Feels this sweet glen an emblem of his fate;
For as it stands, in beauty rich and rare,
By wild hills neighbour’d, healthy, bleak, and bare,
So, midst unletter’d hinds, as rude as those,
He, pensive Minstrel of the mountains, rose;
Who, like devoted Chatterton, was born
In Nature’s triumph and in Fortune’s scorn,
With kindred talents, but with happier mind,
By prudence guarded, as by taste refined;
Whom Industry preserves from woes severe,
Which ill the noble spirit knows to bear;
Saves from those pains that Wealth’s mean sons deride,
Dependent hopes, and heart-corroding pride,
When, for wish’d amity, and ow’d respect,
It meets the chilling scorn of base neglect;
The stingy patron’s contumelious aid,
The taunt of Envy, studious to upbraid,
All, all the ills, by which the proud are known
To crush the talents, that eclipse their own.
Be thine the mercies, EDWIN, which reward
E’en manual labour to the enlighten’d Bard,
Energic health; and, in rare union join’d,
The melting heart, and philosophic mind!
Genius is thine;--before his solar state,
O! fly ye mists of inauspicious fate!
His are the floods of cloudless day, that show
The charms that Nature, Knowledge, Art bestow.
Has he not given thee wealth, which shames the toys
Fortune bestows, and vanity enjoys?
Toys of the groveling soul, empower’d to seize
On the soft splendours of luxurious ease;
Whom yet, with scorn, discerning eyes behold
Pleas’d with life’s tinsel, reckless of its gold;
Gold, richer far than paves Golconda’s mine,
The genuine wealth of intellect divine,
That buys, disdaining Fortune’s bounded plain,
Creative Mind’s illimitable reign.
And if, in that vast range, my Muse’s powers
Lure thy pleas’d tarriance in her cypress bowers,
Ah! should’st thou feel, that real sweets belong
To the pale florets of her pensive song,
The thought that they have sooth’d thy toils, shall dwell
Warm with the heart-felt joys, that Fame’s bright meed excel.
TO THE
REV. JOHN GRANVILLE.
Clear was the morn, that saw me, pensive, leave,
Pellucid Calwick, thy umbrageous scene;
Morn, that beheld the sigh repining heave,
And eyes unjoyous meet the blue serene.
But had those eyes beheld the azure day
Mild in thy large and watry mirror shine,
A glance more lively then had hail’d its ray,
A lighter heart confess’d its power benign.
Written Sept. 1786, after a fortnight’s residence at Calwick, the seat
of the Granville family, in Staffordshire. It stands on the verge of a
large, clear, and beautiful lake, with islands. A branch of the river
Dove passes through it, and a rich valley forms the scenery on the
opposite coast, through which the main river winds. It is bounded by
near hills, and beyond them are seen some of the larger Peak mountains.
A wood rises behind the house.
Yet, though no sunny skies illumed the hours,
Pass’d, honour’d GRANVILLE, in thy spacious dome,
Though winds incessant howl’d around thy bowers,
Troubled thy lake, and lash’d it into foam;
Though, with eternal rains, the silver Dove
Rush’d, swell’d and turbid, down thy beauteous vale,
Yet did the friends, yet did the life I love
Deride the watry skies, the stormy gale.
Thy charming HARRIET, to my heart how dear![139]
Still in that heart her graceful image lives;
Still do I seem her gentle voice to hear,
Still feel the glow her cheerful kindness gives.
Ah! when your mutual praise my strains pursu’d,
And his, to whom those strains allegiance own,
DEWES, the refin’d, the learn’d, the wise, the good,[140]
On a self-doubting mind it warmly shone.
Beneath thy walls, each elegant delight,
By knowledge, taste, and sentiment bestow’d,
Rose on the spirit, in succession bright,
Till each pale day in mental sunshine glow’d.
Thro’ her dim showers, half shrouding vale, and lawn,
I saw, dear GRANVILLE, that no fairer shades,
For Lansdown, in poetic tints were drawn,
No clearer waters, and no greener glades;
When, at thy noble ancestor’s request,
Who led sweet POPE his forest-haunts among,
They rose, in soft, Aonian graces drest,
To bloom for ever in unrivall’d song.
