And the breathings of her mouth 'Neath the green and clouded wave. Tell us what the hidden race With our mourned lost have done! And, beneath the viewless dun, Wend thee to the southern main ODES. PROGRESS OF POESY.-Gray. Awake, Æolian lyre, awake, And give to rapture all thy trembling strings. A thousand rills their mazy progress take: Through verdant vales, and Ceres golden reign: Now rolling down the steep amain, Headlong, impetuous, see it pour: The rocks, and nodding groves, rebellow to the roar. Parent of sweet and solemn-breathing airs, And frantic Passions, hear thy soft control. On Thracia's hills the Lord of War And dropp'd his thirsty lance at thy command. Of Jove, thy magic lulls the feather'd king The terror of his beak, and light'nings of his eye. Thee the voice, the dance obey, Temper'd to thy warbled lay : The rosy-crowned Loves are seen. On Cytherea's day, With antic Sports, and blue-eyed Pleasures, Now pursuing, now retreating, Now in circling troops they meet; Slow melting strains their Queen's approach declare: With arms sublime, that float upon the air, In gliding state she wins her easy way: O'er her warm cheek, and rising bosom, move The bloom of young Desire, and purple light of Love. Man's feeble race what ills await; Labour, and Penury, the racks of Pain,. Disease, and Sorrow's weeping train, And Death, sad refuge from the storms of Fate! The fond complaint, my song, disprove, And justify the laws of Jove. Say, has he given in vain the heav'nly Muse? Night, and all her sickly dews, Her spectres wan, and birds of boding cry, He gives to range the dreary sky; Till down the eastern cliffs afar Hyperion's march they spy, and glittring shafts of war. In climes beyond the solar road, Where shaggy forms o er ice-built mountains roam, The Muse has broke the twilight-gloom, Of Chili's boundless forests laid, She deigns to hear the savage youth repeat, Their feather-cinctur'd chiefs, and dusky loves, Glory pursue, and gen'rous Shame, Th' unconquerable Mind, and Freedom's holy flame. Woods, that wave o'er Delphi's steep, Isles, that crown th' Ægean deep, Fields, that cool Ilissus laves, Or where Mæander's amber waves How do your tuneful echoes languish Till the sad Nine, in Greece's evil hour, They sought, oh Albion! next thy sea-encircled coast. In thy green lap was Nature's darling laid, Thine too these golden keys, immortal boy! Of Horror that, and thrilling Fears, Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic Tears. Nor second he, that rode sublime He pass'd the flaming bounds of Place and Time: Behold, where Dryden's less presumptuous car, Two coursers of ethereal race, With necks in thunder cloth'd, and long-resounding pace. Hark, his hands the lyre explore! Bright-eyed Fancy, hovʼring o'er, Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn. But ah! 'tis heard no more— Oh! Lyre divine, what daring spirit Yet oft before his infant eyes would run With orient hues, unborrow'd of the sun : Yet shall he mount, and keep his distant way Beyond the limits of a vulgar fate, Beneath the Good how far-but far above the Great. THE PASSIONS.-Collins. When Music, heavenly maid, was young, Till once, 'tis said, when all were fired, Still would her touch the strain prolong, A soft, responsive voice was heard at every close; And Hope, enchanted, smiled, and waved her golden hair· And longer had she sung-but, with a frown, REVENGE impatient rose. He threw his blood-stained sword in thunder down; The war-denouncing trumpet took, And blew a blast, so loud and dread, The doubling drum, with furious heat; |