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Anne Ross, “To the memory of a Young Lady, who died in the eleventh year of her age”

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[ANNE ROSS]

“To the memory of a Young LADY, who died in the eleventh year of her age”

All ye who mourn
The loss of friends that’s dear,
The mournful scene that is exhibit here,
Bids envy cease, and pity drop a tear.

To you, whose hearts can feel when others mourn,
This is address’d, it soon may be your turn;
Their case to day, to-morrow may be your’s,
The clearest sun oft sets in clouds and showers.

A tender mother reared a darling child,                                                   5
Joy of her friends, and all the country’s pride;
Her person graceful, her complexion fair,
An antient Baronet’s apparent heir.

Her comely face display’d a lively bloom,
Which promis’d health, and many years to come;                               10
T’ inform her mind, and make her wise as fair,
Was still her honour’d mother’s constant care.

For her, to Heav’n, she still address’d her prayer,
That it might always keep her in its care;
That she, in ev’ry stage of life, might shine,                                            15
And see her race, a long and prosp’rous line.

Her aunt and mother saw, with glad surprise,
Inherent virtues near perfection rise:
Their hopes were rais’d, their expectations high;
But soon, alas! their expectations fly.                                                       20

How fleeting are our pleasures, here below?
A stream of joy, now turns a tide of woe.

From bloom of health, this darling child is seiz’d,
Laid on her bed and pain’d with sore disease;
If human aid could cure, that aid was giv’n;                                           25
But who can alter the decree of Heav’n.

How calm and patient in distress she lay;
In all her trouble never ceas’d to pray:
Th’ afflicted mother sends her sighs to Heav’n,
Restore my child, and all I wish is giv’n.                                                   30

If this request’s deny’d, O! help me still,
To be resign’d unto thy heavenly will;
Heav’n, oft in mercy, does our wish deny,
Our surest hope is fix’d above the sky.

The child was quite resign’d; to die was gain,                                           35
Her prayer was not for life, but ease from pain:
Her prayer was not unheard, her wish was given;
Her blessed Saviour takes her home to heaven.

In youth and innocence, the child she dies,
And angels waft her spirit to the skies.                                                     40

NOTES:

Epigraph Unable to trace; possibly provided by the author.

5 reared “To raise a person” (OED).

8 antient “The spelling of ‘ancient’ from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century; it refers to the titles of office or position formerly occupied” (OED).

16 race A poetical term that refers to “a set of children or descendants” (OED).

24 sore “Violent with pain” (Johnson).

40 waft “To carry through the air” (Johnson).

Source: Poems on Several Occasions (Glasgow, 1791), pp. 36-38. [Google Books]

Edited by Ka Wing Tsang

Matthew Pilkington, “Happiness”

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 [MATTHEW PILKINGTON]

  “Happiness”

Plagu’d with dependance on the great,
To raise me from my humble state;
With paying court to faithless friends,
Who disappointed all my ends;
With wasting all my blooming years,                                             5
In endless toils, and hopes, and fears;
How fondly longs my soul to gain
The calm, uncrowded rural scene!
To fly the man, whose treach’rous art
Deludes the undesigning heart.                                                     10
No calumny, no pale-cheek’d care,
No envy shall attend me there.
There seated near a gliding stream,
Intent on some inspiring theme,
Or wand’ring o’er the flow’ry vale,                                                  15
Imbibing joy from every gale,
I strive that blissful state to gain,
So fondly sought, so sought in vain.

Vain are our fondest hopes of bliss,
From such a faithless world as this.                                               20
Where vice in every form appears,
In wanton’d youth and palsy’d years.
Where villainy exalted shines,
And merit unregarded pines;
Angelic probity’s unpriz’d,                                                                25
And heav’n-descended truth despised:
Where friendship’s name conceals a knave,
Subtle and studious to deceive;
(A Corvus, who with great success,
At once can murder and caress;)                                                   30
Where triumps self-adoring pride,
Where virtue’s scorn’d, and God defy’d.

