I'd have you know, you upstart minx!
Ere you were form'd, with all your sinks,
A lake I was, compared with which,
Your stream is but a paltry ditch:
And still, on honest labour bent,
I ne'er a single flash misspent.
And yet no folks of high degree
Would e'er vouchsafe to visit me,
As in their coaches by they rattle,
Forsooth! to hear your idle prattle.
Though half the business of my flooding
Is to provide them cakes and pudding:
Or furnish stuff for many a trinket,

Which, though so fine, you scarce would think it.
When Boulton's skill has fix'd their beauty,
To my rough toil first owed their duty.
But I'm plain Goody of the mill,
And you are-Madame Cascadille!"

Now gleaming from the rocky height,
Now, in rough eddies, foaming white.
Nor envy me the gay, or great,
That visit my obscure retreat.
None wonders that a clown can dig,
But 'tis some art to dance a jig.
Your talents are employ'd for use,
Mine to give pleasure, and amuse.
And though, dear Coz, no folks of taste
Their idle hours with you will waste,
Yet many a grist comes to your mill,
Which helps your master's bags to fill.
While I, with all my notes and trilling,
For Damon never got a shilling.
Then, gentle Coz, forbear your clamours,
Enjoy your hoppers, and your hammers:
We gain our ends by different ways,
And you get bread, and I get-praise."

ABSENCE.

WITH leaden foot Time creeps along,
While Delia is away,

With her, nor plaintive was the song,
Nor tedious was the day.

Ah, envious power! reverse my doom,
Now double thy career;

Strain every nerve, stretch every plume, And rest them when she's here.

HENRY BROOKE was born in the county of Cavan, in Ireland, where his father was a clergyman. He studied at Trinity College, Dublin, and was a pupil of Dr. Sheridan; but he was taken from the university at the age of seventeen, and sent to England, to study the law at the Temple. On his coming to London he brought letters of introduction (probably from Dr. Sheridan) to Pope and Swift, both of whom noticed him as a youth of promising talents. At the end of a few years he returned to Dublin, and endeavoured to practice as a chamber counsel; but, without having obtained much business, involved himself in the cares of a family, by marrying a beautiful cousin of his own, who had been consigned to his guardianship. It is related, not much to his credit, that he espoused her in her thirteenth year. The union, however, proved to be as happy as mutual affection could make it. Having paid another visit to London, he renewed his acquaintance with Pope; and, with his encouragement, published his poem, entitled, "Universal Beauty." This poem forms a curious, but unacknowledged prototype of Darwin's "Botanic Garden." It has a resemblance to that work, in manner, in scientific spirit, and

in volant geographical allusion, too striking to be supposed accidental; although Darwin has gone beyond his original, in prominent and ostentatious imagery.

After publishing his poem he returned to Ireland, and applied to his profession; but his heart was not in it, and he came once more to England, to try his fortune as a man of letters. In that character, he was cordially received by the Prince of Wales and his friends, as an accession to their phalanx; and this patronage was the more flattering to Brooke, as the maintenance of patriotic principles was the declared bond of union at the Prince's court. He had begun to translate the "Jerusalem" of Tasso, and had proceeded as far as the fourth book; but it is said, that he was invited to quit this task, that he might write a tragedy in the cause of Freedom, which should inspirit the people of England. Glover, it was pretended, was the epic champion of Liberty, who had pointed her spear at Walpole; and Brooke was now to turn the arm of tragedy against him, by describing a tyrannic minister, in his play of "Gustavus Vasa." With regard to Glover, this was certainly untrue. His poetry breathed the spirit of liberty, but he was

above the wretched taste of making a venerable antique subject the channel of grotesque allusion to modern parties, or living characters. If Brooke's Trollio was really meant for Walpole, the minister's friends need not have been much alarmed at the genius of a tragic poet, who could descend to double meanings. They might have felt secure, one would think, that the artifice of poets could not raise any dangerous zeal in Englishmen, against their malt or excise bills, by the most cunning hints about Thermopyla or Dalecarlia. But as if they had been in collusion with Brooke, to identify Walpole with Trollio, they interdicted the representation of the play. The author therefore published it, and got, it is said, £800 by the sale.

