Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets Part 48

4 Reason masters every sense, And her virtues grace her birth: Lovely as all excellence, Modest in her most of mirth: Likelihood enough to prove Only worth could kindle love.

5 Such she is: and if you know Such a one as I have sung; Be she brown, or fair, or so, That she be but somewhile young; Be a.s.sured, 'tis she, or none, That I love, and love alone.

POWER OF GENIUS OVER ENVY.

'Tis not the rancour of a canker'd heart That can debase the excellence of art, Nor great in t.i.tles makes our worth obey, Since we have lines far more esteem'd than they.

For there is hidden in a poet's name A spell that can command the wings of Fame, And maugre all oblivion's hated birth Begin their immortality on earth, When he that 'gainst a muse with hate combines May raise his tomb in vain to reach our lines.

EVENING.

As in an evening when the gentle air Breathes to the sullen night a soft repair, I oft have sat on Thames' sweet bank to hear My friend with his sweet touch to charm mine ear, When he hath play'd (as well he can) some strain That likes me, straight I ask the same again, And he, as gladly granting, strikes it o'er With some sweet relish was forgot before: I would have been content, if he would play, In that one strain to pa.s.s the night away; But fearing much to do his patience wrong, Unwillingly have ask'd some other song: So in this differing key though I could well A many hours but as few minutes tell, Yet lest mine own delight might injure you (Though both so soon) I take my song anew.

FROM 'BRITANNIA'S PASTORALS.'

Between two rocks (immortal, without mother) That stand as if outfacing one another, There ran a creek up, intricate and blind, As if the waters hid them from the wind, Which never wash'd but at a higher tide The frizzled cotes which do the mountains hide, Where never gale was longer known to stay Than from the smooth wave it had swept away The new divorced leaves, that from each side Left the thick boughs to dance out with the tide.

At further end the creek, a stately wood Gave a kind shadow (to the brackish flood) Made up of trees, not less kenn'd by each skiff Than that sky-scaling peak of Teneriffe, Upon whose tops the hernshew bred her young, And h.o.a.ry moss upon their branches hung; Whose rugged rinds sufficient were to show, Without their height, what time they 'gan to grow.

And if dry eld by wrinkled skin appears, None could allot them less than Nestor's years.

As under their command the thronged creek Ran lessen'd up. Here did the shepherd seek Where he his little boat might safely hide, Till it was fraught with what the world beside Could not outvalue; nor give equal weight Though in the time when Greece was at her height.

Yet that their happy voyage might not be Without Time's shortener, heaven-taught melody, (Music that lent feet to the stable woods, And in their currents turn'd the mighty floods, Sorrow's sweet nurse, yet keeping Joy alive, Sad Discontent's most welcome corrosive, The soul of art, best loved when love is by, The kind inspirer of sweet poesy, Least thou shouldst wanting be, when swans would fain Have sung one song, and never sung again,) The gentle shepherd, hasting to the sh.o.r.e, Began this lay, and timed it with his oar:

Nevermore let holy Dee O'er other rivers brave, Or boast how (in his jollity) Kings row'd upon his wave.

But silent be, and ever know That Neptune for my fare would row.

Swell then, gently swell, ye floods, As proud of what ye bear, And nymphs that in low coral woods String pearls upon your hair, Ascend; and tell if ere this day A fairer prize was seen at sea.

See the salmons leap and bound To please us as we pa.s.s, Each mermaid on the rocks around Lets fall her brittle gla.s.s, As they their beauties did despise And loved no mirror but your eyes,

Blow, but gently blow, fair wind, From the forsaken sh.o.r.e, And be as to the halcyon kind, Till we have ferried o'er: So mayst thou still have leave to blow, And fan the way where she shall go.

A DESCRIPTIVE SKETCH.

Oh, what a rapture have I gotten now!

That age of gold, this of the lovely brow, Have drawn me from my song! I onward run, (Clean from the end to which I first begun,) But ye, the heavenly creatures of the West, In whom the virtues and the graces rest, Pardon! that I have run astray so long, And grow so tedious in so rude a song.

