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And Vice reluctant quits th' expected The strange misfortunes, oh! what words prey.

can tell?

Tell! ye neglected sylphs! who lap-dogs

guard,

AT

Cease, thou lorn mother! cease thy Why snatch'd ye not away your precious

wailings drear;

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[IN CHRIST'S HOSPITAL BOOK]

Medio de fonte leporum

Surgit amari aliquid.

ward?

Why suffer'd ye the lover's weight to fall On the ill-fated neck of much-loved Ball? The favourite on his mistress casts his eyes,

Gives a short melancholy howl, anddies.

Sacred his ashes lie, and long his rest! Anger and grief divide poor Julia's breast. Her eyes she fixt on guilty Florio first: On him the storm of angry grief must burst.

The storm he fled: he wooes a kinder fair,

Whose fond affections no dear puppies share.

"Twere vain to tell, how Julia pin'd away: Unhappy Fair! that in one luckless day

JULIA was blest with beauty, wit, and From future Almanacks the day be crost!At once her Lover and her Lap-dog lost.

grace:

Small poets loved to sing her blooming

face.

Before her altars, lo! a numerous train Preferr'd their vows; yet all preferr'd in

vain,

Till charming Florio, born to conquer,

came

1789.

QUÆ NOCENT DOCENT [IN CHRIST'S HOSPITAL BOOK]

O! mihi præteritos referat si Jupiter annos !

And touch'd the fair one with an equal OH! might my ill-past hours return

flame.

The flame she felt, and ill could she conceal

What every look and action would reveal. With boldness then, which seldom fails to move,

He pleads the cause of Marriage and of Love:

The course of Hymeneal joys he rounds, The fair one's eyes danc'd pleasure at the sounds.

Nought now remain'd but Noes'-how little meant !

And the sweet coyness that endears con

sent.

The youth upon his knees enraptur'd fell:

again!

No more, as then, should Sloth around me throw

Her soul-enslaving, leaden chain! No more the precious time would I employ

In giddy revells, or in thoughtless joy,
A present joy producing future woe.

But o'er the midnight Lamp I'd love to pore,

I'd seek with care fair Learning's depths to sound,

And gather scientific Lore:

Or to mature the embryo thoughts inclin'd,

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YE souls unused to lofty verse
Who sweep the earth with lowly
wing,

Like sand before the blast disperse

A Nose! a mighty Nose I sing!

As erst Prometheus stole from heaven the fire

To animate the wonder of his hand; Thus with unhallow'd hands, O muse,

aspire,

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In robes of ice my body wrap!
On billowy flames of fire I float,

Hear ye my entrails how they snap? Some power unseen forbids my lungs to breathe!

What fire-clad meteors round me whizzing fly!

And from my subject snatch a burn- I vitrify thy torrid zone beneath,

ing brand!

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Light of this once all darksome spot Where now their glad course mortals run,

First-born of Sirius begot

Upon the focus of the sun

I'll call thee! for such thy earthly

name

Proboscis fierce! I am calcined! I

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THO' no bold flights to thee belong;
And tho' thy lays with conscious fear,
Shrink from Judgement's eye severe,
Yet much I thank thee, Spirit of my
song!

What name so high, but what too low For, lovely Muse! thy sweet employ
must be?
Exalts my soul, refines my breast,
Comets, when most they drink the solar Gives each pure pleasure keener zest,

flame

Are but faint types and images of thee! Burn madly, Fire! o'er earth in ravage

run,

And softens sorrow into pensive Joy.
From thee I learn'd the wish to bless,
From thee to commune with my heart;
From thee, dear Muse! the gayer part,

Then blush for shame more red by fiercer To laugh with pity at the crowds that

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6 DESTRUCTION OF THE BASTILE-TO A YOUNG LADY

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HEARD'ST thou yon universal cry,

And dost thou linger still on Gallia's shore?

Go, Tyranny! beneath some barbarous sky

Thy terrors lost and ruin'd power deplore!

What tho' through many a groaning

age

Was felt thy keen suspicious rage,

Such scenes no more demand the tear
humane;

I see, I see! glad Liberty succeed
With every patriot virtue in her train!
And mark yon peasant's raptured
eyes;

Secure he views his harvests rise;
No fetter vile the mind shall know,
And Eloquence shall fearless glow.
Yes! Liberty the soul of Life shall
reign,

Shall throb in every pulse, shall flow thro' every vein !

VI

Shall France alone a Despot spurn? Shall she alone, O Freedom, boast thy care?

Yet Freedom roused by fierce Dis- | Lo, round thy standard Belgia's heroes

dain

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burn,

Tho' Power's blood-stain'd streamers fire the air,

And wider yet thy influence spread,

Nor e'er recline thy weary head, Till every land from pole to pole Shall boast one independent soul! And still, as erst, let favour'd Britain be First ever of the first and freest of the free! ? 1789.

TO A YOUNG LADY

WITH A POEM ON THE FRENCH
REVOLUTION

[Probably the preceding verses.] MUCH on my early youth I love to dwell,

Ere yet I bade that friendly dome farewell,

Where first, beneath the echoing cloisters pale,

I heard of guilt and wondered at the tale!

Yet though the hours flew by on careless wing,

Full heavily of Sorrow would I sing.
Aye as the star of evening flung its beam.
In broken radiance on the wavy stream,

My soul amid the pensive twilight gloom If Smiles more winning, and a gentler Mourned with the breeze, O Lee Boo!1

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the shade,

Mien

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Where peaceful Virtue weaves the Myrtle May this (I cried) my course through Life

braid.

30

And O! if Eyes whose holy glances roll, Swift messengers, and eloquent of soul;

1 Lee Boo, the son of Abba Thule, Prince of the Pelew Islands, came over to England with Captain Wilson, died of the small-pox, and is buried in Greenwich church-yard. See Keate's Account of the Pelew Islands. 1788.

2 Southey's Retrospect.

portray!

[display, New scenes of wisdom may each step And knowledge open as my days

advance!

Till what time Death shall pour the undarken'd ray,

My eye shall dart thro' infinite expanse, And thought suspended lie in rapture's blissful trance. 1789.

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where starts Affright!

dreadful is the sight.

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Ah! close the scene- ah! close- -for And starts not in his eye th' indignant

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