Ver. 10. And hate the truth whereby they should is in a female hand, unlike that in which the 8th

Ver. 3. Words with just notes, which till then So at first written, afterwards corrected to then

he retired to Chalfont in Buckinghamshire on account of the plague; and to have been seen inscribed on the glass of a window in that place. I have seen a copy of it written, apparently in a coeval hand, at the end of Tonson's edition of Milton's Smaller Poems in 1713, where it is also Isaid to be Milton's. It is re-printed from Dr. Birch's Life of the poet, in Fawkes and Woty's Poetical Calendar, 1763, vol. viii. p. 67. But, in this sonnet, there is a scriptural mistake; which, as Mr. Warton has observed, Milton was not likely to commit. For the Sonnet improperly represents David as punished by pestilence for his adultery with Bathsheba. Mr. Warton, however, adds, that Dr. Birch had been informed by Vertue the engraver, that he had seen a satirical medal, struck upon Charles the Second, abroad, without any legend, having a correspondent device.-This sonnet, I should add, varies from the construction of the legitimate sonnet, in consisting of only ten lines, instead of

fourteen.

Fair mirrour of foul times! whose fragile sheen,
Shall, as it blazeth, break; while Providence,
Aye watching o'er his saints with eye unseen,
Spreads the red rod of angry pestilence,
To sweep the wicked and their counsels hence;
Yea, all to break the pride of lustful kings,

Who Heaven's lore reject for brutish sense;
As erst he scourg'd Jessides' sin of yore,
For the fair Hittite, when, on seraph's wings,
He sent him war, or plague, or famine sore.

II.

In the concluding note on the seventh Sonnet,

it has been observed that other Italian sonnets

and compositions of Milton, said to be remaining in manuscript at Florence, had been sought for in vain by Mr. Hollis. I think it may not be improper here to observe, that there is a tradition of Milton having fallen in love with a young lady, when he was at Florence; and, as she understood no English, of having written some verses to her in Italian, of which the poem, subjoined to this remark, is said to be the sense. It has often been printed; as in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1760, p. 148; in Fawkes and Woty's Poetical Calendar, 1763, vol. viii. p. 68; in the Annual Register for 1772, p. 219; and in the third volume of Milton's poems in the Edition of the Poets, 1779. But to the original no reference is given, and even of the translator no mention is made, in any of those volumes. The poem is entitled, A fragment of Milton, from

the Italian,

When, in your language, Iunskill'd address

The short-pac'd efforts of a trammell'd Muse; Soft Italy's fair critics round me press,

And my mistaking passion thus accuse.

"Why, to our tongue's disgrace, does thy dumb love

Strive, in rough sound, soft meaning to impart? He must select his words who speaks to move,

And point his purpose at the hearer's heart."

CHRIST'S NATIVITY '.

THIS is the month, and this the happy morn,
Wherein the Son of Heaven's Eternal King,
Of wedded maid and virgin mother born,
Our great redemption from above did bring;
For so the holy sages once did sing,

That he our deadly forfeit should release,
And with his Father work us a perpetual peace,

That glorious form, that light unsufferable,
And that far-beaming blaze of majesty, [table
Wherewith he wont at Heaven's high council-
To sit the midst of Trinal Unity,

He laid aside; and, here with us to be,

Forsook the courts of everlasting day,
And chose with us a darksome house of mortal
clay.

Say, heavenly Muse, shall not thy sacred vein
Afford a present to the Infant-God?
To welcome him to this his new abode,
Hast thou no verse, no hymn, or solemn strain,
Now while the Heaven, by the Sun's team untrod,
Hath took no print of the approaching light,
And all the spangled host keep watch in squa-
drons bright?

See, how from far, upon the eastern road,
The star-led wisards haste with odours sweet:
O run, prevent them with thy humble ode,
And lay it lowly at his blessed feet;
Have thou the honour first thy Lord to greet,
And join thy voice unto the angel-quire,
From out his secret altar touch'd with hallow'd
fire.

THE HYMN.

It was the winter wild,

While the Heaven-born child

All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies; Nature in awe to him,

Had doff'd her gaudy trim,

With her great Master so to sympathize:

'This ode, in which the many learned allusions are highly poetical, was probably composed as a college-exercise at Cambridge, our author being now only twenty-one years old. In the edition of 1645, in its title it is said to have been written in 1629.

No war, or battle's sound,

Was heard the world around:

The idle spear and shield were high up hung;
The hooked chariot stood
Unstain'd with hostile blood;

The trumpet spake not to the armed throng;
And kings sat still with aweful eye,

As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by. Such music (as 'tis said)

But peaceful was the night,

Wherein the Prince of light

His reign of peace upon the Earth began: The winds, with wonder whist,

Smoothly the waters kist,

Whispering new joys to the mild ocean, Who now hath quite forgot to rave,

While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed

wave.

The stars, with deep amaze,
Stand fix'd in stedfast gaze,

Bending one way their precious influence;
And will not take their flight,

For all the morning light,

Or Lucifer that often warn'd them thence;

But in their glimmering orbs did glow,

Before was never made,

But when of old the sons of morning sung, While the Creator great

His constellations set,

And the well-balanc'd world on hinges hung; And cast the dark foundations deep,

And bid the weltering waves their oozy channel keep.

Ring out, ye crystal spheres,

Once bless our human ears,

If ye have power to touch our senses so;
And let your silver chime

Move in melodious time;

And let the base of Heaven's deep organ blow;

And, with your ninefold harmony,

Make up full consort to the angelic symphoy,

Until their Lord himself bespake, and bid them For, if such holy song

go.

And, though the shady gloom

Had given day her room,

The Sun himself withheld his wonted speed,

And hid his head for shame,

As his inferior flame

The new-enlighten'd world no more should need:

He saw a greater Sun appear ·

Enwrap our fancy long,

Time will run back, and fetch the age of gold; And speckled Vanity

Will sicken soon and die,

And leprous Sin will melt from earthly mould; And Hell itself will pass away,

And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day.

Than his bright throne, or burning axletree, Yea, Truth and Justice then

could bear.

The shepherds on the lawn,

Or e'er the point of dawn,

Sat simply chatting in a rustic row;

Full little thought they then,

That the mighty Pan

Was kindly come to live with them below;

Perhaps their loves, or else their sheep,

Will down return to men,

Orb'd in a rainbow; and, like glories wearing, Mercy will sit between,

Thron'd in celestial sheen,

With radiant feet the tissued clouds down And Heaven, as at some festival,

[steering;

Will open wide the gates of her high palace hall.

But wisest Fate says no,

Was all that did their silly thoughts so busy keep. This must not yet be so,

The wakeful trump of doom must thunder Isis, and Orus, and the dog Anubis, haste.

The dreadful Judge in middle air shall spread his The sable-stoled sorcerers bear his worshipt ark,