Too long deceiv’d, I strove to know
Felicity in things below;
But now, O pow’r supreme, I see,                                                  35
True happiness resides with thee.
With thee, whose wisdom guides on high
The worlds of light that gild the sky,
And made this earth, a place of pain,
A mix’d unsatisfying scene.                                                            40

Let wealth have wings, and friends profest
Stab the sincere unguarded breast;
Preferment’s golden show’r be shed
On Clodio’s undeserving head.
Or Calumny’s envenom’d dart                                                       45
Transfix me in the tend’rest part;
Since no distress in time or place,
Can make eternal goodness cease,
In God alone my raptur’d mind
Unmix’d felicity shall find.                                                               50

NOTES:

11 calumny “False charge, slander” (OED).

 15 vale “A dale or valley” (OED).

 16 gale “A song; merriment” (OED).

22 palsy’d “Affected with palsy, trembling, tottering” (OED).

25 probity “Moral integrity, decency” (OED).

29 Corvus Latin for raven. May also refer to a raven in Greek mythology known as a trickster and thief.

44 Clodio Unable to trace.

Source: The Magazine of Magazines, vol. 8 (July, 1754), p. 82. [Google Books]

Edited by Keli Landowski

William Thomas Fitzgerald, “An Address to the Company assembled at Freemason’s Hall, on the Anniversary of the Literary Fund, May 2 1799”

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[WILLIAM THOMAS FITZGERALD, ESQ.]

“An Address to the Company assembled at Freemason’s Hall, on the Anniversary of the Literary Fund, May 2 1799”

Is there a sight the heart can hold more dear,
Than what Humanity contemplates here?
Pure the delight that animates the breast,
To see you throng to succour the distress’d.
Manes of Butler, Otway, Dryden, rise!                                                 5
Behold an object grateful to your eyes;
England, at last atoning for her crime—
England, that starv’d the witty and sublime,
With contrite feeling opes her ample store,
And bids the Sons of Genius starve no more.                                  10
‘Tis said, that some to Poesy are foes,
And think that Literature engenders woes:
Such would bring back a barb’rous age again;
For none but Vandals persecute the pen!
Though some profane the Muse’s gift divine,                                   15
And bow at Avarice of Ambition’s shrine;
Though some illiberal Satire’s pen employ,
And mingle hemlock in the cup of joy;
Pierce the recesses of domestic life,
Expose the husband, or defame the wife;                                          20
The tale of scandal bring to public eye,
And in smooth numbers circulate the lie—
The Muse’s happier office is, to prove
The bond of Friendship, and the lamp of Love;
To harmonize the passions of the Mind,                                             25
To please, instruct, and meliorate Mankind.
By her the selfish feelings are suppress’d,
And social virtues kindle in the breast;
She points to Nature’s wise and gen’rous plan,
And shews how strongly man depends on man;                               30
This sacred truth the thatch-roof’d Peasant owns,
And ermin’d Monarchs feel it on their thrones!
A loyal zeal for Freedom she inspires,
And nerves to energy the Patriot’s fires—
Is there a man so base, so lost to shame,                                            35
Who does not venerate the Patriot’s name!
Not the proud leader of the servile crew,
Who grind the many, to enrich the few;
But he who, active in his Country’s cause,                                            40
Asserts her liberties, maintains her laws;
Whose upright mind pursues no private end,
At once the Monarch’s, and the People’s friend!
Who stems Oppression, which much oft’ner springs
From Tyrant Factions than from Tyrant Kings;                                    45
Arms for his Sovereign, to his standard flies;
For Freedom conquers, or for Freedom dies:
Not for that Fiend, detested by the good,
That bath’d unhappy France with kindred blood;
That brutaliz’d a Nation once humane,                                                 50
Whose sire is Discord, and whose offspring Pain!
That drinks the tears despairing orphans shed,
Tortures the living, and insults the dead!
That leads from crime to crime, from bad to worse,
The Prince’s tyrant, and the People’s curse!                                         55
Which, like a torrent bursting ev’ry mound,
Destroys the harvest, desolates the ground;
Saps the foundation of the loftiest tow’r,
And whelms the work of ages in an hour!
This Gallic Daemon, hated by the wise,                                                 60
Shuns the keen searching of the Patriot’s eyes:
‘Tis not for her his country’s foes he braves,
In burning climes, or on the stormy waves;
But for that Freedom, native of our soil,
That dignifies command, and sweetens toil!                                         65
Whose graceful form, unbent by time, appears,
Blooming as youth, though sanctified by years!
For British Liberty—that draws the line,
‘Twixt wild Democracy, and Right Divine;
With equal zeal the Monarch’s powers maintains,                                70
And guards the Subject from despotic chains:
The slave who once imbibes the English air,
Freed from his fetters, owns the Goddess there!
Where Heaven these words, in voice of thunder spoke,
The Tree of Freedom is the British Oak!                                                  75

