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Before the face of Ilion, and her bright turrets showed. A thousand courts of guard kept fires, and every guard allowed

Fifty stout men, by whom their horse eat oats, and hard-white corn,

And all did wilfully expect the silver-throned morn.
Cowper's translation is brief, but vivid and distinct :-

As when around the clear bright moon, the stars
Shine in full splendour, and the winds are hushed,
The groves, the mountain-tops, the headland heights
Stand all apparent, not a vapour streaks
The boundless blue, but ether opened wide
All glitters, and the shepherd's heart is cheered.

THOMAS TICKELL.

The friendship of Addison has shed a reflected light on some of his contemporaries, and it elevated them, in their own day, to considerable importance. Amongst these was THOMAS TICKELL (1686–1740), born at Bridekirk, near Carlisle, and educated at Oxford. He was a writer in the Spectator and Guardian, and when Addison went to Ireland as secretary to Lord Sunderland, Tickell accompanied him, and was employed in public business. He published

a translation of the first book of the Iliad at the same

time with Pope. Addison and the Whigs pronounced it to be the best, while the Tories ranged under the banner of Pope. The circumstance led to a breach of the friendship betwixt Addison and Pope, which was never healed. Addison continued his patronage of Tickell, made him his under secretary of state, and left him the charge of publishing his works. Tickell had elegance and tenderness as a poet, but was deficient in variety and force. His ballad of 'Colin and Lucy' is worth all his other works. It has the simplicity and pathos of the elder lyrics, without their too frequent coarseness and abrupt transitions. His Elegy on the Death of Addison' is considered by Johnson one of the most elegant and sublime funeral poems in the language. The author's own friend, Steele, considered it only 'prose in rhyme!' The following extract contains the best verses in the elegy

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Oft let me range the gloomy aisles alone,
Sad luxury! to vulgar minds unknown,
Along the walls where speaking marbles show
What worthies form the hallowed mould below;
Proud names! who once the reins of empire held,
In arms who triumphed, or in arts excelled;
Chiefs graced with scars, and prodigal of blood,
Stern patriots, who for sacred freedom stood;
Just men by whom impartial laws were given,
And saints who taught and led the way to heaven.
Ne'er to these chambers where the mighty rest,
Since their foundation came a nobler guest;
Nor e'er was to the bowers of bliss conveyed
A fairer spirit, or more welcome shade.

In what new region to the just assigned,

What new employments please the unbodied mind?
A winged virtue through the ethereal sky,
From world to world unwearied does he fly;
Or curious trace the long laborious maze

Of Heaven's decrees, where wondering angels gaze?
Does he delight to hear bold seraphs tell
How Michael battled, and the dragon fell;
Or, mixed with milder cherubim, to glow
In hymns of love not ill essayed below?
Or dost thou warn poor mortals left behind?
A task well suited to thy gentle mind."
Oh! if sometimes thy spotless form descend,
To me thy aid, thou guardian genius! lend.

.

When rage misguides me, or when fear alarms,
When pain distresses, or when pleasure charms,
In silent whisp'rings purer thoughts impart,
And turn from ill a frail and feeble heart;
Lead through the paths thy virtue trod before,
Till bliss shall join, nor death can part no more.
That awful form which, so the Heavens decree,
Must still be loved, and still deplored by me,
In nightly visions seldom fails to rise,

Or roused by Fancy, meets my waking eyes.
If business calls, or crowded courts invite,
The unblemished statesman seems to strike my sight;
If in the stage I seek to soothe my care,

I meet his soul, which breathes in Cato there;
If pensive to the rural shades I rove,
His step o'ertakes me in the lonely grove;
'Twas there of just and good he reasoned strong,
Cleared some great truth, or raised some serious song;
There patient showed us the wise course to steer,
There taught us how to live, and (oh! too high
A candid censor, and a friend severe;
The price for knowledge) taught us how to die.

