Which to the lofty titles we may join,
They gain'd by merit-you, my Lord, by line.
Let this suffice for one whom Fame reports
Vacant, and vain of servitude in courts;
Fruitless the Muse's admonitions there,
Where sense to read, or feel them are so rare.
+ On borrow'd fame 'tis wretched to repose;
The prop enfeebled, down the fabric goes.
But would you gain a self-supported soul,
Nor, like the yielding hop, require a pole,
Be firmly virtuous; true to every trust;
Brave as a soldier; as an umpire just.
Should you be summon'd by a shameless court,
Where will is law, assassination sport,
Tho' o'er your neck the guillotine they poise,
Point to the criminal, and dictate lies,
Yield not your honour in the jaws of death,
Nor meanly barter happiness for breath.
ON THE DEATH OF GENERAL WOLFE.
THY trembling hills, Quebec, when Victory trod,
Shook her high plume, and waved her banner broad;
Saw Wolfe advance; heard the dire din of war,
And Gallia's genius shrieking from afar,
With fatal haste the astonish'd Goddess flew,
To weave the immortal chaplet for his brow;
Cypress she gather'd with the sacred bays,
And weav'd the asp of Death among the sprays.
They fly they fly! the expiring hero cried, [died.
Hung his wreath'd head; thank'd the kind gods, and
On a Picture of the Kalmia Angustifolia, or Narrowleaved Kalmia.
HIGH rise the cloud-capp'd hills where Kalmia glows
With dazzling beauty, 'mid a waste of snows,
O'er the wild scene she casts a smiling eye,
The earth her bed, the skies her canopy.-
Thus from the north, in undulating streams,
Glance after glance, the polar radiance gleams,
Or, in expanding glare, at noon of night,
Fills the red zenith with unbounded light.
Quick fly the timid herds in wild amaze,
While arms unseen clash dreadful 'mid the blaze.
Th' affrighted shepherd to his cot retires,
Nor dares to gaze upon the quiv'ring fires :
The crouching dogs their masters' feet surround,
And, fix'd by fear, lie torpid on the ground:
Loud shrieks the screaming owl, and flits away,
Scar'd by the lustre of unlook'd for day :
E'en the grim wolf his nightly prey forsakes,
And silent in his gloomy cavern quakes,
Till skies serene their starry groupes display,
And each terrific phantom dies away
To Edward Rushton, of Liverpool, on his Restoration to Sight, after a Blindness of upwards of thirty Years, by a series of Operations performed by Mr. Gibson, of Manchester.
AND does again the orient day
Pour for my friend the visual ray,
And gild the vernal scene?
Does Nature, in her Iris vest,
Again delight his bounding breast
And wave her robe of green?
Does she, in linear pomp arrayed,
And varied charm of light and shade,
Her pictur'd world renew?
And joys of long-extinguish'd sense,
As from the bursting grave, dispense-
Rekindling to his view?
How beats my heart, in transport high,
How swells the moisture of the eye
The joyful tale to hear!
While eager flies the cordial lay,
To meet thee on the verge of day,
With gratulating tear.
Oh! as the visions round thee roll,
That cheer'd thy once accustom'd soul
In daily pomp arrayed,-
Say if not now, with keener zest,
They glad thy long benighted breast?
Remerging from the shade!
But chief, what joys thy bosom own,
New born to raptures never known,
While flock thy offspring round!
Oft heard-oft felt-but never seen,
Till now, with beauty's kindling mien,
They in thy presence bound!
"How will the strong poetic fire,
That, darkling, o'er the wondering lyre
Could guide thy master hand,
Now kindling in a blaze of light,
To bolder raptures urge thy flight,
And with thy joys expand!
Oh friend!-that I the tear might see,
That streams, in silent ecstacy,
O'er every form beloved!
Might hear the murmurs of that tongue,
When first it pours the grateful song,
By cordial rapture mov'd!
But, tho' forbade the tear to see,
That flows in cordial ecstacy,
Or hear the murmur'd song;
Yet Sympathy's omniscient art
In every feeling bears a part
That warms the circling throng.
The father's joy, the poet's fire,
That soon shall wake thy trembling lyre,
Find in my conscious breast,
A string in unison compleat,
A throb, that to thy throb shall beat;-
Blissful, that thou art blest!
By a Fellow of a College, whose Studies were interrupted by the Sight of Ladies walking in the Garden under his Window.
o books, or serious studies, here,
How vainly I apply,
While beauteous forms so oft appear,
To attract my wandering eye!
Nature and art's united powers
Have excellence attained,
And made this Garden's verdant bowers
A paradise regained.
Too near, (I find it to my cost!)
Does the resemblance suit;
This, like the Eden Adam lost,
Contains forbidden fruit!
WADHAM COLLEGE, OXON.
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