To seek a retreat, while he reigns, Thou art sure to be welcome to me, At sight of the first feeble ray That pierces the clouds of the east, To inveigle thee every day My window shall show thee a feast. Then, soon as the swell of the buds Only pay, as thou paidest me before. Thus music must needs be confest To flow from a fountain above, Else how should it work in the breast And who on the globe can be found, STRADA'S NIGHTINGALE. THE shepherd touched his reed; sweet Philomel The numbers, echoed note for note again. And soon (for various was his tuneful store) She dared the task, and rising as he rose, With all the force that passion gives, inspired, Returned the sounds awhile, but in the close Exhausted fell, and at his feet expired. Thus strength and skill prevailed. O fatal strife! And O sad victory; which cost thy life- ODE On the Death of Lady who lived one hundred Years, and died on her Birth-day in 1728. ANCIENT dame, how wide and vast, All thy multitude of years! We, the herd of human kind, Frailer and of feebler powers; Death's delicious banquet-we Seeds of merciless disease Lurk in all that we enjoy ; And if life o'erleap the bourn Fast as moons can wax and wane Sorrow comes; and while we groan, Pant with anguish, and complain, Half our years are fled and gone. If a few, (to few 'tis given) Lingering on this earthly stage, Wherefore live they but to see Sights, lamented much by thee, Oft' was seen, in ages past, All that we with wonder view; Often shall be to the last; Earth produces nothing new. Thee we gratulate; content, Life for us, as calmly spent, Though but half the length of thine, THE CAUSE WON. Two neighbours furiously dispute; Trivial the spot, yet such the rage The pleadings swell. Words still suffice. THE INNOCENT THIEF. Not a flower can be found in the fields, Her lucrative task she pursues, And pilfers with so much address, That none of their odour they lose, Nor charm by their beauty the less. |