Thou hill! whose brow the antique structures grace,
Reared by bold chiefs of Warwick's noble race;
Why, once so loved, whene'er thy bower appears,
How sweet were once thy prospects fresh and fair,
O'er my dim eyeballs glance the sudden tears!
Thy sloping walks, and unpolluted air!
How sweet the glooms beneath thy aged trees,
Thy noontide shadow, and thy evening breeze!
His image thy forsaken bowers restore,
Thy walks and airy prospects charin no more;
No more the summer in thy glooms allayed,
Thy evening breezes, and thy noonday shade.

Colin and Lucy.-A Ballad.

Of Leinster, famed for maidens fair,
Bright Lucy was the grace,
Nor e'er did Liffy's limpid stream
Reflect so sweet a face;

Till luckless love and pining care
Impaired her rosy hue,

Her coral lips and damask cheeks,
And eyes of glossy blue.

Oh! have you seen a lily pale

When beating rains descend?
So drooped the slow-consuming maid,
Her life now near its end.

By Lucy warned, of flattering swains
Take heed, ye easy fair!
Of vengeance due to broken vows,
Ye perjured swains! beware.

Three times all in the dead of night
A bell was heard to ring,
And shrieking, at her window thrice
The raven flapped his wing.

Too well the love-lorn maiden knew
The solemn boding sound,
And thus in dying words bespoke
The virgins weeping round:

'I hear a voice you cannot hear,
Which says I must not stay;
I see a hand you cannot see,
Which beckons me away.

By a false heart and broken vows

In early youth I die.

Was I to blame because his bride

Was thrice as rich as I?

Ah, Colin! give not her thy vows, Vows due to me alone;

Nor thou, fond maid! receive his kiss,
Nor think him all thy own.

To-morrow in the church to wed,

Impatient both prepare;

But know, fond maid! and know, false man!
That Lucy will be there.

Then bear my corse, my comrades! bear,
This bridegroom blithe to meet;
He in his wedding trim so gay,

I in my winding sheet.'

She spoke; she died. Her corpse was borne
The bridegroom blithe to meet;
He in his wedding trim so gay,
She in her winding sheet.

Then what were perjured Colin's thoughts?
How were these nuptials kept?
The bridesmen flocked round Lucy dead,
And all the village wept.
Confusion, shame, remorse, despair,
At once his bosom swell;

The damps of death bedewed his brow;
He shook, he groaned, he fell.

From the vain bride, ah! bride no more!
The varying crimson fled,
When stretched before her rival's corpse
She saw her husband dead.

Then to his Lucy's new made grave
Conveyed by trembling swains,
One mould with her, beneath one sod,
For ever he remains.

Oft at this grave the constant hind
And plighted maid are seen;
With garlands gay and true-love knots
They deck the sacred green.

But, swain forsworn! whoe'er thou art,
This hallowed spot forbear;
Remember Colin's dreadful fate,
And fear to meet him there.

SIR SAMUEL GARTH.

SIR SAMUEL GARTH, an eminent physician, published in 1696 his poem of The Dispensary, to aid the college of physicians in a war they were then waging with the apothecaries. The latter had ventured to prescribe, as well as compound medicines; and the physicians, to outbid them in popularity, advertised that they would give advice gratis to the poor, and establish a dispensary of their own for the sale of cheap medicines. The college triumphed; but in 1703 the House of Lords decided that apothecaries were entitled to exercise the privilege which Garth and his brother physicians resisted. Garth was a popular and benevolent man, a firm Whig, yet the early encourager of Pope; and when Dryden died, he pronounced a Latin oration over the poet's remains. With Addison, he was, politically and personally, on terms of the closest intimacy. Garth died in 1718. The 'Dispensary' is a mock heroic poem in six cantos. Some of the leading apothecaries of the day are happily ridiculed; but the interest of the satire has passed away, and it did not contain enough of the life of poetry to preserve it. A few lines will give a specimen of the manner and the versification of the poem. It opens in the following strain :

