116 S H E N S T O N E. 
Amidst the brake a hollow den was found. 
With rocks and shelving arches vaulted round. Addison. 
SHELVINGS, a name applied to the moveable side-rails 
of a waggon or cart, which are occasionally put on for top 
loads. 
SHE'LVY, adj. Shallow; rocky; full of banks.—I had 
been drowned, but that the shore was shelvy and shallow. 
Shakspeare. 
SHELWICK, a township of England, in Herefordshire ; 
2| miles north-north-east of Hereford. 
SHENANDOAH, a county of the United States, in Vir¬ 
ginia, bounded north by Frederick county, south-east by 
Culpeper and Maddison counties, south-west by Rocking¬ 
ham county, and west by Hardy county. Population 
13,646, including 1038 slaves. Chief town Woodstock. 
SHENANDOAH, a river of the United Sates, in Vir¬ 
ginia, which rises in Augusta county, and after a course of 
200 miles, joins the Potomac, in Lai. 38. 4. N. just before 
the latter bursts through the Blue Ridge. It is composed of 
four branches, South, Middle, and North rivers, and She¬ 
nandoah. It waters a fertile country, and is navigable for 
boats 100 miles. 
SHENANDOAH FORK, a post village of the United 
States, in Shenandoah county, Virginia. 
SHENANGO, a township of the United States, in Beaver 
county, Pennsylvania. Population 679.—2d. Of Crawford 
county, Pennsylvania. Population 727.—2d. Of Mercer 
county, Pennsylvania. Population 634. 
To SHEND, v. a. preter. and part. pass, skent [fcen- 
ban, Saxon; schenden, Dutch.]—To ruin ; to spoil. 
Provide for thy wife, or else look to be shent. 
Good milch-cow for winter, another for Lent. Tusser. 
Such a dream I had of dire portent. 
That much I fear my body will be shent ; 
It bodes I shall have wars. Dry den. 
To disgrace; to degrade; to blame; to reproach. Un¬ 
used. 
Debateful strife, and cruel enmity. 
The famous name of knighthood foully shend. Spenser. 
Sore bruised with the fall, he slow uprose, 
And all enraged him loudly shent; 
Disleal knight, whose coward courage chose 
To wreak itself on beast. Spenser # 
To overpower; to crush; to surpass. Unused. 
She pass’d the rest as Cynthia doth shend 
The lesser stars. Spenser. 
SHENEVAS CREEK, a river of the United States, in 
New York, in Otsego county, which runs south-west 25 
miles, and joins the Susquehanna. 
SHENFIELD, a parish of England, in Essex; 1 mile 
north-east of Brentwood. Population 555. 
SHENLEY, a parish of England, in Hertfordshire; 5 
miles north-west of Chipping Barnet. Population 990. 
SHENLEY, a parish of England, county of Bucking¬ 
ham ; 3 miles west-north-west of Fenny Stratford. 
SHENLEY, a township of Lower Canada, in the county 
of Buckingham. 
SHENNINGTON, a parish of England, in Gloucester¬ 
shire ; 61 miles west-north-west of Banbury. 
SHENSHIL, a village of Upper Egypt, on the right bank 
of the Nile; 2 miles north of Achmim. 
SHENSTONE (William), a poet of celebrity, was born 
at Hales Owen, in Shropshire, in the year 1714. His father 
was an uneducated gentleman farmer, who cultivated an 
estate of his own called the Leasowes, which the son after¬ 
wards rendered celebrated. William received the elements 
of instruction from a village dame, whom he finely described 
in one of his poems. After this he was sent to the grammar- 
school at Hales Owen, whence he was removed to that of a 
clergyman at Solihull, from whom he not only acquired 
solid learning in classical knowledge, but a cultivated taste. 
In 1732 he was entered of Pembroke College, Oxford, where 
he did not make a large acquaintance, but he was one of a 
few who met at each other’s rooms to read and examine the 
best works in English literature. Here it was he discovered 
his poetical genius, and produced some compositions of con¬ 
siderable merit, and he had thoughts of taking his degrees, 
and proceeding to study for a profession, but coming, by the 
death of his father, into the full possession of his paternal 
property, he gave himself up to literary ease, and rural retire¬ 
ment, abandoning at ouce all intentions of active pursuits; 
hence his biographer justly remarks, “ that nothing is more 
unfavourable to the exertion of those energies which lead to 
a useful and honourable station in society, than the early 
possession of a fortune just sufficient to gratify present wishes, 
and preclude the necessity of immediate entrance into any 
vigorous course of action." An acquaintance which Shen- 
stone formed with Mr. Graves, of Mickleton, in Gloucester¬ 
shire, inspired him with an affection for that gentleman’s 
sister; but the passion of love, which, in some minds, operates 
as a stimulus to enterprize, seems in him to have wasted its 
force on plaintive elegies, and other effusions of sentimental 
poetry. To one species of employment, he was probably 
animated by his visit to Mr. Graves,—that of rural embel¬ 
lishment,—which he afterwards bestowed on his favourite 
place of the Leasowes, with a taste that conduced more to his 
celebrity than to his comfort. 
In 1737 he printed, but without his name, a small volume 
of juvenile poems, which obtained scarcely any notice. In 
1740 he came to London, and was introduced to Dodsley, 
who printed his poem of “ The Judgment of Hercules,” 
dedicated to Lord Littleton. This was followed by “ The 
School-mistress,” of which the heroine was the village 
dame already referred to. This is thought, by some very 
respectable critics, to stand at the head of Shenstone’s com¬ 
positions. 
Shenstone, from this time, devoted himself to improving 
the picturesque beauties of the Leasowes, and sometimes 
exercising his pen in effusions of verse and prose. The 
celebrity of this place led him into expenses which his for¬ 
tune was unequal to, and he was perpetually under the pres¬ 
sure of poverty ; which, with the deficiency of regular em¬ 
ployment, and the perpetual desire of doing more, and ap¬ 
pearing better off, than his means admitted, preyed on his 
spirits, and rendered him the miserable inhabitant of the 
Eden which his taste and genius had created. Grey has 
described him in the following sentence, which may in some 
respects be rather a caricature likeness. “ Poor man! he 
was always wishing for money, for fame, and for other dis¬ 
tinctions; and his whole philosophy consisted in living 
against his will in retirement, and in a place which his taste 
had adorned, but which he only enjoyed when people of 
note came to see and commend it.” It has been thought 
a matter of surprise, considering his connections, that 
nothing was done to place him in easier circumstanoes. 
An application was said to have been made to Lord Bute 
to procure him a pension from the privy purse, but before 
the wishes of his friends could be realized he died. This 
event took place in February, 1763, when he was in the 
50th year of his age: he was interred in the churchyard of 
Hales Owen. 
Of his poetical compositions many were inserted in Dods- 
ley’s collection of original pieces; and after his death, his 
“ Works in Verse and Prose,” were published in two vols. 
8vo. in 1764, and a third volume, consisting of “ Letters,” 
was published in 1769. “ Of his poetry,” says the critic, 
“ the general opinion was almost uniform; it is regarded 
as commonly elegant, melodious, tender, and correct in sen¬ 
timent, and often pleasing and natural in description, but 
verging to the languid and feeble, and never exhibiting 
either the powers of the imagination, or the energy and 
splendour of diction, that characterize compositions of the 
higher order. His prose writings display good sense and a 
cultivated taste, and contain just and sometimes new and 
acute observations on mankind." Gen. Biog. 
SHENSTONE, 