If you yourselves should come to add one grace Unto a pleasant grove or such like place, Where, here, the curious cutting of a hedge, There in a pond, the tr.i.m.m.i.n.g of the sedge; Here the fine setting of well-shaded trees, The walks their mounting up by small degrees, The gravel and the green so equal lie, It, with the rest, draws on your lingering eye: Here the sweet smells that do perfume the air, Arising from the infinite repair Of odoriferous buds, and herbs of price, (As if it were another paradise,) So please the smelling sense, that you are fain Where last you walk'd to turn and walk again.

There the small birds with their harmonious notes Sing to a spring that smileth as she floats: For in her face a many dimples show, And often skips as it did dancing go: Here further down an over-arched alley That from a hill goes winding in a valley, You spy at end thereof a standing lake, Where some ingenious artist strives to make The water (brought in turning pipes of lead Through birds of earth most lively fashioned) To counterfeit and mock the sylvans all In singing well their own set madrigal.

This with no small delight retains your ear, And makes you think none blest but who live there.

Then in another place the fruits that be In gallant cl.u.s.ters decking each good tree Invite your hand to crop them from the stem, And liking one, taste every sort of them: Then to the arbours walk, then to the bowers, Thence to the walks again, thence to the flowers, Then to the birds, and to the clear spring thence, Now pleasing one, and then another sense: Here one walks oft, and yet anew begin'th, As if it were some hidden labyrinth.

WILLIAM ALEXANDER, EARL OF STIRLING.

This eminent Scotchman was born in 1580. He travelled on the Continent as tutor to the Duke of Argyle. After his return to Scotland, he fell in love with a lady, whom he calls 'Aurora,' and to whom he addressed some beautiful sonnets. She refused his hand, however, and he married the daughter of Sir William Erskine. He repaired to the Court of James I., and became a distinguished favourite, being appointed Gentleman Usher to Charles I., and created a knight. He concocted a scheme for colonising Nova Scotia, in which he was encouraged by both James and Charles; but the difficulties seemed too formidable, and it was in consequence dropped. Charles appointed him Lord-Lieutenant of Nova Scotia, and, in 1633, he created him Lord Stirling. Fifteen years (from 1626 to 1641) our poet was Secretary of State for Scotland. These were the years during which Laud was foolishly seeking to force his liturgy upon the Presbyterians, but Stirling gained the praise of being moderate in his share of the business. In the course of this time he contrived to ama.s.s an ample fortune, and spent part of it in building a fine mansion in Stirling, which is still, we believe, standing. He died in 1641.

Besides his smaller pieces, Stirling wrote several tragedies, including one on Julius Caesar; an heroic poem; a poem addressed to Prince Henry, the son of James I.; another heroic poem, ent.i.tled 'Jonathan;' and a poem, in twelve parts, on the 'Day of Judgment.' These are all forgotten, and, notwithstanding vigorous parts, deserve to be forgotten; but his little sonnets, which are, if not brilliant, true things, and inspired by a true pa.s.sion, may long survive. He was, on the whole, rather a man of great talent than of genius.

SONNET.

I swear, Aurora, by thy starry eyes, And by those golden locks, whose lock none slips, And by the coral of thy rosy lips, And by the naked snows which beauty dyes; I swear by all the jewels of thy mind, Whose like yet never worldly treasure bought, Thy solid judgment, and thy generous thought,

Which in this darken'd age have clearly shined; I swear by those, and by my spotless love, And by my secret, yet most fervent fires, That I have never nursed but chaste desires, And such as modesty might well approve.

Then, since I love those virtuous parts in thee, Shouldst thou not love this virtuous mind in me?

WILLIAM DRUMMOND.

