grief ! have thy sisters fallen from heaven? are they blast, that rushed unfrequent from the hill. The who rejoiced with thee, at night, no more? Yes, souls of the heroes were sad when she raised the tunethey have fallen, fair light! and thou dost often re- ful voice. Often had they seen the grave of Salgar, tire to mourn. But thou thyself shalt fail, one night, the dark dwelling of white-bosomed Colma. Colma and leave thy blue path in heaven. The stars will left alone on the hill, with all her voice of song! then lift their heads: they, who were ashamed in thy Salgar promised to come: but the night descended presence, will rejoice. Thou art now clothed with | around. Hear the voice of Colma, when she sat alone thy brightness. Look from thy gates in the sky. on the hill! Burst the cloud, O wind! that the daughter of night Colma. It is night; I am alone, forlorn on the hill may look forth! that the shaggy mountains may of storms. The wind is heard in the mountain. The brighten, and the ocean roll its white waves in light. torrent pours down the rock. No hut receives me

from the rain; forlorn on the hill of winds ! [Desolation of Balclutha.]

Rise, moon! from behind thy clouds. Stars of the

night, arise ! Lead me, some light, to the place where I have seen the walls of Balclutha, but they were my love rests from the chase alone! his bow near him, desolate. The fire had resounded in the halls; and unstrung: his dogs panting around him. But here I the voice of the people is heard no more. The must sit alone, by the rock of the mossy stream. The stream of Clutha was removed from its place by the stream and the wind roar aloud. I hear not the voice fall of the walls. The thistle shook there its lonely of my love! Why delays my Salgar, why the chief bead; the moss whistled to the wind. The fox looked of the hill his promise? Here is the rock, and here out from the windows; the rank grass of the wall the tree! here is the roaring stream! Thou didst wared round its head. Desolate is the dwelling of promise with night to be here. Ah! whither is my Moina ; silence is in the house of her fathers. Raise Salgar gone? With thee I would fly from my father ; the song of mourning, O bards! over the land of with thee from my brother of pride. Our race have strangers. They have but fallen before us: for one long been foes; we are not foes, o Salgar! day we must fall. Why dost thou build the hall, Cease a little while, O wind ! stream, be thou silent son of the winged days? Thou lookest from thy a while! let my voice be heard around! Let my wantowers to-day: yet a few years, and the blast of the derer hear mel Salgar, it is Colma who calls ! Here desert comes; it howls in thy empty court, and is the tree and the rock. Salgar, my love! I am here. whistles round thy half-worn shield. And let the Why delayest thou thy coming! Lo! the calm moon blast of the desert come! we shall be renowned in comes forth. The flood is bright in the vale. The our day! The mark of my arm shall be in battle ; rocks are gray on the steep. I see him not on the my name in the song of bards. Raise the song, send brow. His dogs come not before him with tidings of round the shell: let joy be heard in my hall. When his near approach. Here I must sit alone! thou, sun of heaven, shalt fail! if thou shalt fail, Who lie on the heath beside me? Are they my thou mighty light! if thy brightness is but for a sea- love and my brother? Speak to me, O my friend ! To son, like Fingal, our faine shall survive thy beams. Colma they give no reply. Speak to me: I am Such was the song of Fingal in the day of his joy. alone! My soul is tormented with fears! Ah! they

are dead! Their swords are red from the fight. O my (4 Description of Female Beauty.]

brother! my brother! why hast thou slain my Salgar?

why, O Salgar! hast thou slain my brother? Dear The daughter of the snow overheard, and left the were ye both to me! what shall I say in your praise ? hall of her secret sigh. She came in all her beauty, Thou wert fair on the hill among thousands ! he was like the moon from the cloud of the east. Loveliness terrible in fight. Speak to me; hear my voice; hear was around her as light. Her steps were like the me, sons of my love! They are silent; silent for music of songs. She saw the youth and loved him. ever! Cold, cold are their breasts of clay! Oh! He was the stolen sigh of her soul. Her blue eyes from the rock on the hill; from the top of the windy rolled on him in secret; and she blest the chief of steep, speak, ye ghosts of the dead ! speak, I will Morven.

