Sings he the swains, their concert or their loves,
The Golden Age through every couplet moves.
Read Virgil, then; blessed if the strain you love!
How wretched he whom Virgil cannot move!
When in soft sounds, to which the bosom yields,
He cries, O happy sire! that kept thy fields :'
My soul partakes the hoary shepherd's lot,
The close he planted, and his native cot;
With him I hear the murmurs of the dove,
And the wild-pigeon cooing forth his love;
The bee, that buzzes o'er the florid plain,
And mountain, vocal with the woodman's strain,
And grove and stream; for ne'er in truer dress
Did painter yet fair Nature's form express.
But what soft accents on my ears are borne?
'Tis Gallus' strains, his Lycoris that mourn,
His absent Lycoris! his notes entreat
The piercing ice to spare her tender feet!

APOSTROPHIC EULOGY OF VIRGIL.

Virgil! my guide, and god of pastoral lays,

NOTE. The allusion to the Princess Czartorinska, in Canto I. of the preceding poem, is best explained by the following extracts from the elegant epistles which passed between the princess and poet.

To M. l'Abbé Delille: Forgive me, sir, if I break in upon your leisure: you must lay the fault upon your reputation and works, that a whole society should address itself to you for the completion of an object they have in view. Assembled together in a small hamlet where we principally reside, friendship, inclination, consanguinity, and a conformity of manners, bind us together; everything concurs to give us a hope that we shall never be separated.

It is natural that we should desire to embellish our retreat; [your] poem of "The Garden" has discovered to us the means. Sensibility, remembrance, and gratitude, guide us in the attempt; and the whole hamlet is at this moment employed in raising a monument in honor of those authors who have so often instructed, interested, and amused us. They will be marked, according to their rank, upon four faces of a marble pyramid: on one side, Pope, Milton, Young, Sterne, Shakspeare, Racine, and Rousseau; on the other, Petrarch, Anacreon, Metastasio, Tasso, and La Fontaine; on the third, Madame de Sevigné, Madame Riccoboni, Madame de la Fayette, Madame des Houliéres, and Sappho; and on the fourth, Virgil, Gesner, Gresset, and the Abbé Delille. Each side will be accompanied with trees, shrubs, and flowers.

The rose, the jasmin, and the lily, with beds of violets and pansies, will be on the female side; Petrarch, Anacreon, and Metastasio, will have the myrtle; and Tasso, the laurel. The weeping willow, the mournful cypress, and the yew, will accompany Shakspeare, Young, and Racine: as for the fourth side, the society will choose for it whatever may appear most agreeable in their orchards, woods, and meadows; and each inhabitant will plant some tree or shrub to perpetuate the memory of those authors who have given them a taste for rural life, and thereby contributed to their happi

ness.

They only want a suitable inscription to give force to their idea, and transmit it to posterity; it is to be engraved at the foot of the monument, and the whole hamlet, with one voice, has fixed upon you as its author. We request it as well from your heart as your ingenuity. This homage,

When first my muse aspired to Nature's praise,
With strictest care my ravished eye pursued
Her changing scenes through mountain, mead, or
Back to thy page my rapt attention came, [wood:
And saw that thou and Nature were the same!
Forgive my muse, if emulous to raise
Some scattered foliage, dropping from thy bays,
Thy song she imitates with hardy zeal,
And fail to paint what Fancy well can feel!
Thy numbers first inspired her earliest flight;
They gave no glory, but they gave delight.

CONCLUSION; THE POET'S WISH.

Thus, in the shelter of my lonely rock, [shock, While groaned the earth with Discord's dreadful I sang, with artless voice and unconfined, Nature and art, the country and mankind, O would the gods, propitious to the strain, Grant the sole recompense I wish to gain !In my loved fields some seasons yet to tell, And live for books, my friends, and self, as well.

simple and sincere, will be successfully paid by the author of "The Garden," the translator of "Virgil," and, above all, by a man of sensibility.

We beg you, sir, to give credit to the very distinguished sentiments with which we are,' etc.

Answer.Madame: The letter you have done me the honor to write to me reached me at Constantinople, whither I accompanied M. Le Comte de Choiseul-Gouffier, now ambassador from France. *

'I am far from having any pretensions to the place you would kindly appropriate to me, so near to [Virgil], in the charming project of your pyramids. It is sufficient to have disfigured his poetry by my feeble translations, without derogating from the honors you mean to pay him. Several persons of distinguished rank, that have been pleased to admire my pastoral verses, have caused a tree to be planted in their gardens, and called it by my name. This is the sole monument that becomes the modesty of the sylvan muse. **

Your society, united as it is by the ties of blood, by the love of the arts, and, above all, by friendship, is the most amiable assemblage that has yet been seen in Poland. That liberty which the heroes of your country and house so courageously sought at the point of the sword, you have found, without cost or danger, in the solitude and tranquillity of the country. * * I think it will be suf

In regard to the inscription, ficient to engrave on the pyramid,

HOOD'S "RUTH.”

