Amaz'd, within my secret self I fought,
What god, what herb, the miracle had wrought:
But fure no herbs have power like this, I cry'd;
And ftrait I pluck'd fome neighbouring herbs, and try'd.
Scarce had I bit, and prov'd the wondrous taste,
When ftrong convulfions fhook my troubled breast;
I felt
my heart grow fond of fomething strange,
And my whole nature labouring with a change.
Reftless I grew, and every place forfook,
And ftill upon the feas I bent my look.
Farewell, for ever! farewell, land! I faid;
And plung'd amidst the waves my finking head.
The gentle powers, who that low empire keep,
Receiv'd me as a brother of the deep;
To Tethys, and to Ocean old, they pray,
To purge my mortal earthy parts away.
The watery parents to their fuit agreed,
And thrice nine times a fecret charm they read,
Then with luftrations purify my limbs,

And bid me bathe beneath a hundred streams:
A hundred ftreams from various fountains run,
And on my head at once come rushing down.
Thus far each passage I remember well,
And faithfully thus far the tale I tell;
But then oblivion dark on all my fenfes fell.
Again at length my thought reviving came,
When I no longer found myself the fame;
Then first this fea-green beard I felt to grow,
And thefe large honours on my spreading brow;
My long-defcending locks the billows fweep,
And my broad shoulders cleave the yielding deep;

}

My fishy tail, my arms of azure hue,
And every part divinely chang'd, I view.
But what avail these useless honours now?
What joys can immortality bestow?

What, though our Nereids all my form approve?
What boots it, while fair Scylla fcorns my love?
Thus far the god; and more he would have faid;
When from his prefence flew the ruthless maid.
Stung with repulfe, in fuch disdainful fort,
He feeks Titanian Circe's horrid court.

CONTENTS

T

CONTENTS

ROWE'S

OF

POEM S.

HE Golden Verfes of Pythagoras. Tranflated from the Greek

I

On the late Glorious Success of her Majefty's Arms &

Song

28

On Nicolini and Valentini's first coming to the House in the Hay-market

30

Epilogue to the Inconftant: or, The Way to win

him

Prologue to the Gamester

ibid.

32

Epilogue spoken by Mrs. Barry at the Theatre-Royal

in Drury-Lane, April 7, 1709, at her playing in Love for Love with Mrs. Bracegirdle, for the Benefit of Mr. Betterton

Epilogue to the Cruel Gift

Prologue to the Nonjuror

Horace, Book II. Ode IV. imitated

33

35

39

The Reconcilement between Jacob Tonfon and Mr.

Congreve

Horace, Book III. Ode XXI. To his Cask

Horace, Book IV. Ode I. To Venus

Horace, Book I. Epistle IV. imitated

The Union

On Contentment

41

42

45

47

49

ibid.

On the last Judgment, and the Happiness of the Saints

in Heaven

Collin's Complaint. A Song

Reply by another Hand

50

51

53

Epigram on a Lady who shed her Water at feeing the

Tragedy of Cato; occafioned by an Epigram on a Lady who wept at it

56

ibid.

Imitated in Latin
Mæcenas. Verfes occafioned by the Honours con.

ferred on the Right Honourable the Earl of Halifax, 1714; being that Year installed Knight of the most noble Order of the Garter Epigram on the Prince of Wales's, then Regent, appearing at the Fire in Spring Gardens, 1716

Verses made to a Simile of Mr. Pope's

57

<8

ibid.

59

Song on a fine Woman who had a dull Husband Occafioned by his first Visit to Lady Warwick at

The Contented Shepherd, to Mrs. A D ibid.

Song. Ah Willow. To the fame, in her Sickness 65 To the fame, Singing

Song. The fair Inconftant

To Lord Warwick on his Birth-Day

69

68

69

To Lady Jane Wharton, on her studying the Globe 70

To Mrs. Pulteney upon her going abroad

Song for the King's Birth-Day, May 28, 1716

Ode for the New Year, 1716

Ode for the New Year, 1717

to Peace, for the Year 1718

for the King's Birth Day, 1718

to the Thames, for the Year, 1719

71

ibid.

76

78

80

82

84

The Story of Glaucus and Scylla, from Ovid's Me tamorphofes, Book XIII.

END OF ROWE'S POEMS.

86