Osm. Where? Ha! What do I see, Antonio? I am fortunate indeed-my friend, too, safe!

Heli. Most happily, in finding you thus bless'd.
Alm. More miracles! Antonio escaped!
Osm. And twice escaped; both from the rage
of seas

And war for in the fight I saw him fall.

Heli. But fell unhurt, a prisoner as yourself, And as yourself made free; hither I came, Impatiently to seek you, where I knew Your grief would lead you to lament Anselmo. Osm. There are no wonders; or else all is wonder. [up,

Heli. I saw you on the ground and raised you When with astonishment I saw Almeria.

Osm. I saw her too, and therefore saw not thee. Alm. Nor I; nor could I, for my eyes were

yours.

Osm. What means the bounty of all gracious
Heaven,

That persevering, still, with open hand,
It scatters good, as in a waste of mercy!
Where will this end? But Heaven is infinite
In all, and can continue to bestow,
When scanty number shall be spent in telling.

Leon. Or I am deceived, or I beheld the glimpse
Of two in shining habits cross the aisle;
Who, by their pointing, seem to mark this place.
Alm. Sure I have dreamt, if we must part so

soon.

Osm. I wish at least our parting were a dream, Or we could sleep till we again were met.

Heli. Zara and Selim, sir; I saw and know them:

You must be quick, for love will lend her wings. Alm. What love? Who is she? Why are you alarm'd?

Osm. She's the reverse of thee; she's my unhappiness.

Harbour no thought that may disturb thy peace; But gently take thyself away, lest she

Should come, and see the straining of my eyes To follow thee.

Retire, my love, I'll think how we may meet

To part no more; my friend will tell thee all;
How I escaped, how I am here, and thus ;
How I am not called Alphonso, now, but Osmyn;
And he Heli. All, all he will unfold,
Ere next we meet-

Alm. Sure we shall meet again

Osm. We shall; we part not but to meet again. Gladness and warmth of ever-kindling love Dwell with thee, and revive thy heart in absence! [Exeunt ALM. LEON, and HELI.

Yet I behold her-yet-and now no more.
Turn your lights inward, eyes, and view my
thoughts,

So shall you still behold her-'twill not be.
Oh, impotence of sight! Mechanic sense!
Which to exterior objects owest thy faculty,
Not seeing of election, but necessity.
Thus do our eyes, as do all common mirrors,
Successively reflect succeeding images:

Not what they would, but must; a star, or toad;
Just as the hand of chance administers.
Not so the mind, whose undetermined view
Resolves, and to the present adds the past,
Essaying farther to futurity;

But that in vain. I have Almeria here
At once, as I before have seen her often-

SONG.

TELL me no more I am deceived,

That Chloe's false and common;
I always knew (at least believed)
She was a very woman:
As such I liked, as such caress'd;
She still was constant when possess'd,
She could do more for no man.

Bnt, oh! her thoughts on others ran,
And that you think a hard thing;
Perhaps she fancied you the man,

And what care I a farthing?

You think she's false, I'm sure she's kind;
I take her body, you her mind,
Who has the better bargain?

ELIJAH FENTON was obliged to leave the university on account of his non-juring principles, He was for some time secretary to Charles, Earl of Orrery; he afterward taught the grammarschool of Sevenoaks, in Kent; but was induced, by Bolingbroke, to forsake that drudgery for the more unprofitable state of dependence upon a political patron, who, after all, left him disappointed and in debt. Pope recommended him to Craggs as a literary instructor, but the death of that statesman again subverted his hopes of preferment; and he became an auxiliary to Pope in translating the Odyssey, of which his share was the first, fourth, nineteeth, and twentieth books.

The successful appearance of his tragedy of Mariamne on the stage, in 1723, relieved him from his difficulties, and the rest of his life was comfortably spent in the employment of Lady Trumbull, first as tutor to her son, and afterward as auditor of her accounts. His character was that of an amiable but indolent man, who drank, in his great chair, two bottles of port wine a day. He published an edition of the poetical works of Milton and of Waller.*

[* Fenton wrote nothing equal to his Ode to the Lord Gower, which is, says Joseph Warton, written in the true spirit of lyric poetry. It has received too the praises of Pope and Akenside, but is better in parts than as a whole.

AN ODE TO THE RIGHT HON. JOHN LORD GOWER.

WRITTEN IN THE SPRING OF 1716.

