Defiled each hallow'd fane, and sacred wood,
And, drunk with fury, swell'd the Nile with blood;
Waved his proud banner o'er the Theban states,
And pour'd destruction through her hundred gates;
In dread divisions march'd the marshal'd bands,
And swarming armies blacken'd all the lands,
By Memphis these to Ethiop's sultry plains,
And those to Hammon's sand-encircled fanes.
Slow as they pass'd, the indignant temples frown'd,
Low curses muttering from the vaulted ground;
Long aisles of cypress waved their deepen'd glooms,
And quivering spectres grinn'd amid the tombs !
Prophetic whispers breathed from Sphinx's tongue,
And Memnon's lyre with hollow murmurs rung;
Burst from each pyramid expiring groans,
And darker shadows stretch'd their lengthen'd cones.
Day after day their deathful route they steer,
Lust in the van, and Rapine in the rear.

Gnomes! as they march'd, you hid the gather'd fruits,

The bladed grass, sweet grains, and mealy roots; Scared the tired quails that journey'd o'er their heads,

Retain'd the locusts in their earthy beds;
Bade on your sands no night-born dews distil,
Stay'd with vindictive hands the scanty rill.—
Loud o'er the camp the fiend of Famine shrieks,
Calls all her brood and champs her hundred beaks;
O'er ten square leagues her pennons broad expand,
And twilight swims upon the shuddering sand:
Perch'd on her crest the griffin Discord clings,
And giant Murder rides between her wings;
Blood from each clotted hair, and horny quill,
And showers of tears in blended streams distil;
High poised in air her spiry neck she bends,
Rolls her keen eye, her dragon claws extends,
Darts from above, and tears at each fell swoop
With iron fangs the decimated troop.

Now o'er their head the whizzing whirlwinds breathe,

And the live desert pants, and heaves beneath;
Tinged by the crimson sun, vast columns rise
Of eddying sands, and war amid the skies,
In red arcades the billowy plain surround,
And whirling turrets stalk along the ground.
-Long ranks in vain their shining blades extend,
To demon-gods their knees unhallow'd bend,
Wheel in wide circle, form in hollow square,
And now they front, and now they fly the war,
Pierce the deaf tempest with lamenting cries,
Press their parch'd lips, and close their blood-shot
eyes.

Gnomes! o'er the waste you led your myriad powers,
Climb'd on the whirls, and aim'd the flinty showers!
Onward resistless rolls the infuriate surge,
Clouds follow clouds, and mountains mountains
urge;

Wave over wave the driving desert swims,
Bursts o'er their heads, inhumes their struggling

limbs ;

Man mounts on man, on camels camels rush, Hosts march o'er hosts, and nations nations crush

Wheeling in air the winged islands fall,
And one great earthy ocean covers all !—
Then ceased the storm,-Night bow'd his Ethiop
brow

To earth, and listen'd to the groans below,—
Grim Horror shook,-awhile the living hill
Heaved with convulsive throes, and all was still!

FROM CANTO III.

Persuasion to Mothers to suckle their own Children.

CONNUBIAL Fair! whom no fond transport warms
To lull your infant in maternal arms;
Who, bless'd in vain with tumid bosoms, hear
His tender wailings with unfeeling ear;
The soothing kiss and milky rill deny
To the sweet pouting lip, and glistening eye!-
Ah! what avails the cradle's damask roof,
The eider bolster, and embroider'd woof!
Oft hears the gilded couch unpitied plains,
And many a tear the tassel'd cushion stains!
No voice so sweet attunes his cares to rest,
So soft no pillow as his mother's breast!—
Thus charm'd to sweet repose, when twilight hours
Shed their soft influence on celestial bowers,
The cherub Innocence, with smile divine,
Shuts his white wings, and sleeps on beauty'sshrine.

FROM THE SAME.

Midnight Conflagration; Catastrophe of the families of Woodmason and Molesworth.

FROM dome to dome when flames infuriate climb,
Sweep the long street, invest the tower sublime:
Gild the tall vanes, amid the astonish'd night,
And reddening Heaven returns the sanguine
light;

While with vast strides and bristling hair aloof
Pale Danger glides along the falling roof;
And giant Terror howling in amaze
Moves his dark limbs across the lurid blaze.
Nymphs! you first taught the gelid wave to rise,
Hurl'd in resplendent arches to the skies;
In iron cells condensed the airy spring,
And imp'd the torrent with unfailing wing;
-On the fierce flames the shower impetuous falls,
And sudden darkness shrouds the shatter'd walls;
Steam, smoke, and dust, in blended volumes roll,
And night and silence repossess the pole.

