And hurled every where their water's sheen,
That as they bicker'd thro' the sunny glade,
Tho' restless, still themselves a lulling murmur made.

Full in the passage of the vale above,

A sable, silent, solemn forest stood;

Where nought but shadowy forms were seen to move,
As Idlesse fancied in her dreaming mood:

And up the hills on either side a wood

Of blackening pines, aye waving too and fro,
Sent forth a sleepy horror through the blood;
And where the valley winded out below,

The murmuring main was heard, and scarcely heard, to flow.

A pleasing land of drowsy head it was,

Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye;
And of gay castles in the clouds that pass,
For ever flushing round a summer sky:
There eke the soft delights that witchingly
Instill a wanton sweetness through the breast,
And calm the pleasures, always hover'd nigh:
But whate'er smack'd of noyance and unrest,
Was far, far off expell'd from this delicious rest," &c.

ADMIRAL VERNON.

THE memory of this intrepid and characteristic seaman is preserved in the north transept of Westminster Abbey, by a bust crowned with laurels by a figure of Fame, and profusely decorated with naval trophies. The inscription, which is sufficiently long and particular, follows thus:

As a memorial of his own gratitude,

and of the virtues of his benefactor,

This monument was erected by his nephew, Francis

Lord Orwell, in the year 1763,
Sacred to the memory of
EDWARD VERNON,

Admiral of the White Squadron

of the British Fleet.

He was the second son of James Vernon, Who was Secretary of State to King William III. and whose abilities and integrity were equally conspicuous.

In his youth he served under the Admirals
Shovel and Rook;

By their example he learned to conquer,
By his own merit he rose to command.
In the war with Spain of M,DCC,XXXIX.
he took the fort of Portobello
with six ships:

a force which was thought unequal to the attempt
For this he received

the thanks of both Houses of Parliament.
He subdued Chagre; and at Carthagena
conquered as far as naval force

could carry victory.

After these services he retired,
without place or title,

from the exercise of public,
to the enjoyment of private, virtue.
The testimony of a good conscience
was his reward;

The love and esteem of all good men
his glory.

In battle, though calm, he was active,
and though intrepid, prudent;
successful, yet not ostentatious,
ascribing the glory to God.

In the Senate he was disinterested, vigilant, and steady;
On the XXX day of October, M,DCC,LVII.
He died, as he had lived,

the friend of man, the lover of his country,
and the father of the poor,

Aged LXXIII.

Edward Vernon, thus eminently renowned, was descended from a family equally illustrious, which first settled in England at the Norman Conquest. He was born at Westminster, on the 12th of November, 1684. His father filled the post of Secretary of State during the reign of William and Mary, and originally designed his son for the honours of a civil employment; but the predilections of nature were too decisive for control, and it was reluctantly agreed that the sea should be the wide theatre of the boy's ambition. This point once understood, his mind was directed with singular steadiness and success to those studies which were most conducive to the interests of the chosen pursuits. He made his first voyage under Vice-admiral Hopson, when the French fleet and Spanish galleons were destroyed in the harbour of Vigo. His employment now became constant, and the services he was engaged in were of the most varied and beneficial description. In 1702 he was second lieutenant in an expedition against the West Indies, under Commodore Walker; and in 1704, was at the battle of Malaga, and served with Sir George Rooke, to convoy the King of Spain to Lisbon, on which occasion he received a costly ring with a present of one hundred guineas, as a mark of particular favour from the hands of the monarch. In 1705 he was promoted to the rank of Post Captain, and appointed to command the Dolphin frigate, in which he sailed to the Mediterrancan, and was present under Sir John Leake, at the surrender of Alicant. Transferred by that commander to the Rye, he was dispatched to England with the news of victory; but returned to the same station without delay, and there continued under the flag of Sir Cloudesly Shovel, though without any opportunity of particular distinction until the close of the year 1707.