He lived, for some time, very comfortably on this acquisition, at Twickenham, in the neighbourhood of Pope, till the state of his health obliged him to seek the benefit of his native air; when to the surprise of those who knew him, he determined to remain in Ireland. This resolution was owing to the influence of his wife, who apprehended that his political zeal, among his English friends, might lead him to some intemperate publication. Brooke, however, had too much of the politician to lose it by returning to his native soil. In the year of the rebellion, he

addressed his "Farmer's Letters" to his countrymen, and they were supposed to have had a beneficial influence on their temper, at a critical period. He was also, to his honour, one of the earliest advocates for alleviating the penal laws against the Catholics. Their pacific behaviour in 1745 had certainly furnished him with a powerful argument in their behalf.

He wrote thirteen dramatic pieces, of which "Gustavus Vasa," and the "Earl of Essex,” were the only two that ever reached the English stage. The rest were not heard of in England, till his collected works were published in 1778; but his novel, "The Fool of Quality," gave some popularity to his name. In Ireland, Lord Chesterfield gave him the appointment of a barrackmaster, which he held till his death. The accounts of his private circumstances, in that kingdom, are given rather confusedly by his biographers; but it appears, upon the whole, that they were unfortunate. He supported an only brother in his house, with a family as numerous as his own; and ruined himself by his generosity. At last the loss of his wife, after a union of fifty years, the death of many of his children, and his other misfortunes, overwhelmed his intellects. Of this imbecility there were indeed some manifestations in the latest productions of his

pen.

THE REPTILE AND INSECT WORLD. FROM " UNIVERSAL BEAUTY," BOOK V. LIKE Nature's law no eloquence persuades, The mute harangue our every sense invades ; Th' apparent precepts of the Eternal Will His every work, and every object fill; Round with our eyes his revelation wheels, Our every touch his demonstration feels. And, O Supreme! whene'er we cease to know Thee, the sole Source, whence sense and science Then must all faculty, all knowledge fail, [flow! And more than monster o'er the man prevail.

Not thus he gave our optic's vital glance, Amid omniscient art, to search for chance, Blind to the charms of Nature's beauteous frame; Nor made our organ vocal, to blaspheme: Not thus he will'd the creatures of his nod, And made the mortal to unmake his God; Breathed on the globe, and brooded o'er the wave, And bid the wide obsequious world conceive: Spoke into being myriads, myriads rise, And with young transport gaze the novel skies; Glance from the surge, beneath the surface scud, Or cleave enormous the reluctant flood; Or roll vermicular their wanton maze, And the bright path with wild meanders glaze; Frisk in the vale, or o'er the mountains bound, Or in huge gambols shake the trembling ground; Swarm in the beam; or spread the plumy sailThe plume creates, and then directs the gale; While active gaiety, and aspect bright, In each expressive, sums up all delight.

The reptile first, how exquisitely form'd, With vital streams through every organ warm'd! External round the spiral muscle winds, And folding close th' interior texture binds; Secure of limbs or needless wing he steers, And all one locomotive act appears; His rings with one elastic membrane bound, The prior circlet moves th' obsequious round The next, and next, its due obedience owes, And with successive undulation flows. The mediate glands, with unctuous juice replete, Their stores of lubricating guile secrete; Still opportune, with prompt emission flow, And slipping frustrate the deluded foe; When the stiff clod their little augers bore, And all the worm insinuates through the pore.

Slow moving next, with grave majestic pace,
Tenacious snails their silent progress trace;
Through foreign fields secure from exile roam,
And sojourn safe beneath their native home.
Their domes self-wreathed, each architect attend,
With mansions lodge them, and with mail defend!
But chief, when each his wint'ry portal forms,
And mocks secluded from incumbent storms:
Till gates, unbarring with the vernal ray,
Give all the secret hermitage to day;
Then peeps the sage from his unfolding doors,
And cautious heaven's ambiguous brow explores:
Toward the four winds four telescopes he bends,
And on his own astrology depends;

Assured he glides beneath the smiling calm,
Bathes in the dew, and sips the morning balm;
The peach this pamp'ring epicure devours,
And climbing on the topmost fruitage towers.