Speak, goddess! since 'tis thou that best canst tell,
How ancient leagues to modern discord fell;
And why physicians were so cautious grown
Of others' lives, and lavish of their own;
How by a journey to the Elysian plain,
Peace triumphed, and old time returned again.
Not far from that most celebrated place,
Where angry justice shows her awful face;
Where little villains must submit to fate,
That great ones may enjoy the world in state;
There stands a dome,2 majestic to the sight,
And sumptuous arches bear its oval height;
A golden globe, placed high with artful skill,
Seems, to the distant sight, a gilded pill;
This pile was, by the pious patron's aim,
Raised for a use as noble as its frame;
Nor did the learned society decline
The propagation of that great design;
In all her mazes, Nature's face they viewed,
And, as she disappeared, their search pursued.
Wrapt in the shade of night the goddess lies,
Yet to the learned unveils her dark disguise,
But shuns the gross access of vulgar eyes.

Now she unfolds the faint and dawning strife
Of infant atoms kindling into life;
How ductile matter new meanders takes,
And slender trains of twisting fibres makes;
And how the viscous seeks a closer tone,
By just degrees to harden into bone;
While the more loose flow from the vital urn,
And in full tides of purple streams return;
How lambent flames from life's bright lamps
arise,

And dart in emanations through the eyes;
How from each sluice a gentle torrent pours,
To slake a feverish heat with ambient showers;
Whence their mechanic powers the spirits claim;
How great their force, how delicate their frame;
How the same nerves are fashioned to sustain
The greatest pleasure and the greatest pain;
Why bilious juice a golden light puts on,
And floods of chyle in silver currents run;
How the dim speck of entity began

To extend its recent form, and stretch to man;
Why envy oft transforms with wan disguise,
And why gay Mirth sits smiling in the eyes;
Whence Milo's vigour at the Olympic's shown,
Whence tropes to Finch, or impudence to Sloane;
How matter, by the varied shape of pores
Or idiots frames, or solemn senators.

How body acts upon impassive mind;
Hence 'tis we wait the wondrous cause to find,
How fumes of wine the thinking part can fire,
Past hopes revive, and present joys inspire;
Why our complexions oft our soul declare,
And how the passions in the features are;
How touch and harmony arise between
Corporeal figure, and a form unseen;
How quick their faculties the limbs fulfil,
And act at every summons of the will;
With mighty truths, mysterious to descry,
Which in the womb of distant causes lie.

But now no grand inquiries are descried ;
Mean faction reigns where knowledge should preside;
Feuds are increased, and learning laid aside;
Thus synods oft concern for faith conceal,
And for important nothings show a zeal:
The drooping sciences neglected pine,
And Pean's beams with fading lustre shine.
No readers here with hectic looks are found,
Nor eyes in rheum, through midnight-watching
drowned:

The lonely edifice in sweats complains
That nothing there but sullen silence reigns.

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This place, so fit for undisturbed repose, The god of sloth for his asylum chose; Upon a couch of down in these abodes, Supine with folded arms, he thoughtless nods; Indulging dreams his godhead lull to ease, With murmurs of soft rills, and whispering trees: The poppy and each numbing plant dispense Their drowsy virtue and dull indolence; No passions interrupt his easy reign, No problems puzzle his lethargic brain : But dark oblivion guards his peaceful bed, And lazy fogs hang lingering o'er his head.