O'ER winter's long inclement sway,
At length the lusty Spring prevails;
And swift to meet the smiling May,
Is wafted by the western gales.
Around him dance the rosy Hours,
And damasking the ground with flowers,

With ambient sweets perfume the morn;
With shadowy verdure flourish'd high,
A sudden youth the groves enjoy;

Where Philomel laments forlorn.
By her awaked, the woodland choir
To hail the coming god prepares;
And tempts me to resume the lyre,
Soft warbling to the vernal airs.
Yet once more, O ye Muses!* deign
For me, the meanest of your train,

Unblamed t' approach your blest retreat:
Where Horace wantons at your spring,
And Pindar sweeps a bolder string;

Whose notes th' Aonian hills repeat.
Or if invoked, where Thames's fruitful tides,

Slow through the vale in silver volumes play; Now your own Phoebus o'er the month presides, Gives love the night, and doubly gilds the day; Thither, indulgent to my prayer,

Ye bright, harmonious nymphs, repair
To swell the notes I feebly raise:
So, with aspiring ardours warm'd
May Gower's propitious ear be charm'd
To listen to my lays.

Beneath the Pole on hills of Snow,

Like Thracian Mars, th' undaunted Swede† To dint of sword defies the foe;

In fight unknowing to recede:
From Volga's banks, th' imperious Czar
Leads forth his furry troops to war;
Fond of the softer southern sky:
The Soldan galls th' Illyrian coast;
But soon the miscreant moony host
Before the Victor-Cross shall fly.
But here, no clarion's shrilling note
The Muse's green retreat can pierce;
The grove, from noisy camps remote,
Is only vocal with my verse:

Here, wing'd with innocence and joy,
Let the soft hours that o'er me fly

Drop freedom, health, and gay desires;
While the bright Seine, t' exalt the soul,
With sparkling plenty crowns the bowl,
And wit and social mirth inspires.
Enamour'd of the Seine, celestial fair,

(The blooming pride of Thetis' azure train,) Bacchus, to win the nymph who caused his care, Lash'd his swift tigers to the Celtic plain: There secret in her sapphire cell, He with the Nais wont to dwell;

Leaving the nectar'd feasts of Jove:

And where her mazy waters flow
He gave the mantling vine to grow,
A trophy to his love.

Shall man from Nature's sanction stray,
With blind opinion for his guide;
And rebel to her rightful sway,

Leave all her beauties unenjoy'd?

Fool! Time no change of motion knows;
With equal speed the torrent flows,

To sweep Fame, Power, and Wealth away:
The past is all by death possest;
And frugal fate that guards the rest,

By giving, bids him live To-Day.

O Gower! through all the destined space,
What breath the Powers allot to me
Shall sing the virtues of thy race,

United and complete in thee.
O flower of ancient English faith!
Pursue th' unbeaten Patriot-path,

In which confirm'd thy father shone;
The light his fair example gives,
Already from thy dawn receives

A lustre equal to its own.

Honour's bright dome, on lasting columns rear'd,
Nor envy rusts, nor rolling years consume;
Loud Peans echoing round the roof are heard,
And clouds of incense all the void perfume.
There Phocion, Lælius, Capel, Hyde,
With Falkland seated near his side,
Fix'd by the Muse, the temple grace;
Prophetic of thy happier fame,
She to receive thy radiant name,
Selects a whiter space.

EDWARD (familiarly called Ned) Ward was a low-born, uneducated man, who followed the trade of a publican. He is said, however, to have attracted many eminent persons to his house by his colloquial powers as a landlord, to have had a general acquaintance among authors, and to have been a great retailer of literary anecdotes. In those times the tavern was a less discreditable haunt than at present, and his literary acquaintance might probably be extensive. Jacob offended him very much by saying, in his account of the

[* Borrow'd from Milton's minor poems, whence, in 1716, one might steal with safety.] + Charles XII.

poets, that he kept a public-house in the city. He publicly contradicted the assertion as a falsehood, stating that his house was not in the city, but in Moorfields. Ten thick volumes attest the industry, or cacoethes, of this facetious publican, who wrote his very will in verse. His favourite measure is the Hudibrastic. His works give a complete picture of the mind of a vulgar but acute cockney. His sentiment is the pleasure of eating and drinking, and his wit and humour are equally gross; but his descriptions are still curious and full of life, and are worth preserving, as delineations of the manners of the times.