Such have we cull'd from nature's reptile scene,
Least accurate of all the wondrous train,
Who plunged recluse in silent caverns sleep;
Or multipede, earth's leafy verdure creep;
Or on the pool's new mantling surface play,
And range a drop as whales may range the sea;
Or ply the rivulet with supple oars,
And oft, amphibious, course the neighb'ring
shores;

Or shelt'ring, quit the dank inclement sky,
And condescend to lodge where princes lies;
There tread the ceiling, an inverted floor,
And from its precipice depend secure :

Or who nor creep, nor fly, nor walk, nor swim,
But claim new motion with peculiar limb,
Successive spring with quick elastic bound,
And thus transported pass the refluent ground.
Or who all native vehicles despise,
And buoy'd upon their own inventions rise;
Shoot forth the twine, their light aerial guide,
And mounting o'er the distant zenith ride.
Or who a twofold apparatus share,
Natives of earth, and habitants of air;
Like warriors stride, oppress'd with shining mail,
But furl'd, beneath, their silken pennons vail :
Deceived, our fellow reptile we admire,
His bright endorsement, and compact attire,
When lo! the latent springs of motion play,
And rising lids disclose the rich inlay ;
The tissued wing its folded membrane frees,
And with blithe quavers fans the gath'ring breeze;
Elate tow'rds Heaven the beauteous wonder flies,
And leaves the mortal wrapp'd in deep surprise.
So when the guide led Tobit's youthful heir,
Elect, to win the seven times widow'd fair,
Th' angelic form, conceal'd in human guise,
Deceived the search of his associates eyes;
Till swift each charm bursts forth like issuing
flame,

And circling rays confess his heavenly frame;
The zodiac round his waist divinely turns,
And waving radiance o'er his plumage burns:
In awful transports rapt, the youth admires,
While light from earth the dazzling shape aspires.
Oh think, if superficial scenes amaze,
And e'en the still familiar wonders please,
These but the sketch, the garb, the vail of things,
Whence all our depth of shallow science springs;
Think, should this curtain of Omniscience rise,
Think of the sight! and think of the surprise!
Scenes inconceivable, essential, new,
Whelm'd on our soul, and lightning on our view!-
How would the vain disputing wretches shrink,
And shivering wish they could no longer think;
Reject each model, each reforming scheme,
No longer dictate to the Grand Supreme,
But, waking, wonder whence they dared to dream!
All is phenomenon, and type on earth,
Replete with sacred and mysterious birth,
Deep from our search, exalted from our soar;
And reason's task is, only to adore. [swarms,
Who that beholds the summer's glist'ring
Ten thousand thousand gaily gilded forms,
In volant dance of mix'd rotation play,
Bask in the beam, and beautify the day;

Would think these airy wantons so adorn,
Were late his vile antipathy and scorn,
Prone to the dust, or reptile through the mire,
And ever thence unlikely to aspire ?

Or who with transient view, beholding, loathes Those crawling sects, whom vilest semblance clothes;

Who, with corruption, hold their kindred state,
As by contempt, or negligence of fate;
Could think, that such, reversed by wondrous

doom,

Sublimer powers and brighter forms assume;
From death, their future happier life derive,
And though apparently entomb'd, revive;
Changed, through amazing transmigration rise,
And wing the regions of unwonted skies;
So late depress'd, contemptible on Earth,
Now elevate to Heaven by second birth!

No fictions here to willing fraud invite,
Led by the marvellous, absurd delight;
No golden ass, no tale Arabians feign;
Nor flitting forms of Naso's magic strain,
Deucalion's progeny of native stone,

Or armies from Cadmean harvests grown:
With many a wanton and fantastic dream,
The laurel, mulberry, and bashful stream;
Arachne shrunk beneath Tritonia's rage;
Tithonus changed and garrulous with age.
Not such mutations deck the chaster song,
Adorn'd with nature, and with truth made
strong;

No debt to fable, or to fancy due,
And only wondrous facts reveal'd to view.

Though numberless these insect tribes of air, Though numberless each tribe and species fair, Who wing the moon, and brighten in the blaze, Innumerous as the sands which bend the seas; These have their organs, arts, and arms, and tools,

And functions exercised by various rules;
The saw, ax, auger, trowel, piercer, drill;
The neat alembic, and nectareous still;
Their peaceful hours the loom and distaff know :
But war, the force and fury of the foe,
The spear, the falchion, and the martial mail,
And artful stratagem, where strength may fail.
Each tribe peculiar occupations claim,
Peculiar beauties deck each varying frame;
Attire and food peculiar are assign'd,
And means to propagate their varying kind.
Each, as reflecting on their primal state,
Or fraught with scientific craft innate,
With conscious skill their oval embryon shed,
Where native first their infancy was fed:
Or on some vegetating foliage glued;
Or o'er the flood they spread their future brood;
A slender cord the floating jelly binds,
Eludes the wave, and mocks the warring winds;
O'er this their sperm in spiral order lies,
And pearls in living ranges greet our eyes.
In firmest oak they scoop a spacious tomb,
And lay their embryo in the spurious womb:
Some flowers, some fruit, some gems, or blossoms

choose,

And confident their darling hopes infuse ·

While some their eggs in ranker carnage lay,
And to their young adapt the future prey.
Meantime the Sun his fost'ring warmth be-
queaths,

