Of pageant Honour, can seduce to leave Those ever-blooming sweets, which from the store Of Nature fair Imagination culls To charm the enliven'd soul! What though not all Of mortal offspring can attain the heights Of envied life ; though only few possess Patrician treasures or imperial state ; Yet Nature's care, to all her children just, With richer treasures and an ampler state, Endows at large whatever happy man Will deign to use them. His the city's pomp, The rural honours his. Whate'er adorns The princely dome, the column and the arch, The breathing marbles and the sculptured gold, Beyond the proud possessor's narrow claiin His tuneful breast enjoys. For him, the Spring Distils her dews, and from the silken gem Its lucid leaves unfolds : for him, the hand Of Autumn tinges every fertile branch With blooming gold, and blushes like the morn, Each passing hour sheds tribute from her wings ; And still new beauties meet his lonely walk, And loves unfelt attract him. Not a breeze Flies o'er the meadow, not a cloud imbibes The setting Sun's effulgence, not a strain From all the tenants of the warbling shade Ascends, but whence his bosom can partake Fresh pleasure, unreproved.

TOBIAS SMOLLETT.

BORN 1721-DIED 1771.

SMOLLETT is chiefly known as a novelist and historian; yet

there is a classic beauty and genuine vigour of fancy in several of his poetical pieces which must make the admirers of the Ope to INDEPENDENCE and the TEARS OF

SCOTLAND regret that he has left so little verse. Smollett was descended of a family of some note in Dum.

bartonshire. He studied medicine at Glasgow, and was for a short time a surgeon in the navy. But most of his busy life was spent as a man of letters, who lived by his writings. After a long course of bad health, Smollett went abroad with his wife, but without receiving much advantage from change of climate. He died at Leghorn in very distressed circumstances, though to him literature had been a very lucrative pursuit.

ODE TO LEVEN WATER.

On Leven's banks, while free to rove,
And tune the rural pipe to love,
I envied not the happiest swain
That ever trod the Arcadian plain.

Pure stream! in whose transparent wave
My youthful limbs I wont to lave ;
No torrents stain thy limpid source;
No rocks impede thy dimpling course,
That sweetly warbles o'er its bed
With white, round, polish'd pebbles spread;

While, lightly poised, the scaly brood
In myriads cleave thy crystal flood ;
The springing trout in speckled pride ;
The salmon, monarch of the tide ;
The ruthless pike, intent on war;
The silver eel, and mottled par. (a)
Devolving from thy parent lake,
A charming maze thy waters make,
By bowers of birch, and groves of pine,
And edges flower'd with eglantine.
Still on thy banks, so gaily green,
May numerous herds and flocks be seen,
And lasses chanting o'er the pail,
And shepherds piping in the dale,
And ancient Faith that knows no guile,
And Industry imbrown'd with toil,
And hearts resolved, and hands prepared,
The blessings they enjoy to guard.

EXTRACT FROM THE ODE TO INDEPEN

DENCE.

STROPHE.
Thy spirit, Independence ! let me share ;
Lord of the lion-heart and eagle-eye,
Thy steps I follow with my bosom bare,
Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky.
Deep in the frozen regions of the north,
A goddess violated brought thee forth,

(a) The

par is a small fish, not unlike the smelt, which it rivals in delicacy and flavour.

Immortal Liberty! whose look sublime
Hath bleach'd the tyrant's cheek in every varying

clime.
What time the iron-hearted Gaul,
With frantic Superstition for his guide,
Arm'd with the dagger and the pall,
The sons of Woden to the field defied :
The ruthless hag, by Weser's food,
In Heaven's name urged the infernal blow;
And red the stream began to flow :
The vanquish'd were baptized with blood. (a)

ANTISTROPHE. The Saxon prince in horror filed From altars stain'd with human gore; And Liberty his routed legions led In safety to the bleak Norwegian shore. There in a cave asleep she lay, Lull’d by the hoarse-resounding main; When a bold savage past that way, Impell’d by Destiny, his name Disdain. Of ample front the portly chief appear’d: The hunted bear supplied a shaggy vest ; The drifted snow hung on his yellow beard ; And his broad shoulders braved the furious blast. He stopt; he gazed ; his bosom glow'd, And deeply felt the impression of her charms :

(a) Charlemagne obliged four thousand Saxon prisoners to embrace the Christian religion, and, immediately after they were baptized, ordered their throats to be cut.-Their prince, Vitikind, fled for shelter to Gotric, king of Den. mark

He seized the advantage Fate allow'd ;
And straight compress’d her in his vigorous arms.

STROPHE. The curlieu scream'd, the Tritons blew Their shells to celebrate the ravish'd rite; Old Time exulted as he flew; And Independence saw the light. The light he saw in Albion's happy plains, Where under cover of a flowering thorn, While Philomel renew'd her warbled strains, The auspicious fruit of stolen embrace was born ; The mountain Dryads seized with joy, The smiling infant to their charge consign'd ; The Doric Muse caress'd the favourite boy ; The hermit Wisdom stored his opening mind. As rolling years matured his age, He flourish'd bold and sinewy as his sire; While the mild passions in his breast assuage The fiercer flames of his maternal sire.

*

THOMAS BLACKLOCK.

BORN 1721-DIED 1791.

“ The blind poet" was a native of Annan, in Dumfries

shire. At six months old he lost his sight in the smallpox; and, when he reached the proper age, his father and friends, to lighten this calamity, read to him what. ever they conceived likely to please and interest him in

P