He long survives, who lives an hour
In ocean, self-upheld:

And so long he, with unspent power,
His destiny repelled :

And ever as the minutes flew,
Entreated help, or cried-" Adien !”

At length, his transient respite past,
His comrades, who before
Had heard his voice in every blast,
Could catch the sound no more:
For then, by toil subdued, he drank
The stifling wave, and then he sank.

No poet wept him; but the page
Of narrative sincere,

That tells his name, his worth, his age,
Is wet with Anson's tear:

And tears by bards or heroes shed
Alike immortalise the dead.

I therefore purpose not, or dream,
Descanting on his fate,

To give the melancholy theme
A more enduring date:

But misery still delights to trace
Its semblance in another's case.

No voice divine the storm allayed,

No light propitious shone,

When, snatched from all effectual aid,

We perished, each alone:

But I, beneath a rougher sea,

And whelmed in deeper gulfs than he.1

Written March 20, 1799; being the last original poem of the Author. It is founded on a story in Anson's Voyage, which Cowper had not looked into for nearly twenty years.

TRANSLATION OF DRYDEN'S EPIGRAM

ON MILTON.

"Three Poets in three distant ages born," &c.

TRES tria, sed longè distantia, sæcula vates
Ostentant tribus è gentibus eximios.
Græcia sublimem, cum majestate disertum
Roma tulit, felix Anglia utrique parem.
Partubus ex binis Natura exhausta, coacta est,
Tertius ut fieret, consociare duos.

TRANSLATION OF A SIMILE IN PARADISE LOST.

"So when, from mountain tops, the dusky clouds
Ascending," &c.

QUALES aërii montis de vertice nubes

Cum surgunt, et jam Boreæ tumida ora quiêrunt,
Cælum hilares abdit, spissa caligine, vultus:
Tum si jucundo tandem sol prodeat ore,
Et croceo montes et pascua lumine tingat,
Gaudent omnia, aves mulcent concentibus agros,
Balatuque ovium colles vallesque resultant.

TRANSLATIONS OF THE LATIN AND ITALIAN POEMS OF MILTON.

ELEGY I.

TO CHARLES DEODATI.

[Ir was during the lull which followed Cowper's Homeric labours, that the proposal came to him to translate the Latin and Italian poems of Milton. His veneration for the English author was only exceeded by that which he felt towards the Greek, and he embraced the offer with pleasure and hope. But the season was unfortunate. Sickness had visited Mrs. Unwin, and Cowper entered with her into the darkest shade. Often and often he complained of having been caught by this Miltonic trap; and though his disquiet was chiefly occasioned by the critical notes, the poetical portion of the task seems never to have worn a sunny look. His success was moderate. Miss Seward, in a letter to Southey, speaks of the "pedantic, tuneless, and spiritless look and sound" of the translations, and contrasts the version by Cowper with the sweet and touching composition which Langhorne formed of the Elegy on Damon. The defects did not grow of neglect. During Cowper's visit to Eartham, the mornings were chiefly occupied with Hayley, in the revision of the translations. He spared no pains. "I give them," he told Hill, "all the varieties of measure that I can. Some I render in heroic rhyme, some in stanzas, some in seven, and some in eight syllable measure, and some in blank verse." The Sonnet beginning

"As on a hill-top rude, when closing day—"

is, I think, the happiest specimen. The translations were begun September, 1791, and finished in the March of the following year.]

Ar length, my friend, the far-sent letters come,
Charged with thy kindness, to their destined home
They come, at length, from Deva's western side,
Where prone she seeks the salt Vergivian tide.
Trust me, my joy is great that thou shouldst be,
Though born of foreign race, yet born for me,
And that my sprightly friend now free to roam,
Must seek again so soon his wonted home.