Each tepid air its motive influence breathes,
Mysterious springs the wavering life supply,
And quick'ning births unconscious motion try;
Mature, their slender fences they disown,
And break at once into a world unknown.

All by their dam's prophetic care receive
Whate'er peculiar indigence can crave:
Profuse at hand the plenteous table's spread,
And various appetites are aptly fed.

Nor less each organ suits each place of birth,
Finn'd in the flood, or reptile o'er the earth;
Each organ, apt to each precarious state,
As for eternity design'd complete.

Thus nursed, these inconsiderate wretches grow,
Take all as due, still thoughtless that they owe.
When lo! strange tidings prompt each secret
breast,

And whisper wonders not to be express'd;
Each owns his error in his later cares,
And for the new unthought-of world prepares:
New views, new tastes, new judgments are ac-
quired,

And all now loathe delights so late admired.
In confidence the solemn shroud they weave,
Or build the tomb, or dig the deadly grave;

Intrepid there resign their parting breath,
And give their former shape the spoils of death;
But reconceived as in a second womb,
Through metamorphoses, new forms assume:
On death their true exalted life depends,
Commencing there, where seemingly it ends.

The fullness now of circling time arrives;
Each from the long, the mortal sleep revives;
The tombs pour forth their renovated dead,
And, like a dream, all former scenes are fled.
But oh! what terms expressive may relate
The change, the splendour of their new-form'd
state?

Their texture nor composed of filmy skin,
Of cumbrous flesh without, or bone within,
But something than corporeal more refined,
And agile as their blithe informing mind.
In every eye ten thousand brilliants blaze,
And living pearls the vast horizon gaze;
Gemm'd o'er their heads the mines of India gleam,
And Heaven's own wardrobe has array'd their
frame;

Each spangled back bright sprinkling specks

adorn,

Each plume imbibes the rosy tinctured morn; Spread on each wing the florid seasons glow, Shaded and verged with the celestial bow, Where colours blend an ever varying dye, And wanton in their gay exchanges vie.

THIS worthy and poetical quaker was the son of a draper, in London, and was born in the borough of Southwark. His father retired to Amwell, in Hertfordshire, when our poet was only ten years old; and this removal, together with the circumstance of his never having been inoculated for the small-pox, proved an unfortunate impediment to his education. He was put to a day-school, in the neighbouring town of Ware, where not much instruction was to be had; and from that little he was called away, upon the first alarm of infection. Such indeed was his constant apprehension of the disease, that he lived for twenty years within twenty miles of London without visiting it more than once. About the age of seventeen, however, he betook himself to reading. His family, from their cast of opinions and society, were not likely to abound either in books or conversation relating to literature; but he happened to form an acquaintance and friendship with a neighbour of the name of Frogley, a master bricklayer, who, though an uneducated man, was an admirer of poetry, and by his intercourse with this friend he strengthened his literary propensity. His first poetical essays were transmitted to the Gentleman's Magazine. In his thirtieth year he published four elegies, which were favourably received. His poems,

entitled, "The Garden," and "Amwell," and his volume of collected poetical pieces, appeared after considerable intervals; and his "Critical Essays on the English Poets," two years after his death. These, with his "Remarks on the Poems of Rowley," are all that can be called his literary productions. He published also two political tracts, in answer to Dr. Johnson's "Patriot," and 66 False Alarm." His critical essays contain some judicious remarks on Denham and Dyer; but his verbal strictures on Collins and Goldsmith discover a miserable insensibility to the soul of those poets. His own verses are chiefly interesting, where they breathe the pacific principles of the quaker; while his personal character engages respect, from exhibiting a public spint and liberal taste beyond the habits of his brethHe was well informed in the laws of his country; and, though prevented by his tenets from becoming a magistrate, he made himself useful to the inhabitants of Amwell, by his offices of arbitration, and by promoting schemes of local improvement. He was constant in his attendance at turnpike meetings, navigation trusts, and commissions of land-tax. Ware and Hertford were indebted to him for the plan of opening a spacious road between those two towns. His treatises on the highway and parochial laws were

ren.

the result of long and laudable attention to those subjects.

