Page images
PDF
EPUB

But now Dan Phoebus gains the middle skie,
And Liberty unbars her prison-door;
And like a rushing torrent out they fly,
And now the grassy cirque had cover'd o'er
With boisterous revel-rout and wild uproar;
A thousand ways in wanton rings they run,
Heaven shield their short-liv'd pastime, I im-
plore'

For well may Freedom erst so dearly won,
Appear to British elf more gladsome than the Sun.

Enjoy, poor imps! enjoy your sportive trade,
And chase gay flies, and cull the fairest flowers;
For when my bones in grass-green sods are laid,
For never may ye taste more careless hours
In knightly castles, or in ladies' bowers.
O vain to seek delight in earthly thing!
But most in courts where proud Amb tion towers;
Deluded wight! who weens fair Peace can spring
Beneath the pompous dome of kesar or of king.

See in each sprite some various bent appear!
These rudely carol most incondite lay;

ELEGY,

Describing the sorrow of an ingenuous mind, on the melancholy event of a licentious amour.

WHY mourns my friend? why weeps his downcast

eye,

That eye where mirth, where fancy us'd to shine?
Thy cheerful meads reprove that swelling sigh;
Spring ne'er enamel'd fairer meads than thine.
Art thou not lodg'd in Fortune's warm embrace?
Wert thou not form'd by Nature's partial care!
Blest in thy song, and blest in every grace

That wins the friend, or that enchants the fair?
"Damon," said he, "thy partial praise restrain;
Alas! his very praise awakes my pain,
Not Damon's friendship can my peace restore;

And my poor wounded bosom bleeds the more. "For oh! that Nature on my birth had frown'd, Or Fortune fix'd me to some lowly cell;

Those sauntering on the green, with jocund leer Then had my bosom 'scap'd this fatal wound,

Salute the stranger passing on his way;
Some builden fragile tenements of clay;
Some to the standing lake their courses bend,
With pebbles smooth at duck and drake to play;
Thilk to the huxter's savory cottage tend,

In pastry kings and queens th' allotted mite to
spend.

[blocks in formation]

Nor had I bid these vernal sweets farewell. "But led by Fortune's hand, her darling child, My youth her vain licentious bliss admir'd: In Fortune's train the syren Flattery smil'd, And rashly hallow'd all her queen inspir'd. "Of folly studious, e'en of vices vain,

Ah vices! gilded by the rich and gay!

I chas'd the guileless daughters of the plain,
Nor dropp'd the chase, till Jessy was my prey.
"Poor artless maid! to stain thy spotless name,

Expense, and art, and toil, united strove;
To lure a breast that felt the purest flame,
Sustain'd by virtue, but betray'd by love.

[ocr errors]

School'd in the science of love's mazy wiles,
I cloth'd each feature with affected scorn;
I spoke of jealous doubts, and fickle smiles,
And, feigning, left her anxious and forlorn.
"Then, while the fancied rage alarm'd her care,
Warm to deny, and zealous to disprove;

I bade my words their wonted softness wear
And seiz'd the minute of returning love.
"To thee, my Damon, dare I paint the rest!
Will yet thy love a candid ear incline?
Assur'd that virtue, by misfortune prest,

Feels not the sharpness of a pang like mine.
"Nine envious moons matur'd her growing shame
When, scorn'd of virtue, stigmatiz'd by fame,
Erewhile to flaunt it in the face of day;
Low at my feet desponding Jessy lay.
«Henry,' she said, 'by thy dear form subdu'd,
See the sad relics of a nymph undone!
I'find, I find this rising sob renew'd:

[ocr errors]

I sigh in shades, and sicken at the Sun

Amid the dreary gloom of night, I cry,
When will the morn's once pleasing scenes return
Yet what can morn's returning ray supply,

But foes that triumph, or but friends that mourn

'Alas! no more that joyous morn appears That led the tranquil hours of spotless fame; For I have steep'd a father's couch in tears,

And ting'd a mother's glowing cheek with shame.

"The vocal birds that raise their matin strain,
The sportive lambs, increase my pensive moan;
All seem to chase me from the cheerful plain,
And talk of truth and innocence alone.

If through the garden's flowery tribes I stray, Where bloom the jasmines that could once allure, Hope not to find delight in us, they say,

For we are spotless, Jessy; we are pure.

"Ye flowers! that well reproach a nymph so frail;
Say, could ye with my virgin fame compare?
The brightest bud that scents the vernal gale
Was not so fragrant, and was not so fair

Now the grave old alarm the gentler young; And all my fame's abhorr'd contagion flee: Trembles each lip, and falters every tongue,

That bids the morn propitious smile on me.