The blended charms thy crystal scene supplies,
Had my weak muse an equal power to trace,
On Poesy’s bright texture soon should rise
Its sylvan charms, in undecaying grace.
But ah! I may not hope she can display
The splendid web the Bard of Windsor wove,
Yet, for his Granville, no sincerer lay
Breath’d Friendship’s ardour thro’ the vocal grove.
Connubial and parental bliss is thine,
O! may they prove as permanent as sweet!
And be the voice of gratulation mine
Whene’er I hail thee in thy green retreat!
EPISTLE
TO
NATHANIEL LISTER, ESQ.
OF LICHFIELD,
ON HAVING READ HIS VERSES IN MANUSCRIPT,
WRITTEN DECEMBER 1786.[141]
Encircled by thy filial band,
O, LISTER, pleas’d I see thee stand,
Rich in the blessing that can balm
Each mental wound, each sorrow calm,
And every irksome care beguile,
The sweetness of the duteous smile.
Of fortune and of love possest,
With all the sunshine of the breast,
At ease thy placid spirit woos
The favours of a jocund muse,
Who scatters, at thy mild desire,
Careless graces o’er thy lyre.
Not thee, she marks a luckless son,
Whose fortune and renown are one,
Who, if his twice-important strain
The surly bookseller in vain
To-day allows its face to show
In front of pamphlet-crowded bow,
Must pine, alas! in two-fold sorrow,
When pride and hunger fast to-morrow.
Nor yet she marks thee, high of aim,
A throbbing candidate for fame,
Who, plac’d within the sheltering bowers
Where ease and plenty speed the hours,
Far from their rosy confine strays
In authorism’s dangerous ways,
Where Envy’s restless ills betide,
Her thorns infest, her serpents glide,
Those rhyming snakes, whose malice long
Pursues the Bard of higher song.
And mark the scribbling Serpent’s station,
Artificer of defamation!
Who, sore beneath the general sense
Of his vain Muse’s impotence,
Turns public Critic, to supply
His spleen, and gaunt necessity;
Breathes purchas’d praise, in servile tone,
On lays as meagre as his own,
And with rapacious spite abuses
Each happier votary of the muses.
Behold, from day-light cautious screen’d,
His kennel-dirt, with labour glean’d,
This self-elected censor fling,
This dull, insidious, nameless thing.[142]
O, wise art thou those paths to shun,
Where much is lost, and little won;
For never, with enduring roots
The genuine Poet’s laurel shoots,
Or high its blooming branch shall wave,
Till sprung from his unconscious grave.
Yet oft, for candid friends, persuade
Thy muse to warble in this shade.
Its gales have been inured to spring
With notes Aonian on their wing.
Ah! witness many a sparkling rhyme,
By GARRICK rung in tuneful chime,
Ere yet on Britain’s stage he shone,
And shar’d the wreath his Shakespear won!
And witness JOHNSON’S loftier strains,
Proud glory of his native plains:
And theirs, the learn’d, and lucky pair,[143]
Ordain’d to fill the prelate chair;
For modest GREEN, in Lichfield grove,
With NEWTON, tun’d his lute to love,
And many a Muse delighted shed
Her myrtle on each rival head,
Ere yet the mitre’s envied round
Their brows with graver honours bound.
Witness the bright, the jocund powers,
That gave to wit the social hours,
When, as their festal influence glow’d,
Each prompt idea, as it flow’d,
Thy fancy tinged with brilliant dyes,
Ingenious, and ingenuous VYSE![144]
Witness the lays that still engage
Poetic eyes, on Dodsley’s page,
Meek DAVIES, thine, whose feeling mind
Was by each Christian grace refin’d,
While purest rays of Delian fire
Shed living lustre on thy lyre.[145]
Source of my Life, and all the joys[146]
That from a cultured mind arise,
Thy efforts, liberal as benign,
The glories of the Delphic Shrine
To my yet infant eyes display’d
In these green vales, this blooming shade;
Thou, who didst chace the mists of time
From sylvan FLETCHER’S beauteous rhyme,
And graver BEAUMONT’S nervous page,
The faithful mirrour of his age.
