The scene presented by the shores of Salamis on the morning of the battle is thus strikingly depicted. The poet gives no burst of enthusiasm to kindle up his page, and his versification retains most of its usual hardness and want of flow and cadence; yet the assemblage described is so vast and magnificent, and his enumeration is so varied, that the picture carries with it a host of spirit-stirring associations:

The Armies at Salamis.

O sun! thou o'er Athenian towers,
The citadel and fanes in ruin huge,
Dost, rising now, illuminate a scene

More new, more wondrous to thy piercing eye
Than ever time disclosed. Phaleron's wave
Presents three thousand barks in pendants rich;
Spectators, clustering like Hymettian bees,
Hang on the burdened shrouds, the bending yards,
The reeling masts; the whole Crecropian strand,
Far as Eleusis, seat of mystic rites,

Is thronged with millions, male and female race,
Of Asia and of Libya, ranked on foot,

On horses, camels, cars. Ægaleos tall,

Half down his long declivity, where spreads
A mossy level, on a throne of gold,

Displays the king, environed by his court,
In oriental pomp; the hill behind

By warriors covered, like some trophy huge,
Ascends in varied arms and banners clad;
Below the monarch's feet the immortal guard,
Line under line, erect their gaudy spears;

The arrangement, shelving downward to the beach,
Is edged by chosen horse. With blazing steel
Of Attic arms encircled, from the deep
Psyttalia lifts her surface to the sight.
Like Ariadue's heaven-bespangling crown,
A wreath of stars; beyond in dread array.
The Grecian fleet, four hundred galleys, fill
The Salaminian Straits; barbarian prows
In two divisions point to either mouth;
Six hundred brazen beaks of tower-like ships,
Unwieldy bulks; the gently swelling soil
Of Salamis, rich island. bounds the view.
Along her silver-sanded verge arrayed,
The men-at-arms exalt their naval spears
Of length terrific. All the tender sex,
Ranked by Timothea, from a green ascent,
Look down in beauteous order on their sires,
Their husbands, lovers, brothers, sons, prepared

To mount the rolling deck. The younger dames
In bridal robes are clad; the matrons sage,
In solemn raiment, worn on sacred days;
But white in vesture, like their maiden breasts,
Where Zephyr plays, uplifting with his breath
The loosely waving folds, a chosen line
Of Attic graces in the front is placed;
From each fair head the tresses fall, entwined
With newly gathered flowerets; chaplets gay
The snowy hand sustains; the native curls,
O'ershading half, augment their powerful charms;
While Venus, tempered by Minerva, fills
Their eyes with ardour, pointing every glance
To animate, not soften. From on high
Her large controlling orbs Timothea rolls,
Surpassing all in stature, not unlike
In majesty of shape the wife of Jove,
Presiding o'er the empyreal fair.

A popular vitality has been awarded to a ballad of Glover's, while his epics have sunk into oblivion:

As near Portobello lying

Admiral Hosier's Ghost.*

On the gently swelling flood,
At midnight, with streamers flying,
Our triumphant navy rode;
There while Vernon sat all glorious
From the Spaniards' late defeat,
And his crews, with shouts victorious,
Drank success to England's fleet;

On a sudden, shrilly sounding,

Hideous yells and shrieks were heard;
Then, each heart with fear confounding,
A sad troop of ghosts appeared;
All in dreary hammocks shrouded,

Which for winding-sheets they wore,
And, with looks by sorrow clouded,
Frowning on that hostile shore.

On them gleamed the moon's wan lustre,
When the shade of Hosier brave
His pale bands was seen to muster,
Rising from their watery grave:
O'er the glimmering wave he hied him,
Where the Burford reared her sail,
With three thousand ghosts beside him,
And in groans did Vernon hail.

'Heed, oh heed our fatal story!

I am Hosier's injured ghost;
You who now have purchased glory
At this place where I was lost:
Though in Portobello's ruin,

You now triumph free from fears,
When you think on my undoing,
You will mix your joys with tears.

See these mournful spectres sweeping
Ghastly o'er this hated wave, [ing;
Whose wan cheeks are stained with weep
These were English captains brave.
Mark those numbers, pale and horrid,
Who were once my sailors bold;
Lo! each hangs his drooping forehead,
While his dismal tale is told.

I. by twenty sail attended,
Did this Spanish town affright;
Nothing then its wealth defended,
But my orders-not to fight!
Oh! that in this rolling ocean

I had cast them with disdain,
And obeyed my heart's warm motion,
To have quelled the pride of Spain !

