Through sudden fear: a chilly sweat bedews Intrenched with many a frown, and conic beard, Such plagues from righteous men!-Behind him stalks A catchpole, whose polluted hands the gods Beware, ye debtors! when ye walk, beware, Their arts, or arms, or shapes of lovely hue; So pass my days. But, when nocturnal shades And restless wish, and rave; my parched throat In vain; awake. I find the settled thirst The Lilybean shore, with hideous crush On Scylla or Charybdis-dangerous rocks! She strikes rebounding; whence the shattered 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, They stare, they lave, they pump, they swear, they pray; Implacable; till, deluged by the foam, The ship sinks foundering in the vast abyss. JOHN POMFRET. JOHN POMFRET (1667-1703) was the son of a clergyman, rector of Luton, in Bedfordshire, and himself a minister of the Church of England He obtained the rectory of Malden, also in Bedfordshire, and had the prospect of preferment; but the bishop of London considered, unjustly, his poem, the Choice,' as conveying an immoral sentiment, and rejected the poetical candidate. Detained in London by this unsuccessful negotiation, Pomfret caught the small-pox, and died. His works consist of occasional poems and some‘Pindaric Essays,' the latter evidently copied from Cowley. The only piece of Pomfret's now remembered-we can hardly say read-is the Choice.' Dr. Johnson remarks that no composition in our language has been oftener perused; and Southey asks why Pomfret's Choice' is the most popular poem in the English language. To the latter observation, Campbell makes a quaint reply: It might have been demanded with equal propriety, why London Bridge is built of Parian marble.' It is difficult in the present day, when the English muse has awakened to so much higher a strain of thought and expression, and a large body of poetry, full of passion, natural description, and emotion, lies between us and the times of Pomfret, to conceive that the 'Choice' could ever have been a very popular poem. It is tame and commonplace. The idea, however, of a country retirement, a private seat, with a wood, garden, and stream, a clear and competent estate, and the enjoyment of lettered ease and happiness, is so grateful and agreeable to the mind of man, especially in large cities, that we can hardly forbear liking a poem that recalls so beloved an image to our recollection. Swift and Pope, in their exquisite imitation of Horace (“Sat.' Book ii. 6), have drawn a similar picture; and Thomson and Cowper, by their descriptions of rural life, have completely obliterated from the public mind the feeble draft of Pomfret. Extract from 'The Choice.' If Heaven the grateful liberty would give On this side fields, on that a neighbouring wood. Methinks 'tis nauseous, and I'd ne'er endure Too much at fortune; they should taste of mine; And all that objects of true pity were, Should be relieved with what my wants could spare; For that our Maker has too largely given Should be returned in gratitude to Heaven. A frugal plenty should my table spread; To feed the stranger, and the neighbouring poor. EARL OF DORSET. CHARLES SACKVILLE, EARL OF DORSET (1637-8—1705-6), wrote little, but was capable of doing more, and being a liberal patron of poets, was a nobleman highly popular in his day. In the first Dutch war, 1665, when Earl of Buckhurst, he went a volunteer under the Duke of York, and was said to have written or finished a song—his best composition, one of the prettiest that ever was made,' according to Prior-the night before the naval engagement in which Opdam, the Dutch admiral, was blown up, with all his crew. The circumstance of such a lively, easy-flowing song, consisting of eleven stanzas, having been written on board ship, on the eve of an engagement, was justly held to be a fine instance of courage and gallantry. But when Pepys's 'Diary' was published, it was found that the song existed six months before the great sea-fight. Prior's story was an embellishment. Dorset was a lord of the bedchamber to Charles II. and was chamberlain of the household to William and Mary. Prior relates, that when Dorset, as lord-chamberlain, was obliged to take the king's pension from Dryden, he allowed him an equivalent out of his own estate. He introduced Butler's 'Hudibras' to the notice of the court, was consulted by Waller, and almost idolised by Dryden. Hospitable, generous, and refined, we need not wonder at the incense which was heaped upon Dorset by his contemporaries. His works are trifling; a few satires and songs make up the catalogue. They are elegant, and sometimes forcible; but when a man like Prior writes of them, there is a lustre in his verses like that of the sun in Claude Lorraine's landscapes,' it is impossible not to be struck with that gross adulation of rank and fashion which disgraced the literature of the age. 6 Song. Dorinda's sparkling wit and eyes, Which blazes high, but quickly dies; Pains not the heart, but hurts the sight. Love is a calmer, gentler joy; Smooth are his looks, and soft his pace; Her Cupid is a blackguard boy, That runs his link full in your face. Song. 'Written at sea, by the late Earl of Dorset, in the First Dutch War.' (Lintot's 'Miscellany,' 1712. To all you ladies now at land, We men at sea indite; But first would have you understand The Muses now, and Neptune too, For though the Muses should prove kind, Yet if rough Neptune rouse the wind, Then, if we write not by each post, The king with wonder and surprise, Than e'er they used of old: Should foggy Opdam chance to know Our sad and dismal story, The Dutch would scorn so weak a foe, And quit their fort at Goree; For what resistance can they find No sorrow we shall find: To pass our tedious hours away, But why should we in vain But now our fears tempestuous grow, When any mournful tune you hear, As if it sighed with each man's care Think then how often love we've made In justice, you can not refuse All those designs are but to prove From men who've left their hearts be- And now we've told you all our loves, hind? With a fa, &c. Let wind and weather do its worst, Be you to us but kind; Let Dutchmen vapour, Spaniards curse, And likewise all our fears, Let's hear of no inconstancy, DUKE OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE. JOHN SHEFFIELD, DUKE OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE (1649-1720-21), was associated in his latter days with the wits and poets of the reign of Queen Anne, but he properly belongs to the previous age. He went with Prince Rupert against the Dutch, and was afterwards colonel of a regiment of foot. In order to learn the art of war under Marshal Turenne, he made a campaign in the French service The literary taste of Sheffield was never neglected amidst the din of arms, and he made himself an accomplished scholar. He was a member |