A man of much finer gifts than Stirling, was the famous Drummond. He was born, December 13, 1585, at Hawthornden, his father's estate, in Mid- Lothian. It is one of the most beautiful spots, along the sides of one of the fairest streams in all Scotland, and well fitted to be the home of genius. He studied civil law for four years in France, but, in 1611, the estate of Hawthornden became his own, and here he fixed his residence, and applied himself to literature. At this time he courted, and was upon the point of marrying, a lady named Cunningham, who died; and the melancholy which preyed on his mind after this event, drove him abroad in search of solace. He visited Italy, Germany, and France; and during his eight years of residence on the Continent, used his time well, conversing with the learned, admiring all that was admirable in the scenery and the life of foreign lands, and collecting rare books and ma.n.u.scripts. He had, before his departure, published, first, a volume of occasional poems; next, a moral treatise, in prose, ent.i.tled, 'The Cypress Grove;' and then another work, in verse, 'The Flowers of Zion.'

Returned once more to Scotland, he retired to the seat of his brother- in-law, Sir John Scott of Scotstarvet, and there wrote a 'History of the Five James's of Scotland,' a book abounding in bombast and slavish principles. When he returned to his own lovely Hawthornden, he met a lady named Logan, of the house of Restalrig, whom he fancied to bear a striking resemblance to his dead mistress. On that hint he spake, and she became his wife. He proceeded to repair the house of Hawthornden, and would have spent his days there in great peace, had it not been for the distracted times. His politics were of the Royalist complexion; and the party in power, belonging to the Presbyterians, used every method to annoy him, compelling him, for instance, to furnish his quota of men and arms to support the cause which he opposed. In 1619, Ben Jonson visited him at Hawthornden. The pair were not well a.s.sorted. Brawny Ben and dreaming Drummond seem, in the expressive coinage of De Quincey, to have 'interdespised;' and is not their feud, with all its circ.u.mstances, recorded in the chronicles of the 'Quarrels of Authors' compiled by the elder Disraeli? The death of a lady sent Drummond travelling over Europe --the death of a King sent him away on a farther and a final journey.

His grief for the execution of Charles I. is said to have shortened his days. At all events, in December of the year of the so-called 'Martyrdom,' (1649,) he breathed his last.

He was a genuine poet as well as a brilliant humorist. His 'Polemo Middinia,' a grotesque mixture of bad Latin and semi-Latinised Scotch, has created, among many generations, inextinguishable laughter. His 'Wandering Muses; or, The River of Forth Feasting,' has some gorgeous descriptions, particularly of Scotland's lakes and rivers, at a time when

'She lay, like some unkenn'd of isle, Ayont New Holland;'

but his sonnets are unquestionably his finest productions. They breathe a spirit of genuine poetry. Each one of them is a rose lightly wet with the dew of tenderness, and one or two suggest irresistibly the recollection of our Great Dramatist's sonnets, although we feel that 'a less than Shakspeare is here.'

THE RIVER OF FORTH FEASTING.

A PANEGYRIC TO THE HIGH AND MIGHTY PRINCE JAMES, KING Or GREAT BRITAIN, FRANCE, AND IRELAND.

_To His Sacred Majesty._

If in this storm of joy and pompous throng, This nymph (great king) doth come to thee so near That thy harmonious ears her accents hear, Give pardon to her hoa.r.s.e and lowly song: Fain would she trophies to thy virtues rear; But for this stately task she is not strong, And her defects her high attempts do wrong, Yet as she could she makes thy worth appear.

So in a map is shown this flowery place; So wrought in arras by a virgin's hand With heaven and blazing stars doth Atlas stand, So drawn by charcoal is Narcissus' face: She like the morn may be to some bright sun, The day to perfect that's by her begun.

What bl.u.s.tering noise now interrupts my sleep?

What echoing shouts thus cleave my crystal deep, And seem to call me from my watery court?

What melody, what sounds of joy and sport, Are convey'd hither from each neighbouring spring?

With what loud rumours do the mountains ring, Which in unusual pomp on tiptoes stand, And (full of wonder) overlook the land?

Whence come these glittering throngs, these meteors bright, This golden people glancing in my sight?

Whence doth this praise, applause, and love arise, What load-star eastward draweth thus all eyes?