not be afraid ! Whither are you gone to rest! In

what cave of the hill shall I find the departed ? No [The Songs of Selma.]

feeble voice is on the gale: no answer half-drowned in

the storm! Star of descending night! fair is thy light in the I sit in my grief! I wait for morning in my tears ! west! thou liftest thy unshorn head from thy cloud : Rear the tomb, ye friends of the dead. Close it not thy steps are stately on thy hill. What dost thou till Colma come. My life flies away like a dream : behold in the plain? The stormy winds are laid. why should I stay behind ? Here shall I rest with The murmur of the torrent comes from afar. Roaring my friends by the stream of the sounding rock. When wafes climb the distant rock. The flies of evening night comes on the hill, when the loud winds arise, are on their feeble wings; the hum of their course is my ghost shall stand in the blast, and mourn the on the field. What dost thou behold, fair light? death of my friends. The hunter shall hear from his But thou dost smile and depart. The waves come booth; he shall fear, but love my voice! for sweet with joy around thee: they bathe thy lovely hair. shall my voice be for my friends: pleasant were her Farewell, thou silent beain! Let the light of Ossian's friends to Colma! soul arise!

Such was thy song, Minona, softly blushing daughter And it does arise in its strength! I behold my de- of Torman. Our tears descended for Colma, and our parted friends. Their gathering is on Lora, as in the souls were sad! Ullin came with his harp; he gave days of other years. Fingal comes like a watery the song of Alpin. The voice of Alpin was pleasant; column of mist; his heroes are around: And see the the soul of Ryno was a beam of fire! But they had bards of song, gray-haired Ullin! stately Ryno ! rested in the narrow house; their voice had ceased in Alpin, with the tuneful voice! the soft complaint of Selma. Ullin had returned one day from the chase Minona! How are ye changed, my friends, since the before the heroes fell. He heard their strife on the days of Selma's feast? when we contended, like gales hill; their song was soft but sad! They mourned of spring, as they fly along the hill, and bend by the fall of Morar, first of mortal men! Ilis soul was turns the feebly-whistling grass.

like the soul of Fingal ; his sword like the sword of Minona came forth in her beauty, with downcast Oscar. But he fell, and his father mourned; his look and tearful eye. ller hair flew slowly on the sister's eyes were full of tears. Minona's eyes were full of tears, the sister of car-borne Morar. She re- thou awake with thy songs ? with all thy voice of tired from the song of Ullin, like the moon in the music? west, when she foresees the shower, and hides her fair Arise, winds of autumn, arise; blow along the heath! head in a cloud. I touched the harp, with Ullin; streams of the mountains, roar! roar, tempests, in the the song of mourning rose !

groves of my oaks! walk through broken clouds, 0 Ryno. The wind and the rain are past; calm is the moon! show thy pale face at intervals! bring to my noon of day. The clouds are divided in heaven. Over mind the night when all my children fell; when the green hills flies the inconstant sun. Red through Arindal the mighty fell ; when Daura the lovely the stony vale comes down the stream of the hill. failed! Daura, my daughter! thou wert fair; fair Sweet are thy murmurs, O stream! but more sweet is as the moon on Fura; white as the driven snow; sweet the voice I hear. It is the voice of Alpin, the son of as the breathing gale. Arindal, thy bow was strong; song, mourning for the dead! Bent is his head of thy spear was swift in the field ; thy look was like age; red his tearful eye. Alpin, thou son of song, mist on the wave; thy shield, a red cloud in a storm. why alone on the silent hill! why complainest thou, Armar, renowned in war, came, and sought Daura's as a blast in the wood; as a wave on the lonely love. He was not long refused ; fair was the hope shore?

of their friends! Alpin. My tears, O Ryno! are for the dead; my Erath, son of Odgal, repined ; his brother had been voice for those that have passed away. Tall thou art slain by Armor. He came disguised like a son of the on the hill; fair ainong the sons of the vale. But sea; fair was his skiff on the wave; white his locks thou shalt fall like Morar; the mourner shall sit on of age; calm his serious brow. Fairest of women, thy tomb. The hills shall know thee no more; thy he said, lovely daughter of Armin! a rock not disbow shall lie in the hall, unstrung!

