6:6 
Heinains of Joseph Blacket 
See, see, he rises in a car of state ! 
His heav’n-traia’d steeds proclaim 
His never-dying fame ! 
The reins upheld with daring hand, 
He guides them o’er the rugged mountain’s 
brow. 
Around whose base the limpid waters flow. 
Hark ! hark.! his thund’ring wheels re¬ 
sound 
Through ether’s concave wide ! 
H is coursers feel the biting lash. 
The swift revolving axles flash. 
He spurns the trembling ground ! 
See, checking now with fierce com¬ 
mand 
Their dread career, in fullest pride, 
He mounts, on cherub wing, magnificently 
great! 
TO POPE. 
With piercing eye, deep vers’d in Nature’s 
lore, 
Tlesolv’d the realms of reason to explore ; 
The paths of science, the retreats of sense, 
And justify the ways of Providence j 
Pope next I see, the bard whose various 
fire 
A.ttunes the hallow’d or the tender lyre j 
Tears off the fraudful mask that screens the 
mind. 
And aw'es the varying follies of mankind : 
Instructs the serious, and delights the ^ay, 
Shews Fame’s proud fane, and leads himself 
the way I 
TO YOVNO. 
'With coffin’d shrouds surrounded, big with 
thought. 
With painful thought, which moves yet 
mends the heart, 
And swells to aw’d solemnity, see, Young 
Peigns, too, to dwell beneath my humble 
roof ! 
The rellques of the dead, with full-fix’d eye. 
Denoting deep reflection, he surveys. 
And smiles at weak mortality !” Absorb’d 
In contemplation, on the jarring world 
He looks indignant. ’Cross the shoreless 
tide 
Of full eternity his stedfast gaze 
Is fix’d i nor once returns, save that he casts 
One look of pity on disastrous man ! 
TO THOMPSON. 
And Thompson, Nature’s limner, tbouzxt 
mine ! 
Thou, who hast painted the all-blessed year, 
Bringing the seasons fullv/ithin ray view. 
E’en when sequester’d in this nook I sit j 
The flov/’ry dale, the steep aspiring hill, 
Tl'.e velvet bank, the desolated waste. 
The pebbled streamlet, and the roaring 
flood,— 
Spring’s tender fragrance,—Summer’s noon¬ 
tide blaze,— 
Autumnal breezes,—Winter’s icy blasts,*.*, 
fii all.thsi.1' swe«t diversity tf change I - 
TO COLLINS.^ 
And Collins, too, 
T o thee I bow, 
Bright Fancy’s /h-i/ ’rife child. 
Who, in the.-desulated wild. 
With all the varied sweets of song, 
Pour’d forth the strain. 
As o’er the plain, 
Fleet echo did thy swelling notes prolong \ 
And, when the Passions fir’d thy breast, 
Up jn some rocky steep, 
Which fearful overhung the deep, 
Thou, with the frenzy of poetic fire, 
Drew’st all the Furies round thy magic 
lyre j 
And, ’mid the hideous yell 
Of grisly spectres, fell 
Revenge I Despair 1 
And haggard Care i 
With harp in hand, 
Did’st take thv stand, 
Now made them frantic rave, now Iull’4 
them all to rest. 
TO SHENSTONE, 
And late from the blade-waving mead, 
Enamell’d with Spring’s vernal flowers. 
The murmurs of Corydon’s reed. 
Were plaintively heard from the bowers* 
Around him the frolicsome lambs. 
In vvantonness frisk’d to the note ; 
While wistfully gaz’d the fond dams. 
Who seem’d on the younglings to doat. 
As centinel, laid at his feet, 
Poor Tray watch’d the flock on the plain i 
And, pour’d from the thicket’s retreat, 
Was heard the mellifluous strain. 
Suspended, his crook, on the tree. 
Hung ready his hand to receive ; 
The ballad was plac’d on his knee, 
Which taught his fond bosom to he«r9» 
But, broken is Corydon’s reed. 
Ah ! ne’er shall we hear it again ! 
No longer, his lambkins to feed, 
The shepherd shall traverse the plain. 
But, though he to death is consign’d, 
And no more the lov’d bard shall W’esee, 
His song in a wreath is entwin'd, 
And that wreath forms aGARLANo for 
me ! 
TO GRAY. 
Next see ethereal Gray, 
Whose daring fancy took her flight. 
On cagle-vving, to huge Plinlimmon’s 
height, 
And, as above his snow-capt brow she soar’d^ 
The fall of Cambria’s children dear! 
The heav’nly maid, in wild dismay. 
* In characterising the genius of Blacket, 
we are warranted in assimilating it to that of 
CoUi.ns more than to any other poet,—M.M. 
Wit 
