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Prompt to enchant some inadvertent wretch
With his unhallow'd touch. So (poets sing)
Grimalkin, to domestic vermin sworn
An everlasting foe, with watchful eye
Lies nightly brooding o'er a chinky gap,
Protending her fell claws, to thoughtless mice
Sure ruin. So her disembowell'd web

Arachne, in a hall or kitchen, spreads

Obvious to vagrant flies: she secret stands
Within her woven cell: the humming prey,
Regardless of their fate, rush on the toils
Inextricable, nor will aught avail
Their arts, or arms, or shapes of lovely hue;
The wasp insidious, and the buzzing drone,
And butterfly, proud of expanded wings
Distinct with gold, entangled in her snares,
Useless resistance make; with eager strides,
She towering flies to her expected spoils;
Then, with envenom'd jaws, the vital blood
Drinks of reluctant foes, and to her cave
Their bulky carcasses triumphant drags.

So pass my days. But when nocturnal shades
This world envelop, and th' inclement air
Persuades men to repel benumbing frosts
With pleasant wines, and crackling blaze of wood;
Me, lonely sitting, nor the glimmering light
Of make-weight candle, nor the joyous talk
Of loving friend, delights: distress'd, forlorn,
Amidst the horrours of the tedious night,
Darkling I sigh, and feed with dismal thoughts
My anxious mind: or sometimes mournful verse
Indite, and sing of groves and myrtle shades,

Or desperate lady near a purling-stream,
Or lover pendant on a willow-tree.

Meanwhile I labour with eternal drought,
And restless wish, and rave; my parched throat
Finds no relief, nor heavy eyes repose:
But if a slumber haply does invade

My weary limbs, my fancy 's still awake,
Thoughtful of drink, and eager, in a dream,
Tipples imaginary pots of ale,

In vain; awake I find the settled thirst
Still gnawing, and the pleasant phantom curse.
Thus do I live, from pleasure quite debarr'd,
Nor taste the fruits that the Sun's genial rays
Mature, john-apple, nor the downy peach,
Nor walnut in rough-furrow'd coat secure,
Nor medlar, fruit delicious in decay;
Afflictions great! yet greater still remain :
My galligaskins, that have long withstood
The winter's fury, and encroaching frosts,
By time subdued (what will not time subdue!)
An horrid chasm disclos'd with orifice
Wide, discontinuous; at which the winds
Eurus and Auster, and the dreadful force
Of Boreas, that congeals the Cronian waves,
Tumultuous enter with dire chilling blasts,
Portending agues. Thus a well-fraught ship,
Long sail'd secure, or through th' Ægean deep,
Or the Ionian, till cruising near

The Lilybean shore, with hideous crush

On Scylla, or Charybdis (dangerous rocks!)

She strikes rebounding; whence the shatter'd oak, So fierce a shock unable to withstand,

Admits the sea: in at the gaping side

The crowding waves gush with impetuous rage,
Resistless, overwhelming; horrors seize

The mariners; Death in their eyes appears, [pray:
They stare, they lave, they pump, they swear, they
(Vain efforts!) still the battering waves rush in,
Implacable, till, delug'd by the foam,
The ship sinks foundering in the vast abyss.

CIDER,

A POEM, IN TWO BOOKS.

Honos erit huic quoque Pomo?

Book I.

WHAT Soil the apple loves, what care is due
To orchats, timeliest when to press the fruits,
Thy gift, Pomona, in Miltonian verse
Adventurous I presume to sing; of verse
Nor skill'd, nor studious: but my native soil
Invites me, and the theme as yet unsung.

Ye Ariconian knights, and fairest dames,

VIRG

To whom propitious Heaven these blessings grants,
Attend my lays, nor hence disdain to learn,
How Nature's gifts may be improv'd by art.
And thou, O Mostyn, whose benevolence,
And candour, oft experienc'd, me vouchsaf'd
To knit in friendship, growing still with years,
Accept this pledge of gratitude and love.
May it a lasting monument remain

Of dear respect; that when this body frail
Is moulder'd into dust, and I become
As I had never been, late times may know
I once was bless'd in such a matchless friend!
Whoe'er expects his labouring trees should bend
With fruitage, and a kindly harvest yield,
Be this his first concern, to find a tract
Impervious to the winds, begirt with hills
That intercept the Hyperborean blasts
Tempestuous, and cold Eurus' nipping force,
Noxious to feeble buds: but to the west
Let him free entrance grant, let Zephyrs bland
Administer their tepid genial airs;

Nought fear he from the west, whose gentle warmth
Discloses well the Earth's all-teeming womb,
Invigorating tender seeds; whose breath

Nurtures the orange, and the citron groves, Hesperian fruits, and wafts their odours sweet Wide through the air, and distant shores perfumes. Nor only do the hills exclude the winds:

But when the blackening clouds in sprinkling showers

Distil, from the high summits down the rain.
Runs trickling; with the fertile moisture cheer'd,
The orchats smile; joyous the farmers see
Their thriving plants, and bless the heavenly dew.
Next let the planter, with discretion meet,
The force and genius of each soil explore;
To what adapted, what it shuns averse:
Without this necessary care, in vain
He hopes an apple-vintage, and invokes
Pomona's aid in vain. The miry fields,

Rejoicing in rich mould, most ample fruit
Of beauteous form produce; pleasing to sight,
But to the tongue inelegant and fiat.

So Nature has decreed: so oft we see
Men passing fair, in outward lineaments
Elaborate; less, inwardly, exact.

Nor from the sable ground expect success,
Nor from cretaceous, stubborn and jejune :
The Must, of pallid hue, declares the soil
Devoid of spirit; wretched he, that quaffs
Such wheyish liquors; oft with colic pangs,
With pungent colic pangs distress'd he'll roar,
And toss, and turn, and curse th' unwholesome
draught.

But, farmer, look where full-ear'd sheaves of rye
Grow wavy on the tilth, that soil select

For apples: thence thy industry shall gain
Ten-fold reward: thy garners, thence with store
Surcharg'd, shall burst; thy press with purest juice
Shall flow, which, in revolving years, may try
Thy feeble feet, and bind thy faltering tongue.
Such is the Kentchurch, such Dantzeyan ground,
Such thine, O learned Brome, and Capel such,
Willisian Burlton, much-lov'd Geers his Marsh,
And Sutton-acres, drench'd with regal blood
Of Ethelbert, when to th' unhallow'd feast
Of Mercian Offa he invited came,

To treat of spousals: long connubial joys
He promis'd to himseif, allur'd by fair
Elfrida's beauty: but, deluded, dy'd

In height of hopes oh! hardest fate, to fall
By show of friendship, and pretended love!

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