LORD LYTTLETON.

1709-1773.

LORD LYTTLETON courted Lucy Fortescue, daughter of Hugh Fortescue, Esq., a country gentleman of Devonshire. She was in her twenty-second year, and was beautiful and accomplished; he was eight or nine years older, and was extremely plain, "of a feeble, ill-compacted frame, and a meagre, sallow countenance." His manners, however, were elegant, and his talents above mediocrity, and, as a woman seldom thinks of the person of her lover, he succeeded in winning the affections of Miss Fortescue, and they were married in 1741. They lived an ideal life for four or five years, surrounded by books and friends, and devoted to each other. Two children were born to them, and Lady Lyttleton was confined with a third, when she sickened and died. "I believe," her husband wrote to his father, two days before her death, "I believe God supports me above my own strength, for the sake of my friends who are concerned for me, and in return for the resignation with which I endeavor to submit to his will. If it please Him, in his infinite mercy, to restore my dear wife to me, I shall most thankfully acknowledge his goodness; if not, I shall most humbly endure his chastisement, which I have too much deserved." Lady Lyttleton died on the 19th of January, 1747, and was buried at OverArley, in Staffordshire. Her disconsolate husband erected a monument to her in the chancel of the church at Hagley, and solaced himself, Johnson sneeringly remarks, by writing a long monody on her memory.

Lord Lyttleton married again in 1749. His second wife was Elizabeth Rich, daughter of Sir Robert Rich, an intimate and dear friend of his Lucy. The experiment is said to have been an unhappy one, and to have added bitterness to his regrets.

AN IRREGULAR ODE,

WRITTEN AT WICKHAM. 1746.

Ye sylvan scenes, with artless beauty gay,
Ye gentle shades of Wickham, say,

What is the charm that each successive year,
Which sees me with my Lucy here,

Can thus to my transported heart
A sense of joy unfelt before impart?

Is it glad Summer's balmy breath, that blows
From the fair jasmine and the blushing rose?
Her balmy breath, and all her blooming store
Of rural bliss, was here before:

Oft have I met her on the verdant side
Of Norwood Hill, and in the yellow meads
Where Pan the dancing Graces leads,
Arrayed in all her flowery pride.

No sweeter fragrance now the gardens yield,
No brighter colours paint th' enamelled field.

Is it to Love these new delights I owe?
Four times has the revolving Sun
His annual circle through the zodiac run,
Since all that Love's indulgent power
On favoured mortals can bestow,
Was given to me in this auspicious bower.

Here first my Lucy, sweet in virgin charms,
Was yielded to my longing arms;
And round our nuptial bed,

Hovering with purple wings, th' Idalian boy
Shook from his radiant torch the blissful fire
Of innocent desires,

While Venus scattered myrtles o'er her head.
Whence then this strange increase of joy?
He, only he, can tell, who, matched like me,
(If such another happy man there be,)

Has by his own experience tried

How much THE WIFE is dearer than THE BRIDE.

MARK AKENSIDE.

1721-1770.

SONG.

THE shape alone let others prize,
The features of the fair;

I look for spirit in her eyes,
And meaning in her air.

A damask cheek, an ivory arm,
Shall ne'er my wishes win;

Give me an animated form,

That speaks a mind within.

A face where awful honour shines,
Where sense and sweetness move,

And angel innocence refines

The tenderness of love.

These are the soul of beauty's frame,
Without whose vital aid,
Unfinished all her features seem,

And all her roses dead.

But ah! where both their charms unite,

How perfect is the view,

With every image of delight,

With graces ever new:

Of power to charm the greatest woe, The wildest rage control, Diffusing mildness o'er the brow,

And rapture through the soul.

Their power but faintly to express
All language must despair;
But go, behold Arpasia's face,
And read it perfect there.

NATHANIEL COTTON.

1721-1788.

["A Collection of Poems by Several Hands." 1763.]

THE FIRESIDE.

DEAR Chloe, while the busy crowd,
The vain, the wealthy, and the proud,
In folly's maze advance;
Though singularity and pride

Be called our choice, we'll step aside,
Nor join the giddy dance.

From the gay world we'll oft retire
To our own family and fire,

Where love our hours employs;

No noisy neighbour enters here,
No intermeddling stranger near,
To spoil our heartfelt joys.

If solid happiness we prize,
Within our breast this jewel lies,

And they are fools who roam;

The world hath nothing to bestow,

From our own selves our bliss must flow,

And that dear hut our home.