SLY DICK.

A HYMN FOR CHRISTMAS DAY.

volume.] ALMIGHTY framer of the skies! O let our pure devotion rise,

SHARP was the frost, the wind was high
And sparkling stars bedeckt the sky,
Sly Dick, in arts of cunning skill'd,
Whose rapine all his pockets fill'd,
Had laid him down to take his rest
And soothe with sleep his anxious breast.
'Twas thus a dark infernal sprite
A native of the blackest night,
Portending mischief to devise
Upon Sly Dick he cast his eyes;

Then straight descends the infernal sprite,
And in his chamber does alight:
In visions he before him stands,
And his attention he commands.

Thus spake the sprite-"Hearken, my friend:
And to my counsels now attend.
Within the garret's spacious dome
There lies a well stor'd wealthy room,
Well stor'd with cloth and stockings too,
Which I suppose will do for you.
First from the cloth take thou a purse,
For thee it will not be the worse,
A noble purse rewards thy pains,
A purse to hold thy filching gains; ·
Then for the stockings let them reeve
And not a scrap behind thee leave,
Five bundles for a penny sell

And pence to thee will come pell mell;
See it be done with speed and care:"
Thus spake the sprite and sunk in air.

When in the morn with thoughts erect

Sly Dick did on his dream reflect,

'Why faith," thinks he, "'tis something too, It might perhaps it might-be true, I'll go and see"-away he hies,

And to the garret quick he flies,

Enters the room, cuts up the clothes,
And after that reeves up the hose;
Then of the cloth he purses made,
Parses to hold his filching trade.

*** Cætera desunt.

Like incense in thy sight!
Wrapt in impenetrable shade
The texture of our souls were made
Till thy command gave light.

The Sun of Glory gleam'd the ray,
Refin'd the darkness into day,

And bid the vapours fly:
Impell'd by his eternal love
He left his palaces above

To cheer our gloomy sky.

How shall we celebrate the day,
When God appeared in mortal clay,

The mark of worldly scorn;
When the archangel's heavenly lays
Attempted the Redeemer's praise,
And bail'd salvation's morn!

A humble form the Godhead wore,
The pains of poverty he bore,

To gaudy pomp unknown:
Tho' in a human walk he trod,
Still was the Man Almighty God,
In glory all his own.

Despis'd, oppress'd, the Godhead bears
The torments of this vale of tears;

Nor bad his vengeance rise;
He saw the creatures he had made
Revile his power, his peace invade;
He saw with mercy's eyes.

How shall we celebrate his name,
Who groan'd beneath a life of shame
In all afflictions try'd;

The soul is raptur'd to conceive

A truth, which being must believe,

The God Eternal dy'd.

My soul, exert thy powers, adore,
Upon devotion's plumage soar

To celebrate the day:

The God from whom creation sprung Shall animate my grateful tongue;

From him I'll catch the lay!

X. Y.

The priestess rising, sings the sacred tale,
And the loud chorus echoes thro' the dale.
PRIESTESS.

Far from the burning sands of Calabar;
Far from the lustre of the morning star;
Far from the pleasure of th· holy morn;
Far from the blessedness of Chalma's horn:
Now rest the souls of Narva and Mored,
Laid in the dust, and number'd with the dead.
Dear are their memories to us, and long,
Long shail their attributes be known in song.
Their lives were transient as the meadow flow'r
Ripen'd in ages, wither'd in an hour.
Chalma rewards them in his gloomy cave,
And opens all the prisons of the grave.
Bred to the service of the godhead's throne,
And living but to serve his God alone,
Narva was beauteous as the op'ning day
When on the span ling waves the sun-beams play,
When the Mackaw, ascending to the sky,
Views the bright splendour with a steady eye.
Tail, as the house of Cha'ma's dark retreat;
Compact and firm, as Rhadal Yuca's fleet,
Completely beauteous as a summer's Sun,
Was Narva, by his excellence undone.
Where the soft Togla creeps along the meads,
Thro' scented Calamus and fragrant reeds;
Where the sweet Zin a spreads its matted bed
Liv'd the still sweeter flow'r, the young Moied;
Binck was her face, as Togla's hidden cell;
Soft as the moss where hissing adders dwell.
As to the sacred court she brought a fawn,
The sportive tenant of the spicy lawn,
She saw and lov'd! and Narva too forgot
His sacred vestment and his mystic lot.
Long had the mutual sigh, the mutual tear,
Burst from the breast and scorn'd confinement
Existence was a torment! O my breast! [there.
Can I find accents to unfold the rest!
Lock'd in each others arms, from Hyga's cave,
They plung'd relentless to a watery grave;
And falling murmer to the pow'rs above,
"Gods! take our lives, unless we live to love."
Shoreditch, May 2, 1770.

