Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful strain ! Now bright Arcturus glads the teeming grain; Now golden fruits on loaded branches shine, And grateful clusters swell with floods of wine; Now blushing berries paint the yellow grove; Just gods! shall all things yield returns but love! Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful lay! The shepherds cry, Thy flocks are left a prey." Ah! what awails it me the flocks to keep, Who lost my heart while I preserv'd my sheep? Pan came, and ask'd, what magic caus'd my smart, Or what ill eyes malignant glances dart? What eyes but hers, alas, have power to move! And is there magic but what dwells in love?

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Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful strains! I'll fly from shepherds, flocks, and flowery plains. From shepherds, flocks, and plains, I may remove, Forsake mankind, and all the world-but love! I know thee, Love! on foreign mountains bred, Wolves gave thee suck, and savage tigers fed. Thou wert from Etna's burning entrails torn, Got by fierce whirlwinds, and in thunder born! Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful lay! Farewell, ye woods, adieu the light of day! One leap from yonder cliff shall end my pains; No more, ye hills, no more resound my strains! Thus sung the shepherds till th' approach of night, The skies yet blushing with departed light, When falling dews with spangles deck the glade, And the low Sun had lengthen'd every shade.

THYRSIS.

Ye gentle Muses, leave your crystal spring, Let nymphs and sylvans cypress garlands bring; Ye weeping Loves, the stream with myrtles hide, And break your bows as when Adonis dy'd ; And with your golden darts, now useless grown, Inscribe a verse on this relenting stone:

"Let Nature change, let Heaven and Earth deplore,
Fair Daphne's dead, and Love is now no more!"
"Tis done, and Nature's various charms decay: 29
See gloomy clouds obscure the cheerful day!
Now hung with pearls the dropping trees appear,
Their faded honours scatter'd on her bier.
See where, on earth, the flowery glories lie;
With her they flourish'd, and with her they die.

Ah, what avail the beauties Nature wore?
Fair Daphne's dead, and Beauty is no more!
For her the flocks refuse their verdant food,
The thirsty heifers shan the gliding flood:
The silver swans her hapless fate bemoan,
In notes more sad than when they sing their own 3
In hollow caves sweet Echo silent lies,
Silent, or only to her name replies;

Her name with pleasure once she taught the shore,
Now Daphne's dead, and Pleasure is no more!

No grateful dews descend from evening skies,
Nor morning odours from the flowers arise;
No rich perfumes refresh the fruitful field,
Nor fragrant herbs their native incense yield,
The balmy Zephyrs, silent since her death,
Lament the ceasing of a sweeter breath;
Th' industrious bees neglect their golden store;
Fair Daplme's dead, and Sweetness is no more!

No more the mounting larks, while Daphne sings,
Shall, listening in mid ait, suspend their wings;
No more the birds shall imitate her lays,
Or, hush'd with wonder, hearken from the sprays:
No more the streams their murmurs shall forbear,
A sweeter music than their own to hear;
But tell the reeds, and tell the vocal shore,
Fair Daphne's dead, and Music is no more!

Her fate is whisper'd by the gentle breeze, And told in sighs to all the trembling trees; The trembling trees in every plain and wood, Her fate remurmur to the silver flood: The silver flood, so lately calm, appears Swell'd with new passion, and o'erflows with tears; The winds, and trees, and floods, her death deplore, Daphne our grief! our glory now no more!

But see where Daphne wondering mounts on Above the clouds, above the starry sky! [high Eternal beauties grace the shining scene, Fields ever fresh, and groves for ever green! There while you rest in Amaranthine bowers, Or from those meads select unfading flowers, Bebold us kindly, who your name implore, Daphne, our goddess, and our grief no more!

LYCIDAS.

How all things listen, while thy Muse complains! Such silence waits on Philomela's strains, In some still evening, when the whispering breeze Pants on the leaves, and dies upon the trees. To thee, bright goddess, oft a lamb shall bleed, If teeming ewes increase my fleecy breed. [give, 83 While plants their shade, or flowers their olours. Thy name, thy honour, and thy praise, shall live!

THYRSIS.

But see, Orion sheds unwholesome dews; Arise, the pines a noxious shade diffuse;

VARIATIONS.

Ver. 29. Originally thus in the MS.

'Tis done, and Nature's chang'd since you are gone; Behold, the clouds have "put their mourning on." Ver. 83. Originally thus in the MS.

While vapours rise, and driving snows descend, Thy honour, name, and praise, shall never end.

