Time draws his finger o'er the scene;
But I cannot forget between
The thing to me you once have been :
Each sportive sally-wild escape,-
The scoff, the banter, and the jape,-
And antics of my gamesome ape.
LINES SUGGESTED BY A SIGHT OF WALTHAM CROSS.
TIME-mouldering CROSSES, gemmed with imagery
Of costliest work and Gothic tracery,
Point still the spots, to hallowed wedlock dear,
Where rested on its solemn way the bier,
That bore the bones of Edward's Elinor
To mix with royal dust at Westminster.
Far different rites did thee to dust consign,
Duke Brunswick's daughter, princely Caroline.
A hurrying funeral and a banished grave,
High-minded wife! were all that thou couldst have.
Grieve not, great ghost, nor count in death thy losses;
Thou in thy lifetime had'st thy share of crosses.
I HAD sense in dreams of a beauty rare,
Whom Fate had spell-bound, and rooted there,
Stooping, like some enchanted theme,
Over the marge of that crystal stream,
Where the blooming Greek, to Echo blind,
With self-love fond, had to waters pined.
Ages had waked, and ages slept,
And that bending posture still she kept:
For her eyes she may not turn away,
Till a fairer object shall pass that way-
Till an image more beauteous this world can show,
Than her own which she sees in the mirror below.
Pore on, fair creature! for ever pore,
Nor dream to be disenchanted more;
For vain is expectance, and wish is vain,
Till a new Narcissus can come again.
TO A FRIEND ON HIS MARRIAGE.
WHAT makes a happy wedlock? What has fate
Not given to thee in thy well-chosen mate?
Good sense-good humour;-these are trivial things,
Dear M, that each trite encomiast sings.
But she hath these and more. A mind exempt
From every low-bred passion, where contempt,
Nor envy, nor detraction ever found
A harbour yet; an understanding sound;
Just views of right and wrong; perception full
Of the deformed, and of the beautiful,
In life and manners; wit above her sex,
Which, as a gem, her sprightly converse decks;
Exuberant fancies, prodigal of mirth,
To gladden woodland walk or winter hearth;
A noble nature, conqueror in the strife
Of conflict with a hard discouraging life,
Strengthening the veins of virtue, past the power
Of those whose days have been one silken hour,
Spoiled fortune's pampered offspring; a keen sense
Alike of benefit and of offence.
With reconcilement quick, that instant springs
From the charged heart with nimble angel wings;
While grateful feelings, like a signet signed
By a strong hand, seem burnt into her mind.
If these, dear friend, a dowry can confer
Richer than land, thou hast them all in her;
And beauty, which some hold the chiefest boon,
Is in thy bargain for a makeweight thrown.
TO THOMAS STOTHARD, R.A.,
ON HIS ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE POEMS OF MR. ROGERS
CONSUMMATE Artist, whose undying name
With classic Rogers' shall go down to fame,
Be this thy crowning work! In my young days,
How often have I with a child's fond gaze
Pored on the pictured wonders thou hadst done :
Clarissa mournful, and prim Grandison!
All Fielding's, Smollett's heroes, rose to view;
I saw, and I believed the phantoms true.
But, above all, that most romantic tale
Did o'er my raw credulity prevail,
Where Glums and Gawries wear mysterious things,
That serve at once for jackets and for wings,
Age, that enfeebles other men's designs,
But heightens thine, and thy free draught refines.
In several ways distinct you make us feel-
Graceful as Raphael, as Watteau genteel.
Your lights and shades as Titianesque we praise;
And warmly wish you Titian's length of days.
TO CLARA N[OVELLO].
THE Gods have made me most unmusical,
With feelings that respond not to the call
Of stringed harp or voice-obtuse and mute
To hautboy, sackbut, dulcimer, and flute;
King David's lyre, that made the madness flee
From Saul, had been but a jew's-harp to me :
Theorbos, violins, French horns, guitars,
Leave in my wounded ears inflicted scars;
I hate those trills, and shakes, and sounds that float
Upon the captive air; I know no note,
Nor ever shall, whatever folks may say,
Of the strange mysteries of Sol and Fa;
I sit at oratorios like a fish,
Incapable of sound, and only wish
The thing was over. Yet do I admire,
O tuneful daughter of a tuneful sire,
Thy painful labours in a science which
To your deserts I pray may make you rich
As much as you are loved, and add a grace
To the most musical Novello race.