Thou, in whose free harmonious song
The Female Rights shall flourish long;
That song, with generous disdain,
Which breaks the sullen pedant’s chain,
Forg’d our aspiring sex to bind
From ranging the high tracts of mind,
Where Fancy’s flowers, and Learning’s fruit,
On every side, luxuriant shoot;--
Source of my Life, it will not prove
A vain essay of filial love,
Here, if a right thy daughter claim
To rank with theirs thy honour’d name,
whose silver lyre’s harmonious sound
Made lovely LICHFIELD classic ground,
Though now thy vital lamp’s faint light
Gleams on the verge of its long night,
Pale, dim, and weak its social blaze,
And pale its intellectual rays.[147]
While duteous love, with anxious aim,
Guards from rude blasts its quivering flame,
Through yet a few more quiet years,
That bring to thee nor pains, nor fears,
O, be it mine to cheer, and warm
Thy drooping heart, thy helpless form!
And now recorded be the song,
That floated sweet these vales among,
Or lighten’d with satiric ray,
The song of proudly virtuous DAY.[148]
Pride, it is still thy sullen part
To check each kindling glow of heart;
For how should soft affection thrive,
How keep its tender blooms alive,
Where thy repulsive shadow lours,
Like the dark yew on springing flowers!
That sheds its chilling damps around,
And wintry makes the vernal ground.
So changest thou affection’s beam,
To cold, and colourless esteem.
Yet, bounteous DAY, that groveling pride
Did ne’er thy words and actions guide,
Which deals its smiles in each degree,
As rank, or wealth, their gifts decree;
’Tis thine to look too coldly down
On talents liberal as thine own,
While sickness, want, and sorrow, share
Thine ample boon, thy watchful care.
See favour’d LICHFIELD’S classic train
Adorn’d by ELLIOT’S happy strain![149]
And his, for whom the Sisters nine,
And Sisters three, in strife combine,
Which should their choicest gifts award,
That form the Courtier, and the Bard.
Ah! need I say ’tis BOOTHBY claims[150]
These honours from the goddess-dames?
With vigorous mind, whose efforts bend
Where Science’ widening bounds extend,
That ductile, to his earnest gaze
Expand before its potent rays;
And whose so seldom erring art
Averts, or blunts the mortal dart,
Relaxing from severer toil
Here DARWIN won the Muses smile;[151]
Fram’d in these bowers the splendid rhyme,
Of brightest glow, and richest chime,
Still nervous, though it still retain
The Leonine, and Runic chain;
And ne’er, Oh Bard! their power disclaim,
For thou canst gem each link they frame.
These silver lyres are heard no more
On Stow’s calm lake, and grassy shore;
Yet GROVE, as through their mead he roves,[152]
With classic notes, that CLIO loves,
Though seldom, yet at times pervades
The silence of these verdant shades
And, LISTER, may they echo long
The tones of thy convivial song!
EPISTLE
TO
GEORGE ROMNEY, ESQ.
ON HIS HAVING PRESENTED THE AUTHOR’S PICTURE TO HER FATHER, MAY 1788.
Thou, who hast given so many golden hours,
That Genius consecrates by all her powers,
Given them, the heart of failing age to warm,
By the wish’d semblance of a daughter’s form,
Accept the sole reward thy efforts sought,
The acknowledg’d joy this generous present brought.
Creative efforts!--that with living hues
Fix the illusive likeness, and diffuse
O’er all the breathing form, and glowing face,
With art’s last happiness, the nameless grace,
Born of thy pencil, for the actual boon,
Knew nor my youth’s fresh morn, or ripen’d noon,
Long since, in a lov’d Father’s feeble breast,
Life’s train of anxious wishes sunk to rest;
Yet one remain’d, one fond wish linger’d still,
For the pledged gift of thy consummate skill.
“O, my Belov’d!” how often would he say,
“Fast as my worn existence fleets away,
“Life’s prov’d uncertainty to sprightly health,
“May rob my soul of all its earthly wealth;
“Childless I yet to my late grave may go,
“Where only tears for thee would cease to flow:
“‘Twere comfort still to think, should Heaven ordain
“My hopeless years to prove so sharp a pain,
“Something might yet to these dim eyes appear,
“That should that look, that smile of kindness wear,
“With which thou com’st to bless each lingering day,
“Of feeble age, in its perceiv’d decay.”