Sharp Boreas blows, and Nature feels decay, Time conquers all, and we must Time obey, Adieu, ye vales, ye mountains, streams, groves;

Adieu, ye shepherds' rural lays and loves; Adieu, my flocks; farewell, ye sylvan crew; Daphne, farewell! and all the world adieu!

MESSIAH.

A SACRED ECLogue,

IN IMITATION OF VIRGIL'S POLLIO,

ADVERTISEMENT.

and

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Is reading several passages of the prophet Isaiah, which foretel the coming of Christ, and the felicities attending it, I could not but observe a remarkable parity between many of the thoughts, and those in the Pollio of Virgil. This will not seem surprising, when we reflect, that the Eclogue was taken from a Sibyline prophecy on the same subject. One may judge that Virgil did not copy it line for line; but selected such ideas as best agreed with the nature of pastoral poetry, and disposed them in that manner which served most to beautify his piece. I have endeavoured the same in this imitation of him, though without admitting any thing of my own; since it was written with this particular view, that the reader, by comparing the several thoughts, might see how far the images and descriptions of the prophet are superior to those of the poet. But as I fear I have prejudiced them by my management, I shall subjoin the passages of Isaiah, and those of Virgil, under the same disadvantage of a literal translation,

Ver. 8. A Virgin shall conceive All crimes shall cease, &c.] Virg. Ecl. iv. ver. 6.

Jam redit et Virgo, redeunt Saturnia regna, Jam nova progenies cœlo demittitur alto. Te duce, si qua maneant sceleris vestigia nostri, Irrita perpetua solvent formidine terras→ Pacatumque reget patriis virtutibus orbem. "Now the Virgin returns, now the kingdom of Saturn returns, now a new progeny is sent down from high Heaven. By means of thee, whatever reliques of our crimes remain, shall be wiped away. and free the world from perpetual fears. He shall govern the Earth in peace, with the virtues of his Father."

1

From Jesse's root behold a branch arise, Whose sacred flower with fragrance fills the skies: Th' æthereal spirit o'er its leaves shall move, And on its top descends the mystic Dove. Ye Heavens from high the dewy nectar pour, And in soft silence shed the kindly shower! The sick' and weak the healing plant shall aid, From storm a shelter, and from heat a shade. All crimes shall cease, and ancient frauds shall fail; Returning Justice lift aloft her scale; Peace o'er the world her olive wand extend, And white-rob'd Innocence from Heaven descend. Swift fly the years, and rise th' expected morn! Oh spring to light, auspicious Babe, be born! See, Nature hastes her earliest wreaths to bring, 23 With all the incense of the br athing spring: See lofty Lebanon' his head advance, See nodding forests on the mountains dance: See spicy clouds from lowly Saron rise, And Carmel's flowery top perfumes the skies! Hark! a glad voice the lonely desert cheers; Prepare the way! a God, a God appears!

IMITATIONS.

29

shall conceive and bear a Son--Chap. ix. ver. 6, Isaiah, ch. vii. ver. 14. "Behold a Virgin 7. Unto us a Child is born; unto us a Son is given; ment, and of his peace, there shall be no end: the Prince of Peace: of the increase of his governUpon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order and to establish it, with judgment and with justice, for ever and ever."

Ver. 23. See Nature hastes, &c.] Virg. Ecl. iv.

ver. 18.

Aggredere ô magnos (aderit jam tempus) honores, Cara deûm soboles, magnum Jovis incrementum

1 Isai. xi. ver. 1. 3 Ch. xxv. ver. 4. Ch. xxxv, ver. 2.

2 Ch. xlv. ver. 8. 4 Ch. ix. ver. 7. Ch. xl. ver. 3, 4.

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Succeeding monarchs heard the subjects cries,
Nor saw displeas'd the peaceful cottage rise.
Then gathering flocks on unknown mountains fed,
O'er sandy wilds were yellow harvests spread,
The forests wonder'd at th' unusual grain,
And secret transport touch'd the conscious swain.
Fair Liberty, Britannia's goddess, rears
Her chearful head, and leads the golden years.
Ye vigorous swains! while youth ferments your
And purer spirits swell the sprightly flood, [blood,
Now range the hills, the gameful woods beset,
Wind the shrill horn, or spread the waving net.
When milder autumn summer's heat succeeds, 97
And in the new-shorn field the partridge feeds;
Before his lord the ready spaniel bounds,
Panting with hope, he tries the furrow'd grounds;
But when the tainted gales the game betray,
Couch'd close he lies, and meditates the prey:
Secure they trust th' unfaithful field beset,
Till hovering o'er them sweeps the swelling net.
Thus (if small things we may with great compare)
When Albion sends her eager sons to war, [blest, 107
Some thoughtless town, with ease and plenty
Near and more near, the closing lines invest;
Sudden they seize th' amaz'd, defenceless prize,
And high in air Britannia's standard flies.