Women lead men by the nose, some cynics say;
You draw them by the ear-a delicater way.
FREE THOUGHTS ON SEVERAL EMINENT
COMPOSERS.
SOME cry up Haydn, some Mozart,
Just as the whim bites; for my part,
I do not care a farthing candle
For either of them, or for Handel.
Cannot a man live free and easy
Without admiring Pergolesé?
Or through the world with comfort go
That never heard of Doctor Blow?
So help me Heaven, I hardly have;
And yet I eat, and drink, and shave,
Like other people, if you watch it,
And know no more of stave or crotchet
Than did the primitive Peruvians;
Or those old ante-queer-diluvians
That lived in the unwashed world with Jubal,
Before that dirty blacksmith Tubal,
By stroke on anvil, or by summat,
Found out, to his great surprise, the gamut.
I care no more for Cimarosa
Than he did for Salvator Rosa,
Being no painter; and bad luck
Be mine, if I can bear that Gluck!
Old Tycho Brahe and modern Herschel
Had something in them; but who's Purcel?
The devil, with his foot so cloven,
For aught I care, may take Beethoven;
And, if the bargain does not suit,
I'll throw him Weber in to boot!
There's not the splitting of a splinter
To choose 'twixt him last named, and Winter.
Of Doctor Pepusch old Queen Dido
Knew just as much, God knows, as I do.
I would not go four miles to visit
Sebastian Bach (or Batch, which is it?)
No more I would for Bononcini,
As for Novello, or Rossini,
I shall not say a word to grieve 'em,
Because they're living; so I leave 'em.
WRITTEN IN A COPY OF "JOHN WOODVIL."
'TIS a book kept by modern young ladies for show,
Of which their plain grandmothers nothing did know;
A medley of scraps, half verse and half prose,
And some things not very like either, God knows.
The first soft effusions of beaux and of belles,
Of future Lord Byrons and sweet L. E. L.s;
Where wise folk and simple both equally join,
And you write your nonsense that I may write mine.
Stick in a fine landscape to make a display-
A flower-piece, a foreground! all tinted so gay,
As Nature herself, could she see them, would strike
With envy, to think that she ne'er did the like;
And since some Lavaters, with head-pieces comical,
Have agreed to pronounce people's hands physiognomical,
Be sure that you stuff it with autographs plenty,
All penned in a fashion so stiff and so dainty,
They no more resemble folk's ordinary writing
Than lines penned with pains do extempore writing,
Or our everyday countenance (pardon the structure)
The faces we make when we sit for our picture :
Then have you, Madelina, an album complete,
Which may you live to finish, and I live to see't!
TO MARGARET W
MARGARET, in happy hour
Christened from that humble flower
Which we a daisy call!
May thy pretty namesake be
In all things a type of thee,
And image thee in all.
Like it you show a modest face,
An unpretending native grace ;-
The tulip and the pink,
The china and the damask rose,
And every flaunting flower that blows,
In the comparing shrink.
Of lowly fields you think no scorn;
Yet gayest gardens would adorn,
And grace, wherever set.
Home-seated in your lonely bower,
Or wedded—a transplanted flower-
I bless you, Margaret!
TO COLERIDGE'S TRAGEDY OF "REMORSE."
THERE are, I am told, who sharply criticise
Our modern theatres' unwieldy size.
We players shall scarce plead guilty to that charge,
Who think a house can never be too large :
Grieved when a rant, that's worth a nation's ear,
Shakes some prescribed Lyceum's petty sphere;
And pleased to mark the grin from space to space
Spread epidemic o'er a town's broad face.
O might old Betterton or Booth return
To view our structures from their silent urn,
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