SHE stood breast high amid the corn,
Clasped by the golden light of morn,
Like the sweetheart of the sun,
Who many a glowing kiss had won.
On her cheek an autumn flush
Deeply ripened; - such a blush
In the midst of brown was born,
Like red poppies grown with corn.
Round her eyes her tresses fell,
Which were blackest none could tell ;
But long lashes veiled a light
That had else been all too bright.
And her hat, with shady brim,
Made her tressy forehead dim;
Thus she stood amid the stooks,
Praising God with sweetest looks :-
Sure, I said, Heaven did not mean
Where I reap thou shouldst but glean;
Lay thy sheaf adown and come
Share my harvest and my home.

COLLINS'S "FIDELE'S TOMB."
To fair Fidele's grassy tomb

Soft maids and village hinds shall bring
Each opening sweet, of earliest bloom,
And rifle all the breathing Spring.
No wailing ghost shall dare appear,
To vex with shrieks this quiet grove,
But shepherd lads, assemble here,

And melting virgins, own their love.
No withered witch shall here be seen,

No goblins lead their nightly crew;
The female fays shall haunt the green,
And dress thy grave with pearly dew :
The red-breast oft at evening hours
Shall kindly lend his little aid,
With hoary moss, and gathered flowers,

To deck the ground where thou art laid. **
Each lonely scene shall thee restore,
For thee the tear be duly shed;
Beloved till life can charm no more;
And mourned, till pity's self be dead.

And servants that fly when she's waited upon :
But what can she boast if she weds unbeloved?
Can she e'er feel the joy that one morning I proved,
When I put on my new gown and waited for John?

These fields, my dear Ellen, I knew them of yore,
Yet to me they ne'er looked so enchanting before;
The distant bells ringing,
The birds round us singing,

For pleasure is pure when affection is won:
They told me the troubles and cares of a wife;
But I loved him; and that was the pride of my life,
When I put on my new gown and waited for John.

He shouted and ran, as he leaped from the stile;
And what in my bosom was passing the while?
For love knows the blessing

Of ardent caressing,

When virtue inspires us and doubts are all gone.
The sunshine of fortune you say is divine;
True love and the sunshine of nature were mine,
When I put on my new gown and waited for John.

COWPER'S "SHRUBBERY."
O, HAPPY shades! to me unblest,
Friendly to peace, but not to me,
How ill the scene that offers rest,
And heart that cannot rest, agree!
This glassy stream, that spreading pine,
Those alders quivering to the breeze,
Might soothe a soul less hurt than mine,
And please, if anything could please.
But fixed, unalterable care

Foregoes not what she feels within,
Shows the same sadness everywhere,
And slights the season and the scene.
For all that pleased in wood or lawn,
While peace possessed these silent bowers,
Her animating smile withdrawn,

Has lost its beauties and its powers.
The saint or moralist should tread
This moss-grown alley, musing slow ;
They seck, like me, the secret shade,

But not, like me, to nourish woe.
Me fruitful scenes and prospects waste
Alike admonish not to roam;
These tell me of enjoyments past,
And those of sorrows yet to come.

THE SUBJECT STATED; GRANVILLE. — EDEN. — VARIETY OF WINDSOR FOREST.- OAKS.

THY forests, Windsor! and thy green retreats, At once the monarch's and the muse's seats, Invite my lays. Be present, sylvan maids! Unlock your springs, and open all your shades. Granville commands; - your aid, O muses, bring!What muse for Granville can refuse to sing!

The groves of Eden, vanished now so long,
Live in description, and look green in song:
These, were my breast inspired with equal flame,
Like them in beauty, should be like in fame.
Here hills and vales, the woodland and the plain,
Here earth and water, seem to strive again;
Not, chaos-like, together crushed and bruised,
But, as the world, harmoniously confused:
Where order in variety we see,

And where, though all things differ, all agree.
Here waving groves a checkered scene display,
And part admit and part exclude the day;
As some coy nymph her lover's warm address
Nor quite indulges, nor can quite repress :
There, interspersed in lawns and opening glades,
Thin trees arise that shun each other's shades:
Here, in full light the russet plains extend :
There, wrapt in clouds, the bluish hills ascend.
Even the wild heath displays her purple dyes;
And 'midst the desert fruitful fields arise,
That, crowned with tufted trees and fringing corn,
Like verdant isles, the sable waste adorn.
Let India boast her plants, nor envy we
The weeping amber or the balmy tree,
While by our oaks the precious loads are borne,
And realms commanded which those trees adorn.