His verses, and his amiable character, gained him by degrees a large circle of literary acquaintance, which included Dr. Johnson, Sir William Jones, Mrs. Montague, and many other distinguished individuals; and having submitted to inoculation, in his thirty-sixth year, he was from that period more frequently in London. In his retirement he was fond of gardening; and, in

amusing himself with the improvement of his grounds, had excavated a grotto in the side of a hill, which his biographer, Mr. Hoole, writing in 1785, says, was still shown as a curiosity in that part of the country. He was twice married. His first wife was the daughter of his friend Frogley. He died at a house in Radcliff, of a putrid fever, and was interred there in the burying ground of the friends.*

ODE ON HEARING THE DRUM.

I HATE that drum's discordant sound,
Parading round, and round, and round:
To thoughtless youth it pleasure yields,
And lures from cities and from fields,
To sell their liberty for charms
Of tawdry lace, and glittering arms;
And when ambition's voice commands,

To march, and fight, and fall, in foreign lands.

I hate that drum's discordant sound,
Parading round, and round, and round:
To me it talks of ravaged plains,
And burning towns and ruin'd swains,
And mangled limbs, and dying groans,
And widows' tears, and orphans' moans;
And all that misery's hand bestows,
To fill the catalogue of human woes.

ODE ON PRIVATEERING.

How custom steels the human breast
To deeds that nature's thoughts detest!
How custom consecrates to fame
What reason else would give to shame!
Fair spring supplies the favouring gale,
The naval plunderer spreads his sail,
And ploughing wide the watery way,
Explores with anxious eyes his prey.

The man he never saw before,
The man who him no quarrel bore,
He meets, and avarice prompts the fight;
And rage enjoys the dreadful sight
Of decks with streaming crimson dyed,
And wretches struggling in the tide,
Or 'midst th' explosion's horrid glare,
Dispersed with quivering limbs in air.

The merchant now or. foreign shores
His captured wealth in vain deplores;
Quits his fair home, oh mournful change!
For the dark prison's scanty range;

[* In the life of that good man, Scott of Amwell, is inserted a sort of last dying speech and confession, which the Quakers published after his death. This precious paper requires some comment. Scott's life had not merely been innocent, but eviuently useful. "He was esteemed regular and moral in his conduct," says this very document; "nevertheless," it adds, "there is reason to believe he frequently experienced the conviction of the spirit of trath for not faithfully following the Lord." Whether any heavier offence can be proved against him

By plenty's hand so lately fed, Depends on casual alms for bread; And with a father's anguish torn, Sees his poor offspring left forlorn.

And yet, such man's misjudging mind,
For all this injury to his kind,
The prosperous robber's native plain
Shall bid him welcome home again;
His name the song of every street,
His acts the theme of all we meet,
And oft the artist's skill shall place
To public view his pictured face!

If glory thus be earned, for me
My object glory ne'er shall be;
No, first in Cambria's loneliest dale
Be mine to hear the shepherd's tale!
No, first on Scotia's bleakest hill
Be mine the stubborn soil to till!
Remote from wealth to dwell alone,
And die to guilty praise unknown!

THE TEMPESTUOUS EVENING.
AN ODE.

THERE'S grandeur in this sounding storm,
That drives the hurrying clouds along,
That on each other seem to throng,
And mix in many a varied form;
While, bursting now and then between,
The moon's dim misty orb is seen,
And casts faint glimpses on the green.

Beneath the blast the forests bend,
And thick the branchy ruin lies,
And wide the shower of foliage flies;
The lake's black waves in tumult blend,
Revolving o'er and o'er and o'er,
And foaming on the rocky shore,
Whose caverns echo to their roar.

by the society than that of having styled himself Esquire in one of his title-pages, and used such heathen words as December and May in his poems, instead of twelfth month and fifth month, we know not; but when he was dying, at a vigorous age, of a typhus fever, he was "brought down," says this quaker-process, "as from the clifts of the rocks and the heights of the hills into the valley of deep humiliation."-See Quar. Rev. vol. xi. p. 500.]