A BALLA D.

HARK, hark, 'tis a voice from the tomb,

Come, Lucy, it cries, come away,

The grave of thy COLIN has room

To reft thee befide his cold clay.
I come, my dear fhepherd, I come,
Ye friends and companions adieu :
I hafte to my COLIN's dark home,
To die on his bofom fo true.

All mournful the midnight bell rung,
When LUCY, fad Lucy, arofe;
And forth to the green turf she sprung,
Where COLIN's pale afhes repofe.
All wet with the night's chilling dew,

Her bofom embrac'd the cold ground,
While ftormy winds over her blew,

And night-ravens croak'd all-around.

"How long, my lov'd COLIN," she cry'd,
"How long muft thy Lucy complain?
"How long fhall the grave my love hide?
"How long ere it join us again?
"For thee thy fond fhepherdefs liv'd,
"With thee o'er the world would she fly;
For thee has fhe forrow'd and griev'd;
"For thee would the lie down and die.

"Alas!

"Alas! what avails it how dear

66 Thy Lucy was once to her swain! "Her face like the lily so fair,

"And eyes that gave light to the plain. "The fhepherd that lov'd her is gone; "That face and thofe eyes charm no more; "And Lucy forgot, and alone,

"To death fhall her COLIN deplore."

While thus fhe lay funk in defpair,
And mourn'd to the echoes around,
Inflam'd all at once grew the air,

And thunder fhook dreadful the ground. "I hear the kind call, and obey,

“Oh, COLIN receive me," she cried,. Then breathing a groan o'er his clay, She hung on his tomb-stone, and died..

SONGS.

EPISTLE TO A FRIEND.

D%

O, ftudy more difcard that Siren, Eafe, Whose fatal charms are murd'rous while they please.

"Wit's fcanty streams will fret their channel dry, "If Learning's fpring withhold the fresh supply. "Turn leaf by leaf gigantick volumes o'er, "Nor blush to know what antients wrote before. "Why not, fometimes, regale admiring friends "With Greek and Latin fprinklings, odds and ends? "Exert your talents; read, and read to write! "As Horace fays, mix profit with delight."

'Tis rare advice: but I am flow to mend,
Though ever thankful to my partial friend:
Full of strange fears-for hopes are banish'd all→
I list' no more to Phoebus' facred call,

Smit with the Muse, 'tis true, I fought her charms;
But came no champion, clad in cumb'rous arms,
To pull each rival monarch from his throne,
And fwear no lady Clio like my own,
All unambitious of fuperior praife,
My fond amusement afk'd a sprig of bays,
Some little fame for ftringing harmless verse,
And e'en that little fame has prov'd a curse;
Hitch'd into rhime, and dragg'd through muddy prose,
By butcher criticks, worth's confed'rate foes.

If then the Mufe no more shall strive to please, Lull'd in the happy lethargy of ease;

If, unadvent'rous, the forbear to fing,

Nor take one thought to plume her ruffled wing;
"Tis that she hates, howe'er by nature vain,
The fcurril nonfenfe of a venal train..

When defp'rate robbers, ifsuing from the waste,
Make fuch rude inroads on the land of taste,
Genius grows
fick beneath the Gothick rage,
Or feeks her laurels from fome worthier age.

As for Myfelf, I own the prefent charge;
Lazy and lounging, I confefs at large:
Yet Eafe, perhaps, may loose her filken chains,,
And the next hour become an hour of pains.
We write, we read, we act, we think, by fits,
And follow all things as the humour hits ;
For of all pleasures, which the world can bring,
Variety-O! dear variety's the thing!

Our learned Coke, from whom we fcribblers draw
All the wife Dictums of poetick law,

Lays down this truth, from whence my maxim follows,. (See Horace, Ode Dec. Sext.-the cafe Apollo's) "The God of Verse disclaims a plodding wretch,, "Nor keeps his bow for ever on the ftretch."

However great my thirst of honeft fame, I bow with rev'rence to each letter'd name; To worth, where'er it be, with joy submit, But own no curft monopolies of wit.

Nor

Nor think, my friend, if I but rarely quote,
And little reading fhines through what I've wrote,
That I bid peace to ev'ry learned shelf,
Because I dare form judgments for myself.
-Oh! were it mine, with happy skill to look
Up to the ONE, the UNIVERSAL BOOK!
Open to all-to him, to me, to you,
-For NATURE's open to the general view
Then would I fcorn the ancients' vaunted store,
And boast my thefts, where they but robb'd before.

Mean while with them, while Græcian founds impart Th' eternal paffions of the human heart, Burfting the bonds of ease and lazy rest, I feel the flame mount active in my breaft; Or when, with joy, I turn the Roman page, I live, in fancy, in th' AUGUSTAN age! Till fome dull Bavius' or a Mævius' name, Damn'd by the MUSE to everlasting fame, Forbids the mind in foreign climes to roam, And brings me back to our own fools at home.

EPISTLE