tant in the sea bears a tree on its side; red shines Thou wert swift, O Morar! as a roe on the desert; the fruit afar! There Armor waits for Daura. I terrible as a meteor of fire. Thy wrath was as the come to carry his love! She went; she called on storm. Thy sword in battle, as lightning in the field. Armar. Nought answered but the son of the rock, Thy voice was a stream after rain ; like thunder on Armar, my love! my love! why tormentest thou me distant hills. Many fell by thy arm; they were con- with fear? hear, son of Arnart, hear; it is Daura who sumed in the flames of thy wrath. But when thou calleth thee! Erath the traitor fled laughing to the didst return from war, how peaceful was thy brow! | land. She lifted up her voice; she called for her Thy face was like the sun after rain; like the moon brother and her father. Arindal! Armin! none to in the silence of night; calm as the breast of the lake relieve your Daura! when the loud wind is laid.

Her voice came over the sea. Arindal my son deNarrow is thy dwelling now! dark the place of thine scended from the hill; rough in the spoils of the abode! With three steps I compass thy grave, o chase. His arrows rattled by his side; his bow was thou who wast so great before! Four stones, with in his hand : five dark gray dogs attend his steps. He their heads of moss, are the only memorial of thee. saw fierce Erath on the shore ; he seized and bound A tree with scarce a leaf, long grass which whistles him to an oak. Thick wind the thongs of the hide in the wind, mark to the hunter's eye the grave of around his limbs ; he loads the wind with his groans. the mighty Morar. Morar! thou art low indeed. Arindal ascends the deep in his boat, to bring Daura Thou hast no mother to mourn thee; no maid with to land. Armar came in his wrath, and let fly the her tears of love. Dead is she that brought thee forth. gray-feathered shaft. It sung; it sunk in thy heart, Fallen is the daughter of Morglan.

O Arindal, my son ! for Erath the traitor thou diedst. Who on his staff is this? who is this, whose head The car is stopped at once ; he panted on the roek, is white with age? whose eyes are red with tears ? who and expired. What is thy grief, 0 Daura ! when quakes at every step? It is thy father, O Morar! the round thy feet is poured thy brother's blood! The father of no son but thee. He heard of thy fame in boat is broken in twain. Armar plunges into the sea, war; he heard of foes dispersed; he heard of Morar's to rescue his Daura, or die. Sudden a blast from the renown; why did he not hear of his wound? Weep, hill came over the waves. He sunk, and he rose no thou father of Morar! weep; but thy son heareth more. thee not. Deep is the sleep of the dead; low their Alone, on the sea-beat rock, my daughter was heard pillow of dust. No more shall he hear thy voice; no to complain. Frequent and loud were her cries. more awake at thy call. When shall it be morn in What could her father do? All night I stood on the grave, to bid the slumberer awake? Farewell, the shore. I saw her by the faint beam of the moon. thou bravest of men! thou conqueror in the field ! | All night I heard her cries. Loud was the wind ; the but the field shall see thee no more ; nor the dark rain beat hard on the hill. Before morning appeared, wood be lightened with the splendour of thy steel. her voice was weak ; it died away like the evening Thou hast left no son. The song shall preserve thy breeze among the grass of the rocks. Spent with grief,

Future times shall hear of thee; they shall she expired ; and left thee, Armin, alone. Gone is hear of the fallen Morar!

my strength in war! fallen my pride among women! The grief of all arose, but most the bursting sigh When the storms aloft arise, when the north lifts of Armin. He remembers the death of his son, who the wave on high, I sit by the sounding shore, and fell in the days of his youth. Carmor was near the look on the fatal rock. Often by the setting moon hero, the chief of the echoing Galmal. Why bursts I see the ghosts of my children. Half-riewless, they the sigh of Armin, he said ? Is there a cause to mourn? walk in mournful conference together.

