Could but her sacred name, unknown so long, Rise, like her labors, to the son of song, To her, to them, I'd consecrate my lays, And blow her pudding with the breath of praise. I here ascribe her one great virtue more. Each clime my country, and each house my home, For thee, through Paris, that corrupted town, But here, though distant from our native shore, With mutual glee we meet and laugh once more; The same! I know thee by that yellow face, That strong complexion of true Indian race, Which time can never change, nor soil impair, Nor Alpine snows, nor Turkey's morbid air; For endless years, through every mild domain, Where grows the maize, there thou art sure to reign. There are who strive to stamp with disrepute My father loved thee through his length of days, And all my bones were made of Indian corn. Mrs. Anne Grant. Mrs. Grant, commonly styled "of Laggan," to distinguish her from her contemporary, Mrs. Grant of Carron, was born in Glasgow, 1755. Her father, Duncan Macvicar, was an officer in the army. While a child, she accompanied her parents to America; and they settled for a time in the State of New York. In 1768 she returned with her family to Scotland. She married James Grant, a young clergyman, in 1779. He died in 1801; and in 1803 she published a volume of poems. In 1806 appeared her "Letters from the Mountains," which passed through several editions. She reached her eighty-fourth year, retaining her faculties to the last. Her correspondence was published, in three volumes, by her son, John P. Grant, in 1844. The song we quote was written on the occasion of the Marquis of Huntly's departure for Holland with his regiment, in 1799. OH, WHERE, TELL ME WHERE? "Oh, where, tell me where is your Highland laddie gone? Oh, where, tell me where is your Highland laddie gone?" "He's gone with streaming banners, where noble deeds are done, And my sad heart will tremble till he come safely home." "Oh, where, tell me where, did your Highland laddie stay? Oh, where, tell me where, did your Highland laddie stay?" "He dwelt beneath the holly-trees, beside the rapid Spey, And many a blessing followed him the day he went away. He dwelt beneath the holly-trees, beside the rapid Spey, And many a blessing followed him the day he went away." "Oh, what, tell me what, does your Highland laddie wear? Oh, what, tell me what, does your Highland laddie wear?" transient reputation. The name of Bavius for a dunce is taken from Virgil's line: "Qui Bavium non odit amet tua carmina, Mævi." "The Mæviad" followed "The Baviad," but is infe "A bonnet with a lofty plume, the gallant badge rior to it in spirit. Gifford attacked Wolcot in an of war, And a plaid across the manly breast that yet shall wear a star; A bonnet with a lofty plume, the gallant badge of war, And a plaid across the manly breast that yet shall wear a star." "Suppose, ah, suppose, that some cruel, cruel wound Should pierce your Highland laddie, and all your hopes confound?" "The pipe would play a cheering march, the banners round him fly, The spirit of a Highland chief would lighten in his eye; The pipe would play a cheering march, the banners round him fly; And for his king and country dear with pleasure he would die!" "But I will hope to see him yet in Scotland's bonny bounds; But I will hope to see him yet in Scotland's bonny bounds. His native land of liberty shall nurse his glorious wounds; Wide, wide, through all our Highland hills, his warlike name resounds: His native land of liberty shall nurse his glorious wounds; Wide, wide, through all our Highland hills, his warlike name resounds." William Gifford. Gifford (1756-1826) was a native of Ashburton, in Devonshire. His parents were poor, and at thirteen he was a penniless orphan. His godfather first sent him to sea as cabin-boy in a coasting-vessel, and then apprenticed him to a shoemaker. He was a lad of eager intellect, with a taste for verse and for mathematics. Through the efforts of a Mr. Cookesley, he was placed at school, and when twenty-two years old was sent to Oxford. In 1791 he wrote "The Baviad," a satire ridiculing some of the small poets of the day, who, under the signatures of Anna Matilda, Edwin, Orlando, Della Crusca, etc., gained a transient notoriety. The game was hardly worth the candle; but the satire was read and praised, and had a "Epistle to Peter Pindar," and Wolcot replied with "A Cut at a Cobbler." This led to a personal collision, in which Gifford would have got the worse of it but for the interference of a bulky Frenchman who happened to be present, and who turned Wolcot out of the readingroom, where the scene occurred, into the street, throwing his wig and cane after him. Gifford's "small but sinewy intellect," it has been said, "was well employed in bruising the butterflies of the Della Cruscan school." He afterward edited the Anti-Jacobin (see "Canning"), translated Juvenal, and in 1808 became editor of the Quarterly Review, in which he labored to keep alive among the English aristocracy a feeling of dislike toward the United States. As a literary critic, he was merciless and bitter. Southey says of him: "He had a heart full of kindness for all living creatures except authors; them he regarded as a fishmonger regards eels, or as Izaak Walton did slugs, worms, and frogs." Gifford seems to have had a tender place in his heart for Ann Davies, a faithful attendant who died in his service, and in whose memory he wrote some pathetic, but rather faulty and commonplace, lines, entitled "The Grave of Anna." As a poet his claims to remembrance are very slender. TO A TUFT OF EARLY VIOLETS. Sweet flowers! that from your humble beds Thus prematurely dare to rise, And trust your unprotected heads Retire, retire! Stern winter's reign is not yet past: Alas for such ungentle doom! But I will shield you, and supply A kindlier soil on which to bloom, A nobler bed on which to die. Come, then, ere yet the morning ray Has drunk the dew that gems your crest, And drawn your balmiest sweets away; Oh, come, and grace my Anna's breast! FROM "THE BAVIAD." Some love the verse that like Maria's