Excuse the warmth with which my Muse express’d
The subject nearest, dearest to my breast;
But, when the foes of earth and heaven conspire,
To desolate the world with sword, and fire,
Each honest man’s a patriot at the heart,                                               80
And burns to take his King’s and Country’s part.
When Time has swept the present race away,
And friends to Science celebrate this day;
Remembrance shall with more than pleasure name
And give your liberal patronage to Fame—                                              85
To rival Genius—mutual Envy past—
Succeeding ages shall be just at last;
And He, who first this noble fabric rais’d,
Shall with no common gratitude be praised:
Time, that destroys the Hero’s trophied bust,                                         90
Shall spare the bay that blossoms o’er his dust.

NOTES:

Title The Literary Fund Now, “The Royal Literary Fund.” Founded in 1790 by Rev. David Williams, the fund aims to support writers in pursing their work in times of financial hardship. The fund has aided well-known writers like Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Joseph Conrad, D.H. Lawrence, and James Joyce, as well as countless other lesser-known authors.

5 Manes of Butler, Otway, Dryden Summoning the souls of poets Samuel Butler (1612-1680), Thomas Otway (1652-1685), and John Dryden (1631-1700).

9 opes Opens, provides opportunity.

11 Poesy Poetry.

17 illiberal “Unscholarly, not refined” (OED).

18 hemlock “The common name of Conium maculatum, a poisonous umbelliferous plant, having a stout branched stem with purplish spots, finely divided leaves, and small white flowers; it is used medicinally as a powerful sedative” (OED).

32 ermin’d “Cloaked in ermine fur; garmented” (OED).

36 venerate “To regard with feelings of respect and reverence” (OED).

60 Gallic Daemon References the French version of “freedom,” or “liberté,” one of the rallying cries of the French Revolution (1789-99).

69 Right Divine A reference to the divine right of kings, which asserted that a king’s absolute power was sanctioned by God.

75 British Oak An emblem of British nationalism.

88 He, who first this noble fabric rais’d Rev. David Williams (1738-1816), Welsh minster and philosopher who founded the Literary Fund.

91 the bay Or, laurel; “Leaves or sprigs of this tree, esp. as woven into a wreath or garland to reward a conqueror or poet” (OED).

Source: The Gentleman’s Magazine (May 1799), pp. 420-21.

Edited by Tanashati Anderson

James Shirley, “Death’s Final Conquest”

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[JAMES SHIRLEY]

 “Death’s Final Conquest.”

The glories of our blood and state
Are shadows, not substantial things:
There is no armour against Fate,
Death lays his icy hands on kings.
Sceptre and crown                                                               5
Must tumble down,
And in the dust be equal made
With the poor crooked scythe and spade.

Some men with swords may reap the field,
And plant fresh laurels where they kill:                                  10
But their strong nerves at last must yield,
They tame but one another still.
Early or late
They stoop to Fate,
And must give up their murmuring breath                                   15
When they, pale captives, creep to Death.

The garlands wither on your brow,
Then boast no more your mighty deeds,
Upon Death’s purple altar now
See where the victor victim bleeds.                                         20
All heads must come
To the cold tomb,
Only the actions of the just
Smell sweet, and blossom in the dust.

NOTES:

Author James Shirley “Shirley flourished in the reign of Charles I. and II. He died October 29, 1666, aged 72.” [GM Note]

8 Scythe “A tool used for cutting crops such as grass or wheat, with a long curved blade at the end of a long pole attached to which are one or two short handles” (OED).

10 Laurels “The foliage of the bay tree woven into a wreath or crown and worn on the head as an emblem of victory or mark of honour in classical times” (OED).