Early in the year 1708, however, he was appointed to the Jersey frigate of 48 guns, and sailed to the West Indies, in company with a reinforcement for the squadron under Sir Charles Wager, who then commanded that station. On his arrival at Jamaica, the Jersey was employed as a cruiser, and Vernon's success was highly honourable to his vigilance and activity. Continuing in the same ship, he remained in the West Indies till nearly the end of the war; and in the month of May, 1711, being on a cruize to the windward of Jamaica, captured a French ship belonging to the port of Brest, which carried 30 guns, and 120 men. During the remainder of the summer the

Jersey composed one of the squadron, under Commodore Littleton, which was employed to watch the movements of the enemy in the port of Carthagena.

The peace of Utretcht, which came to pass soon after, and gave almost thirty years of repose to Europe, when the tranquillity of half the nations of the civilized world had been disturbed for a period of nearly equal duration, by the profligate ambition of Louis XIV. placed Captain Vernon, with many other naval characters of the highest merit, during the greatest part of that time, in the obscurity of a private station. Hence there is little to record of him, save a few inconsequential appointments, which only serve to show the estimation in which his professional abilities and experience were held. In the year 1714, he led the Assistance of 50 guns, one of the fleet sent to the Baltic, under Sir George Norris, to assist the Russians against the Swedes; and in 1726 commanded the Grafton of 70 guns, one of the armament under Sir Charles Wager, sent to the same quarter, to preserve the peace of the northern states of Europe.

On the accession of George the II. to the throne, in 1727, Vernon was chosen member of parliament for the borough of Penryn, in Cornwall, and soon distinguished himself by an active opposition to the pacific measures of Sir Robert Walpole's administration. As a frequent speaker in the House of Commons, he was one of that minister's most troublesome opponents, and stoutly contended that his moderation was injurious to the honour of the country. He had no pretensions, indeed, to those higher graces of speech, which by pre-eminence constitute oratory; nor was there much of logical arrangement in his arguments; but he possessed a sufficient readiness of words, and always delivered his opinions with generous warmth and manly freedom. His style was not that of a man educated at the bar, or in the senate, whose language is uttered according to the scientific rules of disputation, and who with equal facility can espouse either side of the question: on the contrary, his opinions, which were always forcibly pronounced, invariably proceeded from a conviction of rectitude in his own mind, and this conviction, which was perhaps most apparent when his judgment erred, as at such times it assumed a more positive air, wrought greater effects on his auditory, than axioms better founded, and dictated by more eloquent men, could

have produced. He spoke, perhaps, too often for his reputation as a parliamentary debater; for on many occasions, where neither experience lent him aid, nor the habits of his life had been favourable to the acquisition of such kind of knowledge as the matter argued required, he appeared foremost in the ranks of opposition. Though a copious speaker, and one who never wanted words, he seldom looked as if he had exhausted all that his mind could furnish to elucidate a subject; but having said much, and apparently all that could be advanced, seemed to possess a fund of information superior still to what he had displayed. From a constitutional violence of temper, he was quick and impetuous in debate, and often let fall unguarded observations, which in his cooler moments he would probably have been happy to have retracted. The expedition against Porto Bello is supposed to have originated from some hasty expressions which he uttered in the debates relative to the aggressions of the Spanish guarda costos in the American seas. For, reproaching the administration with the shameful inactivity of their measures, he pledged himself to reduce the town of Porto Bello with a force not exceeding six sail of the line, and the ministers accepted his offer glad, perhaps, of an opportunity to remove so obnoxious an opponent from the House of Commons, and as probably not without a secret wish that he might disgrace himself and his party, by failing to execute what he boasted could be so easily achieved.

Thus, taken at his word, new dignities were necessarily conferred upon him, and on the 9th of July, 1739, he was advanced to the rank of Vice-admiral of the Blue, and appointed Commander-in-chief of all his Majesty's ships in the West Indies. The force he had required being collected, he hoisted his flag on board the Burford, of 70 guns, and sailed with his fleet for Jamaica, where he arrived on the 23d of October. Having refitted his squadron with the utmost diligence, he was enabled to sail from Port Royal on the 5th of November, with the following ships:

Burford............70.........

Hampton Court..70.........

Vice-admiral Vernon.
Captain T. Watson.
S Commodore Brown.
Captain Dent.