Me lonely sitting, nor the glimmering light In vain; awake I find the settled thirst My galligaskins, that have long withstood The Lilybean shere, with hideous crush (Vain efforts!) still the battering waves rush in, Implacable, till, deluged by the foam, The ship sinks foundering in the vast abyss.* FROM "THE VIOLENCE OF LOVE, OR THE RIVAL SISTERS." FAIR and soft, and gay and young, All charm-she play'd, she danced, she sung: Why was such sweetness made for one? But, growing bolder, in her ear To wish her made for more than one! But long she had not been in view, [* This is by Sir Robert Ayton, and was among the poems of his in the Ayton MS. once in Mr. Heber's hands. See Note also at p. 141.] Ere I had reckon'd half her charms, SONG. FROM THE SAME. CELIA is cruel: Sylvia, thou, I must confess, art kind; But in her cruelty, I vow, I more repose can find. For, oh! thy fancy at all games does fly, Fond of address, and willing to comply. Thus he that loves must be undone, Or worse, be kind to all. Vain are our hopes, and endless is our care, We must be jealous, or we must despair. DR. WALTER POPE. [Died, 1714.] DR. WALTER POPE was junior proctor of Oxford, in 1668, when a controversy took place respecting the wearing of hoods and caps, which the reigning party considered as the relics of popery. Our proctor, however, so stoutly opposed the revolutionists on this momentous point, that the venerable caps and hoods continued to THE OLD MAN'S WISH. IF I live to grow old, for I find I go down, May I govern my passion with an absolute sway, Without gout or stone, by a gentle decay. Near a shady grove, and a murmuring brook, May I govern, &c. With Horace and Petrarch, and two or three more be worn till the Restoration. This affair he used to call the most glorious action of his life. Dr. Pope was, however, a man of wit and information, and one of the first chosen fellows of the Royal Society. He succeeded Sir Christopher Wren as Professor of Astronomy in Gresham College. With a pudding on Sundays, with stout hum- And remnants of Latin to welcome the vicar; With a courage undaunted may I face my last day, And when I am dead may the better sort say,In the morning when sober, in the evening when mellow, He's gone, and [has] left not behind him his fellow : For he govern'd his passion with an absolute sway, And grew wiser and better, as his strength wore away, Without gout or stone, by a gentle decay. THOMAS PARNELL. [Born, 1679. Died, 1717?] THE Compass of Parnell's poetry is not extensive, but its tone is peculiarly delightful: not from mere correctness of expression, to which some critics have stinted its praises, but from the graceful and reserved sensibility that accompanied his polished phraseology. The curiosa felicitas, the studied happiness of his diction, does not spoil its simplicity. His poetry is like a flower that has been trained and planted by the skill of the gardener, but which preserves, in its cultured state, the natural fragrance of its wilder air. deacon's orders under the canonical age, had the archdeaconry of Clogher conferred upon him by the bishop of that diocese, in his twenty-sixth year. About the same time he married a Miss Anne Minchin, an amiable woman, whose death he had to lament not many years after their union, and whose loss, as it affected Parnell, even the iron-hearted Swift mentions as a heavy misfortune. Though born and bred in Ireland, he seems to have had too little of the Irishman in his local attachments. His aversion to the manners of his His ancestors were of Congleton, in Cheshire. His father, who had been attached to the repub-native country was more fastidious than amiable. lican party in the civil wars, went to Ireland at the Restoration, and left an estate which he purchased in that kingdom, together with another at Cheshire, at his death, to the poet. Parnell was educated at the university of Dublin, and having been permitted, by a dispensation, to take When he had once visited London, he became attached to it for ever. His zest or talents for society made him the favourite of its brightest literary circles. His pulpit oratory was also much admired in the metropolis; and he renewed his visits to it every year. This, however, was only the bright side of his existence. His spirits were very unequal, and when he found them ebbing, he used to retreat to the solitudes of Ireland, where he fed the disease of his imagination, by frightful descriptions of his retirement. During his intimacy with the Whigs in England, he contributed some papers, chiefly Visions, to the Spectator and Guardian. Afterward his personal friendship was engrossed by the Tories, and they persuaded him to come over to their side in politics, at the suspicious moment when the Whigs were going out of power. In the frolics of the Scriblerus club, of which he is said to have been the founder, whenever literary allusions were required for the ridicule of pedantry, he may be supposed to have been the scholar most able to supply them; for Pope's correspondence shows, that among his learned friends he applied to none with so much anxiety as to Parnell. The death of the queen put an end to his hopes of preferment by the Tories, though not before he had obtained, through the influence of Swift, the vicarage of Finglass, in the diocese of Dublin. His fits of despondency, after the death of his wife, became more gloomy, and these aggravated a habit of intemperance which shortened his days. He died, in his thirty-eighth year, at Chester, on his way to Ireland,* and he was buried in Trinity church, in that city, but without a memorial to mark the spot of his interment. A FAIRY TALE, IN THE ANCIENT ENGLISH IN Britain's isle, and Arthur's days, His mountain back mote well be said Yet, spite of all that Nature did He felt the charms of Edith's eyes, Nor wanted hope to gain the prize, Could ladies look within; But one Sir Topaz dress'd with art, And if a shape could win a heart, He had a shape to win. Edwin, if right I read my song, To revel out the night. His heart was drear, his hope was cross'd, 'Twas late, 'twas far, the path was lost That reach'd the neighbour town; With weary steps he quits the shades, Resolved, the darkling dome he treads And drops his limbs adown. But scant he lays him on the floor, [He is said to have died in 1717; but in the parish register the entry of his burial is the 18th October, 1718. See Goldsmith's Misc. Works by Prior, vol. iv. p. 512.] Now sounding tongues assail his ear, Now sounding feet approachen near, And now the sounds increase: And from the corner where he lay, He sees a train profusely gay, Come prankling o'er the place. But (trust me, gentles!) never yet Or half so rich before; The country lent the sweet perfumes, The sea the pearl, the sky the plumes, The town its silken store. Now whilst he gazed, a gallant, drest At this the swain, whose venturous soul Advanced in open sight; "Nor have I cause of dread," he said, "Who view, by no presumption led, Your revels of the night. "'Twas grief, for scorn of faithful love, Which made my steps unweeting rove Amid the nightly dew." ""Tis well," the gallant cries again, "We fairies never injure men Who dare to tell us true. "Exalt thy love-dejected heart, Be mine the task, or ere we part, To make thee grief resign; He spoke, and all a sudden there The monarch leads the queen: |