SONG.

O GIVE me, kind Bacchus, thou god of the vine,
Not a pipe or a tun, but an ocean of wine;
And a ship that's well-mann'd with such rare
merry fellows,

That ne'er forsook tavern for porterly ale-house.
May her bottom be leaky to let in the tipple,
And no pump on board her to save ship or people;
So that each jolly lad may suck heartily round,
And be always obliged to drink or be drown'd!
Let a fleet from Virginia, well laden with weed,
And a cargo of pipes, that we nothing may need,
Attend at our stern to supply us with guns,
And to weigh us our funk, not by pounds, but by

tuns.

When thus fitted out we would sail cross the line,
And swim round the world in a sea of good wine;
Steer safe in the middle, and vow never more
To renounce such a life for the pleasures on shore.
Look cheerfully round us and comfort our eyes
With a deluge of claret inclosed by the skies;
A sight that would mend a pale mortal's com-
plexion,

And make him blush more than the sun by reflexion.

No zealous contentions should ever perplex us,
No politic jars should divide us or vex us;
No presbyter Jack should reform us or ride us;
The stars and our whimsical noddles should
guide us.

No blustering storms should possess us with fears, Or hurry us, like cowards, from drinking to prayers,

But still with full bowls we'd for Bacchus maintain

The most glorious dominion o'er the clarety main;

And tipple all round till our eyes shone as bright As the sun does by day, or the moon does by night. Thus would I live free from all care or design, And when death should arrive I'd be pickled in wine;

That is, toss'd over-board, have the sea for my grave,

And lie nobly entomb'd in a blood-colour'd wave; That, living or dead, both my body and spirit Should float round the globe in an ocean of claret, The truest of friends and the best of all juices, Worth both the rich metals that India produces: For all men we find, from the young to the old, Will exchange for the bottle their silver and gold,

Except rich fanatics—a pox on their pictures! That make themselves slaves to their prayers and

their lectures;

And think that on earth there is nothing divine, But a canting old fool and a bag full of coin. What though the dull saint make his standard

and sterling

His refuge, his glory, his god, and his darling; The mortal that drinks is the only brave fellow, Though never so poor he's a king when he's

mellow;

Grows richer than Croesus with whimsical thinking,

And never knows care whilst he follows his drinking.

GAY'S Pastorals are said to have taken with the public, not as satires on those of Ambrose Philips, which they were meant to be, but as natural and just imitations of real life and of rural manners. It speaks little, however, for the sagacity of the poet's town readers, if they enjoyed those caricatures in earnest, or imagined any truth of English manners in Cuddy and Cloddipole contending with Amabæan verses for the prize or song, or in Bowzybeus rehearsing the

[* Gay is now best known as the author of The Beggars' Opera, which, in spite of its passed political tendency, still keeps, by its music chiefly, its hold upon the stage; and as the author of Black Eyed Susan, which when sung, as it often is, with feeling, brings to remembrance or acquaintance a once familiar name. The multitude know nothing of Trivia; to a Londoner even, it is a dead-letter; and few of the many have read or even heard of The Shepherd's Week. The stage and the convivial club have essentially assisted in preserving his fame. The works of Gay are on our shelves, but not in our pockets-in our remembrance, but not in our memories.

His Fables are as good as a series of such pieces will in all possibility ever be. No one has envied him their production; but many would like to have the fame of having

laws of nature. If the allusion to Philips was overlooked, they could only be relished as travesties of Virgil, for Bowzybeus himself would not be laughable unless we recollected Silenus.†

Gay's Trivia seems to have been built upon the hint of Swift's Description of a City Shower. It exhibits a picture of the familiar customs of the metropolis that will continue to become more amusing as the customs grow obsolete. As a fabulist he has been sometimes hypercritically

written The Shepherd's Week, Black-Eyed Susan, and the ballad that begins: ""Twas when the seas were roaring."

Had he given his time to satire he had excelled, for his lines on Black more are in the extreme of bitterness.]

[That in these pastorals Gay has hit, undesignedly perhaps, the true spirit of pastoral poetry, was the opinion of Goldsmith: "In fact," he adds, "he more resembles Theocritus than any other English pastoral writer whatsoever." Yet he will not defend, he says, the antiquated expressions.]