THE DEATH OF NICOU.

AN AFRICAN ECLOGUE.

C.

ON Tiber's banks, Tiber, whose waters glide
In slow meanders down to Gaigra's side;
And circling all the horrid mountain round,
Rushes impetuous to the deep profound;
Rolls o'er the ragged rocks with bideous yell;
Collects its waves beneath the earth's vast shell;
There for a while in loud confusion huri'd,
It crumbles mountains down and shakes the
Till borne upon the pinions of the air, [world;
Through the rent earth the bursting waves appear;
Fiercely propell'd the whiten'd billows rise,
Break from the cavern, and ascend the skies:
Then lost and conquer'd by superior force,
Through hot Arabia holds its rapid course;
On Tiber's banks where scarlet jas'mines bloom,
And purple aloes shed a rich perfume;
Where, when the Sun is melting in his heat,
The reeking tigers find a cool retreat;

Bask in the sedges, lose the sultry beam,
And wanton with their shadows in the stream;
On Tiber's banks, by sacred priests rever'd,
Where in the days of old a god appear'd:
'Twas in the dead of night, at Chalma's feast,
The tribe of Alra slept around the priest,
He spoke; as evening thunders bursting near,
His horrid accents broke upon the ear;
"Attend, Alraddas, with your sacred priest!
This day the Sun is rising in the cast;
The Sun, which shall ilumine all the Earth,
Now, now is rising, in a mortal birth."
He vanish'd like a vapour of the night,
And sunk away in a faint blaze of light.
Swift from the branches of the holy oak,
Horror, confusion, fear, and torment broke:
And still when midnight trims her mazy lamp,
They take their way thro' Tiber's wat'ry swamp.
On Tiber's banks, close rank'd, a warring train,
Stretch'd to the distant edge of Galca's plain:
So when arriv'd at Gaigra's highest steep,
We view the wide expansion of the deep;
Se in the gilding of her wat'ry robe,
The quick declension of the circling globe;
From the blue sea a chain of mountains rise,
Blended at once with water and with skies:
Beyond our sight in vast extension curl'd,
The check of waves, the guardians of the world.
Strong were the warriors, as the ghost of Cawn,
Who threw the Hill-of-archers to the lawn:
When the soft earth at his appearance fled;
And rising billows play'd around his head:
When a strong tempest rising from the main,
Dash'd the full clouds, unbroken on the plain.
Nicou, immortal in the sacred song,

Held the red sword of war, and led the strong;
From his own tribe the sable warriors came,
Well try'd in battle, and well known in fame.
Nicou, descended from the god of war,
Who liv'd coeval with the morning star:
Narada was his name; who cannot tell,
How all the world thro' great Narada fell!
Vichon, the god who rul'd above the skies,
Look'd on Narada, but with envious eyes:
The warrior dar'd him, ridicul'd his might,
Rent his white bow, and summon'd him to fight.
Vichon, disdainful, bade his lightnings fly,
And scatter'd burning arrows in the sky;
Threw down a star the armour of his feet,
To burn the air with supernatʼral heat;
Bid a loud tempest roar beneath the ground;
Lifted the sea, and all the earth was drown'd.
Narada still escap'd; a sacred tree
Lifted him up, and bore him thro' the sea.
The waters still ascending fierce and high,
He tower'd into the chambers of the sky:
There Vichon sat, his armour on his bed,
He thought Narada with the mighty dead.
Before his seat the heavenly warrior stands,
The lightning quiv'ring in his yellow hands.
The god, astonish'd, dropt; hurl'd from the shore,
He dropt to torments, and to rise no more.
Head-long he falls; 'tis his own arms compel,
Condemn'd in ever-burning fires to dwell.
From this Narada, mighty Nicou sprung;
The mighty Nicou, furious, wild and young,
Who led th' embattled archers to the field,
And bore a thunderbolt upon his shield:
That shield his glorious father died to gain,
When the white warriors fled along the plain,

