ORIENTAL ECLOGUES. By Mr. COLLINS. E CLOGUE I. SELIM; OR, THE SHEPHERD'S MORAL. SCENE, A VALLEY NEAR BAGDAT. TIME, THE MORNING. E Perfian maids, attend your poet's lays, YE And hear how shepherds pafs their golden days. Not all are bleft, whom fortune's hand fuftains With wealth in courts, nor all that haunt the plains : The radiant morn resum'd her orient pride, Breathe on each flower, and bear their sweets away; By By Tigris' wandering waves he fat, and fung Ye Perfian dames, he faid, to you belong, Boaft but the worth Baffora's pearls display; Drawn from the deep we own their surface bright, But, dark within, they drink no luftrous light: Such are the maids, and fuch the charms they boast, By fenfe unaided, or to virtue lost. Self-flattering fex! your hearts believe in vain That love shall blind, when once he fires the fwain; As fpots on ermin beautify the skin: The lov'd perfections of a female mind! Bleft were the days, when Wisdom held her reign, And fhepherds fought her on the filent plain; With truth fhe wedded in the fecret grove, O haste, fair maids! ye virtues come away, Loft to our fields, for fo the fates ordain, The dear deferters fhall return again. Come thou, whofe thoughts as limpid fprings are clear, To lead the train, fweet Modesty appear: Here make thy court amidst our rural scene, And shepherd-girls fhall own thee for their queen, Distrusting all, a wise suspicious maid; But man the moft-not more the mountain doe Cold is her breast, like flowers that drink the dew; A filken veil conceals her from the view. And Love the last: by these your hearts approve, Thus fung the fwain; and ancient legends fay, Dear to the plains, the virtues came along, ECLOGUE II. HASSAN; OR THE CAMEL-DRIVER. SCENE, THE DESER T I' N filent horror o'er the boundless wafte The driver Haffan with his camels past: One cruise of water on his back he bore, And his light fcrip contain'd a scanty store A fan of painted feathers in his hand, To guard his shaded face from scorching fand. The fultry fun had gain'd the middle sky, And not a tree, and not an herb was nigh; The beafts, with pain, their dufty way pursue, Shrill roar'd the winds, and dreary was the view! With desperate forrow wild, th' affrighted man Thrice figh'd, thrice ftruck his breaft, and thus began: "Sad was the hour, and luckless was the day, "When firft from Schiraz' walls I bent my way!" Ah little thought I of the blafting wind, The thirst or pinching hunger that I find! Bethink thee, Hassan, where fhall thirst afswage, Ye mute companions of my toils, that bear In all my griefs a more than equal share! Here, where no fprings in murmurs break away, Or mofs-crown'd fountains mitigate the day, In vain ye hope the green delights to know, Which plains more bleft, or verdant vales bestow: Here rocks alone, and taftelefs fands are found, And faint and fickly winds for ever howl around. "Sad was the hour, and luckless was the day, When firft from Schiraz' walls 1 bent my way !" Curft be the gold and filver which perfuade Το Yet money tempts us o'er the defert brown, Why heed we not, while mad we hafte along, Or |