OLYMPUS; PAN; POMONA; FLORA; CERES; INDUSTRY; PEACE PLENTY; THE STUART.

Not proud Olympus yields a nobler sight, Though gods assembled grace his towering height, Than what more humble mountains offer here, Where, in their blessings, all those gods appear. See Pan with flocks, with fruits Pomona crowned; Here blushing Flora paints the enamelled ground; Here Ceres' gifts in waving prospect stand, And, nodding, tempt the joyful reaper's hand; Rich industry sits smiling on the plains, And peace and plenty tell, a Stuart reigns.

WINDSOR FOREST UNDER THE SAVAGE WILLIAMS.

Not thus the land appeared in ages past,
A dreary desert, and a gloomy waste;
To savage beasts and savage laws a prey;

And kings more furious and severe than they ;
Who claimed the skies, dispeopled air and floods,
The lonely lords of empty wilds and woods:
Cities laid waste, they stormed the dens and caves—
For wiser brutes were backward to be slaves.
What could be free, when lawless beasts obeyed,
And even the elements a tyrant swayed?
In vain kind seasons swelled the teeming grain,
Soft showers distilled, and suns grew warm in vain ;
The swain with tears his frustrate labor yields,
And famished dies amidst his ripened fields.

TYRANNY OF WILLIAM I.; HE DEPOPULATED THE COUNTRY TO
MAKE THE NEW FOREST; TWO OF HIS SONS KILLED there.

What wonder, then, a beast or subject slain Were equal crimes in a despotic reign? Both, doomed alike, for sportive tyrants bled; But while the subject starved, the beast was fed. Proud Nimrod first the bloody chase began; A mighty hunter, and his prey was man : Our haughty Norman boasts that barbarous name, And makes his trembling slaves the royal game. The fields are ravished from the industrious swains; From men their cities, and from gods their fanes : 1 The levelled towns with weeds lie covered o'er; The hollow winds through naked temples roar ; Round broken columns clasping ivy twined; O'er heaps of ruins stalked the stately hind; The fox obscene to gaping tombs retires; And savage howlings fill the sacred quires. Awed by his nobles, by his commons curst, The oppressor ruled tyrannic where he durst; Stretched o'er the poor and church his iron rod, And served alike his vassals and his God. Whom even the Saxon spared, and bloody Dane, The wanton victims of his sport remain. But see, the man who spacious regions gave A waste for beasts, himself denied a grave! Stretched on the lawn, his second hope survey, At once the chaser, and at once the prey : Lo! Rufus, tugging at the deadly dart, Bleeds in the forest, like a wounded hart.

GRADUAL CULTIVATION. LIBERTY.

Succeeding monarchs heard the subjects' cries, Nor saw displeased the peaceful cottage rise. Then gathering flocks on unknown mountains fed; O'er sandy wilds were yellow harvests spread;

1 William the Conqueror, though he had sixty-eight royal forests, laid waste a vast tract in Hampshire, filled with villages and churches, for the New Forest. Windsor Forest was a part of this. His sons Richard and Rufus were killed there while hunting.

The forests wondered at the unusual grain,
And secret transport touched the conscious swain.
Fair Liberty, Britannia's goddess, rears
Her cheerful head, and leads the golden years.

SNARING PARTRIDGES; SOLDIERS; PHEASANT.

Ye vigorous swains! while youth ferments your And purer spirits swell the sprightly flood, [blood, Now range the hills, the gameful woods beset, Wind the shrill horn, or spread the waving net When milder Autumn Summer's heat succeeds, And in the new-shorn field the partridge feeds, Before his lord the ready spaniel bounds, Panting with hope, he tries the furrowed grounds; But when the tainted gales the game betray, Couched close he lies, and meditates the prey: Secure, they trust the unfaithful field beset, Till, hovering o'er 'em, sweeps the swelling net. Thus (if small things we may with great compare) When Albion sends her eager sons to war, Some thoughtless town, with ease and plenty blest, Near and more near the closing lines invest; Sudden they seize the amazed, defenceless prize, And high in air Britannia's standard flies.