All have sunk into oblivion; but Pope has preserved his memory in various satirical allusions. Addison extended his friendship to the Whig poet, whose private character was exemplary and irreproachable. Dr Johnson included Blackmore in his edition of the poets, but restricted his publication of his works to the poem of Creation,' which, he said, 'wants neither harmony of numbers, accuracy of thought, nor elegance of diction.' Blackmore died in 1729. The design of Creation' was to demonstrate the existence of a Divine Eternal Mind. He recites the proofs of a Deity from natural and physical pheno

The following is from a grandiloquent address by mena, and afterwards reviews the systems of the Colocynthus, a keen apothecary :—

Could'st thou propose that we, the friends of fates,
Who fill churchyards, and who unpeople states,
Who baffle nature, and dispose of lives,
Whilst Russel, as we please, or starves or thrives,
Should e'er submit to their despotic will,
Who out of consultation scarce can skill?
The towering Alps shall sooner sink to vales,
And leeches, in our glasses, swell to whales;
Or Norwich trade in instruments of steel,
And Birmingham in stuffs and druggets deal!
Alleys at Wapping furnish us new modes,

And Monmouth Street, Versailles, with riding-hoods;
The sick to the Hundreds in pale throngs repair,
And change the Gravel-pits for Kentish air.

Our properties must on our arms depend;

"Tis next to conquer, bravely to defend.
"Tis to the vulgar death too harsh appears;
The ill we feel is only in our fears.

To die, is landing on some silent shore,
Where billows never break, nor tempests roar:
Ere well we feel the friendly stroke, 'tis o'er.
The wise through thought the insults of death defy;
The fools through blessed insensibility.
"Tis what the guilty fear, the pious crave;
Sought by the wretch, and vanquished by the brave.
It eases lovers, sets the captive free;
And, though a tyrant, offers liberty.

:

Garth wrote the epilogue to Addison's tragedy of Cato, which ends with the following pleasing lines:Oh, may once more the happy age appear, When words were artless, and the thoughts sincere ; When gold and grandeur were unenvied things, And courts less coveted than groves and springs. Love then shall only mourn when truth complains, And constancy feel transport in his chains; Sighs with success their own soft language tell, And eyes shall utter what the lips conceal: Virtue again to its bright station climb, And beauty fear no enemy but time; The fair shall listen to desert alone, And every Lucia find a Cato's son.

SIR RICHARD BLACKMORE.

SIR RICHARD BLACKMORE was one of the most fortunate physicians, and the most persecuted poets, of this period. He was born of a good family in Wiltshire, and took the degree of M.A. at Oxford in 1676. He was in extensive medical practice, was knighted by King William III., and afterwards made censor of the college of physicians. In 1695, be published Prince Arthur, an epic poem, which he says he wrote amidst the duties of his profession, in coffeehouses, or in passing up and down the streets! Dryden, whom he had attacked for licentiousness, satirised him for writing to the rumbling of his chariot-wheels.' Blackmore continued writing, and published a series of epic poems on King Alfred, Queen Elizabeth, the Redeemer, the Creation, &c.

Epicureans and the Fatalists, concluding with a hymn to the Creator of the world. The piety of Blackmore is everywhere apparent in his writings; but the genius of poetry too often evaporates amidst his commonplace illustrations and prosing declamation. One passage of Creation' (addressed to the disciples of Lucretius) will suffice to show the style of Blackmore, in its more select and improved

manner:

You ask us why the soil the thistle breeds;
Why its spontaneous birth are thorns and weeds;
Why for the harvest it the harrow needs?

The Author might a nobler world have made,
In brighter dress the hills and vales arrayed,
And all its face in flowery scenes displayed:
The glebe untilled might plenteous crops have borne,
And brought forth spicy groves instead of thorn:
Rich fruit and flowers, without the gardener's pains,
Might every hill have crowned, have honoured all the
plains:

This Nature might have boasted, had the Mind
Who formed the spacious universe designed
That man, from labour free, as well as grief,
Should pass in lazy luxury his life.
But he his creature gave a fertile soil,
Fertile, but not without the owner's toil,
That some reward his industry should crown,
And that his food in part might be his own.

