ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A LADY. THE midnight clock has toll'd; and hark, the bell Of death beats slow! heard ye the note profound? It pauses now; and now, with rising knell,

Flings to the hollow gale its sullen sound. Yes, **** is dead. Attend the strain,

Daughters of Albion! Ye that, light as air, So oft have tript in her fantastic train,

With hearts as gay, and faces half as fair: For she was fair beyond your brightest bloom;

(This envy owns, since now her bloom is fled;) Fair as the forms, that, wove in fancy's loom,

Float in light vision round the poet's head. Whene'er with soft serenity she smil'd,

Or caught the orient blush of quick surprise,
How sweetly mutable, how brightly wild,

The liquid lustre darted from her eyes!
Each look, each motion, wak'd a new-born grace,
That o'er her form its transient glory cast:
Some lovelier wonder soon usurp'd the place,

Chas'd by a charm still lovelier than the last.
That bell again! it tells us what she is:

Know, ye were form'd to range yon azure field,
In yon ethereal founts of bliss to lave:
Force then, secure in Faith's protecting shield,

Is this the bigot's rant? Away, ye vain,
The sting from Death, the vict'ry from the Grave.

Your hopes, your fears, in doubt, in dullness steep
Go, soothe your souls in sickness, grief, or pain,
With the sad solace of eternal sleep.
Yet will I praise you, triflers as ye are,

More than those preachers of your fav'rite creed
Who proudly swell the brazen throat of war,

Who form the phalanx, bid the battle bleed;
Nor wish for more: who conquer, but to die.

Hear, Folly, hear, and triumph in the tale :
Like you, they reason; not, like you, enjoy

The breeze of bliss, that fills your silken sail:
On Pleasure's glitt'ring stream ye gaily steer

Your little course to cold oblivion's shore:
They dare the storm, and, through th' inclement year,
Stem the rough surge, and brave the torrent's roar.
Is it for glory? that just Fate denies.

Long must the warrior moulder in his shroud,
Ere from her trump the heav'n-breath'd accents rise
That lift the hero from the fighting crowd.
Is it his grasp of empire to extend?

To curb the fury of insulting foes?
Ambition, cease: the idle contest end:

On what she was, no more the strain prolong: Luxuriant fancy, pause: an hour like this

Demands the tribute of a serious song, Maria claims it from that sable bier,

Where cold and wan the slumberer rests her head; And why must murder'd myriads lose their all,

"Tis but a kingdom thou canst win or lose.

In still small whispers to reflection's ear,

She breathes the solemn dictates of the dead. Oh catch the awful notes, and lift them loud;

(If life be all,) why desolation lower, With famish'd frown, on this affrighted ball,

Proclaim the theme, by sage, by fool rever'd: Hear it, ye young, ye vain, ye great, ye proud!

That thou may'st flame the meteor of an hour? Go wiser ye, that flutter life away,

"Tis Nature speaks, and Nature will be heard. Yes, ye shall hear, and tremble as ye hear, While, high with health, your hearts uxulting leap; Yet know, vain sceptics, know, th' Almighty mind, Ev'n in the midst of Pleasure's mad career,

Crown with the mantling juice the goblet high; Weave the light dance, with festive freedom gay, And live your moment, since the next ye die.

The mental monitor shall wake and weep.
For say, than ****'s propitious star,

Who breath'd on man a portion of his fire,
Bade his free soul, by earth nor time confin'd
To Heav'n, to immortality aspire.

What brighter planet on your births arose :
Or gave of Fortune's gifts an ampler share,
In life to lavish, or by death to lose!
Early to lose; while, borne on busy wing,

Nor shall the pile of hope, his mercy rear'd,
By vain philosophy be e'er destroy'd:
Eternity, by all or wish'd or fear'd,
Shall be by all or suffer'd or enjoy'd.

Ye sip the nectar of each varying bloom :
Nor fear, while basking in the beams of spring,

The wintry storm that sweeps you to the tomb.
Think of her fate! revere the heav'nly hand

That led her hence, though soon, by steps so slow:
Long at her couch Death took his patient stand,
And menac'd oft, and oft withheld the blow:
To give reflection time, with lenient art,

Each fond delusion from her soul to steal;
Teach her from folly peaceably to part,

And wean her from a world she lov'd so well.
Say, are ye sure his mercy shall extend

To you so long a span? Alas, ye sigh:
Make then, while yet ye may, your God, your friend,
And learn with equal ease to sleep or die!
Nor think the Muse, whose sober vice ye hear,

Contracts with bigot frown her sullen brow;
Casts round Religion's orb the mists of fear,

Or shades with horrors, what with smiles should
glow.

No; she would warm you with seraphic fire,
Heirs as ye are of Heav'n's eternal day;
Would bid you boldly to that Heav'n aspire,

Not sink and slumber in your cells of clay.

WILLIAM COWPER.