453

When the full sails could not provoke the flood,
Till Nicou came and swell'd the seas with blood.
Slow at the end of his robust array,
The mighty warrior pensive took his way:
Against the son of Nair, the young Rorest,
Once the coinpanion of his youthful breast.
Strong were the passions of the son of Nair,
Strong as the tempest of the evening air.
Insatiate in desire; fierce as the boar;
Firm in resolve as Cannie's rocky shore.
Long had the gods endeavour'd to destroy
All Nicou's friendship, happiness, and joy:
They sought in vain, till Vicat, Vichon's son,
Never in feats of wieke iness outdone,
Saw Nica, sister to the mountain king,
Drest beautifu!, with all the flow'rs of spring:
He saw, and scatter'd poison in her eyes;
From limb to imb in varied forms he flies;
Dwelt on her crimson lip, and added grace
To every glossy feature of her face.
Rorest was fir'd with passion at the sight;
Friendship and honour sunk to Vicat s right:
He saw, he lov'd, and burning with desire,
Bore the soft maid from brother, sister, sire.
Pining with sorrow, Nica faded, died,
Like a fair aloe in its morning pride.
This brought the warrior to the bloody mead,
And seat to young Rorest the threat'ning reed.
He drew his army forth: oh! need I tell!
That Nicou conquer'd, and the lover fell:
His breathless army mantied all the plain;
And Death sat smiling on the heaps of stain.
The battle ended, with his reeking dart,
The pensive Nicou piere'd his beating heart:
And to his mourning valiant warriors cry'd,
"I and my sister's ghost are satisfy'd."
Brooke-street, June 12.

ELEGY,

So seem'd the woodlands less'ning from afar;
You saw the real prospect as you read.

Majestic Summer's blooming flow'ry pride
Next claim'd the honour of his nervous song;
He taught the streams in hollow trills to glide,
And lead the glories of the year along.

When golden Autumn, wreath'd in ripen'd corn
From purple clusters press'd the foamy wine,
Thy genius did his sailow brows adorn,
And made the beauties of the season thine.

Pale rugged Winter bending o'er his tread,
His grizzled hair bedropt with icy dew;
His eyes, a dusky light, congeal'd and dead;
His robe, a tinge of bright etherial blue;
His train, a motley'd, sanguine, sable cloud,
He limps along the russet dreary moor;
Waist rising whirlwinds, blasting, keen, and loud,
Roll the white surges to the sounding shore.
Nor were his pleasures unimprov'd by thee:
Pleasures be has, th' horribly deform'd:
The silver'd bill, the polish'd lake, we see,
Is by thy genius fix'd, preserv'd, and warm'd.
The rough November has his pleasures too
But I'm insensibl: to every joy:
Farewell the laurel, now I grasp the yew,
And all my little powers in grief employ.

In thee each virtue found a pleasing cell,
Thy mind was honour, and thy soul divine:
With thee did ev'ry pow'r of genius dwell:
Thou wert the Heiicon of all the Nine.

Fancy, whose various figure-tinctur'd vest,
Was ever changing to a different hue:
Her head, with varied bays and flow'rets drest
Her eyes, two spangles of the inorning dew.
In dancing attitude she swept thy string,
And now she soars, and now again descends

FAIRFORD.

No more I hail the morning's golden gleam;
No inore the wonders of the view I sing:
Friendship requires a melancholy theme;
At her command the awful lyre I string.

Now as I wander thro' this leafless grove,
Where the dark vapours of the evening rise,
How shall I teach the chorded shell to move;
Or stay the gushing torrents from my eyes?

Philips, great master of the boundless lyre,
Thee would the grateful Muse attempt to paint;
Give me a double portion of thy fire,
Or all the pow'rs of language are too faint.
Say what bold number, what immortal line
The image of thy genius can reflect;
O, lend my pen what animated thine,
To show thee in thy native glories deckt.

The joyous charms of Spring delighted saw,
Their beauties doubly glaring in thy lay:
Nothing was Spring which Philips did not draw,
And ev'ry image of his Muse was May.

So rose the regal hyacinthal star;

So shone the pleasant rustic daisied bed;

Unto the velvet-vested mead she bends.

Peace, deck'd in all the softness of the dove,
Over thy passions spread a silver plume.
The rosy vale of harmony and love,
Hung on thy soul in one eternal bioom.
Peace, gentlest, softest of the virtues, spread
Her silver pinions, wet with dewy tears,
Upon her best distinguish'd poet's head,
And taught his lyre the music of the spheres.
Temp'rance, with health and beauty in her train
And inassy-muscled strength in all her pride,
Pointed at scarlet luxury and pain,
And did at every cheerful feast preside.
Content, who smiles at all the frowns of fate,
Faun'd from idea ev'ry seeming ill;
la thy own virtue, and thy genius great,
The happy Muse laid anxious troubles still.
But see! the sick'ned glare of day retires,
And the meek ev'ning shades the dusky grey:
The west faint glimmers with the saffron fires,
And, like thy life, O Philips, dies away.

Here, stretch'd upon this heaven-ascending hills
I'll wait the borrours of the coming night;

I'll imitate the gently-plaintive rill,
And by the glare of lambent vapours write.

Wet with the dew, the yellow'd hawthorns bow;
The loud winds whistle thro' the echoing dell;
Far o'er the lea the breathing cattle low,
And the shrill shriekings of the screech-owl swell.
With rustling sound the dusky foliage flies,
And wantons with the wind in rapid whirls,
The gurgling riv'let to the valley hies,
And lost to sight in dying murmurs curls.