But while insulting you arraign the land,
Ask why it wants the plough, or labourer's hand;
Kind to the marble rocks, you ne'er complain
That they, without the sculptor's skill and pain,
No perfect statue yield, no basse relieve,
Or finished column for the palace give.
Yet if from hills unlaboured figures came,
Man might have ease enjoyed, though never fame.
You may the world of more defect upbraid,
That other works by Nature are unmade:
That she did never, at her own expense,
A palace rear, and in magnificence
Out-rival art, to grace the stately rooms;
That she no castle builds, no lofty domes.

Had Nature's hand these various works prepared,
What thoughtful care, what labour had been spared!
But then no realm would one great master show,
No Phidias Greece, and Rome no Angelo.
Why boats and ships require the artist's hand;
With equal reason, too, you might demand
Why generous Nature did not these provide,
To pass the standing lake, or flowing tide?

Harbour in clouds, and mingle with the skies,
You say the hills, which high in air arise,
That earth's dishonour and encumbering load,
Of many spacious regions man defraud;
For beasts and birds of prey a desolate abode.
But can the objector no convenience find
In mountains, hills, and rocks, which gird and bind
The mighty frame, that else would be disjoined ?
Do not those heaps the raging tide restrain,
And for the dome afford the marble vein ?
Does not the rivers from the mountains flow,
And bring down riches to the vale below!

See how the torrent rolls the golden sand From the high ridges to the flatter land. The lofty lines abound with endless store Of mineral treasure and metallic ore.

AMBROSE PHILIPS.

Among the Whig poets of the day, whom Pope's enmity raised to temporary importance, was AMBROSE PHILIPS (1671-1749). He was a native of Leicestershire, educated at Cambridge, and patronised by the Whig government of George I. He was a commissioner of the collieries, held some appointments in Ireland, and sat for the county of Armagh in the Irish House of Commons. The works of Philips consist of three plays, some miscellaneous poems, translations, and pastorals. The latter were published in the same miscellany with those of Pope, and were injudiciously praised by Tickell as the finest in the English language. Pope resented this unjust depreciation of his own poetry by an ironical paper in the Guardian, calculated to make Philips appear ridiculous. Ambrose felt the satire keenly, and even vowed to take personal vengeance on his adversary, by whipping him with a rod in Button's coffeehouse. A paper war ensued, and Pope im

mortalised Philips as

The bard whom pilfered pastorals renown,
Who turns a Persian tale for half-a-crown;
Just writes to make his barrenness appear,
And strains from hard-bound brains eight lines a-year.
The pastorals are certainly poor enough; but
Philips was an elegant versifier, and Goldsmith has
eulogised part of his epistle to Lord Dorset, as in-
comparably fine.'

A fragment of Sappho, translated by Philips, is a poetical gem so brilliant, that Warton thought Addison must have assisted in its composition :

Blessed as the immortal gods is he,
The youth who fondly sits by thee,
And hears and sees thee all the while,
Softly speak and sweetly smile.

'Twas this deprived my soul of rest,
And raised such tumults in my breast;
For while I gazed in transport tossed,
My breath was gone, my voice was lost.
My bosom glowed; the subtle flame
Ran quickly through my vital frame;
O'er my dim eyes a darkness hung;
My ears with hollow murmurs rung.
In dewy damps my limbs were chilled,
My blood with gentle horrors thrilled;
My feeble pulse forgot to play;
I fainted, sunk, and died away.

Epistle to the Earl of Dorset.

COPENHAGEN, March 9, 1709.

From frozen climes, and endless tracts of snow,
From streams which northern winds forbid to flow,
What present shall the Muse to Dorset bring,
Or how, so near the pole, attempt to sing?
The hoary winter here conceals from sight
All pleasing objects which to verse invite.
The hills and dales, and the delightful woods,
The flowery plains, and silver-streaming floods,
By snow disguised, in bright confusion lie,
And with one dazzling waste fatigue the eye.

No gentle-breathing breeze prepares the spring,
No birds within the desert region sing.
The ships, unmoved, the boisterous winds defy,
While rattling chariots o'er the ocean fly.