Where were ye, Nymphs! in those disastrous

hours,

Which wrapp'd in flames Augusta's sinking towers! Why did ye linger in your wells and groves, When sad Woodmason mourn'd her infant loves! When thy fair daughters with unheeded screams, Ill-fated Molesworth! call'd the loitering streams?The trembling nymph on bloodless fingers hung, Eyes from the tottering wall the distant throng,

With ceaseless shrieks her sleeping friends alarms,
Drops with singed hair into her lover's arms,—
The illumined mother seeks with footsteps fleet,
Where hangs the safe balcony o'er the street,
Wrapp'd in her sheet her youngest hope suspends,
And panting lowers it to her tiptoe friends;
Again she hurries on affection's wings,
And now a third, and now a fourth she brings;
Safe all her babes, she smooths her horrent brow,
And bursts through bickering flames, unscorch'd
below,

So by her son arraign'd, with feet unshod,
O'er burning bars indignant Emma trod.

E'en on the day when Youth with Beauty wed,
The flames surprised them in their nuptial bed;-
Seen at the opening sash with bosom bare,
With wringing hands, and dark dishevel'd hair,
The blushing bride with wild disorder'd charms
Round her fond lover winds her ivory arms;
Beat, as they clasp, their throbbing hearts with
fear,

And many a kiss is mix'd with many a tear ;— Ah me! in vain the labouring engines pour Round their pale limbs the ineffectual shower— -Then crash'd the floor, while shrinking crowds retire,

And Love and Virtue sunk amid the fire !With piercing screams afflicted strangers mourn, And their white ashes mingle in their urn.

FROM CANTO IV.

The heroic Attachment of the Youth in Holland, who attended his mistress in the plague.

THUS when the Plague, upborne on Belgian air, Look'd through the mist and shook his clotted hair;

O'er shrinking nations steer'd malignant clouds, And rain'd destruction on the gasping crowds;

The beauteous Egle felt the venom'd dart*,
Slow roll'd her eye, and feebly throbb'd her heart;
Each fervid sigh seem'd shorter than the last,
And starting Friendship shunn'd her as she pass’d.
-With weak unsteady step the fainting maid
Seeks the cold garden's solitary shade,
Sinks on the pillowy moss her drooping head,
And prints with lifeless limbs her leafy bed.
-On wings of love her plighted swain pursues,
Shades her from winds, and shelters her from dews,
Extends on tapering poles the canvas roof,
Spreads o'er the straw-wove mat the flaxen woof,
Sweet buds and blossoms on her bolster strows,
And binds his kerchief round her aching brows;
Soothes with soft kiss, with tender accents charms,
And clasps the bright infection in his arms.-
With pale and languid smiles the grateful fair
Applauds his virtues, and rewards his care;
Mourns with wet cheek her fair companions fled
On timorous step, or number'd with the dead;
Calls to her bosom all its scatter'd rays,
And pours on Thyrsis the collected blaze;
Braves the chill night, caressing and caress'd,
And folds her hero-lover to her breast.-
Less bold, Leander at the dusky hour
Eyed, as he swam, the far love-lighted tower;
Breasted with struggling arms the tossing wave,
And sunk benighted in the watery grave.
Less bold, Tobias claim'd the nuptial bed
Where seven fond lovers by a fiend had bled;
And drove, instructed by his angel-guide,
The enamour'd demon from the fatal bride.-
-Sylphs! while your winnowing pinions fann'd the
And shed gay visions o'er the sleeping pair; [air,
Love round their couch effused his rosy breath,
And with his keener arrows conquer'd Death.

* When the plague raged in Holland, in 1636, a young girl was seized with it, had three carbuncles, and was removed to a garden, where her lover, who was betrothed to her, attended her as a nurse, and slept with her as his wife. He remained uninfected, and she recovered, and was married to him. The story is related by Vinc. Fabricius, in the Misc. Cur. Ann. II. Obs. 188.

