Wild flights of fancy! gay, unbounded strains! Where wanton wit, without true judgment reigns. Yet blooming merit should demand your care; Genius alone can thrive and flourish there: Indulgence comes, like kind, enlivening showers, And the warm sun-beam to awake the flowers; When from the tree young spritely branches shoot, If blasted-blame the wind-and not the root.

To Sir William Brewer, Bart. in Kent; written in the Year 1744.

MUSE! to my worthy friend an offering bring; And his fair garden, in soft numbers sing: Sweet let thy verse from unforced nature flow, Yet strongly mark'd let the full figures glow; As when drawn clouds unveil the blushing sky, And Heaven burns broad with a vermillion dye, While thro' the grovy tracks, cool zephyrs pass, To fan the silver streams, and sweep the grass.

Deep, in surrounding woods, there shines a seat,
Nature's blest favourite, and Love's retreat;
Green, amid stony wilds, rise opening bowers,
Arch'd with a wreathy heaven of pendant flowers:

Cool, in the burning dog-star's sultry sway;
Yet in the ice of winter, warm and gay.

O shades, well temper'd, like your owner's mind, Where soft, and solid, are by nature join'd; Sublimely wise, and to perfection blest,

You know to judge, and dare to choose the best.

Beauty and wit, in your loved consort meet,
Where all that's noble lives with all that's sweet;
At once your wife, your partner, and your friend,
She curbs your cares, and does your joys extend :
You are the point, which all her hopes pursue;
And if she sings, she sweetly sings of you!
In her, alone, you every blessing find,
Charm to your eye, and cordial to your mind.
Ever thus bless'd, may life wear slow away,
And some new charm mark even its latest day;-
May no noise reach you, but thro' rustling trees,
When their broad boughs bend from the murmuring
breeze.

Lift

me, some God, from this tumultuous town, And near that heavenly umbrage set me down; In some small cottage, that delightful stands, Some clean thatch'd tenement within your lands;

Hemm'd with high rosy banks, and shadowy bowers,
"A snow of blossoms and a wild of flowers;"
Where the low vine does the tall elm beseech,
And the sweet lime-tree woos the useful beech;
'Till the mix'd boughs compose a roofy shade,
And no bold sun-beam can my rest invade;
Here out of hated scandal's noisy sound,
Stretch'd in sweet leisure on the silent ground;
Deathless companions of my shade I'd choose,
The few fix'd favourites of our English muse:
High soaring Milton! Dryden sweet of strain!
Undying Shakspeare! and wild Spenser's vein!
Sometimes familiar Jonson in low flight,

Shall place the vulgar world before my sight;
But Waller's numbers most my heart shall move,
For the prevailing passion there, is love;

But naming love, hark! Clio tunes the strings,
And the soul melts before her, as she sings;
What prouder ornaments of life remain,
I leave for fools to seek; and knaves to gain.

DAVID GARRICK.

1716-1779.

The life of Garrick is too well known, and too full of little incidents, to require, or to allow, of its insertion here. He seems always to have written as the manager of a theatre, and to have always kept in view the interest he possessed in it. His poetry is calculated to catch applause, but does not aspire to fame; it would be invidious therefore to try it by very rigid rules. His satire is not weak, but it is not terrible; and his muse is always lively enough to please, though she may not attempt to astonish. The Fribbleriad will not compare with the Rosciad; the first 90 lines are nearly upon the same subject as those of Churchill, beginning

"With that low cunning which in fools supplies'

and are given in these specimens. The reader will see that in a better-natured vein he satirizes a prevailing folly, in the prologue to Foote's comedy," Taste."

The Ode to Shakspeare is not in the manner of the ancient Pindar, but of a modern Manager, and can hardly give a just idea of the lyrick poetry of our times; as it has been much spoken of, an extract from it is subjoined.

The Fribbleriad.

WHO is the Scribler, X, Y, Z,

Who still writes on, though little read?
Whose falshood, malice, envy, spite,
So often grin, yet seldom bite?

Say, Garrick, does he write for bread,
This friend of yours, this X, Y, Z?
For pleasure sure, not bread-'twere vain,
To write for that he ne'er could gain;
No calls of nature to excuse him,
He deals in rancour to amuse him
A man, it seems-'tis hard to say
A woman then?-a moment pray ;-
Unknown as yet by sex or feature,
Suppose we try to guess the creature ;
Whether a wit, or a pretender?

Of masculine, or female gender?

;

Some things it does may pass for either,
And some it does, belong to neither:
It is so fibbing, slandering, spiteful,
In phrase so dainty, so delightful;