at dinner and supper, with which the neighboring town of Pool supplied him. At the upper end of the room stood a small table with a double desk, one side of which held a church Bible, the other the Book of Martyrs. On different tables in the room lay hawk's-hoods; bells; old hats, with their crowns thrust in, full of pheasant eggs; tables; dice; cards; and a store of tobacco-pipes. At one end of this room was a door which opened into a closet, where stood bottles of strong beer and wine, which never came out but in single glasses, which was the rule of the house; for he never exceeded himself, nor permitted others to exceed. Answering to this closet was a door into an old chapel-which had been long disused-for devotion: but in the pulpit, at the safest place, was always to be found a cold shin of beef, a venison pasty, a gammon of bacon, or a great apple-pie, with thick crust, well baked. His table cost him not much, though it was good to eat at. His sports supplied all but beef and mutton, except on Fridays, when he had the best of fish. He never wanted a London pudding; and he always sang it in with "My part lies therein-a-." He drank a glass or two of wine at meals, put syrup of gilliflowers into his sack, and had always a tun-glass of small beer standing by him, which he often stirred about with rosemary. He lived to be an hundred, and never lost his eyesight, nor used spectacles. He got on horseback without help, and rode to the death of the stag till past fourscore. WILLIAM GILPIN, 1724-1807.

SONNET.

Old Harry Hastings! of thy forest life

How whimsical, how picturesque the charms!
Yet it was sensual! With thy hounds and horn,
How cheerily didst thou salute the morn!

With airy steed didst thou pursue the strife,
Sounding through all the woodland-glades alarms.
Sunk not a dell, and not a thicket grew,

But thy skill'd eye and long experience knew.
The herds were thy acquaintance; antler'd deer
Knew where to trust thy voice, and where to fear;
And through the shadowy oaks of giant size,

Thy bugle could the distant sylvans hear,

And wood-nymphs from their bowery bed would rise,
And echoes dancing round repeat their ecstasies.

SIR EGERTON BRYDGES, 1762-1837.

SONNET.

There is exhilaration in the chase

Not bodily only! Bursting from the woods,
Or having climb'd some misty mountain's height,
When on our eyes a glorious prospect opes,
With rapture we the golden view embrace:

Then worshiping the sun on silver floods,
And blazing towers, and spires, and cities bright
With his reflected beams; and down the slopes
The tumbling torrents; from the forest-mass

Of darkness issuing, we with double force
Along the gayly-checker'd landscape pass,

And, bounding with delight, pursue our course.

It is a mingled rapture, and we find

The bodily spirit mounting to the mind.

SIR EGERTON BRYDGES, 1762-1887.

LINES.

This world a hunting is

The prey, poor man; the Nimrod fierce is Death;

His speedy grayhounds are

Lust, sickness, envy, care,

Strife that ne'er falls amiss,

With all those ills that harm'd us while we breathe.

Now if by chance we fly,

Of these the eager chase,

Old age, with stealing pace,

Casts on us his nets, and then we panting die.

WILLIAM DRUMMOND, 1585-1649.

XXIII.

Medley.

H

ODE.

FROM THE LATIN OF HORACE.

OW happy in his low degree,

How rich in humble poverty is he, Who leads a quiet country life; Discharg'd of business, void of strife,

And from the griping scrivener free! Thus, ere the seeds of vice were sown Liv'd men in better ages born, Who plow'd with oxen of their own

Their small paternal field of corn.

Nor trumpets summon him to war,

Nor drums disturb his morning sleep, Nor knows he merchants' painful care, Nor fears the dangers of the deep.

The clamors of contentious law,

And court and state, he wisely shuns; Nor brib'd with hopes, nor dar'd with awe,

To servile salutations runs ; But either to the clasping vine

Does the supporting poplar wed,
Or with his pruning-hook disjoin

Unbearing branches from their head,
And grafts more happy in their stead;

Or climbing to a hilly steep,

He views his buds in vales afar,

Or shears his overburden'd sheep,

Or mead for cooling drink prepares

Of virgin honey in the jars;

Or, in the now declining year,

When beauteous Autumn rears his head,

He joys to pull the ripen'd pear

And clust'ring grapes, with purple spread.

Sometimes beneath an ancient oak,

Or on the matted grass, he lies;

No god of Sleep he need invoke ;

The stream that o'er the pebble flies, With gentle slumber crowns his eyes, The wind that whistles through the sprays Maintains the concert of the song; And hidden birds, with native lays,

The golden sleep prolong.

But when the blast of winter blows,
And hoary frost invests the year,

Into the naked woods he goes,

And seeks the tusky boar to near,

With well-mouthed hounds and pointed spear!

Or spreads his subtile nets from sight,
With twinkling glasses to betray
The larks that in the meshes light;

Or makes the fearful bear his prey.
Amidst his harmless, easy joys,

No anxious care invades his health,
Nor love his peace of mind destroys,
Nor wicked avarice of wealth.
But if a chaste and pleasing wife,
To business of his life,

Divides with him his household care,

Such as the Sabine matrons were,

Such as the swift Apulian's bride,

Sunburnt and swarthy though she be,

Will fire for winter nights provide,

And-without noise-will oversee

His children and his family;
And order all things till he come,
Sweaty and over-labored, home;
If she in pens his flock will fold,

And then produce her dairy store,
With wine to drive away the cold,

And unbought dainties for the poor;

Not oysters of the Lucrine lake

My sober appetite would wish,
Nor turbot, or the foreign fish
That rolling tempests overtake,

And hither waft the costly dish.
Not heathpoult, or the rarer bird,
Which Phasis or Ionia yields,
More pleasing morsels would afford

Than the fat olives of my fields;
Than shards or mallows for the pot,

That keep the loosened body sound;
Or than the lamb, that falls by lot

To the just guardian of my ground.
Amidst these feasts of happy swains,

The jolly shepherd smiles to see
His flock returning from the plains;
The farmer is as pleased as he,
To view his oxen sweating smoke,
Bear on their necks the loosen'd yoke;
To look upon his menial crew,

That sit around his cheerful hearth,
And bodies spent in toil renew

With wholesome food and country mirth.

This Alphius said within himself,
Resolv'd to leave the wicked town,
And live retir'd upon his own,

He call'd his money in ;

But the prevailing love of pelf,

Soon split him on the former shelf-
He put it out again.

Translation of DRYDEN.

LETTER OF SIR THOMAS MORE TO HIS WIFE.

Mistress Alice, in my most heartywise I recommend me to you. And whereas I am informed by my son Heron of the loss of our barns and our neighbours' also, with all the corn that was therein; albeit (saving God's