The vast leviathan wants room to play,
And spout his waters in the face of day.
The starving wolves along the main sea prowl,
And to the moon in icy valleys howl.
O'er many a shining league the level main
Here spreads itself into a glassy plain:
There solid billows of enormous size,
Alps of green ice, in wild disorder rise.

And yet but lately have I seen, even here,
The winter in a lovely dress appear,
Ere yet the clouds let fall the treasured snow,
Or winds begun through hazy skies to blow:
At evening a keen eastern breeze arose,
And the descending rain unsullied froze.
Soon as the silent shades of night withdrew,
The face of nature in a rich disguise,
The ruddy morn disclosed at once to view
And brightened every object to my eyes:
Forevery shrub, and every blade of grass,
And every pointed thorn, seemed wrought in glass;
In pearls and rubies rich the hawthorns show,
While through the ice the crimson berries glow.
The thick-sprung reeds, which watery marshes yield,
Seemed polished lances in a hostile field.
Sees crystal branches on his forehead rise:
The stag, in limpid currents, with surprise
The spreading oak, the beech, and towering pine
Glazed over, in the freezing ether shine.
The frighted birds the rattling branches shun,
Which wave and glitter in the distant sun.

When, if a sudden gust of wind arise, The brittle forest into atoms flies; The crackling wood beneath the tempest bends, And in a spangled shower the prospect ends: Or, if a southern gale the region warm, And by degrees unbind the wintry charm, The traveller a miry country sees, And journeys sad beneath the dropping trees: Like some deluded peasant, Merlin leads Through fragrant bowers, and through delicious meads; While here enchanted gardens to him rise, And airy fabrics there attract his eyes, His wandering feet the magic paths pursue, And, while he thinks the fair illusion true The trackless scenes disperse in fluid air, And woods, and wilds, and thorny ways appear: A tedious road the weary wretch returns, And, as he goes, the transient vision mourns. The First Pastoral.

LOBBIN.

If we, O Dorset ! quit the city-throng,
To meditate in shades the rural song,
By your command, be present; and, O bring
The Muse along! The Muse to you shall sing
Her influence, Buckhurst, let me there obtain,
And I forgive the famed Sicilian swain.

Begin. In unluxurious times of yore,
When flocks and herds were no inglorious store,
Lobbin, a shepherd boy, one evening fair,
As western winds had cooled the sultry air,
His numbered sheep within the fold now pent,
Thus plained him of his dreary discontent;
Beneath a hoary poplar's whispering boughs,
He, solitary, sat, to breathe his vows.
Venting the tender anguish of his heart,
As passion taught, in accents free of art;
And little did he hope, while, night by night,
His sighs were lavished thus on Lucy bright.

Ah! well-a-day, how long must I endure This pining pain? Or who shall speed my cure! Fond love no cure will have, seek no repose, Delights in grief, nor any measure knows: And now the moon begins in clouds to rise; The brightening stars increase within the skies;

The winds are hushed; the dews distil; and sleep
Hath closed the eyelids of my weary sheep:
I only, with the prowling wolf, constrained
All night to wake: with hunger he is pained,
And I with love. His hunger he may tame;
But who can quench, O cruel love! thy flame?
Whilom did I, all as this poplar fair,
Upraise my heedless head, then void of care,
'Mong rustic routs the chief for wanton game;
Nor could they merry make, till Lobbin came.
Who better seen than I in shepherd's arts,
To please the lads, and win the lasses' hearts?
How deftly, to mine oaten reed so sweet,
Wont they upon the green to shift their feet?
And, wearied in the dance, how would they yearn
Some well-devised tale from me to learn?
For many songs and tales of mirth had I,
To chase the loitering sun adown the sky:
But ah! since Lucy coy deep-wrought her spite
Within my heart, unmindful of delight,
The jolly grooms I fly, and, all alone,

To rocks and woods pour forth my fruitless moan.
Oh! quit thy wonted scorn, relentless fair,
Ere, lingering long, I perish through despair.
Had Rosalind been mistress of my mind,

Though not so fair, she would have proved more kind.
O think, unwitting maid, while yet is time,
How flying years impair thy youthful prime !
Thy virgin bloom will not for ever stay,

And flowers, though left ungathered, will decay:
The flowers, anew, returning seasons bring!
But beauty faded has no second spring.

