ON HIS ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE POEMS OF MR. ROGERS.
CONSUMMATE artist, whose undying name With classic Rogers' shall go down to fame, Be this thy crowning work! In my young days How often have I, with a child's fond gaze, Pored on the pictured wonders* thou hadst done: Clarissa mournful, and prim Grandison! All Fielding's, Smollett's heroes, rose to view; I saw, and I believed the phantoms true, But, above all, that most romantic talet Did o'er my rude credulity prevail,
Where glums and gawries wear mysterious things, That serve at once for jackets and for wings. Age, that enfeebles other men's designs,
But heightens thine, and thy free draught refines. In several ways distinct you make us feel Graceful as Raphael, as Watteau genteel.
Your lights and shades, as Titianesque, we praise; And warmly wish you Titian's length of days.
TO A FRIEND ON HIS MARRIAGE.
WHAT makes a happy wedlock? What has fate Not given to thee in thy well-chosen mate? Good sense-good-humour; these are trivial things, Dear M, that each trite encomiast sings. - But she hath these, and more. A mind exempt From every low-bred passion, where contempt, Nor envy, nor detraction, ever found
A harbour yet; an understanding sound; Just views of right and wrong; perception full Of the deform'd, and of the beautiful, In life and manners; wit above her sex, Which, as a gem, her sprightly converse decks;
* Illustrations of the British Novelists. † Peter Wilkins.
Exuberant fancies, prodigal of mirth, To gladden woodland walk or winter hearth; A noble nature, conqueror in the strife Of conflict with a hard discouraging life,
Strengthening the veins of virtue, past the power Of those whose days have been one silken hour, Spoil'd fortune's pamper'd offspring; a keen sense Alike of benefit and of offence,
With reconcilement quick, that instant springs From the charged heart with nimble angel wings; While grateful feelings, like a signet sign'd By a strong hand, seem burnt into her mind. If these, dear friend, a dowry can confer Richer than land, thou hast them all in her; And beauty, which some hold the chiefest boon, s in thy bargain for a make-weight thrown.
I HAD a sense in dreams of a beauty rare, Whom fate had spell-bound, and rooted there, Stooping, like some enchanted theme, Over the marge of that crystal stream, Where the blooming Greek, to Echo blind, With self-love fond, had to waters pined. Ages had waked, and ages slept, And that bending posture still she kept: For her eyes she may not turn away, Till a fairer object shall pass that way-
Till an image more beauteous this world can show,
Than her own which she sees in the mirror below..
Pore on, fair creature! for ever pore,
Nor dream to be disenchanted more ; For vain is expectance, and wish is vain, Till a new Narcissus can come again.
WHOM I USED TO CALL "MONKEY."
LOUISA, serious grown and mild, I knew you once a romping child, Obstreperous much, and very wild. Then you would clamber up my knees, And strive with every art to tease, When every art of yours could please. Those things would scarce be proper now. But they are gone, I know not how, And woman's written on your brow. Time draws his finger o'er the scene; But I cannot forget between
The thing to me you once have been; Each sportive sally, wild escape, The scoff, the banter, and the jape, And antics of my gamesome ape.
[In a leaf of a quarto edition of the "Lives of the Saints, written in Spanish by the learned and reverend father, Alfonso Villegas, Divine, of the Order of St. Dominic, set forth in English by John Heigham, Anno 1630," bought at a Catholic bookshop in Duke-street, Lincoln's Inn Fields, I found, carefully inserted, a painted flower, seemingly coeval with the book itself; and did not, for some time, discover that it opened in the middle, and was the cover to a very humble draught of a St. Anne, with the Virgin and Child; doubtless the performance of some poor but pious Catholic, whose meditations it assisted.]
OH lift with reverent hand that tarnish'd flower, That 'shrines beneath her modest canopy
Memorials dear to Romish piety;
Dim specks, rude shapes, of saints! in fervent hour
The work, perchance, of some meek devotee, Who, poor in worldly treasures to set forth The sanctities she worshipp'd to their worth, In this imperfect tracery might see Hints, that all heaven did to her sense reveal. Cheap gifts best fit poor givers. We are told Of the lone mite, the cup of water cold, That in their way approved the offerer's zeal. True love shows costliest where the means are scant; And, in her reckoning, they abound who want.
FROM THE LATIN OF VINCENT BOURNE.
ON A SEPULCHRAL STATUE OF AN INFANT SLEEPING.
BEAUTIFUL infant, who dost keep
Thy posture here, and sleep'st a marble sleep,
May the repose unbroken be,
Which the fine artist's hand hath lent to thee,
While thou enjoy'st, along with it,
That which no art or craft could ever hit,
Or counterfeit to mortal sense,
The heaven-infused sleep of innocence!
A TUNEFUL challenge rings from either side
Of Thames' fair banks. Thy twice six bells, Saint
Peal swift and shrill; to which more slow reply The deep-toned eight of Mary Overy. Such harmony from the contention flows, That the divided ear no preference knows; Between them both disparting music's state, While one exceeds in number, one in weight.
POOR Irus' faithful wolf-dog here I lie, That wont to tend my old blind master's steps, His guide and guard; nor, while my service lasted, Had he occasion for that staff with which
He now goes picking out his path in fear
Over the highways and crossings, but would plant, Safe in the conduct of my friendly string, A firm foot forward still, till he had reach'd His poor seat on some stone, nigh where the tide Of passers-by in thickest confluence flow'd: To whom with loud and passionate laments From morn to eve his dark estate he wail'd. Nor wail'd to all in vain: some here and there, The well disposed and good, their pennies gave, I meantime at his feet obsequious slept; Not all-asleep in sleep, but heart and ear Prick'd up at his least motion, to receive At his kind hand my customary crumbs, And common portion in his feast of scraps; Or when night warn'd us homeward, tired and spent With our long day and tedious beggary. These were my manners, this my way of life, Till age and slow disease me overtook, And sever'd from my sightless master's side. But lest the grace of so good deeds should die, Through tracts of years in mute oblivion lost, This slender tomb of turf hạth Irus rear'd, Cheap monument of no ungrudging hand, And with short verse inscribed it, to attest, In long and lasting union to attest, The virtues of the beggar and his dog.
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