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How patiently you hear him groan! How glad the case is not your own!

What poet would not grieve to see His brother write as well as he! But, rather than they should excel, Would wish his rivals all in hell?

Her end when emulation misses,
She turns to envy, stings, and hisses:
The strongest friendship yields to pride,
Unless the odds be on our side.
Vain human kind! fantastic race!
Thy various follies who can trace?
Self-love, ambition, envy, pride,
Their empire in our hearts divide.
Give others riches, power, and station,
Tis all on me a usurpation.
I have no title to aspire;

Yet, when you sink, I seem the higher.
In Pepe I cannot read a line,
But with a sigh I wish it mine:
When he can in one couplet fix
More sense than I can do in six,
It gives me such a jealous fit,

I cry, Pox take him and his wit.
I grieve to be outdone by Gay
In my own humorous biting way.
Arbuthnot is no more my friend,
Who dares to irony pretend,
Which I was born to introduce,
Refined it first, and showed its use.
St John, as well as Pulteney,2 knows
That I had some repute for prose;
And, till they drove me out of date,
Could maul a minister of state.
If they have mortified my pride,
And made me throw my pen aside;

If with such talents heaven hath blest 'em,
Have I not reason to detest 'em?

To all my foes, dear fortune, send
Thy gifts, but never to my friend:
I tamely can endure the first;
But this with envy makes me burst.

Thus much may serve by way of proem; Proceed we therefore to our poem.

The time is not remote, when I
Must by the course of nature die;
When, I foresee, my special friends
Will try to find their private ends:
And, though 'tis hardly understood,
Which way my death can do them good,
Yet thus, methinks, I hear them speak:
See, how the dean begins to break!
Poor gentleman! he droops apace!
You plainly find it in his face.
That old vertigo in his head
Will never leave him, till he's dead.
Besides, his memory decays:
He recollects not what he says;
He cannot call his friends to mind;
Forgets the place where last he dined;
Plies you with stories o'er and o'er;
He told them fifty times before.
How does he fancy we can sit
To hear his out-of-fashion wit?
But he takes up with younger folks,
Who for his wine will bear his jokes.
Faith, he must make his stories shorter,
Or change his comrades once a quarter:
In half the time he talks them round,
There must another set be found.

For poetry, he's past his prime;
He takes an hour to find a rhyme:
His fire is out, his wit decayed,
His fancy sunk, his muse a jade.

1 Lord Viscount Bolingbroke.

• William Pulteney, Esq., created Earl of Bath.

I'd have him throw away his pen— But there's no talking to some men.

And then their tenderness appears By adding largely to my years: He's older than he would be reckoned, And well remembers Charles the Second. He hardly drinks a pint of wine; And that, I doubt, is no good sign. His stomach, too, begins to fail;

Last year we thought him strong and hale;
But now he's quite another thing;

I wish he may hold out till spring.
They hug themselves and reason thus:
It is not yet so bad with us.

In such a case they talk in tropes,
And by their fears express their hopes.
Some great misfortune to portend
No enemy can match a friend.
With all the kindness they profess,
The merit of a lucky guess

(When daily how-d'ye's come of course,
And servants answer, Worse and worse!")
Would please them better than to tell,
That, God be praised! the dean is well.
Then he, who prophesied the best,
Approves his foresight to the rest:
'You know I always feared the worst,
And often told you so at first.'
He'd rather choose that I should die,
Than his prediction prove a lie.
Not one foretells I shall recover,
But all agree to give me over.

Yet, should some neighbour feel a pain
Just in the parts where I complain,
How many a message would he send!
What hearty prayers, that I should mend!
Inquire what regimen I kept?

What gave me ease, and how I slept!
And more lament when I was dead,
Than all the snivellers round my bed.

My good companions, never fear;
For, though you may mistake a year,
Though your prognostics run too fast,
They must be verified at last.