The shades of yesternight were softly drawn
Wide o’er these blooming fields, and circling lawn,
And the dear Full of Days his pillow prest
In the soft slumber of an infant’s rest;
Two wond’rous Youths, who strike the Muse’s lyre,[153]
Ere manhood’s dawn, with all a poet’s fire,
Sat by thy friend, to speed the evening hours
By culling florets from Aonian bowers;
When gladly, through the swift-unfolding door,
The promis’d gift a smiling servant bore.
With curious eyes the youthful Lyrists hail,
The heav’d dismission of each tardy nail,
Till to their sight the speaking canvass shone,
And made the magic of thy pencil known.
At early day to the lov’d couch I creep,
Chasing with lenient voice a Father’s sleep,
Then near its pillow draw his hearts desire,
Mark his wan cheek faint tinged with pleasure’s fire,
Enjoy his warm apostrophe to thee,
And his now seldom tear of extacy.
O! generous ROMNEY! whose expansive heart
Glows the blest rival of thy perfect art,
Thy genius is a Sun, that now serene
Shines on the surface of a wintry scene;
Pale waning Life smiles in its glad’ning rays,
And to their light a Bramin’s homage pays.
IDYLLIUM.
FROM THE ITALIAN.
Beauteous infant, dearest boy,
Whither did thy sister hie?
Her favourite hill, and brook, and glade
See not, to day, the charming maid.
Has she led her new-shorn flock
Through the vale, or towards the rock?
Went she forth at early morn?
Will she, ere the noon, return?
Tell me;--ah! if tell thou wilt,
Purple-streak’d and orange-gilt,
This apple,--larger, look, and finer
Than yesterday I gave at dinner,
This I’ll give;--aye this, and more,
There’s a little bird in store,
A lovely bird, and green his wing,
Round his neck a silken string.--
Silent yet!--O, thankless elf!
Thankless, even as herself.
Stubborn chit!--no more to thee,
Listening, leaning on my knee,
Will I tell delightful tales
Of dancing fays in moonlight vales.
Mingling all I sing, or say,
With kisses kind, and frolic play.
What!--hush!--call thy mother!--fye!
Faithless hope!--perfidious boy!
The mother’s here, with passion wild,
This it is to trust a child!
Here take the apple,--get along
Little fool,--and hold thy tongue!
TO
MRS SMITH,
DAUGHTER OF MR SAVILLE,
ON HER SINGING IN PUBLIC,--JANUARY 1789.
In human form should powers divine appear,
And seraph choirings touch the mortal ear,
Some harsh and darken’d bosoms would be found
Cold and fastidious to the charming sound;
Too loud,--too soft,--too spirited,--too tame,
Form their vain jargon of unmeaning blame.
That something wrong they know not to express,
Which sense can ne’er explain, nor science guess.
Too proud to praise, and much too fine to feel,
Their censure strange should souls like these reveal,
O fear them not--they are not worth thy fear,
Yet whence, too modest! whence that starting tear?
Friendship, thou sayst, is partial; yet rely
On pleasure’s tear, swift springing to the eye;
Trust thou the sweetness of thy melting song,
When loud encores thy silver tones prolong.
Trust them, at least from stranger-lips, who ne’er
Knew thy mild virtues, or thy fate severe.
Instructed still on thy melodious course
By him at once thy voice, and virtue’s source,
Who guides thee every coarser sound to shun,
Swell the soft note, the brilliant descant run;
And gives the soul of poetry to dwell
In thy sweet tones, that sweetest flutes excell,
Be thou assured ELIZA, thou wilt find
Thy power establish’d o’er each feeling mind;
Then safely resting on thy filial claim,
Win the bright honours of harmonic fame.
And would’st thou a resembling music hear
And learn how meet thy notes the general ear,
Come to the wild wood, and the glen with me,
When leafy June has curtain’d every tree;
There, in the still noon of the lunar night,
Shall sounds congenial thrill thee with delight,
When, hid beneath long grass, a liquid tune
The bubbling runnel warbles to the moon.
ALPINE SCENERY.
A POEM.
ADDRESSED TO THE REV. THOMAS SEDGWICK WHALLEY,
DURING HIS RESIDENCE ON THE CONTINENT,
IN 1785.
