The ROBIN: An ELEGY.

Written at the close of Autumn, 1756.

By the Same.

Come, thou melancholy Muse,

With solemn dirge affist my strain, While shades descend, and weeping dews,

In forrows wrap the rural plain,

Her mantle grave cool Evening spreads,

The Sun cuts short his joyful race; The jocund hills, the laughing meads,

Put on a fickening, dying face.

Stern Winter brings his gloomy train,

Each pleasing landskip fades from view; In folemn state he shuts the scene,

To flow'ry fields we bid adicu !

Quite stript of every beauty, see

How foon fair Nature's honours fade! The flowers are fled, each spreading tree

No more affords a grateful shade,

Thcir naked branches now behold,

Bicak winds pierce thro' with murmuring found;
Chill'd by the northern breezes cold,
Their leafy honours strew the ground.

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So man, who treads life's active stage,

Like leaf or blossom fades away ; In tender youth, or riper age,

Drops thus, into his native clay!

Alas! and can we chuse but moan,

To see all Nature's charms' expire !
Fair-blooming Spring, gay Summer gone,

And Autumn hastening to retire !

But fee the tender Redbreast comes,

Forsaking now the leafless grove,
Hops o'er my threshold, pecks my crumbs,

And courts my hospitable love.

Then fooths me with his plaintive tale

As Sol withdraws his friendly ray; Cheering, as evening fhades prevail,

The soft remains of closing day.

welcome to my homely board !

There unmolested shalt thou stand ; Were it with choicest daintics stor'd,

For thee I'd ope a liberal hand.

Since thou, of all the warbling throng,

Who now in filence far retire, Remain'st to footh me with a song,

And many a pleasing thought inspire.

An

1

e'er sharp forrow from thine eyes did flow, .

If e'er thy bosom felt another's woe,
If e'er fair beauty's charms thy heart did prove,
If e'er the offspring of thy virtuous love
Bloom'd to thy wish, or to thy soul was dear,
This plaintive marble asks thee for a tear !
For here, alas ! too early snatch'd away,
All that was lovely Death has made his prey.
No more her cheeks with crimson roses vie,
No more the diamond sparkles in her eye ;
Her breath no more its balmy sweets can boast,
Alas! that breath with all its sweets is lost.
Pale now those lips, where blushing rubies hung,
And mute the charming music of her tongue !
Ye virgins fair, your fading charms survey,
She was whate'er your tender hearts can say ;
To her sweet memory for ever dear,
Let the green turf receive your trickling tear.
To this fad place your earliest garlands bring,
And deck her grave with firstlings of the Spring.

Let

Let opening roses, drooping lillies tell,
Like those she bloom’d, and ah! like these she fell.
In circling wreaths let the pale ivy grow,
And distant yews a fable fhade bestow ;
Round her, ye Graces, constant vigils keep,
And guard (fair Innocence !) her sacred fleep :
Till that bright morn shall wake the beauteous clay,
Co bloom and sparkle in eternal day.

By Mr. Nourse, late of All Souls College Oxon, 1741.

S once the Mufe, reclining on her lyre,

, Observ'd her fav’rite bards, a num'rous choir ; che conscious pleasure swelld her filent breast, Ier secret pride exulting smiles confeft.

When thus her sister spoke, whose care presides. V'er the mixt pallat, and the pencil guides, uft, Goddess, is thy joy, thy train, we own, pproaches nearest to Apollo's throne. oremost in Learning's ranks they fit fublime, fonour'd and lov'd thro' every age of time: et let me fay, some fav’rite son of mine las more than follow'd every son of thine. ?hy Homer needs not grieve to hear his fame xceeds not Raphael's widely honour'd name:

Raphael

Raphael like him ʼmidst ages wrapt in night,
Rose father of his science to the light;
With matchless grace, and majesty divine,
Bade Painting breathe, and live the bold design;
To the clay-man the heavenly fire apply'd,
And gave it charms to Nature's self deny'd.

With judgment, genius, industry and art,
Does Virgil captivate his reader's heart?
With rival talents my Caracci blest
Fires with like transport the spectator's breast.
The youthful Lucan, who with rapid force
Urg'd by Pharfalia's field the Muse's horse,
An equal fire, an equal strength of mind,
In Angelo's congenial foul will find :
Whose wild imagination could display
Fierce giants whirl'd from heaven-the world's last day.

With more success does tender Ovid move
The melting foul to softness and to love;
Than wanton Titian, whose warm colours shew
That gods themselves the amorous riot know?
Thy grandeur, Paulo, and thy happy stroke,
I proudly own my emulation spoke,
For I bestow'd them, that the world might see,
A Horace too of inine arise in thee.

Lo! where Poulin his magic colours spreads,
Rise tower'd towns, rough rocks, and flow'ry meads :
What leagues between those azure mountains lie,
(Whose less'ning tops invade the purple sky)