[ Gay acknowledges, in the prefatory Advertisement, that he owes several hints of it to Dr. Swift.]

blamed for presenting us with allegorical impersonations. The mere naked apologue of Esop is too simple to interest the human mind, when its fancy and understanding are past the state of childhood or barbarism. La Fontaine dresses the stories which he took from Esop and others with such profusion of wit and naïveté, that his manner conceals the insipidity of the matter.

"La sauce vaut mieux que le poisson." Gay, though not equal to La Fontaine, is at least free from his occasional prolixity; and in one instance, (the Court of Death,) ventures into allegory with considerable power. Without being an absolute simpleton, like La Fontaine, he possessed a bonhomie of character which forms an agreeable trait of resemblance between the fabulists.

MONDAY; OR, THE SQUABBLE.

LOBBIN CLOUT, CUDDY, CLODDIPOLE.

L. Clout. THY younglings, Cuddy, are but
just awake,

No thrustles shrill the bramble bush forsake,
No chirping lark the welkin sheen invokes,
No damsel yet the swelling udder strokes;
O'er yonder hill does scant the dawn appear:
Then why does Cuddy leave his cot so rear?
Cuddy. Ah, Lobbin Clout! I ween my plight
is guest,

For he that loves, a stranger is to rest;

If swains belie not, thou hast proved the smart,
And Blouzelinda's mistress of thy heart.
This rising rear betokeneth well thy mind,
Those arms are folded for thy Blouzelind.
And well, I trow, our piteous plights agree;
Thee Blouzelinda smites, Buxoma me.

[half, L. Clout. Ah Blouzelind! I love thee more by Than does their fawns, or cows, the new-fallen calf:

Woe worth the tongue! may blisters sore it gall, That names Buxoma Blouzelind withal?

Cuddy. Hold, witless Lobbin Clout, I thee advise, Lest blisters sore on thy own tongue arise. Lo, yonder, Cloddipole, the blithesome swain, The wisest lout of all the neighbouring plain! From Cloddipole we learn to read the skies, To know when hail will fall or winds arise. He taught us erst the heifer's tail to view, When stuck aloft, that showers would straight

ensue:

He first that useful secret did explain,

That pricking corns foretold the gathering rain.
When swallows fleet soar high, and sport in air,
He told us that the welkin would be clear.
Let Cloddipole then hear us twain rehearse,
And praise his sweetheart in alternate verse.
I'll wager this same oaken staff with thee,
That Cloddipole shall give the prize to me.
L. Clout. See this tobacco-pouch, that's lined
with hair,

Made of the skin of sleekest fallow-deer.
This pouch that's tied with tape of reddest hue,
I'll wager that the prize shall be my due. [slouch!
Cuddy. Begin thy carols then, thou vaunting
Be thine the oaken staff, or mine the pouch.

L. Clout. My Blouzelinda is the blithest lass,
Than primrose sweeter, or the clover-grass.
Fair is the king-cup that in meadow blows,
Fair is the daisy that beside her grows;
Fair is the gilliflower, of gardens sweet,
Fair is the marygold, for pottage meet:

But Blouzelind's than gilliflower more fair,
Than daisy, mary gold, or king-cup rare.

Cuddy. My brown Buxoma is the featest maid
That e'er at wake delightsome gambol play'd.
Clean as young lambkins or the goose's down,
And like the goldfinch in her Sunday gown.
The witless lamb may sport upon the plain,
The frisking kid delight the gaping swain,
The wanton calf may skip with many a bound,
And my cur Tray play deftest feats around;
But neither lamb, nor kid, nor calf, nor Tray,
Dance like Buxoma on the first of May. [near;

L. Clout. Sweet is my toil when Blouzelind is Of her bereft 'tis winter all the year. With her no sultry summer's heat I know; In winter, when she's nigh, with love I glow. Come, Blouzelinda, ease thy swain's desire, My summer's shadow, and my winter's fire!

Cuddy. As with Buxoma once I work'd at hay, Even noontide labour seem'd an holiday; And holidays, if haply she were gone, Like worky-days, I wish'd would soon be done. Eftsoons, O sweetheart kind! my love repay, And all the year shall then be holiday.