To a

44

WILLIAM COWPER, a poet of distinguished and Olney in Buckinghamshire, which was thenceforth original genius, was born in 1731, at Great Berk- the principal place of Cowper's residence. At hampstead in Hertfordshire. His father, the rector Olney he contracted a close friendship with the of the parish, was John Cowper, D. D., nephew of Rev. Mr. Newton, then minister there, and since Lord Chancellor Cowper. The subject of this me- rector of St. Mary Woolnoth, London, whose relimorial was educated at Westminster school, where gious opinions were in unison with his own. he acquired the classical knowledge and correctness collection of hymns published by him, Cowper conof taste for which it is celebrated, but without any tributed a considerable number of his own composiportion of the confident and undaunted spirit which tion. He first became known to the public as a is supposed to be one of the most valuable acquisi-poet by a volume printed in 1782, the contents of tions derived from the great schools, to those who which, if they did not at once place him high in the are to push their way in the world. On the con- scale of poetic excellence, sufficiently established his trary, it appears from his poem entitled "Tirocini- claim to originality. Its topics are, "Table Talk," um," that the impressions made upon his mind from · Error," "Truth," Expostulation," "Hope," "Charwhat he witnessed in this place, were such as gave ity," "Conversation," and "Retirement," all treated him a permanent dislike to the system of public upon religious principles, and not without a consideducation. Soon after his leaving Westminster, he erable tinge of that rigor and austerity which bewas articled to a solicitor in London for three years; longed to his system. These pieces are written in but so far from studying the law, he spent the great- rhymed heroics, which he commonly manages with est part of his time with a relation, where he and little grace, or attention to melody. The style, though the future Lord Chancellor (Lord Thurlow) spent often prosaic, is never flat or insipid; and sometimes their time, according to his own expression, "in gig- the true poet breaks through, in a vein of lively degling, and making giggle." At the expiration of his scription or bold figure. time with the solicitor, he took chambers in the If this volume excited but little of the public atTemple, but his time was still little employed on tention, his next volume, published in 1785, introthe law, and was rather engaged in classical pur-duced his name to all the lovers of poetry, and gave suits, in which Coleman, Bonnel Thornton, and him at least an equality of reputation with any of Lloyd, seem to have been his principal associates. his contemporaries. It consists of a poem in six Cowper's spirits were naturally weak; and when books, entitled "The Task," alluding to the injunc his friends had procured him a nomination to the tion of a lady, to write a piece in blank verse, for offices of reading-clerk and clerk of the Private the subject of which she gave him The Sofa. It sets Committees in the House of Lords, he shrunk with out, indeed, with some sportive discussion of this such terror from the idea of making his appearance topic; but soon falls into a serious strain of rural before the most august assembly in the nation, that description, intermixed with moral sentiments and after a violent struggle with himself, he resigned his portraitures, which is preserved through the six intended employment, and with it all his prospects books, freely ranging from thought to thought with in life. In fact, he became completely deranged; no perceptible method. But as the whole poem will and in this situation was placed, in December, 1763, here be found, it is unnecessary to enter into particuabout the 32d year of his age, with Dr. Cotton, an lars. Another piece, entitled "Tirocinium, or a Reamiable and worthy physician at St. Alban's. This view of Schools," a work replete with striking obagitation of his mind is placed by some who have servation, is added to the preceding; and several mentioned it to the account of a deep consideration other pieces gleaned from his various writings will of his state in a religious view, in which the terrors be found in the collection.

of eternal judgment so much overpowered his For the purpose of losing in employment the disfaculties, that he remained seven months in mo- tressing ideas which were ever apt to recur, he next mentary expectation of being plunged into final undertook the real task of translating into blank misery. Mr. Johnson, however, a near relation, has verse the whole of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. This taken pains to prove to demonstration, that these work has much merit of execution, and is certainly views of his condition were so far from producing a far more exact representation of the ancient poet such an effect, that they ought to be regarded as his than Pope's ornamental version; but where simplisole consolation. It appears, however, that his mind city of matter in the original is not relieved by the had acquired such an indelible tinge of melancholy, force of sonorous diction, the poverty of English that his whole successive life was passed with little blank verse has scarcely been able to prevent it from more than intervals of comfort between long parox-sinking into mere prose. Various other translations ysms of settled despondency. denoted his necessity of seeking employment; but

After a residence of a year and a half with Dr. nothing was capable of durably relieving his mind Cotton, he spent part of his time at the house of from the horrible impressions it had undergone. He his relation, Earl Cowper, and part at Huntingdon, passed some of his latter years under the affectionwith his intimate friend, the Rev. Mr. Unwin. The ate care of a relation at East Dereham, in Norfolk, death of the latter caused his widow to remove to where he died on April 25th, 1800.

What are ye, monarchs, laurel'd heroes, say,
But Etnas of the suff'ring world ye sway?
Sweet Nature, stripp'd of her embroider'd robe,
Deplores the wasted regions of her globe;
And stands a witness at Truth's awful bar,
To prove you there destroyers as ye are.

O place me in some Heav'n-protected isle,
Where Peace, and Equity, and Freedom smile;
Where no volcano pours his fiery flood,
No crested warrior dips his plume in blood;
Where Pow'r secures what Industry has won;
Where to succeed is not to be undone;
A land, that distant tyrants hate in vain,
In Britain's isle, beneath a George's reign!

