See Hammond pierce religion's golden mine,
And spread the treasur'd stores of truth divine.
All who to Albion gave the arts of peace
And best the labours plann'd of letter'd ease:
Who taught with truth, or with persuasion mov'd;
Who sooth'd with numbers, or with sense improv'd;
Who rang'd the powers of reasons, or refin'd,
All that adorn'd or humanised the mind;
Each priest of health, that mixed the balmy bowl,
To rear frail man, and stay the fleeting soul;
All crowd around, and echoing to the sky
Hail, Oxford, hail! with filial transport cry.
And see yon sapient train! with liberal aim,
'Twas theirs new plans of liberty to frame;
And on the Gothic gloom of slavish sway
To shed the dawn of intellectual day.

With mild debate each musing feature glows,

And well weigh'd counsels mark their meaning brows "Lo! these the leaders of thy patriot line,"

A Raleigh, Hamden, and a Somers shine.

These from thy source the bold contagion caught,
Their future sons the great example taught:

While in each youth th' hereditary flame
Still blazes, unextinguish'd, and the same!
Nor all the tasks of thoughtful peace engage,
'Tis thine to form the hero as the sage.
I see the sable-suited prince advance

With lilies crown'd, the spoils of bleeding France,
Edward. The muses in yon cloister'd shade,
Bound on his maiden thigh the martial blade:
Bade him the steel for British freedom draw,
And Oxford taught the deeds that Cressy saw.
And see, great father of the sacred band,
The patriot King before me seems to stand,
He by the bloom of this gay vale beguil'd
That cheer'd with lively green the shaggy wild,
Hither of yore, forlorn, forgotten maid,
The muse in prattling infancy convey'd ;
From vandal rage the helpless virgin bore,
And fixed her cradle on my friendly shore:

Soon grew the maid beneath his fostering hand,
Soon stream'd her blessings o'er the enlighten'd land.
Though simple was the dome, where first to dwell
She deign'd, and rude her early Saxon cell,
Lo! now she holds her state in sculptur'd bowers,
And proudly lifts to heaven her hundred towers.
'Twas Alfred first with letters and with laws,

Adorn'd, as he advanc'd, his country's cause:
He bade relent the Briton's stubborn soul,
And sooth'd to soft society's control
A rough untutor'd age.

SELECTIONS FROM THE HAMLET.

THE hinds how blest, who ne'er beguiled
To quit their hamlet's hawthorn wild,
Nor haunt the crowd, nor tempt the main,
For splendid care, and guilty gain.

When morning's twilight-tinctured beam
Strikes their low thatch with slanting gleam,
They rove abroad in ether blue,

To dip the scythe in fragrant dew;
The sheaf to bind, the beech to fell,
That nodding shades a craggy dell.

Midst gloomy glades, in warbles clear,
Wild nature's sweetest notes they hear,
On green untrodden banks they view
The hyacinth's neglected hue;

In their lone haunts, and woodland rounds,
They spy the squirrel's airy bounds;

And startle from her ashen spray,

Across the glen the screaming jay,
Each native charm their steps explore
Of solitude's sequester'd store.
No riot mars the simple fare

That o'er a glimmering hearth they share.

For them the moon with cloudless ray
Mounts, to illume their homeward way:
Their weary spirits to relieve,

The meadows incense breathe at eve.

Their humble porch with honey'd flowers
The curling woodbine's shade embowers:
From the small garden's thymy mound
Their bees in busy swarms resound;
Nor fell Disease, before his time,
Hastes to consume life's golden prime,
But when their temples long have wore
The silver crown of tresses hoar,
As studious still calm peace to keep,
Beneath a flowery turf they sleep.

RETIREMENT.

(Inscription in a Hermitage.)

BENEATH this stony roof reclined,
I soothe to peace my pensive mind ;
And while, to shade my lowly cave,
Embowering elms their umbrage wave,
And while the maple dish is mine,—
The beechen cup, unstained with wine,—
I scorn the gay licentious crowd,
Nor heed the toys that deck the proud.

At morn I take my customed round,
To mark how buds yon shrubby mound,
And every opening primrose count,
That trimly paints my blooming mount;
Or o'er the sculptures, quaint and rude
That grace my gloomy solitude,
I teach in winding wreaths to stray
Fantastic ivy's gadding spray.

At eve, within yon studious nook,
I ope my brass-embossed book,
Portrayed with many a holy deed

Of martyrs, crowned with heavenly meed;
Then, as my taper waxes dim,

Ι

Chant, ere I sleep, my measured hymn,
And, at the close, the gleams behold
Of parting wings, bedropt with gold.

While such pure joys my bliss create,
Who but would smile at guilty state?
Who but would wish his holy lot
In calm oblivion's humble grot?
Who but would cast his pomp away,
To take my staff, and amice gray,
And to the world's tumultuous stage
Prefer the blameless hermitage?

TO SLEEP.

ON this my pensive pillow, gentle Sleep!
Descend in all thy downy plumage drest;
Wipe with thy wing these eyes that wake to weep,
And place thy crown of poppies on my breast.