Now as the mantle of the ev'ning swells
Upon my mind, I feel a thick'ning gloom!
Ah! could I charm, by friendship's potent spells,
The soul of Philips from the deathy tomb!

Then would we wander thro' the dark'ued vale,
In converse such as heav'nly spirits use,
And born upon the plumage of the gale,
Hymn the Creator, and exhort the Muse.

But horrour to reflection! Now no more
Will Philips sing, the wonder of the plain,
When doubting whether they might not adore,
Admiring mortals heard the nervous strain.
A madd'ning darkness reigns thro' all the lawn,
Nought but a doleful bell of death is heard,
Save where into an hoary oak withdrawn,
The scream proclaims the curst nocturnal bird.
Now rest, my Muse, but only rest to weep
A friend made dear by ev'ry sacred tye!
Unknown to me be comfort, peace, or sleep,
Philips is dead! 'tis pleasure then to die!

FEBRUARY.

AN ELEGY.

BEGIN, my Muse, the imitative lay,
Aonian doxies sound the thrumming string;
Attempt no number of the plaintive Gay,
Let me like midnight cats, or Collins sing.
If in the trammels of the doleful line
The bounding hail, or drilling rain descend;
Come, brooding Melancholy, pow'r divine,
And ev'ry unform'd mass of words amend.
Now the rough goat withdraws his curling horns,
And the cold wat'rer twirls his circling mop:
Swift sudden anguish darts thro' alt'ring corns,
And the spruce mercer trembles in his shop.
Now infant authors, madd'ning for renown,
Extend the plume, and hum about the stage,
Procure a benefit, amuse the town,
And proudly glitter in a title page.

Now, wrapt in ninefold fur, his squeamish grace
Defies the fury of the howling storm;
And whilst the tempest whistles round his face,
Exults to find his mantled carcass warm.

Now rumbling coaches furious drive along,
Full of the majesty of city dames,
Whose jewels sparkling in the gaudy throng,
Raise strange emotions and invidious flames.

Now Merit, happy in the calm of place,
To mortals as a Highlander appears,
And conscious of the excellence of lace,
With spreading frogs and gleaming spangles glares:
Whilst Envy, on a tripod seated nigh,
In form a shoe-boy, daubs the valu'd fruit,
And darting lightnings from his vengeful eye,
Raves about Wilkes, and politics, and Bute.

Now Barry, taller than a grenadier,
Dwindles into a stripling of eighteen;
Or sabled in Othello breaks the ear,
Exerts his voice, and totters to the scene.

Now Foote, a looking-glass for all mankind,
Applies his wax to personal defects;
But leaves untouch'd the image of the mind,
His art no mental quality reflects.

Now Drury's potent king extorts applause,
And pit, box, gallery, echo, "How divine!"
Whilst vers'd in all the drama's mystic laws,
His graceful action saves the wooden line.
Now-But what further can the Muses sing?
Now dropping particles of water fall;
Now vapours riding on the north wind's wing,
With transitory darkness shadow all.
Alas! how joyless the descriptive theme,
When sorrow on the writer's quiet preys;
And like a mouse in Cheshire cheese supreme,
Devours the substance of the less'ning bayes.

Come, February, lend thy darkest sky,
There teach the winter'd Muse with clouds to soary
Come, February, lift the number high;
Let the sharp strain like wind thro' alleys roar.

Ye channels, wand'ring thro' the spacious street,
In hollow murmurs roll the dirt along,
With inundations wet the sabled feet,
Whilst gouts responsive, join th' elegiac song.

Ye damsels fair, whose silver voices shrill
Sound thro' meand'ring folds of Echo's horn;
Let the sweet cry of liberty be still,
No more let smoking cakes awake the morn.
O, Winter! put away thy snowy pride;
O, Spring! neglect the cowslip and the bell;
O, Summer! throw thy pears and plums aside;
O, Autumn! bid the grape with poison swell.
The pension'd Muse of Johnson is no more!
Drown'd in a butt of wine his genius lies: [plore,
Earth! Ocean! Heav'n! the wond'rous loss de-
The dregs of Nature with her glory dies!
What iron stoic can suppress the tear;
What sour reviewer read with vacant eye;
What bard but decks his literary bier!
Alas! I cannot sing-I howl-I cry-!
Bristol, Feb. 12.

ELEGY.

ON W. BECKFOrd, esq.

WEEP on, ye Britons-give your gen'ral tear; But hence, ye venal-hence each titled slave; An honest pang should wait on Beckford's bier, And patriot anguish mark the patriot's grave,

D.