L. Clout. As Blouzelinda, in a gamesome mood,
Behind a haycock loudly laughing stood,
I slyly ran, and snatch'd a hasty kiss;
She wiped her lips, nor took it much amiss.
Believe me, Cuddy, while I'm bold to say
Her breath was sweeter than the ripen'd hay.
Cuddy. As my Buxoma, in a morning fair,
With gentle finger stroked her milky care,
I quaintly stole a kiss: at first, 'tis true,
She frown'd, yet after granted one or two.
Lobbin, I swear, believe who will my vows,
Her breath by far excell'd the breathing cows.
L. Clout. Leek to the Welch, to Dutchmen
butter's dear,

Of Irish swains potatoe is the cheer;
Oats for their feasts the Scottish shepherds grind;
Sweet turnips are the food of Blouzelind.
While she loves turnips, butter I'll despise,
Nor leeks, nor oatmeal, nor potatoe, prize.
Cuddy. In good roast-beef my landlord sticks
his knife,

The capon fat delights his dainty wife,
Pudding our parson eats, the squire loves hare,
But white-pot thick is my Buxoma's fare.
While she loves white-pot, capon ne'er shall be,
Nor hare, nor beef, nor pudding, food for me.

L. Clout. As once I play'd at blindman's buff, About my eyes the towel thick was wrapt. [it hapt, I miss'd the swains, and seized on Blouzelind. True speaks that ancient proverb, "Love is blind."

name,

The richest metal joined with the same?"

riddle right,

I'll frankly own thee for a cunning wight:
"What flower is that which royal honour craves,
Adjoin the virgin, and 'tis strown on graves?"
Cloddipole. Forbear, contending louts, give o'er
your strains!

An oaken staff each merits for his pains.
But see the sunbeams bright to labour warn,
And gild the thatch of goodman Hodge's barn.
Your herds for want of water stand a-dry,
They're weary of your songs-and so am I.

THURSDAY; OR, THE SPELL.

HOBNELIA.

HOBNELIA, seated in a dreary vale,

In pensive mood rehearsed her piteous tale;
Her piteous tale the winds in sighs bemoan,
And pining Echo answers groan for groan.
I rue the day, a rueful day I trow,
The woeful day, a day indeed of woe!
When Lubberkin to town his cattle drove,
A maiden fine bedight he hapt to love;
The maiden fine bedight his love retains,
And for the village he forsakes the plains.
Return, my Lubberkin, these ditties hear,
Spells will I try, and spells shall ease my care.
"With my sharp heel I three times mark the
ground,

And turn me thrice around, around, around."

When first the year I heard the cuckow sing, And call with welcome note the budding spring, I straightway set a-running with such haste, Deborah that won the smock scarce ran so fast; Till spent for lack of breath. quite weary grown, Upon a rising bank I sat adown,

Then doff'd my shoe, and by my troth I swear, Therein I spied this yellow frizzled hair, As like to Lubberkin's in curl and hue As if upon his comely pate it grew. "With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,

And turn me thrice around, around, around."

And canst thou then thy sweetheart dear forsake? With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,

And turn me thrice around, around, around."
Last May-day fair I search'd to find a snail,
That might my secret lover's name reveal;
Upon a gooseberry bush a snail I found,
(For always snails near sweetest fruit abound ;)
I seized the vermine, whom I quickly sped,
And on the earth the milk-white embers spread.
Slow crawl'd the snail, and, if aright can spell,
In the soft ashes mark'd a curious L;
Oh, may this wond'rous omen lucky prove!
For L is found in Lubberkin and Love.
"With my sharp heel I three times mark the
ground,

And turn me thrice around, around, around."

Two hazel nuts I threw into the flame, And to each nut I gave a sweetheart's name; This with the loudest bounce me sore amazed, That in a flame of brightest colour blazed. As blazed the nut, so may thy passion grow; For 'twas thy nut that did so brightly glow.

"With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,

And turn me thrice around, around, around."

As peascods once I pluck'd, I chanced to see, One that was closely fill'd with three times three, Which when I cropp'd I safely home convey'd, And o'er the door the spell in secret laid; My wheel I turn'd and sung a ballad new, While from the spindle I the fleeces drew; The latch moved up, when, who should first come But, in his proper person-Lubberkin.

[in

I broke my yarn, surprised the sight to see;
Sure sign that he would break his word with me.
Eftsoons I join'd it with my wonted sleight;
So may again his love with mine unite!

"With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,

And turn me thrice around, around, around." This lady-fly I take from off the grass, Whose spotted back might scarlet red surpass, "Fly, lady-bird, north, south, or east, or west, Fly where the man is found that I love best."