See! from the brake the whirring pheasant springs, And mounts, exulting, on triumphant wings: Short is his joy; he feels the fiery wound, Flutters in blood, and panting beats the ground. Ah! what avails his glossy varying dyes, His purple crest, and scarlet circled eyes! The vivid green his shining plumes unfold, His painted wings, and breast that flames with gold!

HUNTING THE HARE IN WINDSOR FOREST. THE FOWLER AND HIS GUN.

Nor yet, when moist Arcturus clouds the sky, The woods and fields their pleasing toils deny. To plains with well-breathed beagles we repair, And trace the mazes of the circling hare — Beasts, urged by us, their fellow-beasts pursue,

And learn of man each other to undo :-
With slaughtering guns the unwearied fowler roves,
When frosts have whitened all the naked groves,
Where doves in flocks the leafless trees o'ershade,
And lonely woodcocks haunt the watery glade.
He lifts the tube, and levels with his eye;
Straight a short thunder breaks the frozen sky:
Oft, as in airy rings they skim the heath,
The clamorous lapwings feel the leaden death:
Oft, as the mounting larks their notes prepare,
They fall, and leave their little lives in air.

WINDSOR FOREST IN SPRING. ANGLING.

In genial Spring, beneath the quivering shade, Where cooling vapors breathe along the mead, The patient fisher takes his silent stand, Intent, his angle trembling in his hand : With looks unmoved, he hopes the scaly breed, And eyes the dancing cork and bending reed. Our plenteous streams a various race supply, The bright-eyed perch, with fins of Tyrian dye,

The silver eel, in shining volumes rolled,
The yellow carp, in scales bedropped with gold,
Swift trouts diversified with crimson stains,
And pikes, the tyrants of the watery plains.

STAG-HUNTING IN WINDSOR FOREST.QUEEN ANNE.

Now Cancer glows with Phoebus' fiery car: The youth rush eager to the sylvan war, Swarm o'er the lawns, the forest walks surround, Rouse the fleet hart, and cheer the opening hound. The impatient courser pants in every vein, And, pawing, seems to beat the distant plain : Hills, vales, and floods appear already crossed, And, ere he starts, a thousand steps are lost. See the bold youth strain up the threatening steep, Rush through the thickets, down the valleys sweep. Hang o'er their coursers' heads with eager speed; And earth rolls back beneath the flying steed. Let old Arcadia boast her ample plain, The immortal huntress, and her virgin-train; Nor envy, Windsor, since thy shades have seen As bright a goddess, and as chaste a queen : Whose care, like hers, protects the sylvan reign; The earth's fair light, and empress of the main. DIANA IN WINDSOR FOREST; THE NYMPH LODONA AND GOD PAN.

Here too, 't is sung, of old Diana strayed, And Cynthus' top forsook for Windsor shade; Here was she seen o'er airy wastes to rove, Seek the clear spring, or haunt the pathless grove ; Here, armed with silver bows, in early dawn, Her buskined virgins traced the dewy lawn.

Above the rest a rural nymph was famed,
Thy offspring, Thames! the fair Lodona named
Lodona's fate, in long oblivion cast,

The Muse shall sing, and what she sings shall last.
Scarce could the goddess from her nymph be known,
But by the crescent, and the golden zone.
She scorned the praise of beauty, and the care;
A belt her waist, a fillet binds her hair:
A painted quiver on her shoulder sounds,
And with her dart the flying deer she wounds.
It chanced, as, eager of the chase, the maid
Beyond the forest's verdant limits strayed,
Pan saw and loved; and, burning with desire,
Pursued her flight; her flight increased his fire.

PURSUIT OF PAN; LODONA CHANGED INTO A COLD STREAM.

Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly, When the fierce eagle cleaves the liquid sky; Not half so swiftly the fierce eagle moves, [doves, When through the clouds he drives the trembling As from the god she flew with furious pace, Or as the god, more furious, urged the chase. Now fainting, sinking, pale, the nymph appears ; Now, close behind, his sounding steps she hears ; And now his shadow reached her as she run, His shadow lengthened by the setting sun; And now his shorter breath, with sultry air, Pants on her neck, and fans her parting hair.

Faint, breathless, thus she prayed, nor prayed in
Ah Cynthia! ah!— though banished from thy train,
Let me, O let me, to the shades repair,

My native shades- there weep, and murmur there.'
She said, and melting as in tears she lay,
In a soft silver stream dissolved away.
The silver stream her virgin coldness keeps,
Forever murmurs, and forever weeps ;

Still bears the name the hapless virgin bore,
And bathes the forest where she ranged before.