"Thus for your sake I shun each human eye; I bid the sweets of blooming youth adieu; To die I languish, but I dread to die,

Lest my sad fate should nourish pangs for you.

Raise me from earth; the pains of want remove, And let me silent seek some friendly shore: There only, banish'd from the form I love, My weeping virtue shall relapse no more

Be but my friend; I ask no dearer name; Be such the meed of some more artful fair; Nor could it heal my peace, or chase my shame, That pity gave, what love refus'd to share.

'Force not my tongue to ask its scanty bread; Nor hurl thy Jessy to the vulgar crew; Not such the parent's board at which I fed!

Not such the precept from his lips I drew!

"Haply, when Age has silver'd o'er my hair, Malice may learn to scorn so mean a spoil; Envy may slight a face no longer fair;

And pity, welcome, to my native soil.'

"She spoke nor was I born of savage race;

Nor could these hands a niggard boon assign; Grateful she clasp'd me in a last embrace,

And vow'd to waste her life in prayers for mine.

"I saw her foot the lofty bark ascend;

I saw her breast with every passion heave;

I left her-torn from every earthly friend;
Oh! my hard bosom, which could bear to leave!

"-Brief let me be; the fatal storm arose;

The billows rag'd, the pilot's art was vain; O'er the tall mast the circling surges close; My Jessy-floats upon the watery plain! "And see my youth's impetuous fires decay; Seek not to stop Reflection's bitter tear; But warn the frolic, and instruct the gay, From Jessy floating on her watery bier!"

A PASTORAL BALLAD,

IN FOUR PARTS. 1743.

Arbusta humilesque myrice.-Virg.

I. ABSENCE.

YE shepherds so cheerful and gay,
Whose flocks never carelessly roam;
Should Corydon's happen to stray,

Oh! call the poor wanderers home.
Allow me to muse and to sigh,

Nor talk of the change that ye find; None once was so watchful as I;

I have left my dear Phyllis behind. Now I know what it is, to have strove

With the torture of doubt and desire; What it is to admire and to love,

And to leave her we love and admire Ah! lead forth my flock in the morn,

And the damps of each evening repel; Alas! I am faint and forlorn :

-I have bade my dear Phyllis farewell.
Since Phyllis vouchsaf'd me a look,
I never once dreamt of my vine:
May I lose both my pipe and my crook,
If I knew of a kid that was mine!

I priz'd ev'ry hour that went by,
Beyond all that had pleas'd me before;
But now they are past, and I sigh;
And I grieve that I priz'd them no more.

But why do I languish in vain;

Why wander thus pensively here? Oh! why did I come from the plain, Where I fed on the smiles of my dear? They tell me, my favorite maid,

The pride of that valley, is flown; Alas! where with her I have stray'd, I could wander with pleasure, alone. When forc'd the fair nymph to forego, What anguish I felt at my heart! Yet I thought-but it might not be so'Twas with pain that she saw me depart. She gaz'd, as I slowly withdrew;

My path I could hardly discern;
So sweetly she bade me adieu,

I thought that she bade me return.
The pilgrim that journeys all day
To visit some far-distant shrine,
If he bear but a relic away,

Is happy, nor heard to repine.
Thus widely remov'd from the fair,
Where my vows, my devotion, I owe,
Soft Hope is the relic I bear,
And my solace wherever I go.

II. HOPE.

My banks they are furnish'd with bees,
Whose murmur invites one to sleep;
My grottoes are shaded with trees,
And my hills are white over with sheep

I seldom have met with a loss,
Such health do my fountains bestow:
My fountains all border'd with moss,
Where the hare-bells and violets grow.

Not a pine in my grove is there seen,
But with tendrils of wood bine is bound:
Not a beech's more beautiful green,

But a sweet-brier entwines it around.
Not my fields, in the prime of the year
More charms than my cattle unfold;
Not a brook that is limpid and clear,
But it glitters with fishes of gold.

One would think she might like to retire
To the bower I have labor'd to rear,
Not a shrub that I heard her admire,
But I hasted and planted it there.
O how sudden the jessamine strove

With the lilac to render it gay!
Already it calls for my love,

To prune the wild branches away.

From the plains, from the woodlands and groves,
What strains of wild melody flow!
How the nightingales warble their loves
From thickets of roses that blow!
And when her bright form shall appear,
Each bird shall harmoniously join

In a concert so soft and so clear,

As she may not be found to resign.

I have found out a gift for my fair;

I have found where the wood-pigeons breed: But let me that plunder forbear,

She will say 'twas a barbarous deed. For he ne'er could be true, she averr'd,

Who would rob a poor bird of its young: And I lov'd her the more when I heard Such tenderness fall from her tongue.