Will none The song comes, with its music, to melt and please of you speak in pity? They do not regard their the soul. It is like soft mist, that, rising from a lake, father. I am sad, o Carmor ! nor small is my cause pours on the silent vale; the green flowers are filled of wo! with dew, but the sun returns in his strength, and the Such were the words of the bards in the days mist is gone. Why art thou sad, 0 Armin! chief of of song, when the king heard the music of harps, sea-surrounded Gorma?

the tales of other times ! The chiefs gathered from Sad I am! nor small is my cause of wo! Carmor, all their hills, and heard the lovely sound. They thou hast lost no son ; thou hast lost no daughter of praised the voice of Cona! the first among a thousand beauty. Colgar the valiant lives ; and Annira, fairest bards ! But age is now on my tongue; my soul has maid. The boughs of thy house ascend, o Carmor! failed! I hear, at times, the ghosts of bards, and but Armin is the last of his race. Dark is thy bed, learn their pleasant song. But memory fails on my O Daura ! deep thy sleep in the tomb! When shalt | mind. I hear the call of years! They say, as they

name.

pass along, why does Ossian sing! Soon shall he lie To Damon's homely hut I fly;
in the narrow house, and no bard shall raise his fame! I see it smoking on the plain;
Roll on, ye dark-brown years; ye bring no joy on When storms are past and fair the sky,
your course! Let the tomb open to Ossian, for his I'll often seek my cave agaim.
strength has failed. The sons of song are gone to
rest. My voice remains, like a blast that roars, lonely,

From Macpherson's manuscripts at Belleville on a sea-surrounded rock, after the winds are laid we copy the following fragment, marked, An AdThe dark moss whistles there ; the distant mariner dress to Venus, 1785:sees the waving trees!

Thrice blest, and more than thrice, the morn When Macpherson had not the groundwork of Whose genial gale and purple light Ossian to build upon, he was a very indifferent Awaked, then chased the night, poet. The following, however, shows that, though On which the Queen of Love was born ! his taste was defective, he had poetical fancy :

Yet hence the sun's unhallowed ray,

With native beams let Beauty glow;
The Cave.

What need is there of other day,

Than the twin-stars that light those hills of snow? [Written in the Highlands.] The wind is up, the field is bare, Some hermit lead me to his cell,

THOMAS CHATTERTON. Where Contemplation, lonely fair,

The success of Macpherson's Ossian seems to have With blessed content has chose to dwell.

prompted the remarkable forgeries of ChattertonBehold! it opens to my sight, Dark in the rock, beside the flood;

The marvellous boy, Dry fern around obstructs the light;

The sleepless soul that perished in his pride.* The winds above it move the wood.

Such precocity of genius was never perhaps before Reflected in the lake, I see

witnessed. We have the poems of Pope and Cowley The downward mountains and the skies, written, one at twelve, and the other at fifteen years The flying bird, the waving tree,

The goats that on the hill arise.
The gray-cloaked herd* drives on the cow;

The slow-paced fowler walks the heath;
A freckled pointer scours the brow;

A musing shepherd stands beneath. Curved o'er the ruin of an oak,

The woodman lifts his axe on high ; The hills re-echo to the stroke;

I see I see the shivers fly! Some rural maid, with apron full,

Brings fuel to the homely flame; I see the smoky columns roll,

And, through the chinky hut, the beam. Beside a stone o'ergrown with moss,

Two well-met hunters talk at ease; Three panting dogs beside repose;

One bleeding deer is stretched on grass. A lake at distance spreads to sight,

Skirted with shady forests round; In midst, an island's rocky height

Sustains a ruin, once renowned.
One tree bends o'er the naked walls;

Two broad-winged eagles hover nigh;
By intervals a fragment falls,
As blows the blast along the sky.

