EPITAPH ON MRS. M. HIGGINS, OF WESTON. LAURELS may flourish round the conqueror's tomb, And their exploits are veil'd from human sight. 1791. SONNET TO A YOUNG LADY ON HER BIRTH-DAY. DEEM not, sweet rose, that bloom'st 'midst thorn, many a Thy friend, tho' to a cloister's shade consign'd, To blend good sense with elegance and ease; ON A MISTAKE IN HIS TRANSLATION OF HOMER. COWPER had sinn'd with some excuse, If, bound in rhyming tethers, He had committed this abuse Of changing ewes for wethers;* But, male for female is a trope, That would have startled even Pope, ON THE BENEFIT RECEIVED BY HIS MAJESTY FROM SEA-BATHING IN THE YEAR 1789. O SOVEREIGN of an isle renown'd For undisputed sway, Wherever o'er yon gulf profound Her navies wing their way, ters. * I have heard about my wether mutton from various quarIt was a blunder hardly pardonable in a man who has lived amid fields and meadows, grazed by sheep, almost these thirty years. I have accordingly satirized myself in two stanzas which I composed last night, while I lay awake, tormented with pain, and well dosed with laudanum. If you find them not very brilliant, therefore, you will know how to account for it.--Letter to Joseph Hill, Esq., dated April 15, With juster claim she builds at length And well may boast the waves her strength Which strength restored to thee. ADDRESSED TO MISS ON READING THE PRAYER FOR INDIFFERENCE.* AND dwells there in a female heart, Dwells there a wish in such a breast To smother in ignoble rest At once both bliss and woe! Far be the thought, and far the strain, Come, then, fair maid, (in nature wise,) * For Mrs. Greville's Ode, see Annual Register, vol. v. p. 202. In justice to the various powers Of pleasing, which you share, Join me, amid your silent hours, To form the better prayer. With lenient balm may Oberon hence To fairy land be driven, With every herb that blunts the sense Mankind received from heaven. "Oh! if my sovereign Author please, "Each tender tie of life defied, Whence social pleasures spring, Unmoved with all the world beside, A solitary thing—" Some Alpine mountain, wrapt in snow, Thus braves the whirling blast, Eternal winter doom'd to know, No genial spring to taste. In vain warm suns their influence shed, He rears unchanged his barren head, What though in scaly armour dress'd, e-in such a breast The shafts of woe No joy can ever dwell. 'Tis woven in the world's great plan, And fix'd by Heaven's decree, 'Tis nature bids, and whilst the laws Thus grief itself has comforts dear The sordid never know; And ecstasy attends the tear When virtue bids it flow. For, when it streams from that pure source, No bribes the heart can win To check, or alter from its course, Peace to the phlegm of sullen elves, Let no low thought suggest the prayer, Where'er the heavenly nymph is seen, With lustre-beaming eye. A train, attendant on their queen (Her rosy chorus) fly; |