I have heard her with sweetness unfold How that pity was due to-a dove : That it ever attended the bold;

And she call'd it the sister of love. But her words such a pleasure convey, So much I her accents adore, Let her speak, and whatever she say, Methinks I should love her the more.

Can a bosom so gentle remain

Unmov'd when her Corydon sighs? Will a nymph that is fond of the plain, These plains and this valley despise? Dear regions of silence and shade!

Soft scenes of contentment and ease? Where I could have pleasingly stray'd, If aught, in her absence, could please

But where does my Phyllida stray?

And where are her grots and her bowers? Are the groves and the valleys as gay, And the shepherds as gentle as ours? The groves may perhaps be as fair,

And the face of the valleys as fine; The swains may in manners compare, But their love is not equal to mine.

III. SOLICITUDE.

WHY will you my passion reprove!
Why term it a folly to grieve?
Ere I show you the charms of my love,
She's fairer than you can believe.

With her mien she enamours the brave,
With her wit she engages the free;
With her modesty pleases the grave;
She is every way pleasing to me.

O you that have been of her train,
Come and join in my amorous lays,
I could lay down my life for the swain,
That will sing but a song in her praise.
When he sings, may the nymphs of the town
Come trooping, and listen the while;
Nay on him let not Phyllida frown;
-But I cannot allow her to smile.

For when Paridel tries, in the dance
Any favor with Phyllis to find,

O how with one trivial glance,

Might she ruin the peace of my mind! In ringlets he dresses his hair,

And his crook is bestudded around;
And his pipe-oh my Phyllis, beware
Of a magic there is in the sound.

"Tis his with mock passion to glow,
"Tis his in smooth tales to unfold,
How her face is as bright as the snow,
And her bosom, be sure, is as cold.
How the nightingales labor the strain,

With the notes of his charmer to vie; How they vary their accents in vain, Repine at her triumphs, and die.

To the grove or the garden he strays,
And pillages every sweet;
Then, suiting the wreath to his lays,
He throws it at Phyllis's feet.
"O Phyllis," he whispers, "more fair,
More sweet than the jessamine's flower
What are pinks in a morn to compare?
What is eglantine after a shower?

Then the lily no longer is white; The rose is depriv'd of its bloom; Then the violets die with despite,

And the woodbines give up their perfume." Thus glide the soft numbers along,

And he fancies no shepherd his peer; -Yet I never should envy the song, Were not Phyllis to lend it an ear.

Let his crook be with hyacinths bound,
So Phyllis the trophy despise :
Let his forehead with laurels be crown'd,
So they shine not in Phyllis's eyes.
The language that flows from the heart,
Is a stranger to Paridel's tongue;
-Yet may she beware of his art,
Or sure I must envy the song.

IV. DISAPPOINTMENT. YE shepherds, give ear to my lay, And take no more heed of my sheep; They have nothing to do but to stray; I have nothing to do but to weep. Yet do not my folly reprove;

She was fair-and my passion begun, She smil'd-and I could not but love; She is faithless-and I am undone.

Perhaps I was void of all thought. Perhaps it was plain to foresee,

That a nymph so complete would be sought
By a swain more engaging than me.
Ah! love every hope can inspire;
It banishes wisdom the while;
And the lip of the nymph we admire
Seems for ever adorn'd with a smile

She is faithless, and I am undone ;

Ye that witness the woes I endure, Let reason instruct you to shun

What it cannot instruct you to cure
Beware how you loiter in vain

Amid nymphs of a higher degree:
It is not for me to explain
How fair, and how fickle, they be.

Alas! from the day that we met,

What hope of an end to my woes? When I cannot endure to forget

The glance that undid my repose.
Yet time may diminish the pain:

The flower, and the shrub, and the tree,
Which I rear'd for her pleasure in vain,
In time may have comfort for me.
The sweets of a dew-sprinkled rose,

The sound of a murmuring stream,
The peace which from solitude flows,

Henceforth shall be Corydon's theme. High transports are shown to the sight, But we're not to find them our own;

Fate never bestow'd such delight

As I with my, Phyllis had known.

O ye woods, spread your branches apace;
To your deepest recesses I fly ;

I would hide with the beasts of the chase;
I would vanish from every eye.
Yet my reed shall resound through the grove
With the same sad complaint it begun;
How she smil'd-and I could not but love;
Was faithless-and I am undone!

[blocks in formation]

Erewhile, in sportive circles round

She saw him wheel, and frisk, and bound;
From rock to rock pursue his way,
And on the fearful margin play.