Thomas Chatterton.
The rough-spun hinds the pinnace guide

of age, but both were inferior to the verses of ChatWith labouring oars along the flood;

terton at eleven ; and his imitations of the antique, An angler, bending o'er the tide,

executed when he was fifteen and sixteen, exhibit a Hangs from the boat the insidious wood.

vigour of thought and facility of versification—to Beside the flood, beneath the rocks,

say nothing of their antiquarian character, which On grassy bank, two lovers lean;

puzzled the most learned men of the day-that stamp Bend on each other amorous looks,

him a poet of the first class. His education also was And seem to laugh and kiss between.

miserably deficient; yet when a mere boy, eleven The wind is rustling in the oak;

years of age, this obscure youth could write as folThey seem to hear the tread of feet;

lows: They start, they rise, look round the rock ;

Almighty Framer of the skies,
Again they smile, again they meet.

O let our pure devotion rise
But see! the gray mist from the lake

Like incense in thy sight!
Ascends upon the shady hills;

Wrapt in impenetrable shade,
Dark storms the murmuring forests shake,

The texture of our souls was made,
Rain beats around a hundred rills.

Till thy command gave light.
* Neat-herd.

* Wordsworth.

48

The sun of glory gleamed, the ray

romantic imagination. He would also lie down on Refined the darkness into day,

the meadows in view of St Mary's church, Bristol, And bid the vapours fly:

fix his eyes upon the ancient edifice, and seem as if Impelled by his eternal love,

he were in a kind of trance. He thus nursed the He left his palaces above,

enthusiasm which destroyed him. Though correct To cheer our gloomy sky.

and orderly in his conduct, Chatterton, before he How shall we celebrate the day,

was sixteen, imbibed principles of infidelity, and the When God appeared in

rtal clay,

idea of suicide was familiar to his mind. It was, The mark of worldly scorn.

however, overruled for a time by his passion for When the archangel's heavenly lays

literary fame and distinction. It was a favourite Attempted the Redeemer's praise,

maxim with him, that man is equal to anything, And hailed Salvation's morn?

and that everything might be achieved by diligence A humble form the Godhead wore,

and abstinence. His alleged discoveries having The pains of poverty he bore,

attracted great attention, the youth stated that he To gaudy pomp unknown :

found the manuscripts in his mother's house. 'In Though in a human walk he trod,

the muniment room of St Mary Redcliffe church Still was the man Almighty God,

of Bristol, several chests had been anciently depoIn glory all his own.

sited, among which was one called the “ Coffre” of

Mr Canynge, an eminent merchant of Bristol, who Despised, oppressed, the Godhead bears

had rebuilt the church in the reign of Edward IV. The torments of this vale of tears, Nor bids his vengeance rise :

About the year 1727 those chests had been broken

open by an order from proper authority: some anHe saw the creatures he had made

cient deeds had been taken out, and the remaining Revile his power, his peace invade, He saw with Mercy's eyes.

