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THE scenery and subjects then of the following eclogues alone are Oriental; the style

and colouring are purely European; and, for this reason, the author's preface, in which he intimates that he had the originals from a merchant who traded to the Eaft, is omitted, as being now altogether fuperfluous.

WITH regard to the merit of thefe Eclogues, it may justly be afferted, that in fimplicity of defcription and expreffion, in delicacy and foftrefs of numbers, and in natural and unaffected tenderness, they are not to be equalled by any thing of the paftoral kind in the English language.

ECLOGUE

ECLOGUE I.

HIS eclogue, which is entitled Selim, or

THI

the Shepherd's Moral, as there is nothing dramatic in the subject, may be thought the leaft entertaining of the four: but it is, by no means, the least valuable. The moral precepts which the intelligent fhepherd delivers to his fellow-fwains and the virgins, their companions, are fuch as would infallibly promote the happiness of the paftoral life.

IN imperfonating the private virtues, the poet has obferved great propriety, and has formed their genealogy with the most perfect judgment, when he represents them as the daughters of truth and wisdom.

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THE characteristics of modesty and chaflity are extremely happy and peinturesque:

Come thou, whofe thoughts as limpid springs
are clear,

To lead the train, sweet modesty appear!
With thee be chastity, of all afraid,

Diftrufting all, a wife fufpicious maid;
Cold is her breaft, like flowers that drink

the dew,

A filken veil conceils her from the view.

The two fimiles borrowed from rural objects are not only much in character, but perfectly natural and expreffive. There is, notwithftanding, this defect in the former, that it wants a peculiar propriety; for purity of thought may as well be applied to chastity as to modefty; and from this inftance, as well as from a thousand more, we may fee the necef

fity

fity of diftinguishing, in characteristic poetry, every object by marks and attributes peculi arly its own.

IT cannot be objected to this eclogue that it wants both those effential Criteria of the paftoral, love and the drama; for though it partakes not of the latter, the former ftill retains an intereft in it, and that too very material, as it profeffedly confults the virtue and happinefs of the lover, while it informs what are the qualities

-that muft lead to love.

H 3

ECLOGUE

A

ECLOGUE II.

LL the advantages that any fpecies of

poetry can derive from the novelty of the subject and scenery, this eclogue poffeffes. The rout of a camel-driver is a scene that scarce could exift in the imagination of an European, and of its attendant diftreffes he could have no idea.-These are very happily and minutely painted by our defcriptive poet. What fublime fimplicity of expreffion! what nervous plainnefs in the opening of the poem!

In filent horror o'er the boundless wafte
The driver Haffan with his camels past.

The magic pencil of the poet brings the whole fcene before us at once, as it were by enchantment, and in this fingle couplet we feel

all

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