17 Garlands “A wreath of flowers and leaves, worn on the head or hung as a decoration” (OED).

19 Purple “(In ancient Rome) a position of rank, authority, or privilege” (OED). Generally pertaining to someone of royal blood.

Source: The Gentleman’s Magazine, Vol. 51 (December 1781), p. 583.

Edited by Jeanine Tatiana Shands-Ballas

Mary Masters, “On Marinda’s Marriage”

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MARY MASTERS

“On Marinda’s Marriage”

The Day is come, the mystick Knot is ty’d,
And HYMEN laughs upon the beaut’ous Bride.
Amidst her Maids, see gay MARINDA shine,
Newly conducted from the Sacred Shrine:
Great Heav’n, the wise Disposer of her Charms,                                  5
Consigns them to a happy Lover’s Arms:
Happiest among the Happy here below,
On whom th’ indulging Fates such Gifts bestow.

In fair MARINDA’s Person is exprest,
All that can most delight the Human Breast.                                       10
Motion its Charms in full Perfection spreads,
Where with a graceful Negligence she treads,
And Innocence, which might the First-born Pair
Adorn, displays itself in ev’ry Air.
Yet tho’ her Form has various Beauties join’d,                                     15
It yields in Beauty to her brighter Mind:
Amidst the Virgin Trains the first is nam’d,
For Wit, for Eloquence, and Virtue, fam’d,
When-e’er she speaks, who strives not to be near?
See warm’d Attention bend the list’ning Ear!                                        20
With still Surprise, see the fond Hearers gaze!
While ev’ry Heart beats Measure to her Praise:
Experienc’d Age may by her Youth be taught,
So sage Her Maxims, so sublime her Thought.

But lo! the happy Bridegroom now draws nigh,                           25
His Soul’s in Triumph and his Heart beats high:
A livelier Red inflames his am’rous Cheek,
And in his Voice the tend’rest Accents break:
With Looks erect, and with manly Air
He meets the softer Beauties of the Fair                                               30
The dedicated Nymph each Thought employs,
See from his Eyes the emanating Joys!
He seats himself with Pleasure by her side,
And looks transported on his blushing Bride.

Hail, wedded Pair! O may your Union prove                                  35
The brightest Pattern of Connubial Love!
And may this Day, select by smiling Fate,
Parent of Blessings in your Nuptial State,
Revolving often with the rolling Years,
Ne’er bring less Joy than what the present wears.                               40
Nor melancholy Cares, nor stormy Strife,
Trouble the Tenour of your future Life.

And when the tender Pledges of your Love
In Years to come MARINDA’S Form improve.
New Charmers (yet unborn) shall fire the Muse,                                 45
And endless Beauties endless Verse diffuse.

NOTES:

 2 HYMEN God of marriage.

13 First-born Pair Adam and Eve.

36 Connubial “Of or relating to marriage or a married couple”(OED).

Source: Mary Masters, Poems on Several Occasions (London, 1733), pp.17-20. [Google Books]

Edited by Donna Hang

Mary Darwall, “To a Friend, on her recovery from Sickness”

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[MARY DARWALL]

“To a Friend, on her recovery from Sickness”

My much belov’d, my gentle friend,
May ev’ry happiness attend
Thy health’s returning bloom;
May fell disease, and grief, and pain,
With all their dire afflictive train,                                                 5
No longer be thy doom.

Th’ autumnal sun now shines serene,
Rich Ceres beautifies each scene,
And plenty laughs around;
The woods, the hills, the vales look gay,                                  10
O! hither come, and every day
With rapture shall be crown’d.

Come, range with me the verdant lawn,
And hear the lark at early dawn
His sprightly matin trill;                                                        15
Or, with my little playful throng,
At eve enjoy the blackbird’s song,
Beside some gurgling rill.

But wheresoe’er my friend shall stray,
May peace and pleasure smooth her way,                               20
And health and fortune smile;
May love, with all his choicest flowr’s,
For thee adorn his myrtle bowr’s,
And all thy cares beguile.