manuscripts left exposed as of no value. Chatter

ton's father, whose uncle was sexton of the church, THOMAS CHATTERTON was born at Bristol, No- had carried off great numbers of the parchments, and vember 20, 1752. His father, who had taught the had used them as covers for books in his school. Free School there, died before his birth, and he Amidst the residue of his father's ravages, Chatterwas educated at a charity school, where nothing ton gave out that he had found many writings of but English, writing, and accounts were taught. Mr Canynge, and of Thomas Rowley (the friend of His first lessons were said to have been from a black- Canynge), a priest of the fifteenth century.'* These letter Bible, which may have had some effect on fictitious poems were published in the Town and his youthful imagination. At the age of fourteen Country Magazine, to which Chatterton had become he was put apprentice to an attorney, where his a contributor, and occasioned a warm controversy situation was irksome and uncomfortable, but left among literary antiquaries. Some of them he had him ample time to prosecute his private studies. He submitted to Horace Walpole, who showed them to was passionately devoted to poetry, antiquities, and Gray and Mason; but these competent judges proheraldry, and ambitious of distinction. His ruling nounced them to be forgeries. After three years passion, he says, was 'unconquerable pride.' He spent in the attorney's office, Chatterton obtained now set himself to accomplish his various imposi- his release from his apprenticeship, and went to tions by pretended discoveries of old manuscripts. London, where he engaged in various tasks for the In October 1768 the new bridge at Bristol was booksellers, and wrote for the magazines and news. finished; and Chatterton sent to a newspaper in papers. He obtained an introduction to Beckford, the town a pretended account of the ceremonies the patriotic and popular lord-mayor, and his own on opening the old bridge, introduced by a letter inclinations led him to espouse the opposition party. to the printer, intimating that the description of “But no money,' he says, “is to be got on that side the friars first passing over the old bridge was taken of the question; interest is on the other side. But from an ancient manuscript.' To one man, fond he is a poor author who cannot write on both sides.' of heraldic honours, he gave a pedigree reaching up He boasted that his company was courted everyto the time of William the Conqueror; to another where, and that he would settle the nation before he presents an ancient poem, the 'Romaunt of he had done.' The splendid visions of promotion the Cnyghte,' written by one of his ancestors and consequence, however, soon vanished, and even 450 years before; to a religious citizen of Bristol his labours for the periodical press failed to afford he gives an ancient fragment of a sermon on the him the means of comfortable subsistence. He apDivinity of the Holy Spirit, as wroten by Thomas plied for the appointment of a surgeon's mate to Rowley, a monk of the fifteenth oentury; to another, Africa, but was refused the necessary recommendasolicitous of obtaining information about Bristol, he tion. This seems to have been his last hope, and he makes the valuable present of an account of all the made no farther effort at literary composition. His churches of the city, as they appeared three hundred spirits had always been unequal, alternately gloomy years before, and accompanies it with drawings and and elevated—both in extremes; he had cast off the descriptions of the castle, the whole pretended to be restraints of religion, and had no steady principle to drawn from writings of the 'gode prieste Thomas guide him, unless it was a strong affection for his Rowley.' Horace Walpole was engaged in writing mother and sister, to whom he sent remittances of the History of British Painters, and Chatterton sent money, while his means lasted. Habits of intemhim an account of eminent 'Carvellers and Peync- perance, succeeded by fits of remorse, exasperated ters, who once flourished in Bristol. These, with his constitutional melancholy; and after being revarious impositions of a similar nature, duped the duced to actual want (though with characteristic citizens of Bristol. Chatterton had no confidant in pride he rejected a dinner offered him by his landhis labours; he toiled in secret, gratified only by lady the day before his death), he tore all his papers, *the stoical pride of talent.' He frequently wrote and destroyed himself by taking arsenic, August 25, by moonlight, conceiving that the immediate pre- 1770. At the time of his death he was aged sevensence of that luminary added to the inspiration. His teen years nine months and a few days. *No EngSundays were commonly spent in walking alone into lish poet,' says Campbell, “ever equalled him at the the country about Bristol, and drawing sketches of churches and other objects which had impressed his

same age.' The remains of the unhappy youth were The satirical and town effusions of Chatterton interred in a shell in the burying-ground of Shoe- are often in bad taste, yet display a wonderful comLane workhouse. His unfinished papers he had de- mand of easy language and lively sportive allusion. stroyed before his death, and his room, when broken They have no traces of juvenility, unless it be in open, was found covered with scraps of paper. The adopting the vulgar scandals of the day, unworthy citizens of Bristol have erected a monument to the his original genius. In his satire of Kew Gardens memory of their native poet.

are the following lines, alluding to the poet laureate The poems of Chatterton, published under the and the proverbial poverty of poets :name of Rowley, consist of the tragedy of Ella, the Execution of Sir Charles Bawdin, Ode to Ella,

Though sing-song Whitehead ushers in the year, the Battle of Hastings, the Tournament, one or two

With joy to Britain's king and sovereign dear, Dialogues, and a description of Canynge's Feast.

And, in compliance to an ancient mode, Some of them, as the Ode to Ella (which we sub

Measures his syllables into an ode; join), have exactly the air of modern poetry, only

Yet such the scurvy merit of his muse, disguised with antique spelling and phraseology.

