Censorious envy dares not blame
The passion which thy truth inspires:
Ye stars, bear witness that my flame
Is chaste as your eternal fires !"

Love saw them (hid among the boughs),
And heard him sing their mutual bliss!
Enjoy,' cried he, 'IANTHE's vows;
But, oh! I envy thee her kiss.'

TO IANTHE, A HYMN TO MAY.

WHERE lives the man (if such a man there be)
In idle wilderness or desert drear,

To beauty's sacred power an enemy?

Let foul fiends harrow him; I'll drop no tear.
I deem that carl by beauty's power unmov'd
Hated of Heaven, of none but hell approv'd;
O may he never love, O never be belov'd!

Hard is his heart, unmelted by thee, May!
Unconscious of love's nectar-tickling sting,
And, unrelenting, cold to beauty's ray;
Beauty the mother and the child of spring!
Beauty and wit declare the sexes even ;
Beauty to woman, wit to man is given;
Neither the slime of earth, but each the fire of Heaven.

Alliance sweet! let beauty wit approve,

As flowers to sunshine ope the ready breast;
Wit beauty loves, and nothing else can love;
The best alone is grateful to the best:
Perfection has no other parallel !

Can light with darkness, doves with ravens dwell?
As soon,perdie,shall Heaven communion hold with hell.

Come then, IANTHE! milder than the Spring,
And grateful as the rosy month of May,
O come; the birds the hymn of Nature sing
Inchanting wild, from every bush and spray:
Swell the green-gems and teem along the vine,
A fragrant promise of the future wine;
The spirits to exalt, the genius to refine!

Let us our steps direct where father Thames
In silver windings draws his humid train,
And pours, where'er he rolls his naval streams,
Pomp on the city, plenty o'er the plain.
Or by the banks of Isis shall we stray,
(Ah, why so long from Isis banks away?)
Where thousand damsels dance, and thousand shep
herds play.

Or choose you rather Theron's calm retreat,
Embosom'd, Surrey, in thy verdant vale,
At once the muses' and the graces' seat!
There gently listen to my faithful tale;
Along the dew-bright parterres let us rove;
Or taste the odours of the mazy-grove:
Hark! how the turtles coo;-Ilanguish, too, with love!
Amid the pleasaunce of Arcadian scenes,
Love steals his silent arrows on my breast;
Nor falls of water, nor enamell'd greens,
Can soothe my anguish, or invite to rest.
You, dear IANTHE! you alone impart

Balm to my wounds, and cordial to my smart :
The apple of my eye, the life-blood of my heart.

With line of silk, with hook of barbed steel,
Beneath this oaken umbrage let us lay,
And from the water's crystal bosom steal
Upon the grassy bank the finny prey:

The perch, with purple speckled manifold;
The eel, in silver labyrinth self roll'd;

And carp, all-burnish'd o'er with drops of scaly gold.

Or shall the meads invite, with Iris' hues
And nature's pencil gay diversify'd,
(For now the sun has lick'd away the dews);
Fair flushing, and bedeck'd like virgin bride?
Thither (for they invite us) we'll repair ;
Collect and weave whate'er is sweet and fair,
posy for thy breast, a garland for thy hair.

A

Fair is the lily, clad in balmy snow;

Sweet is the rose, of spring the smiling eye :
Nipt by the winds, their heads the lilies bow;
Cropt by the hand, the roses fade and die.
Though now in pride of youth and beauty drest,
O think, IANTHE, cruel time lays waste

The roses of the cheek, the lilies of the breast.

Weep not; but rather, taught by this, improve
The present freshness of thy springing prime :
Bestow thy graces on the God of love,
Too precious for the wither'd arms of Time.
In chaste endearments, innocently gay,
IANTHE! now, now love thy spring away;
Ere cold October blasts despoil the bloom of May!

JAMES THOMSON.

1727-40.

Among the illustrious men that Scotland has had the honour of producing, is the Poet of the Seasons, who was born at Ednam, near Kelso, in Roxburghshire, September the 11th, 1700. He studied at Edinburgh, where, perhaps, influenced by the example of his father, who had been minister of Eduam, in the presbytery of Kelso, his attention was directed to theological pursuits; but the ardour of his mind, discovered early in some poetical exercises, soon induced him to relinquish divinity for poetry; and, in the year 1725, Thomson arrived in London, a youthful adventurer, in search of protection and patronage. Here the friendship of Mallet, commenced at the university, enabled him to effect the publication of "Winter," the part that first appeared of his " Seasons." Notwithstanding the celebrity this production has since obtained, it struggled painfully into existence, and remained for some time unnoticed, But the day of retribution was at hand. Thomson became at length known to those who were qualified to estimate and recompense his talents. A place was conferred on him by Chancellor Talbot, on his return from accompanying the son of that nobleman in his travels : afterwards introduced to Lyttelton, he obtained through him a pension of 100 l. from Frederic Prince of Wales; and received, in addition to this favour, when his Lordship came into power, the appointment of Surveyor General to the Leeward Islands, by which, deducting the payment of a deputy in office, he acquired an income of 3001. per annum. His theatrical reputation induced the Prince to request the "Masque of Alfred," which was acted at Cliefden House, on the birth-day of the Princess Augusta, before his Royal Highness. Though this piece was the joint effort of Mallet and Thompson, to the latter is attributed the national Song of "Rule

Britannia." Thomson died at his house in Kew Lane, August 27, 1748. He has a plain monument in Westminster Abbey, the charge of which was defrayed by the profits arising from a splendid edition of his works, pub→ lished by Millar. A tablet, with a memorial inscription, has also been placed in the wall of Richmond Church, to denote and preserve the site of his interment. It is to the present Earl of Buchan, in conjunction with Thomas Park, Esq. that the public are indebted for this useful and honourable attention to the memory of an admired bard!

No calumny seems at one period to have been circulated with more malicious industry, than the assertion that Thomson was insensible to the delicacies of love; to the blandishments of that delightful intercourse, which he has described with such beauty, force, and tenderness. His writings must be permitted to vindicate him from this unmerited obloquy; since his raptures, far from being fictitious, were inspired by the impulse of affection. For Miss Stanley, whose perfections are so fondly commemorated in his "Summer," and in the epitaph for her tomb, he may be concluded to have felt a regard something exceeding the limited formality of friendship: -to her appear to allude those affecting stanzas beginning, "Tell me, thou Soul of her I love?" If his Amanda were Miss Young, of Richmond, he must have loved her with the constancy characteristic of virtuous attachment. She is introduced in the "Summer,” published in 1727: in the "Spring," 1728, she is again adverted to, with increasing solicitude

"AMANDA, come! pride of my song!

Form'd by the Graces, loveliness itself!

Come with those downcast looks, sedate and sweet,
Those looks demure that deeply pierce the soul;
Where, with the light of thoughtful reason mix'd,
Shines lively fancy and the feeling heart:
O come! and while the rosy-footed May
Steals blushing on, together let us tread
The morning dews, and gather in their prime