ODE. TO A GREAT NUMBER OF GREAT MEN, NEWLY MADE. SEE, a new progeny descends To one of these direct thy flight, O Clio! these are golden times! And thou no more go tatter'd : Make haste then, lead the way, begin, For here are people just come in, Who never yet were flatter'd. But first to Carteret fain you'd sing; Yet careless how you use him; Then (but there's a vast space betwixt) Each hour a different face he wears, Now in a fury, now in tears, [ Since this was written, an edition of Sir Charles H. Williams's works, in 3 vols. 8vo, has been printed, of which a properly bitter critique appeared in the 55th number of the Quarterly Review,-it is said from the pen of Mr. Croker.] Now laughing, now in sorrow; Now he'll command, and now obey, Bellows for liberty to-day, And roars for power to-morrow. At noon the Tories had him tight, Each party tried to 'ave won him ; That now both parties shun him. See yon old, dull, important Lord, Why did you cross God's good intent? Nor longer act this farce of power, See valiant Cobham, valorous Stair, Dear Bat, I'm glad you've got a place, "Tis comfortable to be in, And think what a damn'd while you've been, Like Peter, at the door. [* This is sorry stuff, but Williams did not always write this way. Witness his famous quatrain on Pulteney: When you touch on his Lordship, &c. Leave a blank here and there in each page, To enrol the fair deeds of his youth! When you mention the acts of his age Leave a blank for his honour and truth!] [Browne was an entertaining companion when he had drunk his bottle, but not before; this proved a snare to him, and he would sometimes drink too much; but I know RECITATIVO. Like Neptune, Cæsar guards Virginian fleets, AIR. Happy mortal! he who knows Pleasures which a Pipe bestows; Curling eddies climb the room, Wafting round a mild perfume. RECITATIVO. Let foreign climes the wine and orange boast, not that he was chargeable with any other irregularities. He had those among his intimates, who would not have been such had he Leen otherwise viciously inclined:-the Duncombes, in particular. father and son, who were of unblemished morals.-COWPER, Letter to Rose, 20 May, 1789.] [ Mr. Hawkins Browne, the author of these, had no good original manner of his own, yet we see how well he succeeds when he turns an imitator; for the following are rather imitations, than ridiculous parodies.--GOLDSMITH.] AIR. Smiling years that gaily run Round the zodiac with the sun, Tell if ever you have seen Realms so quiet and serene. British sons no longer now Hurl the bar or twang the bow, Nor of crimson combat think, But securely smoke and drink. CHORUS. Smiling years, that gaily run Round the zodiac with the sun, Tell if ever you have seen Realms so quiet and serene. IMITATION II.-AMB. PHILIPS. Tenues fugit ceu fumus in auras.-VIRG. LITTLE tube of mighty power, Charmer of an idle hour, Object of my warm desire, Lip of wax and eye of fire; And thy snowy taper waist, With my finger gently braced; And thy pretty swelling crest, With my little stopper prest, And the sweetest bliss of blisses, Breathing from thy balmy kisses. Happy thrice, and thrice agen, Happiest he of happy men; Who when again the night returns, When again the taper burns, When again the cricket's gay, (Little cricket full of play,) Can afford his tube to feed With the fragrant Indian weed: Pleasure for a nose divine, Incense of the god of wine. Happy thrice, and thrice again, Happiest he of happy men. O THOU, matured by glad Hesperian suns, [Browne," said Pope to Spence," is an excellent copyist, and those who take it ill of him are very much in the wrong" This appears to have been said with an eye to Them on, who, soon after the "Pipe" appeared, published in the papers of the day what Armstrong has called "a warin copy of verses" by way of reply! These we have the good luck to recover; they are altogether unnoticed and unknown, and as such, not from their merit, may find a place here. THE SMOKER SMOKED.† Still from thy pipe, as from dull Tophet, say, Foh dost thou mean to stink the town to death? Where not one cloud e'er stain'd his purest sky. And at each puff imagination burns: Flash on thy bard, and with exalting fires IMITATION IV.-DR. YOUNG. -Bullatis mihi nugis Pagina turgescat-dare pondus idonea fumo.-PERS. CRITICS avaunt! Tobacco is my theme; Tremble like hornets at the blasting steam. And you, court-insects, flutter not too near Its light, nor buzz within the scorching sphere. Pollio, with flame like thine my verse inspire, So shall the Muse from smoke elicit fire. Coxcombs prefer the tickling sting of snuff; Yet all their claim to wisdom is- -a puff: Lord Foplin smokes not-for his teeth afraid : Sir Tawdry smokes not-for he wears brocade. Ladies, when pipes are brought, affect to swoon; They love no smoke, except the smoke of town; But courtiers hate the pufling tribe,-no matter, Strange if they love the breath that cannot flatter! Its foes but show their ignorance; can he Who scorns the leaf of knowledge, love the tree? The tainted Templar (more prodigious yet) Rails at Tobacco, though it makes him-spit. Citronia vows it has an odious stink; She will not smoke (ye gods!)-but she will drink: Were to the dusky tribe Parnassus free, What clamb'ring up, what crowding should we see? [† Gent.'s Mag. for 1736, p. 743.] BLEST leaf! whose aromatic gales dispense This village, unmolested yet * * * By troopers, shall be my retreat: I ask not what the French are doing, But now she is absent, I walk by its side, My lambkins around me would oftentimes play, But now, in their frolics when by me they pass, My dog I was ever well pleased to see Come wagging his tail to my fair one and me; Winds over us whisper'd, flocks by us did bleat, And chirp went the grasshopper under our feet. But now she is absent, though still they sing on, The woods are but lonely, the melody's gone: Her voice in the concert, as now I have found, Gave ev'ry thing else its agreeable sound. Rose, what is become of thy delicate hue? Ah! rivals, I see what it was that you drest, And made yourselves fine for-a place in her breast: You put on your colours to pleasure her eye, And Phoebe was pleased too, and to my dog said, How slowly Time creeps till my Phœbe re When walking with Phoebe, what sights have I Nor will budge one foot faster for all thou canst WILLIAM SHENSTONE was born at the Leasowes, in Hales Owen. He was bred at Pembroke College, Oxford, where he applied himself to poetry, and published a small miscellany in 1737, without his name. He had entertained thoughts, at one period, of studying medicine; but on coming of age he retired to a property at Harborough, left him by his mother, where, in an old romantic habitation, haunted by rooks, and shaded by oaks and elms, he gave himself up to indolence and the Muses. He came to London for the first time in 1740, and published his "Judgment of Hercules." A year after appeared his "Schoolmistress." For several years he led a wandering life of amusement, and was occasionally at Bath, London, and Cheltenham; at the last of which places he met with the Phyllis of his pastoral ballad. The first sketch of that ballad had been written under a former attachment to a lady of the name of Graves; but it was resumed and finished in compliment to his new flame. Dr. Johnson informs us that he might have obtained Phyllis, whoever the lady was, if he had chosen to ask her. In the year 1745 the death of his indulgent uncle, Mr. Dolman, who had hitherto managed his affairs, threw the care of them upon himself and he fixed his residence at the Leasowes, which he brought, by improvements, to its far-famed beauty. In these improvements his affectionate apologist, Mr. Greaves, acknowledges that he spent the whole of his income, but denies the alleged poverty of his latter days, as well as the rumour that his landscapes were haunted by [This Goldsmith justly preferred to any of Shenstone's pastorals.] |