He bows to deans, and licks his lordship's shoes ;

Then leave the wicked barren way of rhyme, The avowed compositions of Chatterton are equally inferior to the forgeries in poetical powers and dic

Fly far from poverty, be wise in time: tion; which is satisfactorily accounted for by Sir

Regard the office more, Parnassus less, Walter Scott by the fact, that his whole powers and

Put your religion in a decent dress : energies must, at his early age, have been converted

Then may your interest in the town advance,

Above the reach of muses or romance. to the acquisition of the obsolete language and peculiar style necessary to support the deep-laid decep- In a poem entitled The Prophecy are some vigorous tion. He could have had no time for the study of stanzas, in a different measure, and remarkable for our modern poets, their rules of verse, or modes of maturity and freedom of style :expression; while his whole faculties were intensely

This truth of old was sorrow's friendemployed in the Herculean task of creating the person, history, and language of an ancient poet, which,

Times at the worst will surely mend.' vast as these faculties were, were sufficient wholly

The difficulty's then to know to engross, though not to overburden them. Å

How long Oppression's clock can go ;

When Britain's sons may cease to sigh, power of picturesque painting seems to be Chatterton's most distinguishing feature as a poet. The

And hope that their redemption's nigh. heroism of Sir Charles Bawdin, who

When vile Corruption's brazen face
Summed the actions of the day

At council-board shall take ter place;
Each night before he slept,

And lords-commissioners resort and who bearded the tyrant king on his way to the

To welcome her at Britain's court; scaffold, is perhaps his most striking portrait. The

Look up, ye Britons ! cease to sigh, following description of Morning in the tragedy of

For your redemption draweth nigh. Ella, is in the style of the old poets :

See Pension's harbour, large and clear, Bright sun had in his ruddy robes been dight,

Defended by St Stephen's pier! From the red east he fitted with his train;

The entrance safe, by current led, The Houris draw away the gate of Night,

Tiding round G—'s jetty head; Her sable tapestry was rent in twain :

Look up, ye Britons ! cease to sigh, The dancing streaks bedeckëd heaven's plain,

For your redemption draweth nigh. And on the dew did smile with skimmering eye, When civil power shall snore at ease; Like gouts of blood which do black armour stain, While soldiers fire-to keep the peace ; Shining upon the bourn which standeth by;

When murders sanctuary find, The soldiers stood upon the hillis side,

And petticoats can Justice blind; Like young enleaved trees which in a forest bide.

Look up, ye Britons! cease to sigh, A description of Spring in the same poem

For your redemption draweth nigh. The budding floweret blushes at the light,

Commerce o'er Bondage will prevail, The meads be sprinkled with the yellow hue,

Free as the wind that fills her sail. In daisied mantles is the mountain dight,

When she complains of vile restraint, The fresh young cowslip bendeth with the dew; And Power is deaf to her complaint; The trees en leafed, into heaven straight,

Look up, ye Britons ! cease to sigh, When gentle winds do blow, to whistling din is For your redemption draweth nigh. brought.

When at Bute's feet poor Freedom lies, The evening comes, and brings the dews along,

Marked by the priest for sacrifice, The ruddy welkin shineth to the eyne,

And doomed a victim for the sins Around the ale-stakel minstrels sing the song,

Of half the outs and all the ins; Young ivy round the door-post doth entwine;

Look up, ye Britons! cease to sigh, I lay me on the grass, yet to my will

For your redemption draweth nigh. Albeit all is fair, there lacketh something still.

When time shall bring your wish about, In the epistle to Canynge, Chatterton has a striking

Or, seven-years lease, you sold, is out; censure of the religious interludes which formed

No future contract to fulfil ; the early drama; but the idea, as Warton remarks,

Your tenants holding at your will; is the result of that taste and discrimination which

Raise up your heads ! yout right demandcould only belong to a more advanced period of so

For your redemption's in your hand. ciety

Then is your time to strike the blow, Plays made from holy tales I hold unmeet;

And let the slaves of Mammon know, Let some great story of a man be sung;

Britain's true sons a bribe can scorn, When as a man we God and Jesus treat,

And die as free as they were born.
In my poor mind we do the Godhead wrong.

Virtue again shall take her seat,
The sign-post of an alehouse.

And your redemption stand complete.