Written on the taking of Carthageng from the Spaniards. 1739. The case of Hosier, which is here so pathetically represented was briefly this: In April 1726. that commander was sent with a strong fleet into the Spanish West Indies. to block up the galleons in the ports of that country: or. should they presume to come out. to seize and carry them into England. He accordingly arrived at the Bastimentos. near Portobello; but being restricted by his orders from obeying the dictates of his courage, lay inactive on that sta tion until he became the jest of the Spaniards. He afterwards removed to Carthagena, and continued crusing in those seas until the far greater part of his men perished deplorably by the diseases of that unhealthy climate. This brave man, seeing his best officers and men thus daily swept away, his ship exposed to inevitable destruction, and him. self made the sport of the enemy. is said to have died of a broken heart, -PERCY.

For resistance I could fear none;
But with twenty ships had done
What thou, brave and happy Vernon,
Hast achieved with six alone.
Then the Bastimentos never
Had our foul dishonour seen,
Nor the seas the sad receiver

Of this gallant train had been

• Thus, like thee, proud Spain dismaying,
And her galleons leading home,
Though condemned for disobeying,
I had met a traitor's doom:
To have fallen, my country crying,
"He has played an English part,"
Had been better far than dying

Of a grieved and broken heart.

'Unrepining at thy glory,

Thy successful arms we hail;
But remember our sad story,
And let Hosier's wrong prevail.

Sent in this foul clime to languish,
Think what thousands fell in vain,
Wasted with disease and anguish,
Not in glorious battle slain.

'Hence with all my train attend
From their oozy tombs below:
Through the hoary foam ascen
Here I feed my constant woe.
Here the Bastimentos viewing,

We recall our shameful doom,
And, our plainti e cries renewing,
Wander through the midnight gloom.

'O'er these waves for ever mourning
Shall we roam, deprived of rest,
If, to Britain's shores returning,
You neglect my just request;
After this proud foe subduing,
When your patriot friends you see,
Think on vengeance for my ruin,
And for England-shamed in me.'

WILLIAM MASON.

WILLIAM MASON, the friend and literary executor of Gray, long survived the connection which did him so much honour, but he appeared early as a poet. He was the son of the Rev. Mr. Mason, vicar of St. Trinity, Yorkshire, where he was born in 1725. At Pembroke College, Cambridge, he became acquainted with Gray, who assisted him in obtaining his degree of M. A. His first literary production was a poem, entitled 'Isis,' being an attack on the Jacobitism of Oxford, to which Thomas Warton replied in his Triumph of Isis.' In 1753 appeared his tragedy.of 'Elfrida,'' written,' says Southey, 'on an artificial model, and in a gorgeous diction, because he thought Shakspeare had precluded all hope of excellence in any other form of drama.' The model of Mason was the Greek drama, and he introduced into his play the classic accompaniment of the chorus. A second drama, 'Caractacus,' is of a higher cast than Elfrida:' more noble and spirited in language, and of more sustained dignity in scenes, situations, and character. Mason also wrote a series of odes

on

Independence,'' Memory,'' Melancholy,' and the Fall of Tyranny,' in which his gorgeousness of diction swells into extravagance and bombast. His greatest poetical work is his English Garden,' a long descriptive poem in blank verse, extended over four books, which were published separately between 1772 and 1782. He wrote odes to the naval officers of Great Britain, to the Honourable William Pitt, and in commemoration of the Revolution of 1688. Mason, under the name of Malcolm Macgregor, published a lively satire, entitled An Heroic Epistle to Sir William Chambers, Knight,' 1773. The taste for Chinese pagodas and Eastern bowers is happily ridiculed in this production, so different from the other poetical works of Mason. Gray having left Mason a legacy of £500, together with his books

and manuscripts, the latter discharged the debt due to his friend's memory, by publishing, in 1775, the poems of Gray with memoirs of his life. As in his dramas Mason had made an innovation on the established taste of the times, he ventured, with greater success, to depart from the practice of English authors, in writing the life of Gray. Instead of presenting a continuous narrative, in which the biographer alone is visible, he incorporated the journals and letters of the poet in chronological order, thus making the subject of the memoir in some degree his own biographer. The plan was afterwards adopted by Boswell in his 'Life of Jolinson,' and has been sanctioned by subsequent usage, in all cases where the subject is of importance enough to demand copious information and minute personal details. The circumstances of Mason's life are soon related. After his career at college, he entered into orders, and was appointed one of the royal chaplains. He held the living of Ashton, and was precentor of York Cathedral. When politics ran high, he took an active part on the side of the Whigs, but was respected by all parties. He died in 1797.