Behold the fatal day arrive!
How is the dean he's just alive.
Now the departing prayer is read;
He hardly breathes. The dean is dead.
Before the passing-bell begun,

The news through half the town has run;
Oh! may we all for death prepare!
What has he left? and who's his heir?

I know no more than what the news is;
'Tis all bequeathed to public uses.
To public uses! there's a whim!
What had the public done for him?
Mere envy, avarice, and pride:
He gave it all-but first he died.
And had the dean in all the nation
No worthy friend, no poor relation!
So ready to do strangers good,
Forgetting his own flesh and blood!

Now Grub Street wits are all employed;
With elegies the town is cloyed:
Some paragraph in every paper
To curse the dean, or bless the drapier.
The doctors, tender of their fame,
Wisely on me lay all the blame.
We must confess his case was nice;
But he would never take advice.
Had he been ruled, for aught appears,
He might have lived these twenty years;
For when we opened him, we found
That all his vital parts were sound.
From Dublin soon to London spread,
'Tis told at court the dean is dead.

And Lady Suffolk in the spleen
Runs laughing up to tell the queen;
The queen so gracious, mild, and good,
Cries, Is he gone! 'tis time he should.
He's dead, you say, then let him rot!
I'm glad the medals were forgot.
I promised him, I own; but when?
I only was the princess then;
But now as consort of the king,
You know 'tis quite another thing."2
Now Charteris, at Sir Robert's levee,
Tells with a sneer the tidings heavy;
"Why, if he died without his shoes
(Cries Bob), I'm sorry for the news:
Oh, were the wretch but living still,
And in his place my good friend Will 15
Or had a mitre on his head,

Provided Bolingbroke was dead!'

Now Curle6 his shop from rubbish drains:
Three genuine tomes of Swift's Remains!
And then to make them pass the glibber,
Revised by Tibbalds, Moore, and Cibber.
He'll treat me, as he does my betters,
Publish my will, my life, my letters ;7
Revive the libels born to die,
Which Pope must bear, as well as I.

Here shift the scene, to represent
How those I love my death lament.
Poor Pope will grieve a month, and Gay
A week, and Arbuthnot a day.
St John himself will scarce forbear
To bite his pen, and drop a tear.
The rest will give a shrug, and cry,
'I'm sorry-but we all must die!'

Indifference clad in wisdom's guise,
All fortitude of mind supplies;
For how can stony bowels melt
In those who never pity felt?
When we are lashed, they kiss the rod,
Resigning to the will of God.

The fools my juniors by a year
Are tortured with suspense and fear;
Who wisely thought my age a screen,
When death approached, to stand between;
The screen removed, their hearts are trembling,
They mourn for me without dissembling.
My female friends, whose tender hearts
Have better learned to act their parts,
Receive the news in doleful dumps:
'The dean is dead (pray, what is trumps?)
Then, Lord, have mercy on his soul!
(Ladies, I'll venture for the vole.)
Six deans, they say, must bear the pall.
(I wish I knew what king to call.)
Madam, your husband will attend
The funeral of so good a friend:
No, madam, 'tis a shocking sight;
And he's engaged to-morrow night:
My Lady Club will take it ill,
If he should fail her at quadrille.
He loved the dean-(I lead a heart)
But dearest friends, they say, must part.

1 The Countess of Suffolk (formerly Mrs Howard), a lady of the queen's bed-chamber.

2 Queen Caroline had, when princess, promised Swift a present of medals, which promise was never fulfilled.

3 Colonel Francis Charteris, of infamous character, on whom

an epitaph was written by Dr Arbuthnot.

4 Sir Robert Walpole, then first minister of state, afterwards Earl of Orford.

5 William Pulteney, Esq., the great rival of Walpole.

6 An infamous bookseller, who published things in the dean's name, which he never wrote.

7 For some of these practices he was brought before the House of Lords.

His time was come, he ran his race;
We hope he's in a better place.'