My words are wind! She, deaf to all my cries,
Takes pleasure in the mischief of her eyes.
Like frisking heifer, loose in flowery meads,
She gads where'er her roving fancy leads;
Yet still from me. Ah me! the tiresome chase!
Shy as the fawn, she flies my fond embrace.
She flies, indeed, but ever leaves behind,
Fly where she will, her likeness in my mind.
No cruel purpose in my speed I bear;

"Tis only love; and love why should'st thou fear?
What idle fears a maiden breast alarm!
Stay, simple girl; a lover cannot harm;
Two sportive kidlings, both fair-flecked, I rear,
Whose shooting horns like tender buds appear:
A lambkin too, of spotless fleece, I breed,
And teach the fondling from my hand to feed:
Nor will I cease betimes to cull the fields
Of every dewy sweet the morning yields:
From early spring to autumn late shalt thou
Receive gay girlonds, blooming o'er thy brow:
And when-but why these unavailing pains?
The gifts alike, and giver, she disdains;
And now, left heiress of the glen, she'll deem
Me, landless lad, unworthy her esteem;
Yet was she born, like me, of shepherd-sire,
And I may fields and lowing herds acquire.
O! would my gifts but win her wanton heart,
Or could I half the warmth I feel impart,
How would I wander, every day, to find
The choice of wildings, blushing through the rind!
For glossy plums how lightsome climb the tree,
How risk the vengeance of the thrifty bee.
Or, if thou deign to live a shepherdess,
Thou Lobbin's flock, and Lobbin shall possess;
And fair my flock, nor yet uncomely I,
If liquid fountains flatter not; and why
Should liquid fountains flatter us, yet show
The bordering flowers less beauteous than they grow?
O come, my love! nor think the employment mean,
The dams to milk, and little lambkins wean;
To drive afield, by morn, the fattening ewes,
Ere the warm sun drink up the coolly dews;
While with my pipe, and with my voice, I cheer
Each hour, and through the day detain thine ear.

How would the crook beseem thy lily hand!
How would my younglings round thee gazing stand!
Ah, witless younglings! gaze not on her eye:
Thence all my sorrow; thence the death I die.
Oh, killing beauty! and oh, sore desire!
Must then my sufferings but with life expire!
Though blossoms every year the trees adorn,
Spring after spring I wither, nipt with scorn:
Nor trow I when this bitter blast will end,
Or if yon stars will e'er my vows befriend.
Sleep, sleep, my flock; for happy ye may take
Sweet nightly rest, though still your master wake.'
Now to the waning moon the nightingale,
In slender warblings, tuned her piteous tale.
The love-sick shepherd, listening, felt relief,
Pleased with so sweet a partner in his grief,
Till, by degrees, her notes and silent night
To slumbers soft his heavy heart invite.

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born at Barnstaple, in Devonshire, in 1688. He was of the ancient family of the Le Gays of Oxford and Devonshire; but his father being in reduced circumstances, the poet was put apprentice to a silk-mercer in the Strand, London. He disliked this mercenary employment, and at length obtained his discharge from his master. In 1711, he published his Rural Sports, a descriptive poem, dedicated to Pope, in which we may trace his joy at being emancipated from the drudgery of a shop:

But I, who ne'er was blessed by Fortune's hand,
Nor brightened ploughshares in paternal land;
Long in the noisy town have been immured,
Respired its smoke, and all its cares endured.

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