May some gay youth, fond, kind, and true,                               25
My SYLVIA’s worthy heart subdue
To Hymen’s gentle pow’r;
Soft may the silken fetters prove,
Distrust or doubt ne’er chill your love,
But peace gild every hour!                                                    30

NOTES:

8 Ceres “The Roman goddess of the growth of food” (Britannica).

10 vales “A more or less extensive tract o f land lying between two ranges of hills” (OED).

14 lark “A name used generally for any bird of the Alaudidae family” (OED).

15 matin “The morning song of birds” (OED); trill “To utter or sing (a note, tune, etc.) with tremulous vibration of sound” (OED).

18 rill “Small stream; a brook; a rivulet” (OED).

23 myrtle bowr’s “Any various evergreen shrubs or small trees of the genus Myrtus” (OED).

27 Hymen “In Greek mythology, the god of marriage” (Britannica).

28 fetters “Chains for the legs” (Johnson).

30 gild “To cover entirely or partially with a thin layer of gold” (OED).

Source: Poems on Several Occasions (London, 1794), pp. 26­-28. [ Google Books]

Edited by Sandy Karkar

Anonymous, “Epilogue”

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ANONYMOUS

“Epilogue”

 Hard is the task to trace the poet’s life,
Where praise and censure ever are at strife;
Where wit and weakness in succession reign
And hold, by turns, th’ enthusiast in their train.
He (to whose rapid eye the Muse hath giv’n                                                    5
“To glance from Heav’n to earth, then earth to Heav’n,”)
O’erlooks all vulgar arts and sober rules,
And leaves the world to knaves and thriving fools:
By all admir’d, rewarded, and carest,
No future cares perplex his anxious breast;                                                    10
No gloomy wants the smiling hours o’ercast,
He paints each year propitious as the last;
Whilst his warm heart, forever unconfin’d,
Expands for all the wants of all mankind.
Hence private griefs from virtuous weakness flow;                                       15
Hence social pleasures prove domestic woe.
Oft’ on this spot the Muse, with solemn mien,
And artful sadness, fills the tragic scene;
The well-feign’d sorrows your attention gain,
Whilst the prompt tear attests the pleasing pain:                                           20
But our sad story needs no poet’s art
To tutor grief, and heave the swelling heart.
To you the deep distress is not unknown,
And, Britons, you have made the cause your own.
—O may your gentle bosoms never prove                                                       25
Th’ untimely loss of those you dearly love!
Since thus your feeling hearts the aid supply
To sooth the widow’s pangs, and orphan’s sigh.

NOTES:

6 “To glance… Heav’n” Quotation from Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (V.i.1842). The original reads: “The poets eye, in fine frenzy rolling,/ Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to Heaven.”

9 carest Caressed.

24 Britons British people.

SOURCE: The Gentleman’s Magazine (June 1777), pp. 286-87.

Edited by Cydnei Jordan

Matthew Pilkington, “The Lost Muse”

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MATTHEW PILKINGTON
“The Lost Muse”

Clio the sweetest Muse of Nine
Who charm the Gods with Lays divine,
Private and unperceiv’d withdrew,
And swift from sacred Pindus flew,
On some exalted Project bent,                                                    5
But told no Creature her Intent.

The God of Numbers heard it said,
His fav’rite, sweet-tongu’d Muse was fled,
And he had oft observ’d, of late
That she was absent from her Seat,                                        10
When all her tuneful Sister-Train
Were forming some immortal Strain.

He us’d to send her, now and then,
With Hints to some peculiar Men,
To Pope, Delany, Gay, or Swift,                                                    15
But now he cou’d not guess her Drift,
And wonders much, that she wou’d venture
To visit Bards, except he sent her;
So, half-provok’d, away he flies,
Takes Hermes with him in Disguise,                                          20
Resolv’d to roam the World around,
’Till Clio’s private Haunt is found.

The Gods, impatient of Delay,
To fam’d Eblana wing their Way,
And prudent, first at Swift’s descend,                                      25
Apollo’s best-regarded Friend,
And whom the God of Verse and Wit,
Inspir’d in ev’ry Line he writ;
There might they hope their Prize to gain
Where ev’ry Muse delights to Reign;                                        30
But she, to execute her Scheme,
Had left him just before they came.