Mason's poetry cannot be said to be popular, even with poetical readers. His greatest want is simplicity, yet at times his rich diction has a fine effect. In his English Garden,' though verbose and languid as a whole, there are some exquisite images. Gray quotes the following lines in one of Mason's odes as superlative :'

While through the west, where sinks the crimson day,
Meek twilight slowly sails, and waves her banners gray.
Apostrophe to England-From the English Garden,'

In thy fair domain,

Yes, my loved Albion! many a glade is found,

The haunt of wood-gods only, where if Art

E'er dared to tread, 'twas with unsandalled foot,

Printless, as if the place were holy ground.

And there are scenes where, though she whilome trod,
Led by the worst of guides, fell Tyranny,

And ruthless Superstition, we now trace

Her footsteps with delight, and pleased revere

What once had roused our hatred. But to Time,

Not her, the praise is due: his gradual touch

Has moulded into beauty many a tower

Which, when it frowned with all its battlements,
Was only terrible; and many a fane

Monastic, which, when decked with all its spires,
Served but to feed some pampered abbot's pride,
And awe the unlettered vulgar.

Mount Snowdon.-From 'Caractacus.'

Mona on Snowdon calls:
Hear, thou king of mountains, hear:
Hark, she speaks from all her strings:
Hark, her loudest echo rings;
King of mountains, bend thine ear:
Send thy spirits, send them soon,
Now, when midnight and the moon,
E. L. v. iv.-6

Meet upon thy front of snow;
See their gold and ebon rod,
Where the sober sisters nod,
And greet in whispers sage and slow.
Snowdon, mark! 'tis magic's hour,
Now the muttered spell hath power;
Power to rend thy ribs of rock,

And burst thy base with thunder's shock:
But to thee no ruder spell

Shall Mona use, than those that dwell
In music's secret cells, and lie
Steeped in the stream of harmony.
Snowdon has heard the strain:
Hark, amid the wondering grove
Other harpings answer clear,
Other voices meet our ear,
Pinions flutter, shadows move,
Busy murmurs hum around,
Rustling vestments brush the ground;

Round and round, and round they go,
Through the twilight, through the
shade,

Mount the oak's majestic head,
And gild the tufted mistletoe.
Cease, ye glittering race of light,
Close your wings, and check your flight;
Here arranged in order due;
Spread your robes of saffron hue;
For lo! with more than mortal fire,
Mighty Mador smites the lyre:
Hark, he sweeps the master-strings!

Epitaph on Mrs. Mason, in the Cathedral of Bristol.

Take, holy earth! all that my soul holds dear:
Take that best gift which Heaven so lately gave:
To Bristol's fount I bore with trembling care

Her faded form; she bowed to taste the wave,
And died! Does youth, does beauty, read the line?
Does sympathetic fear their breasts alarm?
Speak, dead Maria! breathe a strain divine;

Even from the grave thou shalt have power to charm.
Bid them be chaste, be innocent, like thee;

Bid them in duty's sphere as meekly move;

And if so fair, from vanity as free;

As firm in friendship, and as fond in love.

Tell them, though 'tis an awful thing to die

('Twas even to thee), yet the dread path once trod, Heaven lifts its everlasting portals high,

And bids the pure in heart behold their God.'

FRANCIS FAWKES.

He

FRANCIS FAWKES (1721-1777) translated Anacreon, Sappho, Bion, and other classic poets, and wrote some pleasing original verses. was a clergyman, and died vicar of Hayes, in Kent. Fawkes enjoyed the friendship of Johnson and Warton; but, however classic in his tastes and studies, he seems to have relished a cup of English ale. The following song is still, and will always be, a favourite:

The Brown Jug

Dear Tom, this brown jug that now foams with mild ale

In which I will drink to sweet Nan of the vale

Was once Toby Fillpot, a thirsty old soul,
As e'er drank a bottle, or fathomed a bowl;
In bousing about 'twas his praise to excel,
And among jolly topers he bore off the bell.

It chanced as in dog-days he sat at his ease,
In his flower-woven arbour, as gay as you please,
With a friend and a pipe puffing sorrows away,
And with honest old stingo was soaking his clay,
His breath-doors of life on a sudden were shut,
And he died full as big as a Dorchester butt.

His body when long in the ground it had lain,
And time into clay had resolved it again,

A potter found out in its covert so snug.

And with part of fat Toby he formed this brown jug;
Now sacred to friendship, and mirth, and mild ale,
So here's to my lovely sweet Nan of the vale!