Delighted with my bauble coach, and wrapp'd
In scarlet mantle warm, and velvet cap,
'Tis now become a hist'ry little known,
That once we call'd the past'ral house our own.
Short-liv'd possession! but the record fair,
That mem'ry keeps of all thy kindness there,
Still outlives many a storm, that has effac'd
A thousand other themes less deeply trac'd.
Thy nightly visits to my chamber made,
That thou might'st know me safe and warmly laid;
Thy morning bounties ere I left my home,
The biscuit, or confectionary plum;

The fragrant waters on my cheeks bestow'd
By thy own hand, till fresh they shone and glow'd!
All this, and more endearing still than all,

Thy constant flow of love, that knew no fall,
Ne'er roughen'd by those cataracts and breaks,

ON THE RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE That humor interpos'd too often makes;

OUT OF NORFOLK,

THE GIFT OF MY COUSIN ANN BODHAM.

O THAT those lips had language! Life has pass'd
With me but roughly since I heard thee last.
Those lips are thine-thy own sweet smile I see,
The same, that oft in childhood solac'd me;
Voice only fails, else how distinct they say,
"Grieve not, my child, chase all thy fears away!"
The meek intelligence of those dear eyes
(Blest be the art that can immortalize,
The art that baffles Time's tyrannic claim
To quench it,) here shines on me still the same.
Faithful remembrancer of one so dear,
O welcome guest, though unexpected here!
Who bidd'st me honor with an artless song,
Affectionate, a mother lost so long.
I will obey, not willingly alone,

But gladly, as the precept were her own:
And, while that face renews my filial grief,
Fancy shall weave a charm for my relief,
Shall steep me in Elysian reverie,
A momentary dream that thou art she.

My mother! when I learn'd that thou wast dead,
Say, wast thou conscious of the tears I shed
Hover'd thy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son,
Wretch even then, life's journey just begun?
Perhaps thou gav'st me, though unfelt, a kiss;
Perhaps a tear, if souls can weep in bliss-
Ah, that maternal smile! it answers-Yes.
I heard the bell toll'd on thy burial day,
I saw the hearse, that bore thee slow away,
And, turning from my nurs'ry window, drew
A long, long sigh, and wept a last adieu!
But was it such ?-It was.-Where thou art gone,
Adieus and farewells are a sound unknown.
May I but meet thee on that peaceful shore,
The parting word shall pass my lips no more!
Thy maidens, griev'd themselves at my concern,
Oft gave me promise of thy quick return.
What ardently I wish'd, I long believ'd,
And, disappointed still, was still deceiv'd.
By expectation ev'ry day beguil'd,
Dupe of to-morrow even from a child.
Thus many a sad to-morrow came and went
Till, all my stock of infant-sorrow spent,
I learn'd at last submission to my lot,
But, though I less deplor'd thee, ne'er forgot.
Where once we dwelt our name is heard no more,
Children not thine have trod my nurs'ry floor;
And where the gard'ner Robin, day by day,
Drew me to school along the public way,

All this still legible in mem'ry's page,
And still to be so to my latest age,
Adds joy to duty, makes me glad to pay
Such honors to thee as my numbers may;
Perhaps a frail memorial, but sincere,
Not scorn'd in Heav'n, though little notic'd here.

Could Time, his flight revers'd, restore the hours When, playing with thy vesture's tissued flow'rs, The violet, the pink, and jessamine,

I prick'd them into paper with a pin,
(And thou wast happier than myself the while,
Wouldst softly speak, and stroke my head, and smile ;)
Could those few pleasant days again appear,
Might one wish bring them, would I wish them here?
I would not trust my heart-the dear delight
Seems so to be desir'd, perhaps I might.-
But no-what here we call our life is such,
So little to be lov'd, and thou so much,
That I should ill requite thee to constrain
Thy unbound spirit into bonds again.

19

Thou, as a gallant bark from Albion's coast
(The storms all weather'd and the ocean cross'd)
Shoots into port at some well-haven'd isle,
Where spices breathe, and brighter seasons smile,
There sits quiescent on the floods, that show
Her beauteous form reflected clear below,
While airs impregnated with incense play
Around her, fanning light her streamers gay;
So thou, with sails how swift! hast reach'd the shore,
"Where tempests never beat, nor billows roar,'
And thy lov'd consort on the dang'rous tide
Of life long since has anchor'd by thy side.
But me, scarce hoping to attain that rest,
Always from port withheld, always distress'd-
Me howling blasts drive devious, tempest-toss'd,
Sails ripp'd, seams op'ning wide, and compass lost,
And day by day some current's thwarting force
Sets me more distant from a prosp'rous course.
Yet O the thought, that thou art safe, and he!
That thought is joy, arrive what may to me.
My boast is not, that I deduce my birth
From loins enthron'd, and rulers of the Earth;
But higher far my proud pretensions rise-
The son of parents pass'd into the skies.
And now, farewell-Time unrevok'd has run
His wonted course, yet what I wish'd is done.
By contemplation's help, not sought in vain,
I seem t'have liv'd my childhood o'er again;
To have renew'd the joys that once were mine,
Without the sin of violating thine;

* Garth.