My friend bade me welcome, but struck me quite

dumb,

With tidings that Johnson and Burke would not come ; "For I knew it," he cried, "both eternally fail,

The one with his speeches, and t'other with Thrale;
But no matter, I'll warrant we'll make up the party,
With two full as clever, and ten times as hearty.
The one is a Scotchman, the other a Jew,
They're both of them merry, and authors like you;
The one writes the Snarler, the other the Scourge ;
Some think he writes Cinna-he owns to Panurge.'
While thus he described them by trade and by name,
They entered, and dinner was served as they came.
At the top a fried liver and bacon were seen,
At the bottom was tripe, in a swinging tureen;
At the sides there were spinage and pudding made hot;
In the middle a place where the pasty-was not.
Now, my lord, as for tripe, it's my utter aversion,
And your bacon I hate like a Turk or a Persian;
So there I sat stuck, like a horse in a pound,
While the bacon and liver went merrily round.
"I like these here dinners, so pretty and small;
But your friend there, the doctor, eats nothing at all.”
"O-ho!" quoth my friend, "he'll come on in a trice,
He's keeping a corner for something that's nice."
"We'll all keep a corner," the lady cried out;
"We'll all keep a corner," was echoed about.
While thus we resolved and the pasty delayed,
With looks that quite petrified, entered the maid;
A visage so sad, and so pale with affright,
Waked Priam in drawing his curtains by night;
But we quickly found out-for who could mistake
her?

That she came with some terrible news from the baker:
And so it fell out, for that negligent sloven

Had shut out the pasty on shutting his oven.

Р

WILLIAM WHITEHEAD.

ON CŒLIA.

From the Je ne scai quoi.

'Tis not her face which love creates,
For there no graces revel;
'Tis not her shape, for there the fates
Have rather been uncivil.

'Tis not her air, for sure in that

There's nothing more than common; And all her sense is only chat,

Like any other woman.

Her voice, her touch might give the alarm; 'Twas both, perhaps, or neither;

In short, 'twas that provoking charm,
Of Cælia altogether.

WILLIAM JULIUS MICKLE.

[1734-1788

THERE IS NO LUCK ABOUT THE HOUSE.

Sae true his heart, sae smooth his speech,

His breath like caller air;

His very foot has music in't

As he comes up the stair.

And will I see him once again ?
And will I hear him speak?

I'm right down dizzy with the thought,
In troth I'm like to greet.1

For there's no luck about the house,

There's no luck at a';

There is little pleasure in the house
When our gudeman's awa'.

1 Weep.

JOHN LOGAN.

TO THE CUCKOO.

Hail, beauteous stranger of the grove!
Thou messenger of Spring!
Now Heaven repairs thy rural seat,
And woods thy welcome sing.

What time the daisy decks the green,
Thy certain voice we hear;
Hast thou a star to guide thy path,
Or mark the rolling year?

The school-boy wandering through the wood, To pull the primrose gay,

Starts, the new voice of Spring to hear,

And imitates thy lay.

Sweet bird thy bower is ever green,

Thy sky is ever clear;

Thou hast no sorrow in thy song,

No winter in thy year.

WILLIAM COWPER.

EPISTLE TO JOSEPH HILL.

Dear Joseph, five-and-twenty years ago-
Alas! how time escapes, 'tis even so—
With frequent intercourse, and always sweet,
And always friendly, we were wont to cheat
A tedious hour, and now we never meet!
As some grave gentleman in Terence says-
'Twas therefore much the same in ancient days—
Good lack, we know not what to-morrow brings;
Strange fluctuation of all human things!
True! Changes will befall, and friends may part,
But distance only cannot change the heart;
And, were I called to prove the assertion true,
One proof should serve a reference to you.

Whence comes it then, that in the wane of life,
Though nothing have occurred to kindle strife,
We find the. friends we fancied we had won,
Though numerous once, reduced to few or none?
Can gold grow worthless that has stood the touch?
No; gold they seemed, but they were never such.
Horatio's servant once, with bow and cringe,
Swinging the parlour door upon its hinge,
Dreading a negative, and overawed

Lest he should trespass, begged to go abroad. "Go, fellow whither?"-turning short about

Nay, stay at home--you're always going out." "'Tis but a step, sir, just at the street's end." "For what?" "An please you, sir, to see a friend." "A friend!" Horatio cried, and seemed to start, "Yea, marry, shalt thou, and with all my heart! And fetch my cloak; for, though the night be raw, I'll see him too-the first I ever saw!"

I knew the man, and knew his nature mild,
And was his plaything often when a child;

But something at that moment pinched him close, Else he was seldom bitter or morose.

Perhaps his confidence just then betrayed,

His grief might prompt him with the speech he made.
Perhaps 'twas mere good humour gave it birth,
The harmless play of pleasantry and mirth..
But not to moralize too much, and strain
To prove an evil of which all complain,-
I hate long arguments verbosely spun,
One story more, dear Hill, and I have done.
Once on a time an emperor, a wise man-
No matter where, in China or Japan-
Decreed, that whosoever should offend
Against the well-known duties of a friend,
Convicted once, should ever after wear
But half a coat, and show his bosom bare.
The punishment importing this, no doubt,
That all was naught within, and all found out.
O happy Britain! we have not to fear
Such hard and arbitrary measure here.
Else, could a law, like that which I relate,
Once have the sanction of our triple state,
Some few that I have known in days of old,
Would run most dreadful risk of catching cold.
While you, my friend, whatever wind should blow,
Might traverse England safely to and fro,
An honest man, close-buttoned to the chin,
Broad-cloth without, and a warm heart within.

CATHARINA.

She came she is gone-we have met,
And meet perhaps never again;

The sun of that moment is set,

And seems to have risen in vain.