Why do we grieve that friends should die! No loss more easy to supply.

One year is past; a different scene!
No further mention of the dean,
Who now, alas! no more is missed,
Than if he never did exist.
Where's now the favourite of Apollo?
Departed: and his works must follow;
Must undergo the common fate;
His kind of wit is out of date.

Some country squire to Lintot goes,1
Inquires for Swift in verse and prose.
Says Lintot, I have heard the name;
He died a year ago.' The same.'
He searches all the shop in vain.
'Sir, you may find them in Duck-Lane.
I sent them, with a load of books,
Last Monday to the pastry-cook's.
To fancy they could live a year!
I find you're but a stranger here.
The dean was famous in his time,
And had a kind of knack at rhyme.
His way of writing now is past;
The town has got a better taste.
I keep no antiquated stuff,

But spick-and-span I have enough.
Pray, but do give me leave to show 'em ;
Here's Colley Cibber's birth-day poem ;
This ode you never yet have seen
By Stephen Duck upon the queen.
Then here's a letter finely penned
Against the Craftsman and his friend;
It clearly shows that all reflection
On ministers is disaffection.
Next, here's Sir Robert's vindication,
And Mr Henley's last oration.
The hawkers have not got them yet;
Your honour please to have a set?'

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Suppose me dead; and then suppose
A club assembled at the Rose,
Where, from discourse of this and that,
I grow the subject of their chat.
'The dean, if we believe report,
Was never ill-received at court.
Although ironically grave,

He shamed the fool, and lashed the knave.
To steal a hint was never known,
But what he writ was all his own.'
'Sir, I have heard another story;
He was a most confounded Tory,
And grew, or he is much belied,
Extremely dull, before he died.'
'Can we the Drapier then forget?
Is not our nation in his debt?
'Twas he that writ the Drapier's letters!'
'He should have left them for his betters;
We had a hundred abler men,

Nor need depend upon his pen.
Say what you will about his reading,
You never can defend his breeding;
Who, in his satires running riot,
Could never leave the world in quiet;
Attacking, when he took the whim,
Court, city, camp-all one to him.
But why would he, except he slobbered,
Offend our patriot, great Sir Robert,
Whose counsels aid the sovereign power
To save the nation every hour?

1 Bernard Lintot, a bookseller. See Pope's 'Dunciad' and Letters.

2 A place where old books are sold.

3 Commonly called Orator Henley, a quack preacher in Lon. don, of great notoriety in his day.

What scenes of evil he unravels,
In satires, libels, lying travels!
Not sparing his own clergy-cloth,
But eats into it, like a moth!'
Perhaps I may allow, the dean
Had too much satire in his vein,

And seemed determined not to starve it,
Because no age could more deserve it.
Vice, if it e'er can be abashed,
Must be or ridiculed or lashed.
If you resent it, who's to blame?

He neither knew you, nor your name:
Should vice expect to 'scape rebuke,
Because its owner is a duke?
His friendships, still to few confined,
Were always of the middling kind;
No fools of rank or mongrel breed,
Who fain would pass for lords indeed,
Where titles give no right or power,
And peerage is a withered flower.
He would have deemed it a disgrace,
If such a wretch had known his face.
He never thought an honour done him,
Because a peer was proud to own him;
Would rather slip aside, and choose
To talk with wits in dirty shoes;

And scorn the tools with stars and garters,
So often seen caressing Charteris.
He kept with princes due decorum,
Yet never stood in awe before 'em.
He followed David's lesson just;
In princes never put his trust :
And, would you make him truly sour,
Provoke him with a slave in power.'
Alas, poor dean! his only scope
Was to be held a misanthrope.
This into general odium drew him,