flows, William Sotheby. No rubs to stagger, and no sense to pose; And gravely wonder-what it is about. And can we, when such mope-eyed dolts are placed Lo, Beaufoy tells of Afric's barren sand, Accommodate, ye gods, their feet with shoes! Oh for the good old times when all was new, Of streams of amber, and of rocks of gold: Sotheby (1757-1833), an accomplished scholar, poet, and translator, was a native of London. He was of good At the age of seventeen he entered the army, but quitted it in 1780, purchased a place at Southampton, and resided there ten years. In 1789 he published a translation of Wieland's "Oberon," which was a success. He now wrote poems, translations, and tragedies in great profusion. His translations were the chief source of his fame: that of Virgil's "Georgies" is one of the best in the language; those of the "Iliad" and "Odyssey" have their peculiar merits. Wieland, the German poet, is said to have been charmed with the version of his "Oberon." Byron said of Sotheby that he imitated everybody, and occasionally surpassed his models. STAFFA-VISITED 1829. Staffa, I scaled thy summit hoar, I passed beneath thy arch gigantic, That hour the wind forgot to rave, Then the past age before me came, When, 'mid Iona's wrecks meanwhile O'er sculptured graves I trod, Where Time had strewn each mouldering aisle I hailed the eternal God: Yet, Staffa, more I felt his presence in thy cave William Blake. Extraordinary as an artist and a poet, Blake (1757– 1828) was the son of a London hosier. Apprenticed at fourteen to an engraver, he became a diligent and enthusiastic student. At twenty-six he married Catherine Boutcher, who survived him, and was a most devoted and attached wife. He produced a series of designs and poems which are quite unique in the peculiar spirit of their conception, but replete with beauties of a high order. The designs are drawn, and the poems written, upon copper, with a secret composition (disclosed to him, as he says, by the spirit of his brother Robert); and when the uncovered parts were eaten away by aqua-fortis, the rest remained as if in stereotype. His wife worked off the plates in the press; and he tinted the impressions, designs, and letter-press with a variety of pleasing colors. Blake thought that he conversed with the spirits of the departed great-with Homer, Moses, Pindar, Virgil, Dante, Milton, and many others; and that some of them sat to him for their portraits. He produced a great variety of works, many of which now command high prices. The principal are "The Gates of Paradise," "Ulrizen," "Illustrations of Young's "Night Thoughts,"" "Jerusalem," and "Illustrations to the Book of Job." Blake got from his strange, fanciful illustrations but little worldly gain. He was often extremely poor. Fond of children, he retained a child's heart to the last. Mr. Ruskin says of his poems: "They are written with absolute sincerity, with infinite tenderness, and, though in the manner of them diseased and wild, are in verity the words of a great and wise mind, disturbed, but not deceived, by its sickness; nay, partly exalted by it, and sometimes giving forth in fiery aphorism some of the most precious words of existing literature." When wolves and tigers howl for prey, They pitying stand and weep, THE TIGER. Tiger, tiger, burning bright In what distant deeps or skies And what shoulder, and what art, Could twist the sinews of thy heart? And when thy heart began to beat, Can a mother sit and hear An infant groan, an infant fear? No, no! never can it be! Never, never can it be! And can He who smiles on all He doth give his joy to all; Think not thou canst weep a tear, INTRODUCTION TO "SONGS OF INNOCENCE." Piping down the valleys wild, Piping songs of pleasant glee, On a cloud I saw a child; And he, laughing, said to me: "Pipe a song about a lamb." So I piped with merry cheer. "Piper, pipe that song again." So I piped; he wept to hear. "Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe; Sing thy songs of happy cheer." So I sung the same again, While he wept with joy to hear. "Piper, sit thee down and write, In a book that all may read-" So he vanished from my sight; And I plucked a hollow reed, And I made a rural pen, And I stained the water clear, And I wrote my happy songs, Every child may joy to hear. Thomas Taylor. Taylor (1758-1835) was a native of London, where, at an early age, he was sent to St. Paul's School. He became an accomplished classical scholar, and devoted his spare hours to the study of Plato and Aristotle. To the end of his life he gave six hours a day to study. Poverty and its attendant annoyances were no obstacle. He translated the writings of all the untranslated ancient Greek philosophers, and through the generous aid of friends was enabled to publish works that must have cost more than £10,000, and upon the whole yielded no pecuniary profit. He is described as "a sincere friend and a delightful companion." But Taylor was a Platonist and polytheist. He characterized the Christian religion as a "barbarized Platonism;" and maintained that the divinities of Plato are the divinities to be adored ; that we should be taught to call God, Jupiter; the Virgin, Venus; and Christ, Cupid! This "literary lunacy" did not prevent his being held in high esteem by many influential friends. He wrote an "Ode to the Rising Sun," a remarkable production, and having the passionate impetus of a sincere adoration; for Taylor believed what he was writing, and pours forth real idolatry to the sun: Apollo was to him a living power in the universe. An English critic says of the poem: "The frequently repeated and splendidly effective 'See!' was the true inimitable suggestion of sincere emotion, as is proved by the otherwise inartificial character of the poem. The alliteration with which the verses abound is evidently the unconscious effect of passion; the music is occasionally exquisite." ODE TO THE RISING SUN. See! how with thundering fiery feet See! led by Morn, with dewy feet, Replete with sevenfold fire;' 1 That is, with his own proper fire, and with the fire of the other planets. |