And may they be fed from above

By him which first ordain'd your love!

Fresh as the hours may all your pleasures be,
And healthful as eternity!

Sweet as the flower's first breath, and close
As th' unseen spreadings of the rose,
When he unfolds his curtain'd head,

And makes his bosom the sun's bed.

Like the day's warmth may all your comforts be,
Untoil'd for, and serene as he;

Yet free and full, as is that sheaf
Of sun-beams gilding every leaf,
When now the tyrant heat expires

And his cool'd locks breathe milder fires.

RICHARD FLECKNO.

"He was," says Langbaine," as famous as any in his age for ❝ indifferent metre ;" and adds "his acquaintance with the "nobility was more than with the muses." He is said to have been originally a Jesuit, and was the author of five dramatic pieces: but is less indebted to them than to the satire of Dryden for the celebrity of his name. Farther particulars may be met with in Langbaine and the Biogr. Dram. The following specimens are taken from his "Miscellania," &c. London, 1653. 12mo.

THE ANT.

LITTLE think'st thou, poor ant, who there
With so much toil, and so much time
A grain or two to th' cell dost bear,
There's greater work i' th' world than thine.

Nor is 't such wonder now in thee,

No more of th' world nor things dost know, That all thy thoughts o' th' ground should be, And mind on things so poor and low.

'But that man so base mind should bear,
To fix it on a clod of ground,
As there no greater business were,

Nor greater worlds for to be found!

He so much of the man does want
As metamorphos'd quite again,

Whilst thou'rt but man turn'd groveling ant,
Such grovelers seem but ants turn'd men.

Extempore in praise of drinking Wine.

THE fountains drink caves subterrene,
The rivulets drink the fountains dry;
Brooks drink those rivulets again,

And them some river gliding by.
Until some gulph o' th' sea drink them,
And th' ocean drinks up that again.

Of th' ocean then does drink the sky,
When, having brew'd it into rain,
The earth with drink it does supply,

And plants do drink up that again.
When turn'd to liquor in the vine,
"Tis our turn next to drink the wine.

By this who does not plainly see,

How down our throats at once is hurl'd (Whilst merrily we drinking be)

The quintessence of all the world? Whilst all drink then in land, air, sea, Let us too drink as well as they.

INVOCATION OF SILENCE.

STILL-born silence! thou that art
Flood-gate of the deeper heart!

Secrecy's confident, and he
Who makes religion mystery!
Admiration's speaking'st tongue!
Leave, thy desart shades among,
Reverend hermits' hallowed cells,
Where retir'd devotion dwells!
With thy enthusiasms come,

Seize our tongues, and strike us dumb!

MATTHEW STEVENSON,

Author of "Poems, or a miscellany of Sonnets, Satyrs, "Drollery, Panegyricks, Elegies, &c." London, 1673, 12mo. a book which sometimes occurs with the title of "Norfolk "Drollery;" and in 1685 was called "the Wits, in Poems "and Songs on various Occasions." A different volume of "Poems by Matthew Stevenson," appeared in 1665, and "Bellum Presbyteriale," an heroic poem, in 1661. In 1654, he printed a 12mo. miscellany, styled "Occa"sion's Offspring." Stevenson seems to have resembled Fleckno as a poet and publisher. The following song (from the first-mentioned) is tolerable.

CAROLINA.

SONG.

SHOULD I sigh out my days in grief,
And, as my beads, count miseries,
My wound would meet with no relief
For all the balsam of my eyes:
I'll therefore set my heart at rest,
And of bad market make the best.