Which, if he liked, much good may't do him.
His zeal was not to lash our crimes,
But discontent against the times:
For, had we made him timely offers
To raise his post, or fill his coffers,
Perhaps he might have truckled down,
Like other brethren of his gown.
For party he would scarce have bled:
I say no more-because he's dead.
What writings has he left behind?
I hear they're of a different kind:
A few in verse; but most in prose:
Some high-flown pamphlets, I suppose :
All scribbled in the worst of times,
To palliate his friend Oxford's crimes;
To praise Queen Anne, nay more, defend
her,

As never favouring the Pretender:
Or libels yet concealed from sight,
Against the court, to show his spite :
Perhaps his travels, part the third;
A lie at every second word-
Offensive to a loyal ear:

But not one sermon, you may swear.'
As for his works in verse or prose,
I own myself no judge of those.
Nor can I tell what critics thought 'em ;
But this I know, all people bought 'em,
As with a moral view designed,
To please, and to reform mankind:
And, if he often missed his aim,
The world must own it to their shame,
The praise is his, and theirs the blame.
He gave the little wealth he had
To build a house for fools and mad;
To show, by one satiric touch,
No nation wanted it so much.

That kingdom he hath left his debtor;
I wish it soon may have a better.

And, since you dread no further lashes, Methinks you may forgive his ashes.'

The Grand Question Debated:

Whether Hamilton's Bawn should be turned into a Barrack or a Malt-house. 1729.*

Thus spoke to my lady the knight full of care:
Let me have your advice in a weighty affair.
This Hamilton's Bawn,2 whilst it sticks on my hand,
I lose by the house what I get by the land;
But how to dispose of it to the best bidder,
For a barrack or malt-house, we now must consider.
First, let me suppose I make it a malt-house,
Here I have computed the profit will fall to us;
There's nine hundred pounds for labour and grain,
I increase it to twelve, so three hundred remain;
A handsome addition for wine and good cheer.
Three dishes a day, and three hogsheads a year:
With a dozen large vessels my vault shall be stored;
No little scrub joint shall come on my board:
And you and the dean no more shall combine
To stint me at night to one bottle of wine;
Nor shall I, for his humour, permit you to purloin
A stone and a quarter of beef from my sirloin.
If I make it a barrack, the crown is my tenant;
My dear, I have pondered again and again on't:
In poundage and drawbacks I lose half my rent,
Whatever they give me I must be content,
Or join with the court in every debate;
And rather than that I would lose my estate.

Thus ended the knight: thus began his meek wife;

It must and shall be a barrack, my life.

I'm grown a mere mopus; no company comes,
But a rabble of tenants and rusty dull rums.3
With parsons what lady can keep herself clean!
I'm all over daubed when I sit by the dean.
But if you will give us a barrack, my dear,
The captain, I'm sure, will always come here;
I then shall not value his deanship a straw,
For the captain, I warrant, will keep him in awe;
Or should he pretend to be brisk and alert,
Will tell him that chaplains should not be so pert;
That men of his coat should be minding their prayers,
And not among ladies to give themselves airs.

Thus argued my lady, but argued in vain ;
The knight his opinion resolved to maintain.

But Hannah, who listened to all that was past,
And could not endure so vulgar a taste,

As soon as her ladyship called to be drest,
Cried, Madam, why, surely my master's possest.
Sir Arthur the maltster! how fine it will sound!
I'd rather the bawn were sunk under ground.
But, madam, I guessed there would never come good,
When I saw him so often with Darby and Wood.5
And now my dream's out; for I was a-dreamed
That I saw a huge rat; O dear, how I screamed!
And after, methought, I had lost my new shoes;
And Molly she said I should hear some ill news.

*Swift spent almost a whole year (1728-9) at Gosford, in the north of Ireland, the seat of Sir Arthur Acheson, assisting Sir Arthur in his agricultural improvements, and lecturing, as usual, the lady of the manor upon the improvement of her health by walking, and her mind by reading. The circumstance of Sir Arthur letting a ruinous building called Hamilton's Bawn to the crown for a barrack, gave rise to one of the dean's most lively pieces of fugitive humour.-Scott's Life of Swift. A bawn is strictly a place near a house enclosed with mud or stone walls to keep the cattle.

