DR. HENRY KING. [Born, 1592. Died, 1669.] [HENRY KING, D. D., was the eldest son of John King, Bishop of London, and was born in Warnoll, Buckinghamshire, and educated at Oxford. He became chaplain to James I., Archdeacon of Colchester, Dean of St. Paul's, and finally Bishop of Chichester. Besides his polemical works, he published "The Psalms of David turned into Metre," "Poems, Elegies, Paradoxes, and Sonnets," and "Various Latin and Greek Poems." An edition of his " Poems and Psalms" was published in London in 1843, with a memoir by the Rev. J. Hannah, B. A. Some of his pieces are remarkable for tenderness and elegance.-G.] SIC VITA. LIKE to the falling of a star, The wind blows out, the bubble dies; LIFE. WHAT is the existence of man's life Till death's cold hand signs his release. It is a storm-where the hot blood It is a flower-which buds and grows, Till all-obscuring earth had laid It is a weary interlude Which doth short joys, long woes include: The world the stage, the prologue tears; The acts vain hopes and varied fears; The scene shuts up with loss of breath, And leaves no epilogue but Death! THE ANNIVERSARY. AN ELEGY. So soon grown old! hast thou been six years dead? Poor earth, once by my love inhabited! And must I live to calculate the time How happy were mankind, if Death's strict Consumed our lamentations like the cause! But sacred Heaven! O, how just thou art But what my own misfortune beaten hath :- I do but follow life's vocation. Sure we were made to grieve: at our first birth, With cries we took possession of the earth; And though the lucky man reputed be Fortune's adopted son, yet only he Is nature's true-born child, who sums his years (Like me) with no arithmetic but tears. A COMPLAINT OF A LEARNED DIVINE IN PURITAN TIMES. IN a melancholy study, None but myself, Methought my Muse grew muddy; And costly breeding, I felt, but could find no pelf. I have rent my plush and satin, In Hebrew, Greek, and Latin: Would I had got a patten. Alas, poor scholar, whither wilt thou go. I have bow'd, I have bended, And all in hope One day to be befriended; I have preach'd, I have printed, To please our English Pope: But the sun doth now forsake me; The northern winds do shake me. At great preferment I aim'd, Witness my silk, But now my hopes are maim'd. I looked lately To live most stately, And have a dairy of bell-rope's milk; But now, alas! Myself I must flatter, Bigamy of steeples is a laughing matter; Each man must have but one, And curates will grow fatter. Alas, poor, &c. Into some country village Now I must go, Where neither tithe nor tillage Swear to the church they owe; author of a poem, entitled "Iter Boreale," and "The Benefice," a comedy. SIR JOHN MENNIS AND JAMES SMITH. [Born, 1598. Born, 1604.] SIR JOHN MENNIS was born in 1598. He was successively a military and naval commander; a vice-admiral in the latter service, governor of Dover Castle, and chief comptroller of the navy. He composed the well-known ballad on Sir John Suckling's defeat.-SMITH was born about 1604: was a military and naval chaplain, canon of Exeter cathedral, and doctor in divinity. UPON LUTE-STRINGS CAT-EATEN. FROM "MUSARUM DELICIE, OR THE MUSES' RECREATION." ARE these the strings that poets feign Have clear'd the air and calm'd the main? Charm'd wolves, and from the mountain crests Made forests dance, with all their beasts? Could these neglected shreds you see Inspire a lute of ivory, And make it speak? oh then think what Hath been committed by my cat! Who, in the silence of the night, Hath gnawn these cords, and marr'd them quite, Leaving such relics as may be For frets, not for my lute, but me. Puss, I will curse thee! may'st thou dwell Where rat ne'er peep'd, where mouse ne'er fed, .... Or with some close-pared brother, where He did the calf from naked bones; The elephant, or apish nag, For a strange sight; puss should be sung In lousy ballads 'midst the throng, At markets, with as good a grace Thus, puss, thou see'st what might betide thee; 89 242 305 JASPER MAYNE. (Born, 1604. Died, 1672.] THIS writer has a cast of broad humour that is amusing, though prone to extravagance. The idea in The City Match of Captain Quartfield and his boon companions