Quick as descending Rays of Light,
To Delville next they take their Flight:
Delville, where all the Wise resort,                                            35
Where oft the Muses keep their Court;
And veil’d from ev’ry mortal Eye
Thro’ all the Doctor’s Rooms they pry,
They search his arbour’d Seats, and Garden,
(Fit Place to find a Muse or Bard in:)                                         40
Then turn’d his Papers o’er with Care,
And plainly found she had been there,
Such Learning, Elegance, and Ease,
Appear in all Delany’s Lays,
Such Beauties in his Numbers shine,                                      45
As prove their Origin divine.

With these their Disappointments vext,
They fly to fair Saphira’s next,
And found her, forming into Rhime
A Thought exalted and Sublime,                                              50
Perceiv’d such Excellence and Wit,
Such Charms in all she spoke and writ,
As soon convinc’d their wond’ring Eyes,
The Muse was with her in Disguise,
And, fond the rising Age to bless,                                            55
Assum’d a mortal Form and Dress.

The God, delighted, calms his Rage,
And crys, there Live, to charm the Age,
Be thou a gay inspiring Guest,
And fill, the soft Delights, her Breast,                                     60
That Breast with all that’s good replete,
But Clio, this will be thy Fate,
Thou shalt contrive the deathless Lays,
But see Saphira win the Praise.

NOTES:

1 Clio “Proper name of the Muse of epic poetry and history” (OED).

4 Pindus A range of mountains in west central Greece, stretching from the border with Albania southwards to the Gulf of Corinth (OED).

7 God of Numbers Apollo, God of poetry (OED).

15 Pope Alexander Pope ( 1688–1744 ), an English poet and a major figure of the Augustan age who is famous for his caustic wit and metrical skill, in particular his use of the heroic couplet (OED); Delany Patrick Delany (?1685–1768) an Irish clergyman and writer, friend of Jonathan Swift (OED); Gay John Gay (1685–1732) an English poet and playwright who is chiefly known for The Beggar’s Opera (1728) (OED); Swift Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) an Irish satirist, poet, and Anglican cleric; known as Dean Swift. He is best known for Gulliver’s Travels (1726) (OED).

18 Bards Poets (OED).

20 Hermes “In Greek mythology, a deity, the son of Zeus and Maia, represented as the messenger of the gods, the god of science, commerce, eloquence, and many of the arts of life” (OED).

24 Eblana Name recorded in Ptolemy’s geography (2nd cent. ad) for the site of what is now Dublin (OED).

26 Apollo The god of the sun, truth, music, poetry, dance and healing. Poets and bards put themselves under his protection (OED).

34 Delville The Delany estate located in Glasnevin, Ireland; a separate village in the eighteenth century, now part of Dublin.

48 Saphira Mary Barber (c. 1685-c.1755), poet and friend of Swift and Delany (Memoirs of Laetitia Pilkington, vol. I, ed. A.C. Elias, Jr, 393).

49 Rhime “Metre, measure” (in verse) (OED).

Source: Poems on Several Occasions (1730), pp. 52-58. [Google Books]

Edited by August Braddock

“C.S.,” Written in a Fit of Sickness, On Shipboard”

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[C.S.]

“Written in a Fit of Sickness, On Shipboard”

As tender plants in parching days, are seen
Withering to droop, forgetful to be green;
So droops my soul, so waste my limbs away;
So fade my cheeks, and so my pow’rs decay.
Some wrathful Angel sure infests the skies,                                       5
And scatters poison’d arrows as he flies;
He smites my head, the organs of my breath
Confess the baleful influence of Death.
Relentless Pow’r! why dost thou blast my bloom?
My age is yet unworthy of the tomb;                                                  10
Too early dost thou come, this youthful breast
Is fitter to receive a softer guest:
To hoary heads, and bosoms cold repair,
More proper is thy reign, and grateful there.
Relentless Pow’r! remonstrances are vain,                                          15
His vengeful weapons rankle in my brain;
Where’er the circling life a channel knows,
His arrows gall me, and his venom flows.

Ah me! no tender parent here is by,
No sympathizing kind companion nigh;                                              20
Nor one kind matron to attend my bed,
Living to cherish, or enshroud me dead.