1 Sir Arthur Acheson, an intimate friend of the poet. Sir Arthur was ancestor of the present Earl of Gosford.

2 A large old house belonging to Sir Arthur, two miles from his residence.

3 A cant word in Ireland for a poor country clergyman. My lady's waiting-maid,

Two of Sir Arthur's managers.

Dear madam, had you but the spirit to tease,
You might have a barrack whenever you please:
And, madam, I always believed you so stout,
That for twenty denials you would not give out.
If I had a husband like him, I purtest,
'Till he gave me my will, I would give him no rest;
But, madam, I beg you contrive and invent,
And worry him out, 'till he gives his consent.

Dear madam, whene'er of a barrack I think,
An I were to be hanged I can't sleep a wink:
For if a new crotchet comes into my brain,
I can't get it out, though I'd never so fain.
I fancy already a barrack contrived,

At Hamilton's Bawn, and the troop is arrived;
Of this, to be sure, Sir Arthur has warning,
And waits on the captain betimes the next morning.
Now see when they meet how their honours behave,
Noble captain, your servant-Sir Arthur, your slave;
You honour me much-the honour is mine-
'Twas a sad rainy night-but the morning is fine.
Pray how does my lady?-my wife's at your service.
I think I have seen her picture by Jervis.

To shorten my tale (for I hate a long story),
The captain at dinner appears in his glory;
The dean and the doctor have humbled their pride,
For the captain's intreated to sit by your side;
And, because he's their betters, you carve for him
first,

The parsons for envy are ready to burst;
The servants amazed are scarce ever able
To keep off their eyes, as they wait at the table;
And Molly and I have thrust in our nose
To peep at the captain in all his fine clothes;
Dear madam, be sure he's a fine spoken man,
Do but hear on the clergy how glib his tongue ran;
'And madam,' says he, if such dinners you give,
You'll never want parsons as long as you live;
I ne'er knew a parson without a good nose,
But the devil's as welcome wherever he goes;
G-d-me, they bid us reform and repent,
But, z-s, by their looks they never keep lent;
Mister curate, for all your grave looks, I'm afraid
You cast a sheep's eye on her ladyship's maid;
I wish she would lend you her pretty white hand

Good morrow, good captain-I'll wait on you down-In mending your cassock, and smoothing your band;

You shan't stir a foot-you'll think me a clown-
For all the world, captain, not half an inch farther-
You must be obeyed-your servant, Sir Arthur;
My humble respects to my lady unknown-
I hope you will use my house as your own.

Go bring me my smock, and leave off your prate,
Thou hast certainly gotten a cup in thy pate.'
Pray madam, be quiet: what was it I said?
You had like to have put it quite out of my head.
Next day, to be sure, the captain will come
At the head of his troop, with trumpet and drum ;
Now, madam, observe how he marches in state;
The man with the kettle-drum enters the gate;
Dub, dub, adub, dub. The trumpeters follow,
Tantara, tantara, while all the boys hollow.
See now comes the captain all daubed with gold
lace;

O, la! the sweet gentleman, look in his face;
And see how he rides like a lord of the land,
With the fine flaming sword that he holds in his hand;
And his horse, the dear creter, it prances and rears,
With ribbons in knots at its tail and its ears;
At last comes the troop, by the word of command,
Drawn up in our court, when the captain cries, Stand.
Your ladyship lifts up the sash to be seen
(For sure I had dizened you out like a queen),
The captain, to show he is proud of the favour,
Looks up to your window, and cocks up his beaver.
(His beaver is cocked; pray, madam, mark that,
For a captain of horse never takes off his hat;
Because he has never a hand that is idle,

(For the dean was so shabby, and looked like a ninny,
That the captain supposed he was curate to Jenny)."
Whenever you see a cassock and gown,