Glad, as the lone night-wanderer, on his way
Hails the mild day-spring, red’ning on the shore,
We meet description’s light diffusing ray,
Shining on climes not given us to explore.
Powers, that thro’ distant scenes, or soft, or dread,
Lead the charm’d spirit with supreme controul,
Where icy hills, or torrid plains, are spread,
Where winds might waft us, or where seas might roll.
Rich in those powers, energic, warm, and bland,
The leaves where WRAXAL, MORE, and COXE explain
How clime prevails,--thrones rise,--or laws expand,
To ravage, or to bless each mark’d domain.
And gayer STERNE, whose page, to latest time,
Britons shall love;--since its pervading art,
As manners vary with the varied clime,
Winds through the labyrinths of the human heart.
Does one mild virtue spread its lunar ray,
Deep in the pensive bosom’s coy recess,
Untrac’d by him along its latent way
To love,--to pity,--charity,--and peace?
Or lurks one selfish passion, sly, and grave,
But at his touch its genuine form shall wear?
To whose free pen presiding Genius gave
The force resistless of Ithuriel’s spear.
And shalt not thou, O daring COOK! obtain
The lasting homage of the enquiring soul,
Who, ’mid the dangers of the frozen main,
Lifts the pale curtains of the southern pole!
But now what meed shall my thrill’d fancy pay
The talents, which to public honours cold,
Yet warm to amity, those scenes display
That did to their delighted sense unfold,
When up the Savoy mountains WHALLEY rose,[154]
Where Alpine eagles have their aeries built;
Saw rocks as bold as savage Rosa shows,
And dales as soft as sunny Claude has gilt;
His lov’d CHATILION’S home; whose youthful mind[155]
Congenial wit, and kindred worth adorn;
By genius nerv’d, by classic taste refined,
A summer ripeness in a vernal morn.
What marvel, WHALLEY, that an heart like thine
Should brave the surging storms, that ceaseless howl
When winter yells around that craggy shrine
With icy breath and petrifying scowl;
What marvel?--drawn by the magnetic power,
That soul to soul so instantly endears,
Investing friendship’s young, and blossoming hour
With all the fruits that crown her mellowest years.
I bless that power, illum’d by fancy’s ray,
It gives to thy free pen supreme command,
That bears me with resistless force away,
And on the rocks of Savoy bids me stand;
Shows me the Alps, huge in embattled pride,
A clust’ring Phalanx, meet the wintry gales;
Or where, dispers’d, they seem, with giant stride,
To chace each other to the gloomy vales;
Now, in vast curtains of encircling clouds,
Wrap their stupendous heads from mortal eyes;
And then, awakening, pierce the misty shrouds,
Roll the dark volumes back--and brave the skies.
I see, as winter blots the lurid air,
The savage Graces o’er the mountains stalk,
Shake the frore horrors from their shaggy hair,
While howling wolves attend their desert walk;
Then, as with livid hand, and Gorgon frown,
Sternly they wave the pale, petrific wand
O’er the loud floods, down, down the vast steeps thrown;--
In silent ice the shrinking cataracts stand.
Now charm’d I mark the genial breath of spring
To life, and beauty wake the dreary scene,
When o’er the melting vales she hastes to fling
Her silver blossoms, and her tender green;
And on the lawns, between the mountains spread,
To bid the floret’s lavish perfume flow,
Against their basis rest its blushing head,
Whose summits whiten in eternal snow.
I mark the clouds, that gorgeous summer shows,
Enfold the mountain-cliffs with mantles bright,
Or gather on their vast, imperial brows
In glorious diadems of colour’d light;
Or sail from rock to rock, and change their form,
As setting suns their last effulgence shed,
That, now with gold, and now with crimson warm,
Tinges their floating skirts, magnificently spread.
Charm’d I behold purpureal autumn lead
Her grapes of deep, or of transparent stain,
Round the tall steeps, and o’er the yellow mead,
Varied, and spotted with the sable grain.[156]
View that cold mass, shining as though it drew
New radiant whiteness from the orb that fills
With cordial strength, and gives the tyrian hue
To the rich vines that deck the opposing hills;
Hear melted cataracts thunder down the steeps,
Startling the gloomy valley’s deep repose,
Whose current, as from rock to rock it leaps,
Retains the whiteness of its parent snows,
Ample and still, that on the mountain’s brow,
Heedless of tepid, or of stormy gales,
Sit,--in calm contrast to the roar below
Of filial torrents, tumbling to the vales.