With Heav’n’s just vengeance I can be content,
But why should men my miseries augment?
Me here they keep, where things in all degrees,                                  25
Are foes to health, and enemies to ease;
With stench the smell, with noise the ear’s annoy’d:
A place, of ev’ry consolation void.

For this, may Heav’n avenging fix their doom,
With sorrow to descend into the tomb.                                                30
In their distress be no fond parent by,
Nor one of all their friends, or blood be nigh;
Nor one kind matron to attend their bed,
Living to cherish, or enshroud them dead.

NOTES:

8  baleful  “Full of malign, deadly, or noxious influence; pernicious, destructive” (OED).

9  bloom  “The blossom or flower of a plant” (OED).

13  hoary heads  Old people.

15  remonstrances  “An appeal, a request” (OED).

16  rankle  “A festering sore; the fact or condition of festering” (OED).

17  channel  “A tube or tubular passage, natural or artificial, usually for liquids or fluids” (OED).

18  gall  “The secretion of the liver, bile. With reference to the bitterness of gall, ‘to dip one’s pen in gall’, to write with virulence and rancor” (OED).

Source: Poems on Several Occasions (London, 1768), pp.19-21. [Google Books]

Edited by Geordie Stock

 

 

Anonymous, “The Snail’s Apologist. An Heroi-Comic Ode from the French”

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ANONYMOUS

“The SNAIL’s APOLOGIST. An Heroi-Comic ODE from the French.”

What seas of blood! what heaps of dead!
What horrid scenes around are spread!
Murder and carnage rush to light,
Tumultuous from the realms of night;
One wide destruction covers all,                                                              5
The virtuous with the vicious fall;
Amidst a throng of guilty ghosts
That crowd the Styx on Pluto’s coasts,
I see (or do my senses fail?)
Untimely slain, the gentle snail.                                                              10
Say whence thy claim, presumptuous man!
To bound their life’s contracted span?
Have they from thee receiv’d their breath?
Hast thou a right to give them death?
I know what vain pretence is made,                                                       15
Thou sayst that rapine is their trade.
What rapine—? is not yonder tree
Their country? falsely claim’d by thee!
What if the foliage fade and fall,
Their own, that fragrant foliage all.                                                        20
Born where yon peach nutrition draws,
The snail is ign’rant of thy laws;
Kind nature’s voice the peach bestows,
Kind nature’s voice alone he knows.
Contented with his humble lot,                                                              25
He plunders none, he riots not;
Cease then an hasty fate to give,
And since he only eats to live,
Indulge him in the green retreat,
And let, ah! let him live to eat.                                                               30
With martial ardour dost thou glow?
Up, seek and charge an equal foe;
Against the gnat the war declare,
And hunt him thro’ the fields of air;
Let hostile wasps provoke thy rage,                                                     35
And, foe to sloth, the drone engage;
The gorgeous moth, the dragon’s dread,
Destroy them, and bestride the dead;
Strike home, nor let thy vengeance fail,
’Tis due to these, but spare the snail.                                                  40
Alcides thus, in days of yore,
Bade monsters vex the world no more;
And by thy valour’s equal deed,
Be later times from monsters freed;
Thro’ dangers press, pursue the fight,                                                 45
The threaten’d wound, inflicted, slight.
As fairest flow’rs of sharpest thorn,
Of baffled danger, glory’s born,
Hence demi-gods and heroes claim
Proud statues in the shrine of Fame.                                                   50

NOTES:

8 Styx on Pluto’s coasts Pluto is another name for Hades, the Greek God of the Underworld. “Pluto’s coasts” refers here to the banks of the river Styx, the river of the Underworld (Oxford Reference).

16 rapine “The act or practice of seizing and taking away by force the property of others; plunder, pillage, robbery” (OED).

36 drone “The male of the honey-bee. It is a non-worker, its function being to impregnante the queen-bee” (OED).

37 dragon’s “A fly so called” [Author’s note].

41 Alcides thus…no more An alternative name for Heracles, a divine hero from Greek mythology known for battling against monsters of the Underworld.

Source: The Gentleman’s Magazine, vol. 18 (August 1748), p. 375.

Edited by Daniel Bresnahan