With bow and shaft, have burnt them. Some have
A splinter'd stump, bleach'd to a snowy white;
And some, memorial none where once they grew.
Yet life still lingers in thee, and puts forth
Proof not contemptible of what she can,
Even where death predominates. The spring
Finds thee not less alive to her sweet force
Than yonder upstarts of the neighb'ring wood,
So much thy juniors, who their birth receiv'd
Half a millennium since the date of thine.
But since, although well qualified by age
To teach, no spirit dwells in thee, nor voice
May be expected from thee, seated here
On thy distorted root, with hearers none
Or prompter, save the scene, I will perform
Myself the oracle, and will discourse
In my own ear such matter as I may.
One man alone, the father of us all,
Drew not his life from woman; never gaz'd,
With mute unconsciousness of what he saw,
On all around him; learn'd not by degrees,
Nor ow'd articulation to his ear:
But, moulded by his Maker into man
At once, upstood intelligent, survey'd
All creatures, with precision understood
Their purport, uses, properties, assigned
To each his name significant, and, fill'd
With love and wisdom, rendered back to Heav'n
In praise harmonious the first air he drew.
He was excus'd the penalties of dull
Minority. No tutor charg'd his hand
With the thought-tracing quill, or task'd his mind
With problems. History, not wanted yet,
Lean'd on her elbow, watching Time, whose course,
Eventful, should supply her with a theme ;-
WHICH THE AUTHOR HEARD SING ON NEW-YEAR'S DAY.
WHENCE is it, that amaz'd I hear
From yonder wither'd spray,
This foremost morn of all the year,
The melody of May ?
And why, since thousands would be proud
Of such a favour shown,
Am I selected from the crowd,
To witness it alone?
Sing'st thou, sweet Philomel, to me,
For that I also long
Have practis'd in the groves like thee,
Though not like thee in song?
Or sing'st thou rather ur der force
Of some divine com nand,
Commission'd to presage a course
Of happier days at hand?
Thrice welcome, then! for many a long
And joyless year have I,
As thou to-day, put forth my song
Beneath a wintry sky.
But thee no wintry skies can harm,
Who only need'st to sing,
To make ev'n January charm,
And ev'ry season Spring.
Written for insertion, in a collection of hand-writings and signatures made by Miss Patty, sister of Hannah More.
In vain to live from age to age
While modern bards endeavour,
I write my name in Patty's page,
And gain my point for ever.
A free but tame Redbreast, a favourite of
Miss Sally Hurdis.
THESE are not dew-drops, these are tears,
And tears by Sally shed
For absent Robin, who she fears,
With too much cause, is dead.
One morn he came not to her hand
As he was wont to come,
And on her finger perch'd, to stand
Picking his breakfast crumb.
Alarm'd, she call'd him, and perplex'd
She sought him but in vain,
That day he came not, nor the next,
Nor ever came again.
She, therefore, raised him here a tomb,
Though where he fell, or how,
None knows, so secret was his doom,
Nor where he moulders now.
Had half a score of coxcombs died
In social Robin's stead,
Poor Sally's tears had soon been dried,
Or haply never shed.
But Bob was neither rudely bold,
Nor spiritlessly tame ;
Nor was, like theirs, his bosom cold,
But always in a flame.
WILLIAM WILBERFORCE, ESQ.
THY Country, Wilberforce, with just disdain,
Hears thee by cruel men and impious call'd
Fanatick, for thy zeal to loose the enthrall'd
From exile, publick sale, and slav'ry's chain.
Friend of the poor, the wrong'd, the fetter gall'd,
Fear not lest labour such as thine be vain.
Thou hast achiev'd a part; hast gain'd the ear Of Britain's senate to thy glorious cause; Hope smiles, joy springs, and tho' cold caution pause And weave delay, the better hour is near That shall remunerate thy toils severe By peace for Afric, fenc'd with British laws.
Enjoy what thou hast won, esteem and love
From all the just on earth, and all the blest above.
(Printed in the Northampton Mercury.)
To purify their wine some people bleed
A lamb into the barrel, and succeed;
No nostrum, planters say, is half so good
To make fine sugar, as a negro's blood.
Now lambs and negroes both are harmless things,
And thence perhaps this wondrous virtue springs,
"Tis in the blood of innocence alone-
Good cause why planters never try their own
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