THE RIVER LODONA (LODDON) DESCRIBED.
In her chaste current oft the goddess laves,
And with celestial tears augments the waves.
Oft in her glass the musing shepherd spies
The headlong mountains and the downward skies;
The watery landscape of the pendent woods,
And absent trees that tremble in the floods;
In the clear azure gleam the flocks are seen,
And floating forests paint the waves with green;
Through the fair scene roll slow the lingering

streams,

Then foaming pour along, and rush into the Thames.

PRAISE OF THE RIVER THAMES.

Thou, too, great father of the British floods!
With joyful pride survey'st our lofty woods;
Where towering oaks their growing honors rear,
And future navies on thy shores appear,

Not Neptune's self from all her streams receives
A wealthier tribute than to thine he gives.
No seas so rich, so gay no banks appear,
No lake so gentle, and no spring so clear;
Nor Po so swells the fabling poet's lays,
While led along the skies his current strays,
As thine, which visits Windsor's famed abodes,
To grace the mansion of our earthly gods:
Nor all his stars above a lustre show,
Like the bright beauties on thy banks below;
Where Jove, subdued by mortal passion still,
Might change Olympus for a nobler hill.

THE BRITISH COURT. RURAL COMPETENCE, STUDY AND QUIET.
-THE HERBALIST, ASTRONOMER, SCHOLAR, SAGE.

Happy the man whom this bright court approves, His sovereign favors, and his country loves: Happy next him, who to these shades retires, Whom Nature charms, and whom the Muse inspires : Whom humble joys of home-felt quiet please, Successive study, exercise, and ease. He gathers health from herbs the forest yields, And of their fragrant physic spoils the fields: With chemic art exalts the mineral powers, And draws the aromatic souls of flowers: Now marks the course of rolling orbs on high, O'er figured worlds now travels with his eye; Of ancient writ unlocks the learned store, Consults the dead, and lives past ages o'er : Or wandering thoughtful in the silent wood,

Attends the duties of the wise and good,
To observe a mean, be to himself a friend,
To follow nature, and regard his end;
Or looks on heaven with more than mortal eyes,
Bids his free soul expatiate in the skies,
Amid her kindred stars familiar roam,
Survey the region, and confess her home!
Such was the life great Scipio once admired;
Thus Atticus, and Trumbal thus, retired.

RURAL SCENES; COOPER'S HILL. — DENHAM. — COWLEY. Ye sacred Nine! that all my soul possess, Whose raptures fire me, and whose visions bless, Bear me, O bear me to sequestered scenes, The bowery mazes, and surrounding greens; To Thames's banks which fragrant breezes fill, Or where ye, Muses, sport on Cooper's Hill. On Cooper's Hill eternal wreaths shall grow, While lasts the mountain, or while Thames shall I seem through consecrated walks to rove, [flow. I hear soft music die along the grove : Led by the sound, I roam from shade to shade, By godlike poets venerable made :

Here his first lays majestic Denham sung;
There the last numbers flowed from Cowley's tongue.
O, early lost! what tears the river shed
When the sad pomp along his banks was led !
His drooping swans on every note expire,
And on his willows hung each Muse's lyre.

Since fate relentless stopped their heavenly voice,
No more the forests ring, or groves rejoice;
Who now shall charm the shades where Cowley strung
His living harp, and lofty Denham sung?

TRIBUTE TO GRANVILLE AND SURREY.

But, hark! the groves rejoice, the forest rings! Are these revived? or is it Granville sings? 'Tis yours, my lord, to bless our soft retreats, And call the Muses to their ancient seats; To paint anew the flowery sylvan scenes, To crown the forests with immortal greens, Make Windsor hills in lofty numbers rise, And lift her turrets nearer to the skies; To sing those honors you deserve to wear, And add new lustre to her silver star.

Here noble Surrey felt the sacred rage, Surrey the Granville of a former age: Matchless his pen, victorious was his lance, Bold in the lists, and graceful in the dance : In the same shades the Cupids tuned his lyre, To the same notes, of love and soft desire: Fair Geraldine, bright object of his vow, Then filled the groves as heavenly Mira now.

HEROES OF WINDSOR CASTLE; EDWARD; HENRY; CHARLES I. -ANNE. PEACE.

O, wouldst thou sing what heroes Windsor bore, What kings first breathed upon her winding shore; Or raise old warriors, whose adored remains In weeping vaults her hallowed earth contains!