A hundred to one but it covers a clown;
Observe how a parson comes into a room,
G-d-me, he hobbles as bad as my groom;
A scholar, when just from his college broke loose,
Can hardly tell how to cry bo to a goose;
Your Noveds, and Bluturks, and Omurs,2 and stuff,
By G-, they don't signify this pinch of snuff.
To give a young gentleman right education,
The army's the only good school of the nation;
My schoolmaster called me a dunce and a fool,
But at cuffs I was always the cock of the school;
I never could take to my book for the blood o' me,
And the puppy confessed he expected no good o' me.
He caught me one morning coquetting his wife,
But he mauled me; I ne'er was so mauled in my life;
So I took to the road, and what's very odd,
The first man I robbed was a parson by G-.
Now, madam, you'll think it a strange thing to say,
But the sight of a book makes me sick to this day.'

Never since I was born did I hear so much wit,
And, madam, I laughed till I thought I should split.
So then you looked scornful, and snift at the dean,
As who should say, Now, am I skinny and lean 13
But he durst not so much as once open his lips,
And the doctor was plaguily down in the hips.

Thus merciless Hannah ran on in her talk,
Till she heard the dean call, Will your ladyship walk!
Her ladyship answers, I'm just coming down.

For the right holds the sword, and the left holds the Then turning to Hannah and forcing a frown,
bridle);

Then flourishes thrice his sword in the air,
As a compliment due to a lady so fair;
(How I tremble to think of the blood it hath spilt !)
Then he lowers down the point, and kisses the hilt.
Your ladyship smiles, and thus you begin:
Pray captain, be pleased to alight and walk in.
The captain salutes you with congee profound,
And your ladyship curtsies half way to the ground.
Kit, run to your master, and bid him come to us.
I'm sure he'll be proud of the honour you do us;
And, captain, you'll do us the favour to stay,
And take a short dinner here with us to-day;
You're heartily welcome; but as for good cheer,
You come in the very worst time of the year.
If I had expected so worthy a guest-
Lord, madam! your ladyship sure is in jest ;
You banter me, madam, the kingdom must grant-
You officers, captain, are so complaisant.

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Hist, hussy, I think I hear somebody coming' No, madam, 'tis only Sir Arthur a-humming.

Although it was plain in her heart she was glad,
Cried, Hussy, why sure the wench is gone mad;
How could these chimeras get into your brains?
Come hither, and take this old gown for your pains.
But the dean, if this secret should come to his ears,
Will never have done with his jibes and his jeers.
For your life not a word of the matter, I charge ye;
Give me but a barrack, a fig for the clergy.'

ALEXANDER POPE.

United with Swift in friendship and in fame, but possessing far higher powers as a poet, and more refined taste as a satirist, was ALEXANDER POPE, born in London May 22, 1688. His father, a linendraper, having acquired an independent fortune, retired to Binfield, in Windsor Forest. He was a Roman Catholic, and the young poet was partly

1 Dr Jenny, a clergyman in the neighbourhood.
Ovids, Plutarchs, Homers. 8 Nicknames for my lady.

educated by the family priest. He was afterwards sent to a Catholic seminary at Twyford, near Win

A. Pope

chester, where he lampooned his teacher, was severely punished, and afterwards taken home by his parents. He educated himself, and attended no school after his twelfth year! The whole of his early life was that of a severe student. He was a poet in his infancy.

As yet a child, and all unknown to fame,
I lisped in numbers, for the numbers came.