JAMES BEATTIE was born in the parish of Lawrence Kirk, in Kincardineshire, Scotland. His father, who rented a small farm in that parish, died when the poet was only seven years old; but the loss of a protector was happily supplied to him by his elder brother, who kept him at school till he obtained a bursary at the Marischal College, Aberdeen. At that university he took the degree of master of arts; and, at nineteen, he entered on the study of divinity, supporting himself, in the mean time, by teaching a school in the neighbouring parish. Whilst he was in this obscure situation, some pieces

of verse, which he transmitted to the Scottish Magazine, gained him a little local celebrity. Mr. Garden, an eminent Scottsh lawyer, afterwards Lord Gardenstone, and Lord Monboddo, encouraged him as an ingenious young man, and introduced him to the tables of the neighbouring gentry: an honour not usually extended to a parochial schoolmaster. In 1757, he stood candidate for the place of usher in the highschool of Aberdeen. He was foiled by a competitor, who surpassed him in the minutiae of Latin grammar; but his character as a scholar suffered so little by the disappointment, that at

the next vacancy he was called to the place without a trial. He had not been long at this school, when, in 1761, he published a volume of Original Poems and Translations which (it speaks much for the critical clemency of the times) were favourably received, and highly commended in the English Reviews. So little satisfied was the author himself with those early effusions, that, excepting four, which he admitted to a subsequent edition of his works, he was anxious to have them consigned to oblivion; and he destroyed every copy of the volume which he could procure. About the age of twenty-six, he obtained the chair of Moral Philosophy in the Marischal College of Aberdeen, a promotion which he must have owed to his general reputa- | tion in literature: but it is singular, that the friend who first proposed to solicit the High Constable of Scotland to obtain this appointment, should have grounded the proposal on the merit of Beattie's poetry. In the volume already mentioned there can scarcely be said to be a budding promise of genius.

Upon his appointment to this professorship, which he held for forty years, he immediately prepared a course of lectures for the students; and gradually compiled materials for those prose works, on which his name would rest with considerable reputation, if he were not known as a poet. It is true, that he is not a first-rate metaphysician; and the Scotch, in undervaluing his powers of abstract and close reasoning, have been disposed to give him less credit than he deserves, as an elegant and amusing writer. But the English, who must be best able to judge of his style, admire it for an ease, familiarity, and an Anglicism that is not to be found even in the correct and polished diction of Blair. His mode of illustrating abstract questions is fanciful and interesting.

In 1765, he published a poem entitled "The Judgment of Paris," which his biographer, Sir William Forbes, did not think fit to rank among his works*. For more obvious reasons Sir William excluded his lines, written in the subsequent year, on the proposal for erecting a monument to Churchill in Westminster Abbey-lines which have no beauty or dignity to redeem their bitter expression of hatred. On particular subjects, Beattie's virtuous indignation was apt to be hysterical. Dr. Reid and Dr. Campbell hated the principles of David Hume as sincerely as the author of the Essay on Truth; but they never betrayed more than philosophical hostility, while Beattie used to speak of the propriety of excluding Hume from civil society.

His reception of Gray, when that poet visited Scotland in 1765, shows the enthusiasm of his

*It is to be found in the Scottish Magazine; and, if I may judge from an obscure recollection of it, is at least as well worthy of revival as some of his minor pieces. [See it also in the Aldine edition of Beattie, p. 97.]

literary character in a finer light. Gray's mind was not in poetry only, but in many other respects, peculiarly congenial with his own; and nothing could exceed the cordial and reverential welcome which Beattie gave to his illustrious visitant. In 1770, he published his "Essay on Truth," which had a rapid sale, and extensive popularity; and within a twelvemonth after, the first part of his "Minstrel." The poem appeared at first anonymously; but its beauties were immediately and justly appreciated. The second part was not published till 1774. When Gray criticised the Minstrel he objected to its author, that, after many stanzas, the description went on and the narrative stopped+. Beattie very justly answered to this criticism, that he meant the poem for description, not for incident. But he seems to have forgotten this proper apology, when he mentions in one of his letters his intention of producing Edwin, in some subsequent books, in the character of a warlike bard inspiring his countrymen to battle, and contributing to repel their invaders. This intention, if he ever seriously entertained it, might have produced some new kind of poem, but would have formed an incongruous counterpart to the piece as it now stands, which, as a picture of still life, and a vehicle of contemplative morality, has a charm that is inconsistent with the bold evolutions of heroic narrative. After having portrayed his young enthusiast with such advantage in a state of visionary quiet, it would have been too violent a transition to have begun in a new book to surround him with dates of time and names of places. The interest which we attach to Edwin's character, would have been lost in a more ambitious effort to make him a greater or more important, or a more locally defined being. It is the solitary growth of his genius, and his isolated and mystic abstraction from mankind, that fix our attention on the romantic features of that genius. The simplicity of his fate does not divert us from his mind to his circumstances. A more unworldly air is given to his character, that instead of being tacked to the fate of kings, he was one "Who envied not, who never thought of kings;" and that, instead of mingling with the troubles which deface the creation, he only existed to make his thoughts the mirror of its beauty and magnificence. Another English critic§ has blamed Edwin's vision of the fairies as too splendid and artificial for a simple youth; but