exposing simple Timothy dead drunk, and dressed up as a sea-monster for a show, is not indeed within the boundaries of either taste or credibility; but amends is made for it in the next scene, of old Warehouse and Seathrift witnessing in disguise the joy of their heirs at their supposed deaths. Among the many interviews of this nature by which comedy has sought to produce merriment and surprise, this is not one of the worst managed. Plotwell's cool impudence is well supported, when he gives money to the waterman, (who tells that he had escaped by swimming at the time the old citizens were drowned,) There, friend, there is A fare for you: I'm glad you 'scaped; I had Dr. Mayne was a clergyman in Oxfordshire. He lost his livings at the death of Charles I. and became chaplain to the Earl of Devonshire, who made him acquainted with Hobbes; but the philosopher and poet are said to have been on no very agreeable terms. At the Restoration he was reinstated in his livings, made a canon of Christchurch, Archdeacon of Chichester, and chaplain in ordinary to the king. Besides the comedy of the City Match, he published a tragi-comedy called The Amorous War; several sermons; dialogues from Lucian; and a pamphlet on the Civil Wars. A SON AND NEPHEW RECEIVING THE NEWS OF A Persons.-WAREHOUSE and SEATHRIFT, two wealthy old merchants in disguise; CYPHER, the former's factor, disguised as a waterman; PLOTWELL, nephew to WAREHOUSE; TIMOTHY, Son to SEATHRIFT; CAPTAIN QUARTFIELD, BRIGHT, and NEWCUT, companions of PLOTWELL. PLACE:A Tavern. Cyph. THEN I must tell the news to you, 'tis sad. Plot. I'll hear't as sadly. Cyph. Your uncle, sir, and Mr. Seathrift are Both drown'd, some eight miles below Greenwich. Plot. Drown'd! Cyph. They went i' th' tilt-boat, sir, and I was one [us, O' th' oars that row'd'em; a coal-ship did o'er-run I 'scaped by swimming; the two old gentlemen Took hold of one another, and sunk together. Bright. How some men's prayers are heard! We did invoke [took 'em. The sea this morning, and see the Thames has Plot. It cannot be; such good news, gentlemen, Cannot be true. Ware. 'Tis very certain, sir; "Twas talk'd upon th' Exchange. Sea. We heard it too In Paul's now as we came. Plot. There, friend, there is A fare for you; I'm glad you 'scaped; I had Plot. Sir, it is conscience; I do believe you might Sue me in chancery. Cyph. Sir, you show the virtues of an heir. And some twelve hundred pound a year in earth, 306 Plot. This valiant captain and this man of wit First fox'd him, then transform'd him. We will wake him, And tell him the news. Ho, Mr. Timothy ! Tim. Plague take you, captain. Plot. What! does your sack work still? Tim. Where am I? Plot. Come, y'have slept enough. Bright. Mr. Timothy ! A mastich-patch t' apply to his wife's temples, How in the name of fresh cod came you changed In great extremity of tooth-ache. This is Into a sea-calf thus? New. 'Slight, Sir, here be Two fishmongers to buy you, beat the price; Tim. How's this! my hands Transmuted into claws? my feet made flounders? Array'd in fins and scales! Are n't you Ashamed to make me such a monster? Pray Help to undress me. Plot. We have rare news for you. Tim. No letter from the lady, I hope? And my grave uncle, sir, are cast away. Plot. They by this have made a meal And worship sea-coals, for a ship of them Plot. This fellow here We are all mortal; but in what wet case Sea. Fie, sir! good truth, it is not manly in you, To weep for such a slight loss as a father. Tim. I do not cry for that. Sea. No? Tim. No, but to think, My mother is not drown'd too. Sea. I assure you, And that a shrewd mischance. Tim. For then might I Ha' gone to th' counting-house, and set at liberty Those harmless angels, which for many years Have been condemn'd to darkness. Plot. You'd not do Like your penurious father, who was wont New. Indeed they say he was a monument of Tim. Yes, he was there As constant as Duke Humphrey. I can show The prints where he sate, holes i' th' logs. True, Mr. Timothy, is't not? Tim. Yes: then linen To us was stranger than to Capuchins. Sea. I'll not endure it; Ware. Stay, hear all first. New. Thy uncle was such another. He still last left th' Exchange, and would commend |