Deep Bibo soaks, and boasts the reason, 'Wine's the best antidote to treason, Our bumpers large revenues bring, I drink my claret for my king.' Yet still his zeal by far surpasses
Who empties first, then breaks the glasses* How Fungus glows with patriot pride; While credit pours an even tide! Thus buoy'd along, through fairy scenes, He clubs his share to ways and means; At length the dun's incessant clamour Dooms every chattel to the hammer; Still there's decorum in his fall, Since now the Auction + closes all.
Smile, Walpole's ghost +, untaught to feign,
For private folly's public gain:
And bid old Cecil smooth his brow,- If England thrives,-no matter how. Vespasian thus, the bee of money, From every weed could gather honey: Though squeamish Titus leer'd and laugh'd, The wiser father bless'd the craft;
And, when his bags the cash was sure in, Ne'er thought the tribute smelt of urine.
* New tax on glass wares.
+ Ditto on auctions.
Sir Robert Walpole, first Earl of Orford.
Probably William Cecil, Lord Burleigh, is here desig
IN a fair summer's radiant morn, A butterfly, divinely born,
Whose lineage dated from the mud Of Noah's or Deucalion's flood, Long hovering round a perfumed lawn, By various gusts of odours drawn, At last establish'd his repose
On the rich bosom of a rose.
The palace pleased the lordly guest; What insect own'd a prouder nest? The dewy leaves luxurious shed Their balmy odours o'er his head, And, with their silken tapestry, fold His limbs enthroned on central gold. He thinks the throne's embattled round To guard his castle's lovely mound, And all his bush's wide domain Subservient to his fancied reign.
Such ample blessings swell'd the fly! Yet, in his mind's capacious eye, He roll'd the change of mortal things, The common fate of flies and kings.
With grief he saw how lands and honours Are apt to slide to various owners;
Where Mowbrays dwelt, how grocers dwell, And how cits buy what barons sell.
This piece was occasioned by the author being asked (after he had finished the little castle at Strawberry Hill, and adorned it with the portraits and arms of his ancestors) if he did not design to entail it on his family.
'Great Phoebus! patriarch of my line, Avert such shame from sons of thine, To them confirm these roofs,' he said: And then he swore an oath so dread The stoutest wasp that wears a sword Had trembled to have heard the word! "If law can rivet down entails,
These manors ne'er shall pass to snails. I swear-and then he smote his ermine- 'These towers were never built for vermin.' A caterpillar grovel'd near,
A subtle, slow conveyancer,
Who summon'd, waddles with his quill To draw the haughty insect's will. None but his heirs must own the spot,
Begotten, or to be begot:
Each leaf he binds, each bud he ties To eggs of eggs of butterflies.
When, lo! how Fortune loves to tease Those who would dictate her decrees! A wanton boy was passing by; The wanton child beheld the fly And eager ran to seize the prey; But, too impetuous in his play, Crush'd the proud tenant of an hour, And swept away the mansion flower.
THE SILENT LOVER.
PASSIONS are liken'd best to floods and streams; The shallow murmur, but the deep are dumb: So, when affections yield discourse, it seems The bottom is but shallow whence they come.
They that are rich in words must needs discover They are but poor in that which makes a lover.
Wrong not, sweet mistress of my heart,
The merit of true passion,
With thinking that he feels no smart Who sues for no compassion.
Since if my plaints were hot to' approve The conquest of thy beauty,
It comes not from defect of love, But fear to exceed my duty.
For, knowing that I sue to serve A saint of such perfection As all desire, but none deserve A place in her affection;
I rather choose to want relief Than venture the revealing: Where glory recommends the grief Despair disdains the healing.
Silence in love betrays more woe
Than words though ne'er so witty; A beggar that is dumb, you know, May challenge double pity.
Then wrong not, dearest to my heart, My love for secret passion;
He smarteth most who hides his smart, And sues for no compassion.
READING MILTON WITH A YOUNG LADY.
Ан no, when we study our poet divine,
Believe me, dear girl, all the profit is mine; When he paints the first woman, the fairest of creatures,
The bloom of creation still fresh on her features, Never dreaming as yet or of sorrow or sin, All faultless without, and all spotless within, Oh, how could I think such perfection were true, Unvouch'd by a proof so convincing as you! [skies, And when, with his Muse, we shall mount to the Oh, think what advantage to me must arise, With you through the birthplace of angels to roam, Where I am an alien, and you are at home!
THE NEEDLESS ALARM.
THERE is a field, through which I often pass, Thick overspread with moss and silky grass, Adjoining close to Kilwick's echoing wood, Where oft the bitch fox hides her hapless brood, Reserved to solace many a neighbouring squire, That he may follow them through brake and brier, Contusion hazarding of neck or spine,
Which rural gentlemen call sport divine. A narrow brook, by rushy banks conceal'd, Runs in a bottom, and divides the field; Oaks intersperse it, that had once a head, But now wear crests of oven wood instead; And where the land slopes to its watery bourn Wide yawns a gulf beside a ragged thorn,
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