See! from the brake the whirring pheasant
And mounts exulting on triumphant wings: [springs,
Short is his joy; he feels the fiery wound,
Flutters in blood, and panting beats the ground.
Ah! what avail his glossy, varying dies,
His purple crest, and scarlet circled eyes,
The vivid green his shining plumes unfold,
His painted wings, and breast that flames with gold?
Nor yet, when moist Arcturus clouds the sky,
The woods and fields their pleasing toils deny.
To plains with well-breath'd beagles we repair,
And trace the mazes of the circling hare:
(Beasts, urg'd by us, their fellow beasts pursue,
And learn of man each other to undo)
With slaughtering guns th' unweary'd fowler roves,
When frosts have whiten'd all the naked

When yellow autumn summer's heat succeeds, And into wine the purple harvest bleeds, The partridge, feeding in the new-shorn fields, Both morning sports and ev'ning pleasure yields. Ver. 107. It stood thus in the first edition: Pleas'd, in the general's sight, the host lie down Sudden before some unsuspecting town; The young, the old, one instant makes our prize, And o'er their captive heads Britannia's standard flies.

Ver. 126. O'er rustling leaves around the naked groves.

Ver. 129. The fowler lifts his levell'd tube on high.

Oft, as in airy rings they skim the heath,
The clamorous lapwings feel the leaden death;
Oft, as the mounting larks their notes prepare,
They fall, and leave their little lives in air.

In genial spring, beneath the quivering shade,
Where cooling vapours breathe along the mead,
The patient fisher takes his silent stand,
Intent, his angle trembling in his hand:
With looks unmov'd, he hopes the scaly breed,
And eyes the dancing cork and bending reed.
Our plenteous streams a various race supply,
The bright-ey'd perch with fins of Tyrian dye,
The silver eel, in shining volumes roll'd,
The yellow carp, in scales bedropp'd with gold,
Swift trouts, diversify'd with crimson stains,
And pikes, the tyrants of the watery plains.

Now Cancer glows with Phoebus' fiery car:
The youth rush eager to the sylvan war,
Swarm o'er the lawns, the forest walks surround,
Rouze the fleet hart, and cheer the opening hound.
Th' impatient courser pants in every vein,
And, pawing, seems to beat the distant plain:
Hills, vales, and floods, appear already cross'd,
And, ere he starts, a thousand steps are lost.
See the bold youth strain up the threatening steep,
Rush through the thickets, down the valleys
sweep,

Hang o'er their coursers heads with cager speed,
And Earth rolls back beneath the flying steed.
Let old Arcadia boast her ample plain,
Th' immortal huntress, and her virgin-train ;
Nor envy, Windsor! since thy shades have seen
As bright a goddess, and as chaste a queen;
Whose care, like her's, protects the sylvan reign,
The Farth's fair light, and empress of the main.

Here, too, 'tis sung, of old Diana stray'd,
And Cynthus' top forsook for Windsor shade;
Here was she seen o'er airy wastes to rove,
Seek the clear spring, or haunt the pathless grove¿
Here, arm'd with silver bows, in early dawn,
Her buskin'd Virgins trac'd the dewy lawn.

Above the rest a rural nymph was fam'd,
Thy offspring, Thames! the fair Lodona nam'd.
(Lodona's fate, in long oblivion cast,
The Muse shali sing, and what she sings shall last.)
Scarce could the goddess from her nymph be known,
But by the crescent, and the golden zone.
She scorn'd the praise of beauty, and the care;
A belt her waist, a fillet binds her hair;
A painted quiver on her shoulder sounds,
And with her dart the flying deer she wounds,
It chanc'd, as, eager of the chase, the maid
Beyond the forest's verdant limits stray'd,
Pan saw and lov'd, and burning with desire
Pursued her flight; her flight increas'd his fire.
Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly,
When the fierce eagle cleaves the liquid sky;
Not half so swiftly the fierce eagle moves,
When through the clouds he drives the trembling
doves;

As from the god she flew with furious pace,
Or as the god, more furious, urg'd the chase.
Now fainting, sinking, pale, the nymph appears ;
And now his shadow reach'd her as she run,
Now close behind, his sounding steps she hears:
His shadow lengthen'd by the setting Sun;
And now his shorter breath, with sultry air,
Pants on her neck, and fans her parting hair.
In vain on father Thames she calls for aid,
Nor could Diana help her injur'd maid,