Vainly, the cygnet spread her downy plume,
The vine gush nectar, and the virgin bloom.
But swift to thee, alive, and warm,
Devolves each tributary charm:

See modest Nature bring her simple stores,
Luxuriant Art exhaust her plastic powers;
While every flower in Fancy's clime,
Each gem of old heroic Time,
Cull'd by the hand of the industrious Muse,
Around thy shrine their blended beams diffuse.

Hail, Mem'ry! hail. Behold, I lead
To that high shrine the sacred Maid:
Thy daughter she, the Empress of the lyre,
The first, the fairest, of Aonia's quire.

She comes, and lo, thy realms expand!
She takes her delegated stand

Full in the midst, and o'er thy num'rous train
Displays the awful wonders of her reign.
There thron'd supreme in native state,
If Sirius flame with fainting heat,

She calls; ideal groves their shade extend,
The cool gale breathes, the silent show'rs de-
scend,

Or, if bleak. Winter, frowning round, Disrobe the trees, and chill the ground, She, mild Magician, waves her potent wand, And ready Summers wake at her command. See, visionary Suns arise,

Thro' silver clouds, and azure skies;

See, sportive Zephyrs fan the crisped streams; Thro' shadowy brakes light glance the sparkling beams :

While, near the secret moss-grown cave,
That stands beside the crystal wave,

Sweet Echo, rising from her rocky bed,
Mimics the feather'd Chorus o'er her, head.

Rise, hallow'd Milton! rise, and say,
How, at thy gloomy close of day;

How, when "deprest by Age, beset with wrongs;"
When "fall'n on evil days and evil tongues ;"
When Darkness, brooding on thy sight,
Exil'd the sov'reign lamp of light;

Say, what could then one cheering hope diffuse? What friends were thine, save Mem❜ry and the Muse?

Hence the rich spoils, thy studious youth

Caught from the stores of antient Truth: Hence all thy classic wand'rings could explore, When Rapture led thee to the Latian shore;

Each Scene, that Tiber's bank supply'd;

Each Grace, that play'd on Arno's side; The tepid Gales, thro' Tuscan glades that fly; The blue Serene, that spreads Hesperia's sky;

Were still thine own: thy ample mind Each charm receiv'd, retain'd, combin'd. And thence" the nightly Visitant," that came To touch thy bosom with her sacred flame, Recall'd the long-lost beams of grace, That whilom shot from Nature's face, When God, in Eden, o'er her youthful breast Spread with his own right hand Perfection's gorgeous vest.

17

ODE II.

* TO A WATER NYMPH.

YE green-hair'd Nymphs, whom Pan's de

crees

Have giv❜n to guard this solemn wood †,
To speed the shooting scions into trees,
And call the roseate blossom from the bud,
Attend. But chief, thou Naiad, wont to lead
This fluid crystal sparkling as it flows,

Whither, ah, whither art thou fled?.
What shade is conscious to thy woes?
Ah, 'tis yon' Poplars' awful gloom :
Poetic eyes can pierce the scene;

Can see thy drooping head, thy withering bloom;
See grief diffus'd o'er all thy languid mien.
Well may'st thou wear misfortune's fainting air;
Well rend those flow'ry honours from thy brow;
Devolve that length of careless hair;
And give thine azure veil to flow
Loose to the wind: for, oh, thy pain
The pitying Muse can well relate:

That pitying Muse shall breathe her tend'rest strain,
To teach the echoes thy disastrous fate.

*This Ode was written in the Year 1747, and published in the first Volume of Mr. Dodsley's Miscellany. It is here revised throughout, and concluded according to the Author's original idea.

A seat near *** finely situated, with a great command of water; but disposed in a very false taste.

C

"Twas where yon Beeches' crowding branches clos'd
What time the Dog-star's flames intensely burn,
In gentle indolence compos'd,
Reclin'd upon thy trickling urn,

Slumb'ring thou lay'st, all free from fears;
No friendly dream foretold thine harm;
When sudden, see, the tyrant Art appears,
To snatch the liquid treasures from thine arm.
Art, gothic Art, has seiz'd thy darling vase :
That vase which silver-slipper'd Thetis gave,
For some soft story told with grace,
Among th' associates of the wave;
When, in sequester'd coral vales,
While worlds of waters roll'd above,

The circling sea-nymphs told alternate tales
Of fabled changes, and of slighted love.
Ah! loss too justly mourn'd: for now the Fiend
Has on yon shell-wrought terras pois'd it high;
And thence he bids its streams descend,
With torturing regularity.

From step to step, with sullen sound,
The forc'd cascades indignant leap;

Now sinking fill the bason's measur'd round;
There in a dull stagnation doom'd to sleep.
Where now the vocal pebbles gurgling song?
The rill slow-dripping from its rocky spring?
What free meander winds along,

Or curls when Zephyr waves his wing?
Alas, these glories are no more :
Fortune, O give me to redeem

The ravish'd vase; O give me to restore.
Its antient honours to this hapless stream.

Then, Nymph, again, with all their wonted ease, Thy wanton waters, volatile and free,

Shall wildly warble, as they please, Their soft, loquacious harmony. Where Thou and Nature bid them rove, There will I gently aid their way; Whether to darken in the shadowy grove, Or, in the mead, reflect the dancing ray. For thee too, Goddess, o'er that hallow'd spot, Where first thy fount of crystal bubbles bright, These hands shall arch a rustic grot, Impervious to the garish light. I'll not demand of Ocean's pride

To bring his coral spoils from far:

Nor will I delve yon yawning mountain's side,
For latent minerals rough, or polish'd spar :
But antique roots, with ivy dark o'ergrown,
Steep'd in the bosom of thy chilly lake,

Thy touch shall turn to living stone;
And these the simple roof shall deck.
Yet grant one melancholy boon:

Grant that, at evening's sober hour,
Led by the lustre of the rising moon,
My step may frequent tread thy pebbled floor.
There, if perchance I wake the love-lorn theme;
In melting accents querulously slow,

Kind Naiad, let thy pitying stream
With wailing notes accordant flow:
So shalt thou sooth this heaving heart,
That mourns a faithful Virgin lost;
So shall thy murmurs, and my sighs impart
Some share of pensive pleasure to her ghost