ON THE LOSS OF THE ROYAL GEORGE.

WRITTEN WHEN THE NEWS ARRIVED.

BY WILLIAM COWPER.

[For biographical sketch, see page 267.]

TOLL for the brave!

The brave that are no more!
All sunk beneath the wave,

Fast by their native shore!

Eight hundred of the brave,
Whose courage well was tried,

Had made the vessel heel,

And laid her on her side.

A land-breeze shook the shrouds,
And she was overset;
Down went the Royal George,
With all her crew complete.

Toll for the brave!

Brave Kempenfelt is gone;
His last sea-fight is fought;
His work of glory done.

It was not in the battle;
No tempest gave the shock;
She sprang no fatal leak;
She ran upon no rock.

His sword was in its sheath;
His fingers held the pen,
When Kempenfelt went down
With twice four hundred men.

Weigh the vessel up,

Once dreaded by our foes!

And mingle with our cup

The tears that England owes

Her timbers yet are sound,

And she may float again

Full charged with England's thunder,
And plow the distant main.

But Kempenfelt is gone,

His victories are o'er;

And he and his eight hundred

Shall plow the wave no more.

THE DEBT OF THE GIULI TRE.

BY CASTI.

(Translated by Leigh Hunt.)

[GIOVANNI Battista Casti, Italian poet, was born at Monteflascone, in the States of the Church, in 1721. Though of low extraction, he became canon of the cathedral in his native place; but caring more for pleasure and travel than for church advancement, visited the chief European capitals, and on Metastasio's death, in 1782, was made Poeta Cesario (poet laureate) of Austria, and wrote comic operas with great success. He resigned in 1796 to have a freer hand, lived in Paris, and died in 1803. His best known works are "Novelle Galanti," metrical tales, and "Gli Animali Parlanti," or "The Talking Animals" (1802), a satirical allegory on the political systems tried or suggested by the French Revolution. He wrote also" Poema Tartaro "a satire on the court of Catherine II. of Russia.]

[The "giulio" was a small coin, three of which he owed to the creditor whose importunities he thus makes poetic capital of.]

I.

No: NONE are happy in this best of spheres.
Lo! when a child, we tremble at a look;
Our freshest age is withered o'er a book;
Then fine arts bite us, and great characters.
Then we go boiling with our youthful peers,
In love and hate, in riot and rebuke;

By hook misfortune has us, or by crook,

And griefs and gouts come thick'ning with one's years.

In fine, we've debts: - and when we've debts, no ray
Of hope remains to warm us to repose.

Thus has my own life passed from day to day;

And now, by way of climax, though not close,

The fatal debit of the Giuli Tre

Fills up the solemn measure of my woes.

II.

Often and often have I understood

From Galen's readers and Hippocrates's,

That there are certain seasons in diseases
In which the patient oughtn't to lose blood.
Whether the reason that they give be good,
Or doctors square their practice to the thesis,
I know not; nor is this the best of places
For arguing that matter, as I could.

All that I know is this, that Giuli Tre
Has no such scruple or regard with me,
Nor holds the rule himself: for every day
He does his best, and that most horribly,
To make me lose my cash; which, I must say,
Has with one's blood some strange affinity.

III.

Never did beetle hum so teasingly

About one's ears, in walking, when it's hot;
Never did fly return so to one spot,

As comes my teasing Creditor on me.
Let it but rain, for instance, and you'll see
The flies and beetles vanish like a shot;
But never comes the time, the day is not, -
In which this vermin here will let me be.

Perhaps as bodies tend invariably

Towards other bodies by some force divine, -
Attraction, gravity, or centripathy,

(God knows; I'm little versed in your right line,) So by some natural horrid property

This pretty satellite tends towards me and mine.

IV.

I've said forever, and again I say,

And it's a truth as plain as truth can be,
That from a certain period to this day,
Pence are a family quite extinct with me,
And yet you still pursue me, and waylay,
With your insufferable importunity,
And for those d-d infernal Giuli Tre
Haunt me without remorse or decency.

Perhaps you think that you'll torment me so
You'll make me hang myself? You wish to say
You saw me sus. per coll. —No, Giuli, no.
The fact is, I'll determine not to pay;

And drive you, Giuli, to a state so low,
That you shall hang yourself, and I be gay.

V.

Oh, with what folly did they toil in vain,
Who thought old Arnold, Sully, or Gabor wise,
And night and day labored with earnest eyes
To turn their metals into golden grain!
How did their pots and they perspire again
Over their sulphurs, salts, and mercuries,
And never, after all, could see their prize,
Or do what Nature does, and with no pain:

And yet, ah me! why, why, dear Nature say,
This lovely art- why must it be despised?
Why mayn't we follow this thy noblest way?
I'd work myself; and having realized,
Great Heavens! a capital of Giuli Tre,
Break up my tools, content and aggrandized.

VI.

My Creditor seems often in a way
Extremely pleasant with me, and polite;
Just like a friend. You'd fancy, at first sight,
He thought no longer of the Giuli Tre.

All that he wants to know is, what they say
Of Frederick now; whether his guess was right
About the sailing of the French that night;
Or, What's the news of Hanover and D'Estrée.

But start from whence he may, he comes as truly,
By little and little, to his ancient pass,

And

says,

"Well

when am I to have the Giuli?" 'Tis the cat's way. She takes her mouse, alas!

And having purred, and eyed, and tapped him duly, Gives him at length the fatal coup de grace.

VII.

My Creditor has no such arms as he

Whom Homer trumpets, or whom Virgil sings,

Arms which dismissed so many souls in strings,

From warlike Ilium and from Italy;

Nor has he those of later memory,

With which Orlando did such loads of things;

But with hard hints, and horrid botherings,

And such rough ways, — with these he warreth me.

And suddenly he launcheth at me, lo!
His terrible demand the Giuli Tre;

I draw me back, and thrust him with a No!
Then glows the fierce resentment of the fray,
Till turning round, I scamper from the foe;
The only way, I find, to gain the day.

THE CURATE AND HIS BISHOP.

(From the French. Written during the Old Régime. Translated by Leigh Hunt.)

ON BUSINESS called from his abode,
A curate jogged along the road.
In patient leanness jogged his mare;
The curate, jogging, breathed a prayer;
And jogging as she faced the meads,
His maid, behind him, told her beads.

They hear a carriage, it o'ertakes 'em ;
With grinding noise and dust it rakes 'em ;
'Tis he himself! they know his port;
My Lord the Bishop, bound to court.
Beside him to help meditation,
The lady sits, his young relation.

The carriage stops! the curate doffs
His hat, and bows; the lady coughs:
The prelate bends his lordly eyes,

And "How now, sir!" in wrath he cries;
"What! choose the very King's highway,
And ride with girls in open day!

Good heav'ns! what next will curates do?
My fancy shudders at the view. -
Girl, cover up your horrid stocking:
Was ever seen a group so shocking!"

"My Lord," replies the blushing man,
"Pardon me, pray, and pardon Anne;
Oh deem it, good my Lord, no sin :
I had no coach to put her in."