They, through the wide-stretch’d forest, black with pines,
Run silvering onward with divided streams,
While, in the vale, the lone MONTMELION shines,[157]
Gilded by sunny evening’s saffron gleams.
Once, on that insulated summit, rose
The towers most hostile to ambition’s sway,
That ere for Savoy’s weal had dar’d oppose
The Gallic victor, on his ruthless way.
Resisting long, they found resistance vain,
And to the polish’d despot slowly yield;--
Why did not wanton MONTESPAN detain
Voluptuous LOUIS from the deathful field?
Tender repentant VALIERE!--not thy tears
For honour lost so deeply pitied flow,
As those sad sighs, and agonizing fears
That rose, in all the bitterness of woe,
When the pale Genius of that lovely land
Lean’d from his rock, defil’d with goary stains,
And saw fierce War stretch forth his red right hand,
Drenching with blood those fair, and fertile plains.
Wall’d by the cloud-capt Alps on every side,
The plenteous vales of SAVOY guarded seem
From the fierce inroad of Ambition’s tide,
When neighbouring powers unsluice its wasteful stream.
But ah! what barriers may kind Nature rear
Which that fell Demon, on his restless course,
Shall not, in some disastrous hour, o’er-peer,
Sap by his art, or vanquish by his force?
O happier SWITZERLAND!--as yet ’tis thine
To see bright Liberty triumphant shake
Her radiant Ægis on thy craggy shrine,
And dip her pinions in thy silver lake![158]
Not on its fertile banks, or through the street
Of busy Zuric, does the squalid crew
Of useless beggary the traveller meet,
Wound his reluctant ear, and shock his view;
But Plenty breathes an universal gale,
And liberal Commerce every want supplies,
For equal her unfetter’d powers prevail,
Urge the quick step, and animate the eyes.
Where idleness, or vicious waste alone
Want Life’s warm comforts, or her soft repose;
O Monarchy! can thy proud pomp atone
For those lost joys Equality bestows?
Ye, who so loudly plead for kingly sway,[159]
The rank of nobles, and the pageant train
Of mean subordination, speed your way
Where SAVOY’S richest vallies teem in vain.
Not for her hapless sons her vineyards bend,
With loaded branches, from the mountain’s side;
O! not for them her golden vales extend,
Or slope her forests in theatric pride.
In beauty’s pomp, in vegetation’s wealth
Boon Nature cloth’d her vallies and her bowers;
But seek her capital,--view life, and health,
Shudder, and pine beneath her crumbling towers!
O! if that form of government is best
That makes its people happiest,--then compare
The crowds CHAMBERY’S ruin’d streets infest
With those that breathe throng’d ZURIC’S gladden’d air!
And when that calm comparison is made
By English spirits, shall they fail to guard
Those sacred laws, Ambition would invade,
And save us from a Despot’s proud award?
But now, from blessings England never knew,
From evils which, I trust, she ne’er shall prove,
Turn thou, my soul, thy unavailing view,
And seek the scenes thy kindling senses love!
Though, hapless SAVOY, Liberty is fled
From thy wild haunts, that every charm disclose,
Yet, with my friend, thy mazes let me tread,
And in thy graces half forget thy woes.
Calm let us sit, at Evening’s solemn hour,
Beneath a rock;--and see her mantle brown
Veil the mark’d features of each Alpine tower,
Till in one huge stupendous mass they frown;
View Night’s pale orb her shadowy pomp assume,
And o’er the sombrous cliffs majestic ride;
And partially their craggy points illume
Or deck with hoary light their stony side;
Silver the vale, which at their feet secure
Slumbers,--and smiles amid its peaceful dreams;
Bares its green bosom to the radiance pure,
That gems the ISER’S wildly-devious streams.
And during brighter hours, in smiling gaze,
Shall our fix’d eyes the BOURGIAN LAKE behold,[160]
When Autumn-evenings, and their burnish’d rays,
Tint her green waters with etherial gold;