The writings of Dryden became the more particular object of his admiration, and he prevailed upon a friend to introduce him to Will's coffeehouse, which Dryden then frequented, that he might have the gratification of seeing an author whom he so enthusiastically admired. Pope was then not more than twelve years of age. He wrote, but afterwards destroyed, various dramatic pieces, and at the age of sixteen composed his Pastorals, and his imitations of Chaucer. He soon became acquainted with most of the eminent persons of the day both in politics and literature. In 1711 appeared his Essay on Criticism, unquestionably the finest piece of argumentative and reasoning poetry in the English language. The work is said to have been composed two years before publication, when Pope was only twenty-one. The ripeness of judgment which it displays is truly marvellous. Addison commended the Essay' warmly in the Spectator, and it instantly rose into great popularity. The style of Pope was now formed and complete. His versification was that of his master, Dryden, but he gave the heroic couplet a peculiar terseness, correctness, and melody. The essay was shortly afterwards followed by the Rape of the Lock. The stealing of a lock of hair from a beauty of the day, Miss Arabella Fermor, by her lover, Lord Petre, was taken seriously, and caused an estrangement between the families, and Pope wrote his poem to make a jest of the affair, and laugh them together again.' In this he did not succeed, but he added greatly to his reputation by the effort. The

machinery of the poem, founded upon the Rosicrucian theory, that the elements are inhabited by spirits, which they called sylphs, gnomes, nymphs, and salamanders, was added at the suggestion of Dr Garth and some of his friends. Sylphs had been previously mentioned as invisible attendants on the fair, and the idea is shadowed out in Shakspeare's 'Ariel,' and the amusements of the fairies in the Midsummer Night's Dream.' But Pope has blended the most delicate satire with the most lively fancy, and produced the finest and most brilliant mock-heroic poem in the world. It is,' says Johnson, the most airy, the most ingenious, and the most delightful of all Pope's compositions.' The Temple of Fame and the Elegy on an Unfortunate Lady, were next published; and in 1713 appeared his Windsor Forest, which was chiefly written so early as 1704. The latter was evidently founded on Denham's 'Cooper's Hill,' which it far excels. Pope was, properly speaking, no mere descriptive poet. He made the picturesque subservient to views of historical events, or to sketches of life and morals. But most of the 'Windsor Forest' being composed in his earlier years, amidst the shades of those noble woods which he selected for the theme of his verse, there is in this poem a greater display of sympathy with external nature and rural objects than in any of his other works. The lawns and glades of the forest, the russet plains, and blue hills, and even the purple dyes' of the wild heath,' had struck his young imagination. His account of the dying pheasant is a finished picture

See! from the brake the whirring pheasant springs,
And mounts exulting on triumphant wings:
Short is his joy, he feels the fiery wound,
Flutters in blood, and panting beats the ground.
Ah! what avail his glossy varying dyes,
His purple crest and scarlet-circled eyes;
The vivid green his shining plumes unfold,
His painted wings, and breast that flames with gold
Another fine painting of external nature, as pic-
turesque as any to be found in the purely descrip-
tive poets, is the winter piece in the Temple of
Fame-

So Zembla's rocks (the beauteous work of frost)
Rise white in air, and glitter o'er the coast;
Pale suns, unfelt, at distance roll away,
And on the impassive ice the lightnings play;
External snows the growing mass supply,
Till the bright mountains prop the incumbent sky:
As Atlas fixed, each hoary pile appears,
The gathered winter of a thousand years.

Pope now commenced his translation of the Iliad. At first the gigantic task oppressed him with its difficulty, but he grew more familiar with Homer's images and expressions, and in a short time was able to despatch fifty verses a-day. Great part of the manuscript was written upon the backs and covers of letters, evincing that it was not without reason he was called paper-sparing Pope. The poet obtained a clear sum of £5320, 4s. by this translation: his exclamation

And thanks to Homer, since I live and thrive,
Indebted to no prince or peer alive-

was, however, scarcely just, if we consider that this large sum was in fact a benevolence' from the upper classes of society, good-naturedly designed to reward his literary merit. The fame of Pope was not advanced in an equal degree with his fortune by his labours as a translator. The 'fatal facility' of his rhyme, the additional false ornaments which he imparted

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