[ Gray complained of a want of action. "As to description," he says, "I have always thought that it made the most graceful ornament of poetry, but never ought to make the subject."]

[This was no written intention, but one delivered orally in reply to a question from Sir William Forbes An invasion however, had been for long a settled pointsome great service that the minstrel was to do his country; but his plan was never concerted.]

§ Dr. Aikin.

there is nothing in the situation ascribed to Edwin, as he lived in minstrel days, that necessarily excluded such materials from his fancy. Had he beheld steam-engines or dock-yards in his sleep, the vision might have been pronounced to be too artificial; but he might have heard of fairies and their dances, and even of tapers, gold, and gems, from the ballads of his native country. In the second book of the poem there are some fine stanzas; but he has taken Edwin out of the school of nature, and placed him in his own, that of moral philosophy; and hence a degree of languor is experienced by the reader.

Soon after the publication of the "Essay on Truth," and of the first part of the "Minstrel," he paid his first visit to London. His reception, in the highest literary and polite circles, was distinguished and flattering. The university of Oxford conferred on him the degree of doctor of laws, and the sovereign himself, besides honouring him with a personal conference, bestowed on him a pension of £200 a year.

On his return to Scotland, there was a proposal for transferring him to the university of Edinburgh, which he expressed his wish to decline, from a fear of those, personal enemies whom he had excited by his Essay on Truth. This motive, if it was his real one, must have been connected with that weakness and irritability on polemical subjects which have been already alluded to. His metaphysical fame perhaps stood higher in Aberdeen than in Edinburgh; but to have dreaded personal hostility in the capital of a religious country, amidst thousands of individuals as pious as himself, was a weakness unbecoming the professed champion of truth. For reasons of delicacy, more creditable to his memory, he declined a living in the church of England which was offered to him by his friend Dr. Porteous.

After this, there is not much incident in his life. He published a volume of his Essays in 1776, and another in 1783; and the outline of his academical lectures in 1790. In the same

year, he edited, at Edinburgh, Addison's papers in "The Spectator," and wrote a preface for the edition. He was very unfortunate in his family. The mental disorder of his wife, for a long time before it assumed the shape of decided derangement, broke out in caprices of temper, which disturbed his domestic peace, and almost precluded him from having visitors in his family. The loss of his son, James Hay Beattie, a young man of highly promising talents, who had been conjoined with him in his professorship, was the greatest, though not the last calamity of his life. He made an attempt to revive his spirits after that melancholy event, by another journey to England, and some of his letters from thence bespeak a temporary composure and cheerfulness; but the wound was never healed. Even music, of which he had always been fond, ceased to be agreeable to him, from the lively recollections which it excited of the hours which he had been accustomed to spend in that recreation with his favourite boy. He published the poems of this youth, with a partial eulogy upon his genius, such as might be well excused from a father so situated. At the end of six years more, his other son, Montague Beattie, was also cut off in the flower of his youth. This misfortune crushed his spirits even to temporary alienation of mind. With his wife in a madhouse, his sons dead, and his own health broken, he might be pardoned for saying, as he looked on the corpse of his last child, "I have done with this world." Indeed he acted as if he felt so; for though he performed the duties of his professorship till within a short time of his death, he applied to no study, enjoyed no society, and answered but few letters of his friends. Yet, amidst the depth of his melancholy, he would sometimes acquiesce in his childless fate, and exclaim, " How could I have borne to see their elegant minds mangled with madness!" He was struck with a palsy in 1799, by repeated attacks of which his life terminated in 1803.

The rolls of fame I will not now explore; Nor need I here describe, in learned lay, How forth the Minstrel fared in days of yore, Right glad of heart, though homely in array; His waving locks and beard all hoary grey: While from his bending shoulder, decent hung His harp, the sole companion of his way, Which to the whistling wild responsive rung: And ever as he went some merry lay he sung.

