On a Woodbine or Honeysuckle, which instinctively clasped its Tendrils round an Urn to the Memory of Shenstone.
BY THE LATE REV. R. GRAVES.
AMIDST these laurels ever green,
And ivy mantling round,
Poor Shenstone's votive urn is seen,
And consecrates the ground.
This limpid stream, that murmuring falls
And winds those shades among,
His Leasowes to our mind recalls,
And sweetly plaintive song.
The woodbine here its sweetest flowers
And rambling shoots confiues:
And round the urn, 'midst vernal showers,
Its sheltering foliage twines.
These roses, though they rarely view
The sun's all-cheering ray,
Yet, to the bard so justly due,
Their annual tribute pay.
Yon jessamine, tho' so remote,
Its blossoms sweet as fair,
While pendant o'er the urn they float,
Perfume the ambient air.
Each fragrant shrub to poets dear,
Or pleasing to the sight,
Round Shenstone's urn assembled here
Their balmy sweets unite.
Yet sweeter far his verse was deemed,
More beautiful his grove :
While he himself, by all esteemed,
Claimed universal love.
Tho' ere life's noon his glass was run,
Yet gained he endless fame:
But on the eve of ninety-one,
How humble is my name!
My life's prolonged full many a year
Beyond life's usual space;
Yet, ah! in that long life, I fear,
Heaven few good deeds can trace.
But, as I've cherished in my breast
A love of all mankind,
may, 'tis hoped, among the blest
An humble mansion find.
On the Cloudiness of the Night, which prevented a View of the Conjunction of Saturn and the Moon.
WHEN prudish Cynthia, whom no youth could move,
Was forc'd at length to own the power of love,
And, late relenting, sacrificed her charms
To palsied age in Saturn's chilling arms;
Lest prying man celestial sins should know,
And spread the scandal thro' the world below,
With blushing cheeks, no more of pallid hue,
A mystic veil before his eyes she threw,
And hid the unchaste amour from mortal view.
On the Death of George the Second, and Accession of his
SEE, like the sun, where Albion's isle
Flames on the bosom of the deep!
What sudden blaze of light divine
Bids the smooth face of Ocean smile,
And with unwonted splendor shine
Beneath yon silver steep?
"Tis He-the Muse's boundless eye
Saw, when to leave the sapphire sky
He stretched his pearly plumes-and now,
On yonder white cliff's starry brow,
Majestic sees him stand.
Hail loveliest of the etherial throng
Around terrestrial thrones who wait,
Observant of a nation's fate!
Submissive to your influence strong
Flies the pale Genius of the Gaul;
And sees on every hostile plain,
And sees amid the unfriendly main,
His fading lilies fall.
Celestial minister! when you
O'er the blest Isle your piuions spread,
In vain her thorns tumultuous Discord threw
Along the path where Virtue loved to tread.
Its monarch rears his hoary head,
While thro' the void each gale that floats
Feasts his fond ear with manly notes,
That o'er Europa's conscious realms proclaim
The glories of his age, and Britain's genuine Fame.
Hark! hark! the feather-cinctur'd Muse, that roves
O'er Canada's high-trophied shore,
Calls to the sable nymph that dwells
Amid the thunder-echoing cells
Where Senegal's rough waters roar;
Calls to the Muse sublime that swells
Her voice in Asia's spicy groves,
And oft her glowing bosom laves
In the rich Ganges' sparkling waves,
To chaunt the triumphs that have crown'd
The second George's arms;
To chaunt the blessings they have found
In British virtue, thro' the world renowned,
And British freedom's unresisted charms.
Why fades the scene! why foams the tide !
Why dies the charming song away!
Each breeze what instant horror chills!
See Death, terrific spectre, glide!
His hand the fatal javelin fills,
Red with the recent prey
Low, low, the exulting tyrant cries,
I've laid him on his kindred earth;
Nor vast domain, nor royal birth
Can mock my strong resistless dart,
That now has pierced the firmest heart,
And closed the purest eyes.
But, King of terrors! where's thy train,
The torturing pang,-the speechless moan,
Terrific dread, and shuddering groan,-
Where, King of terrors, where's thy train?
"Of all my wonted arms bereft
"Came I to strike the dauntless breast
"By that majestic soul possess'd,
"Nor had one terror left.
"Arrayed in all my dreadful pride
"I've sought him in the desperate war;
"The hero there my present power defied,
"Nor shunned the scythes that armed my thundering
"Opposing virtues still debar
"My just pursuit-They bade him meet
"Without one sigh my javelin fleet;
"They seized with rapid hands the shafts of Fate
"And with it oped the folds of Heaven's eternal gate.”
And opened too (replied the angelic guest,
Dispersing with his radiance clear
The dreary shades, and that pale sprite
Immerging in immortal night;
And wiping off the lucid tear,
That, in all-cheering Hope's despite
Streamed o'er Britannia's heaving breast)
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