Or, if yet remembered above,

Remembrance no sadness shall raise,
They will be but new signs of thy love,
New themes for my wonder and praise.

Thus the strokes which from sin and from pain
Shall set me eternally free,

Will but strengthen and rivet the chain
Which binds me, my Saviour! to thee.

ON A MISCHIEVOUS BULL

WHICH THE OWNER OF HIM SOLD AT THE AUTHOR'S INSTANCE

Go! thou art all unfit to share
The pleasures of this place
With such as its old tenants are,
Creatures of gentler race.

The squirrel here his hoard provides,
Aware of wintry storms,

And woodpeckers explore the sides
Of rugged oaks for worms.

The sheep here smooths the knotted thorn

With frictions of her fleece ;

And here I wander eve and morn,

Like her, a friend to peace.

Ah! I could pity thee exiled
From this secure retreat-
I would not lose it to be styled
The happiest of the great.

But thou canst taste no calm delight;
Thy pleasure is to show

Thy magnanimity in fight,
Thy prowess; therefore, go!

I care not whether east or north,
So I no more may find thee;
The angry Muse thus sings thee forth,
And claps the gate behind thee.

IMPROMPTU

ON WRITING A LETTER WITHOUT HAVING ANYTHING TO SAY

So have I seen the maids in vain

Tumble and tease a tangled skein;

They bite the lip and scratch the head,
"The deuce is in the thread!”

And cry,

They torture it and jerk it round,

Till the right end at last is found;
Then wind, and wind, and wind away,
And what was work is changed to play.

TO MRS. THROCKMORTON

ON HER BEAUTIFUL TRANSCRIPT OF HORACE'S ODE AD LIBRUM SUUM”

MARIA, Could Horace have guessed
What honour awaited his ode
To his own little volume addressed,

The honour which you have bestowed
Who have traced it in characters here,
So elegant, even, and neat,

He had laughed at the critical sneer

Which he seems to have trembled to meet.

"And sneer, if you please," he had said,
"Hereafter a nymph shall arise

"Who shall give me, when you are all dead,

"The glory your malice denies;

"Shall dignity give to my lay,

Although but a mere bagatelle;

"And even a poet shall say,

Nothing ever was written so well."

INSCRIPTION

FOR A STONE ERECTED AT THE SOWING OF A GROVE OF OAKS AT CHILLINGTON, THE SEAT OF T. Giffard, ESQ. 1790

OTHER stones the era tell

When some feeble mortal fell;
I stand here to date the birth

Of these hardy sons of earth.

Which shall longest brave the sky,
Storm and frost-these oaks or I?
Pass an age or two away,

I must moulder and decay ;
But the years that crumble me
Shall invigorate the tree,
Spread its branch, dilate its size,
Lift its summit to the skies.

Cherish honour, virtue, truth,
So shalt thou prolong thy youth:
Wanting these, however fast
Man be fixed, and formed to last,
He is lifeless, even now,

Stone at heart, and cannot grow.

ANOTHER

For a STONE ERECTED ON A SIMILAR OCCASION AT THE SAME PLACE IN THE FOLLOWING YEAR

READER! behold a monument

That asks no sigh or tear,
Though it perpetuate the event
Of a great burial here.

TO MRS. KING

ON HER KIND PRESENT TO THE AUTHOR, A PATCHWORK QUILT OF HER OWN MAKING

THE Bard, if e'er he feel at all,
Must sure be quickened by a call
Both on his heart and head,

To

pay with tuneful thanks the care And kindness of a lady fair

Who deigns to deck his bed.

A bed like this, in ancient time,
On Ida's barren top sublime,
(As Homer's Epic shows),
Composed of sweetest vernal flowers,
Without the aid of sun or showers,
For Jove and Juno rose.

Less beautiful, however gay,

Is that which in the scorching day
Receives the weary swain,

Who, laying his long scythe aside,
Sleeps on some bank with daisies pied,
Till roused to toil again.

What labours of the loom I see!
Looms numberless have groaned for me!
Should every maiden come

To scramble for the patch that bears
The impress of the robe she wears,
The bell would toll for some.

And oh, what havoc would ensue!
This bright display of every hue
All in a moment fled!

As if a storm should strip the bowers
Of all their tendrils, leaves, and flowers, ---
Each pocketing a shred.

Thanks, then, to every gentle fair,
Who will not come to peck me bare
As bird of borrowed feather,

And thanks to one, above them all,
The gentle fair of Pertenhall,

Who put the whole together.

STANZAS

ON THE LATE INDECENT LIBERTIES TAKEN WITH THE REMAINS OF THE GREAT MILTON, ANNO 1790

"ME too, perchance, in future days
"The sculptured stone shall show
"With Paphian myrtle or with bays
“Parnassian on my brow.

"But I, or ere that season come,

Escaped from every care,

"Shall reach my refuge in the tomb,
"And sleep securely there.” *

* Forsitan et nostros ducat de marmore vultus
Nectens aut Paphia myrti aut Parnasside lauri
Fronde comas-At ego securâ pace quiescam.
MILTON in Manso.

So sang, in Roman tone and style,
The youthful bard, ere long
Ordained to grace his native isle
With her sublimest song.

Who then but must conceive disdain,
Hearing the deed unblest

Of wretches who have dared profane
His dread sepulchral rest?

Ill fare the hands that heaved the stones
Where Milton's ashes lay,

That trembled not to grasp his bones
And steal his dust away!

O ill-requited bard! neglect
Thy living worth repaid,
And blind idolatrous respect

As much affronts thee dead.

IN MEMORY OF THE LATE JOHN THORNTON, Esq.

POETS attempt the noblest task they can,
Praising the Author of all good in man,
And, next, commemorating worthies lost,
The dead in whom that good abounded most.
Thee, therefore, of commercial fame, but more
Famed for thy probity from shore to shore;
Thee, THORNTON! worthy in some page to shine
As honest and more eloquent than mine,

I mourn; or, since thrice happy thou must be,
The world no longer thy abode, not thee.
Thee to deplore were grief misspent indeed;
It were to weep that goodness has its meed,
That there is bliss prepared in yonder sky,
And glory, for the virtuous when they die.
What pleasure can the miser's fondled hoard
Or spendthrift's prodigal excess afford
Sweet as the privilege of healing woe

By virtue suffered combating below?

That privilege was thine; Heaven gave thee means
To illumine with delight the saddest scenes,

Till thy appearance chased the gloom, forlorn
As midnight and despairing of a morn.
Thou hadst an industry in doing good,
Restless as his who toils and sweats for food;