Fret not thyself, thou glittering child of pride, That a poor villager inspires my strain; With thee let Pageantry and Power abide : The gentle Muses haunt the sylvan reign; Where through wild groves at eve the lonely swain Enraptured roams, to gaze on Nature's charms. They hate the sensual, and scorn the vain, The parasite their influence never warms, Nor him whose sordid soul the love of gold alarms.

Though richest hues the peacock's plumes adorn, Yet horror screams from his discordant throat. Rise, sons of harmony, and hail the morn, While warbling larks on russet pinions float: Or seek at noon the woodland scene remote, Where the grey linnets carol from the hill. O let them ne'er, with artificial note, To please a tyrant, strain the little bill, But sing what Heaven inspires, and wander where they will.

Liberal, not lavish, is kind Nature's hand; Nor was perfection made for man below. Yet all her schemes with nicest art are plann'd, Good counteracting ill, and gladness woe. With gold and gems if Chilian mountains glow; If bleak and barren Scotia's hills arise; There plague and poison, lust and rapine grow; Here peaceful are the vales, and pure the skies, And freedom fires the soul, and sparkles in the eyes.

Then grieve not, thou, to whom th' indulgent
Muse

Vouchsafes a portion of celestial fire:
Nor blame the partial Fates, if they refuse
Th' imperial banquet, and the rich attire.
Know thine own worth, and reverence the lyre.
Wilt thou debase the heart which God refined?
No; let thy Heaven-taught soul to Heaven aspire,
To fancy, freedom, harmony, resign'd;
Ambition's groveling crew for ever left behind.

Canst thou forego the pure ethereal soul In each fine sense so exquisitely keen, On the dull couch of Luxury to loll, Stung with disease, and stupified with spleen ; Fain to implore the aid of Flattery's screen, Even from thyself thy loathsome heart to hide (The mansion then no more of joy serene), Where fear, distrust, malevolence, abide, And impotent desire, and disappointed pride?

O how canst thou renounce the boundless store Of charms which Nature to her votary yields! The warbling woodland, the resounding shore, The pomp of groves, and garniture of fields; All that the genial ray of morning gilds, And all that echoes to the song of even, All that the mountain's sheltering bosom shields, And all the dread magnificence of Heaven, O how canst thou renounce, and hope to be forgiven?

These charms shall work thy soul's eternal health,
And love, and gentleness, and joy, impart.
But these thou must renounce, if lust of wealth
E'er win its way to thy corrupted heart :
For ah! it poisons like a scorpion's dart ;
Prompting th' ungenerous wish, the selfish scheme,
The stern resolve unmoved by pity's smart,
The troublous day, and long distressful dream.
Return, my roving Muse, resume thy purposed
theme.

There lived in Gothic days, as legends tell,
A shepherd-swain, a man of low degree;
Whose sires, perchance, in Fairyland might dwell,
Sicilian groves, or vales of Arcady;

But he, I ween, was of the north countrie;
A nation famed for song, and beauty's charms;
Zealous, yet modest; innocent, though free ;
Patient of toil; serene amidst alarms;
Inflexible in faith; invincible in arms.

The shepherd-swain of whom I mention made, On Scotia's mountains fed his little flock; The sickle, scythe, or plough, he never sway'd; An honest heart was almost all his stock : His drink the living water from the rock; The milky dams supplied his board, and lent Their kindly fleece to baffle winter's shock; And he, though oft with dust and sweat besprent, Did guide and guard their wanderings, wheresoe'er they went.

From labour health, from health contentment springs :

Contentment opes the source of every joy. He envied not, he never thought of, kings; Nor from those appetites sustain'd annoy, That chance may frustrate, or indulgence eloy: Nor Fate his calm and humble hopes beguiled; He mourn'd no recreant friend, nor mistress eoy, For on his vows the blameless Phoebe smiled, And her alone he loved, and loved her from a child

No jealousy their dawn of love o'ercast,

Nor blasted were their wedded days with strife; Each season look'd delightful as it past, To the fond husband, and the faithful wife. Beyond the lowly vale of shepherd life They never roam'd; secure beneath the storm Which in Ambition's lofty land is rife, Where peace and love are canker'd by the worn Of pride, each bud of joy industrious to deform