And while, with measur'd steps, ye move
Through the green mazes of the grove,
With laurels bind the Bridegroom's brow,
Eternal as the nuptial vow;
And wreaths of sweetest flowers prepare
For lov'd ELIZA'S auburn hair.
Let odours, from Arabian vales,
Breathe gently on the balmy gales,
And not a sound in Æther float,
Save the soft Dove's enamour'd note,
Till the bright star of Evening rise
Auspicious to the Lover's sighs;
And Cynthia, with her paler fire,
Warn lingering Beauty to retire.
Oh! ever may the circling hours
New blessings on their pinions bring;
Health that no cankering care devours,
And Pleasure that shall leave no sting!
May yonder Sun, as o'er this nether sphere
He rolls his chariot of æthereal gold,
Beneath his orb no happier pair behold,
But, ceaseless, as he runs his bright career,
View rolling years their stedfast faith improve,
And CHILDREN'S CHILDREN crown their virtuous
love!
EPIGRAM.
FROM THE FRENCH.
DAMIS, an author cold and weak,
Thinks as a critic he's divine;"
Likely enough we often make
Good vinegar of sorry wine.
ODE TO MISS SARAH FOWLER.
Toutesfois vous demeurant en ce lieu, mes tenebreuses et tristes parolles n'en pourroient chasser les Graces, desquels vous me semblez estre l'unique simulachre, et moins les Muses qui Vous recognoissent pour leur Minerve.
WHEN first Aurora's gorgeous car
Springs from might's dreary vault releas'd,
And beauty's consecrated star,
Retires behind the blushing east,
Can Titian's orient beams dispense
A more propitious influence
To animate th' exulting earth,
Than sheds bright Fancy o'er the mind,
When, from Care's grosser dregs refin'd,
It gives the fruits of genius birth.
Not in the solitary gloom,
By the dim taper's sickly ray,
Sunk in the rust of Greece and Rome
Does Genius point the doubtful way,
While in abstracted thought the Sage
Revolves the stern Socratic page;
Or by the tedious rules of art
In melancholy search pursues,
Yet finds the gay, the bashful Muse
Unseen and unattain'd depart.
Where Poesy erects her seat,
The myrtle's fragrant branches twine.
Beneath the Pleasures' nimble feet
Upstarts the new-born columbine.
Methinks I see the jocund band
Of Loves and Graces hand in hand
Their artless symphony inspire;
The Muses catch the dulcet sound,
They waft the sportive echoes round,
And wake the sympathetic lyre.
The rose's aromatic bloom
Adorns their wild fantastic grove,
And o'er the violet's perfume
Angelic forms delighted rove;
Fair Sappho in Elysian bowers
Beguiles the gently stealing hours,
And sooths entranc'd Despair to rest,
Her strains so feelingly express
The force of elegant distress,
Implanted in a female breast.
Carelessly tripping o'er the green
The sprightly Deshoulieres appears
With winning air and brow serene,
Unclouded by the frown of years;
Around the Nymph in graceful state,
A thousand smiling Cupids wait,
And each performs his destin'd part;
Some give the cheeks a livelier glow,
Some tune the lyre, some twang the bow,
To pierce the most obdurate heart..
The plaintive Rowe, whose warbling breath
Dispers'd the melancholy gloom
Which at her dear Alexis' death
O'erhung the sickening vales of Frome,
To the soft Cyprian lute recites
The fears, the hopes, the fond delights,
The tender blandishments of love,.
Their mutual happiness completing,
Where Innocence and Pleasure meeting,
Have fixed them in the realms above;
Beside them Cytherea stands
In Virtue's snowy garb array'd,
And reunites their social hands
Sever'd by Death's remorseless blade:
The Loves with elegiac verse,
Meanwhile adorn the sable hearse
In which their mortal ashes lye,:
And in due chaplet Phoebus weaves,
The laurel's never-fading leaves,
The pledge of immortality.
Yet not from these romantick shades,
Whene'er I wake the Teian string,
Will I invoke th' harmonious Maids
T' unlock Castalia's vaunted spring:
The palms of Genius thinly spread
Where cypress glooms o'er-arch the dead
Let others glean:-My raptur'd ear
Has caught the soul-enchanting strains,
That on Salopia's happy plains..
The bright Sabrina joys to hear:
ON SEEING A LADY'S DRESSING-ROOM.
WHENE'ER, to guard some fertile mead
Against the rude encroacher's tread,
We purpose that the soil unsound
With ambush'd mischief should abound,
The law commands to hang on high
A caution to the passing eye,
That no one trespass; and to show
What dangers threaten such as do,
That each offender risks to feel
The latent gun, or trap of steel.
But from the code of female laws,
Can we extract a single clause
Empower'd the fair one to compel
Of all her ambuscades to tell?
Within a blue dissolving eye
What mischief oft conceal'd will lie,
Or, in some ringlet left to stray,
What Cupids, meditating prey,
Like riflemen lurk up and down,
To pick their men and bring them down;
What fate the dimpled cheek invests,
Or heaves luxuriant in the breasts,
When gauze is taught but half to hide,
And half disclose the panting pride;
To tempt the busy eye, how low
The bell-hoop'd petticoat must go ;
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