Saw bursting clouds eclipse the noontide beams, While sounding billows from the mountains roll'd, With bitter waves polluting all my streams, My nectar'd streams, that flow'd on sands of gold. Then vanish'd many a sea-girt isle and grove, Their forests floating on the wat❜ry plain: Then, fam'd for arts and laws deriv'd from Jove, My Atalantis sunk beneath the main, No longer bloom'd primæval Eden's bow'rs, Nor guardian dragons watch'd th'Hesperian steep: With all their fountains, fragrant fruits and flow'rs, Torn from the continent to glut the deep. No more to dwell in sylvan scenes I deign'd, And ev'ry echo taught my raptur'd name, But chief in Europe, and in Europe's pride, My Albion's favour'd realms, I rose ador'd; And pour'd my wealth, to other climes denied ; From Amalthea's horn with plenty stor❜d. Ah me! for now a younger rival claims To her my garlands and triumphal song. say what yet untasted beauties flow, What purer joys await her gentler reign? Do lilies fairer, vi'lets sweeter blow? And warbles Philomel a softer strain? Do morning suns in ruddier glory rise? Ah! no: the blunted beams of dawning light Pale, immature, the blighted verdure springs, When silence listens at the midnight hour. Nor wonder, man, that nature's bashful face, With show'rs and sunshine in her fickle eyes, Is this the fair invested with my spoil By Europe's laws, and senates' stern command? Ungen'rous Europe! let me fly thy soil, And waft my treasures to a grateful land; Again revive, on Asia's drooping shore, My Daphne's groves, or Lycia's ancient plain; Again to Afric's sultry sands restore Embow'ring shades, and Lybian Ammon's fane: Or haste to northern Zembla's savage coast, And swell her barren womb with heat and life. Then Britain-Here she ceas'd. Indignant grief, And parting pangs, her falt'ring tongue supprest: Veil'd in an amber cloud she sought relief, And tears and silent anguish told the rest. SONG TO WHAT! bid me seek another fair In untried paths of female wiles? And bask secure in other smiles? Ah no!-my dying lips shall close, FRANCIS FAWKES. FRANCIS FAWKES made translations from some of the minor Greek poets (viz. Anacreon, Sappho, Bion and Moschus, Musæus, Theocritus, and Apollonius), and modernized the description of " May and Winter," from Gawin Douglas. He was born in Yorkshire, studied at Cambridge, was curate of Croydon, in Surrey, where he obtained the friend ship of Archbishop Herring, and by him was collated to the vicarage of Orpington, in Kent. By the favour of Dr. Plumptre, he exchanged this vicarage for the rectory of Hayes, and was finally made chaplain to the Princess of Wales. He was the friend of Johnson, and Warton; a learned and a jovial parson. THE BROWN JUG. DEAR Tom, this brown jug that now foams with mild ale, (In which I will drink to sweet Nan of the Vale) It chanc'd as in dog-days he sat at his ease & His body, when long in the ground it had lain, A potter found out in its covert so snug, And with part of fat Toby he form'd this brown jug, Now sacred to friendship, and mirth, and mild ale, So here's to my lovely sweet Nan of the Vale. |