But thou thereon didst only breathe

And sent'st it back to me.

Since when it grows and smells, I swear,
Not of itself, but thee.

FIRST SPEECH IN "THE SAD SHEPHERD."

Enter EGLAMONE.

Egla. Here she was wont to go! and here! and here!
Just where those daisies, pinks, and violets grow:
The world may find the spring by following her,
For other print her airy steps ne'er left.
Her treading would not bend a blade of grass,
Or shake the downy blowball from his stalk

But like the soft west wind she shot along,

And where she went the flowers took thickest root,

As she had sowed them with her odorous foot.

This delightful pastoral on the story of Robin Hood and Maid Marian is unhappily unfinished. Scarcely half is written, and even that wants the author's last touches.

SPEECH OF MAIA, IN "THE PENATES."

If every pleasure were distilled

Of every flower in every field,

And all that Hybla's hives do yield,

Were into one broad mazer filled;

If thereto added all the gums

And spice that from Panchaia comes,
The odor that Hydasper lends,
Or Phoenix proves before she ends;
If all the air my Flora drew,
Or spirit that Zephyr ever blew,
Were put therein; and all the dew
That every rosy morning knew;
Yet all diffused upon this bower,
To make one sweet detaining hour,
Were much too little for the grace
And honor you vouchsafe the place.
But if you please to come again,
We vow we will not then with vain
And empty pastimes entertain
Your so desired, though grieved, pain.
For we will have the wanton Fawns,
That frisking skip about the lawns,
The Panisks, and the Sylvans rude,
Satyrs, and all that multitude,

To dance their wilder rounds about,
And cleave the air with many a shout,
As they would hunt poor Echo out
Of yonder valley, who doth flout
Their rustic noise. To visit whom
You shall behold whole bevies come
Of gaudy nymphs, whose tender calls
Well tuned unto the many falls
Of sweet and several sliding rills,
That stream from tops of those less hills,
Sound like so many silver quills,
When Zephyr them with music fills.
For them Favorius here shall blow
New flowers, that you shall see to grow,
Of which each hand a part shall take,
And, for your heads, fresh garlands make
Wherewith, while they your temples round,
An air of several birds shall sound

An Io Pæan, that shall drown

The acclamations at your crown.

All this, and more than I have gift of saying,
May vows, so you will oft come here a Maying.

EPITAPH ON THE COUNTESS OF PEMBROKE.

Underneath this sable hearse
Lies the subject of all verse,
Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother;
Death, ere thou hast slain another
Learn'd and fair, and good as she,

Time shall throw a dart at thee.

After all we take leave of him, transcribing yet another exqui site song, and echoing our first words, O rare Ben Jonson!

FROM THE MASQUE OF "THE GIPSYS METAMORPHOSED."

XX.

FASHIONABLE POETS.

WILLIAM ROBERT SPENCER.

GRANDSON of two dukes, nursed in the very lap of fashion, and coming into life at the time of all others when wit and fancy, and the lighter graces of poetry, were most cordially welcomed by the higher circles—at a time when the star of Sheridan was still in the ascendant, and that of Moore just appearing on the horizon-William Spencer may be regarded as much the representative of a class, as John Clare, or Robert Burns. The style of his verse eminently airy, polished, and graceful, as well as his personal qualities, combined to render him the idol of that society which, by common consent, we are content to call the best. His varied accomplishments enlivened a country-house, his brilliant wit formed the delight of a dinner table; while his singular charm of manner, and perhaps of character, gave a permanency to his social success by converting the admirers of an evening into friends for life. With all these genial triumphs, however, we can not look over the little volume of graceful verse which is all that now remains of so splendid a reputation, without feeling that the author was born for better, higher, more enduring purposes; that the charming trifler, whose verses forty years ago every lady knew by heart, and which are now well nigh forgotten, ought not to have wasted his high endowments in wreathing garlands for festivals-ought not, above all, to have gone on from youth to age, leading the melancholy life which is all holyday.

Nevertheless we must accept these verses for such as they are, just as we admire unquestioning the wing of a butterfly, or the petal of a flower; and in their kind they are exquisite. Look at the fancy and the finish of these stanzas !

TO THE LADY ANNE HAMILTON.*

Too late I stayed, forgive the crime,
Unheeded flew the hours;

How noiseless falls the foot of Time
That only treads on flowers!

What eye with clear account remarks
The ebbing of his glass,

When all its sands are diamond sparks
That dazzle as they pass?

Ah! who to sober measurement
Time's happy swiftness brings,
When birds of Paradise have lent

Their plumage for his wings?

In the next extract there is an unexpected touch of sentiment mixed with its playfulness, that is singularly captivating.

* Very sweetly mated with one of the sweetest old Irish airs, “The Yel low Horse."

Good-bye replied, "Your statement's true,
And well your cause you've pleaded;
But pray who'd think of How-d'-ye-do,
Unless Good-bye preceded?

"Without my prior influence,

Could yours have ever flourish'd?
And can your hand one flower dispense,
But those my tears have nourish'd?

"How oft, if at the court of Love
Concealment be the fashion,

When How-d'-ye-do has fail'd to move,
Good-bye reveals the passion!

"How oft, when Cupid's fires decline,
As every heart remembers,
One sigh of mine, and only mine,
Revives the dying embers!

"Go, bid the timid lover choose,
And I'll resign my charter,
If he for ten kind How-d'-ye-does
One kind Good-bye would barter!

"From love and friendship's kindred source
We both derive existence,

And they would both lose half their force,
Without our joint assistance.

""Tis well the world our merit knows,
Since time, there's no denying,

One half in How-d'-ye-doing goes,

And t' other in Good-byeing!"

Nobody has told the tragedy of Beth-Gelert so well as Mr. Spencer, in his simple but elegant ballad. I do not know if many persons partake my feeling respecting those stories of which the animal world are the heroes, but to me they seem more touching than grander histories of men and women. Dumb creatures to use that phrase of the common people, which makes in its two homely words so true an appeal to our protection, and our pity-dumb creatures are in their love so faithful, so patient in their sufferings, so submissive under wrong, so powerless for remonstrance or for redress, that we take their part against the human brutes, their oppressors, as naturally and almost as vehemently as we do that of Philoctetes against Ulysses,

* L