shade, Wave soon to be embued with hostile gore, Drawn from the heart of myriads! methinks, ev'n now, The whizzing bullets stun my startled car, And sulphurous smoke envelopes the grim sky With tenfold horrors! Vain attempt, to scale Gibraltar's giant brow, when marble mounds, And British breasts more stern, defend the place. So strove the haughty pow'r of hell, when fall'n From site celestial to the burning deep, With turms diminish'd by Messiah's hand, To climb the crystal battlements of heav'n; So fell he, vaunting !—The Hispanian crew Wond'ring retire, and eye with envious look The walls impregnable, where Glory sits, Thron'd with her Britons! Like a dreadful row Of gods embattled on Olympus' top, The warriors scowl derision. Heathfield chief, The Mars of Albion, stirs the latent spark Of honour to a blaze, invigorates Each manly bosom; and the fainting cheers! The martial youths, and Justice sounds the trump VOL. I. N MILTON'S EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS TRANSLATED. ADVERTISEMENT. THE following translation was the amusement of a few hours, at a time when I felt pretty much the same sorrows with Milton, on account of the death of a youthful and beloved brother. I have often conceived an idea of rendering all his Latin poems into English verse; but, conscious of my own inability to do them justice, must decline the task. Translation too, I apprehend, is not my fort; though no one can feel an higher veneration for the classical productions of the Athenian and the Roman muse. Apollonius Rhodius I admire in particular; and could any author tempt me to a long translation, it would certainly be he. The Latin poems of Milton can fairly rival the most illustrious performances of the middle, if not of the Augustine age; perspicuity of style, elegant diction, and harmonious measures, are conspicuous through all of them. In my opinion, Strada, Vida, Politian, Buchannan, nay Claudian, are vastly inferior to him in these points. The reader of taste will find sufficient entertainment of the sublimer kind, in the perusal of the following poems; De Idea Platonica, quemadmodum Aristoteles intellexit: which begins with these amazingly beautiful verses: "DICITE, sacrorum præsides nemorum dex, Tuque, O noveni perbeata numinis Memoria mater, quæque in immenso procul Antro recumbis otiosa Æternitas, Monumenta servans, et ratas leges Jovis: &c. that with the title, Naturam non pati senium; Mansus; the cxrvth Psalm in Greek; Ad Patrem; and all his elegies. Mansus, I should have attempted, were it not elegantly versified by Mr. Sterling. EPITAPHIUM DAMONIS. ARGUMENT. THYRSIS and Damon, shepherds in the same village, were united in the same studies from their infancy, and bound in the strictest friendship. Thyrsis, having gone to the city for recreation's sake, receives an account of the death of Damon. Returning home afterwards, and finding the news true, he bemoans himself and his solitary situation, in the following poem. In the appellation Damon, is understood that of Carolus Diodatus: a person descended from a family of Lucca in Italy, yet in every thing but birth an Englishman; and a youth of the most promising appearance as to wit, learning, and all other conspicuous virtues, while he lived. SICILIAN nymphs, attend my mournful claim, ARGUMENTUM. Thyrsis et Damon, ejusdem viciniæ pastores, eadem studia sequuti, à pueritiâ amici erant, ut qui plurimùm. Thyrsis animi causâ profectus peregrè de obitu Damonis nuncium accepit. Demùm postea reversus, et rem ita esse comperto, se, suamque solitudinem, hoc carmine deplorat. Damonis autem sub personâ hîc intelligitur Carolus Deodatus ex urbe Hetruriæ Lucâ paterno genere oriundus, cætera Anglus; ingenio, doctrinâ, clarissimisque cæteris virtutibus, dum viveret, juvenis egregius. HIMERIDES nympha (nam vos et Daphnin et Hylan, |