316 On a Letter from Stephen Duel: 



I "climb the winding mazy Mountain's Brow: 

 And, the' I swiftly walk ascend but slow. 

 The spiral paths in gradual Circles lead, 

 Increase my journey, and elude my speed : 

 Yet, when at length I reach the lofty Height, 

 Towns, Vallies, Rivers, Meadows meet my Sight, 

 A thousand grateful Objects round me Smile, 

 Whose various Beauties overpay my Toil." 



(He had leanit to write fairly correct English, hut he hadn't quite 

 o-ot rid of his rustic pronunciation.) After a moral siviile, he 

 proceeds to refer to the grotto, which one of his patronesses, the 

 Countess of Hertford, had constructed in Marlhorough Castle 

 Mount : — 



" Within the Basis of the verdant Hill, 

 A beauteous Grot comprises Hertford's skill ; 

 Who with her lovely Nymphs, adorns the Place ; 

 Gives ev'ry polish'd Stone its proper grace ; 

 Now varies rustic moss about the Cell; 

 Now fits the shining Pearl, or Purple Shell: 

 Cali/pso thus, attended with her Train, 

 With rural Palaces, adorns the Plain ; 

 Nor with more Elegance her Grots appear, 

 Nor with more Beauty shines th' Immortal Fair." 



" The Muse her Journey, next to Bath, pursues." &c. 



So onward to Salisbury, Wilton, Spithead, Portsmouth, and by 

 Witney, to Oxford. There Duck apparently was entertained by 

 his friend, Mr. T. Winder, of Corpus, a clergyman's son, who had 

 gone to college at the age of 13, and was probably a B.A. at the 

 time of the poet's visit and was elected fellow of Corpus before 

 the poem was printed in 1736. Benjamin Kennicott had not yet 

 come into residence at Oxford, even at the date when Duck's 

 collected poems were printed by subscription, with his portrait, 

 by G. Bickham. He had no reason to complain of his reception. 

 Queen Caroline accepted the Dedication (and not improbably 

 remunerated the author, as was then the custom). He numbered six 

 of the Koyal Family, and an unusually large number of the nobility. 