Pleas'd on his various freaks to dwell,
She saw him climb my rustic cell;
Thence eye my lawns with verdure bright,
And seem all ravish'd at the sight.

She tells with what delight he stood To trace his features in the flood; Then skipp'd aloof with quaint amaze, And then drew near again to gaze.

She tells me how with eager speed
He flew to hear my vocal reed;
And how with critic face profound,
And stedfast ear, devour'd the sound.

His every frolic, light as air,
Deserves the gentle Delia's care;
And tears bedew her tender eye,
To think the playful kid must die.—

But knows my Delia, timely wise, How soon this blameless era flies? While violence and craft succeed; Unfair design, and ruthless deed!

Soon would the vine his wounds deplore.
And yield her purple gifts no more;
Ah! soon, eras'd from every grove
Were Delia's name, and Strephon's love.

No more those bowers might Strephon see
Where first he fondly gaz'd on thee,
No more those beds of flowerets find,
Which for thy charming brows he twin'd

Each wayward passion soon would tear
His bosom, now so void of care;
And, when they left his ebbing vein,
What, but insipid age, remain ?

Then mourn not the decrees of Fate, That gave his life so short a date; And I will join thy tenderest sighs, To think that youth so swiftly flies

THOMAS GRAY.

composed several years before. It met with immediate appreciation, went rapidly through eleven editions, and was translated into Latin. And its popularity has never waned. In 1757 he published his “Pindaric Odes." The same year he declined the Laureate-ship, which had become vacant by the death of Cibber. In 1768 he was appointed to the chair of Modern His

THOMAS GRAY was born in London, December | 26, 1716. He was educated at Eton and at Cambridge. At Eton he became intimate with Horace Walpole, and after their college-days were over they travelled together on the Continent. Gray studied law for a while; but after the death of his father, in 1741, he gave it up and went to Cambridge to take the doctor's degree. There he spent the greater part of history at Cambridge. The professorship had been life. His passion was for books and for natural held as a sinecure, but Gray prepared to fulfil scenery. The one he found in the great libra- its duties. His good intentions, however, were ries, and for the other he rambled about in Wales, defeated by his natural indolence and by declinScotland, and the lake district of England. In ing health. He died of gout, on July 30, 1771, his travels he always carried a note-book, and and was buried at Stoke-Pogis, Buckinghamhis letters to his literary friends were filled with shire, in the churchyard which is the scene of descriptions of what he saw. In 1747 he pub- his Elegy. Gray wrote but little poetry (nearly lished his "Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton all his poems are in this collection), but what he College," whose closing lines are one of the did write is singularly perfect. In proportion most familiar of all quotations. In 1751 his to its quantity, it has probably furnished more "Elegy in a Country Churchyard" was pub-popular quotations than the works of any other lished anonymously. Portions of it had been writer of English verse.

ON VICISSITUDE.

Now the golden morn aloft
Waves her dew-bespangled wing,
With vermil cheek, and whisper soft,
She woos the tardy spring:
Till April starts, and calls around
The sleeping fragrance from the ground;
And lightly o'er the living scene
Scatters his freshest, tenderest green.

New-born flocks, in rustic dance,
Frisking ply their feeble feet;
Forgetful of their wintry trance
The birds his presence greet:
But chief the skylark warbles high
His trembling thrilling ecstasy;
And, lessening from the dazzled sight,
Melts into air and liquid light.

Yesterday the sullen year
Saw the snowy whirlwind fly;
Mute was the music of the air,
The herd stood drooping by:
Their raptures now that wildly flow,
No yesterday, nor morrow know;
'Tis man alone that joy descries
With forward and reverted eyes.
Smiles on past misfortune's brow,
Soft reflection's hand can trace;

And o'er the cheek of sorrow throw
A melancholy grace:

While hope prolongs our happier hour;
Or deepest shades, that dimly lower
And blacken round our weary way,
Gilds with a gleam of distant day.

Still, where rosy pleasure leads,
See a kindred grief pursue;
Behind the steps that misery treads,
Approaching comfort view;
The hues of bliss more brightly glow,
Chastised by sabler tints of woe;
And blended form, with artful strife,
The strength and harmony of life.

See the wretch, that long has tost
On the thorny bed of pain,
At length repair his vigor lost,
And breathe, and walk again;
The meanest flowerot of the vale,
The simplest note that swells the gale,
The common sun, the air, the skies,
To him are opening Paradise.

Humble Quiet builds her cell
Near the course where pleasure flows;
She eyes the clear crystalline well,
And tastes it as it goes.

« PreviousContinue »