In one rude clash he struck the lyre,
And swept with hurried hand the strings.

With woeful measures wan Despair

Low sullen sounds his grief beguiled,
A solemn, strange, and mingled air,
'T was sad by fits, by starts 't was wild.

But thou, O hope, with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure?
Still it whispered promised pleasure,

And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail!
Still would her touch the strain prolong,

And from the rocks, the woods, the vale, She called on Echo still through all the song;

And where her sweetest theme she chose,

A soft responsive voice was heard at every close,
And Hope enchanted smiled, and waved her golden hair.

And longer had she sung-but, with a frown,
Revenge impatient rose,

He threw his blood-stained sword in thunder down,
And with a withering look

The war-denouncing trumpet took,

And blew a blast so loud and dread,

Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe.

And ever and anon he beat

The doubling drum with furious heat;

And though sometimes each dreary pause between

Dejected Pity at his side

Her soul-subduing voice applied,

Yet still he kept his wild unaltered mien,

While each strained ball of sight seemed bursting from his head.

Thy numbers, Jealousy, to nought were fixed
Sad proof of thy distressful state,

Of differing themes the veering song was mixed,

And now it courted Love, now raving called on Hate. With eyes up-raised as one inspired,

Pale Melancholy sat retired,

And from her wild sequestered seat,

In notes by distance made more sweet,

Poured through the mellow horn her pensive soul:

And dashing soft from rocks around,

Bubbling runnels joined the sound;

Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole, Or o'er some haunted stream, with fond delay, Round an holy calm diffusing,

Love of peace and lonely musing,

In hollow murmurs died away.

But O, how altered was its sprightlier tone!
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue!
Her bow across her shoulder flung,

Her buskins gemmed with morning dew;

Blew an inspiring air that dale and thicket rung,
The hunter's call to Faun and Dryad known;

The oak-crowned sisters, and their chaste-eyed queen,
Satyrs and sylvan boys were seen,

Peeping from forth their alleys green;

Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear,

And Sport leapt up, and seized his beechen spear.

Last came Joy's ecstatic trial,

He with viney crown advancing,

First to the lively pipe his hand addrest, But soon he saw the brisk-awakening viol,

Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best; They would have thought who heard the strain, They saw in Tempe's vale her native maids, Amidst the festal sounding shades,

To some unwearied minstrel dancing,

While as his flying fingers kissed the strings,
Love framed with Mirth a gay, fantastic round,
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound,
And he, amidst his frolic play,

As if he would the charming air repay,
Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings.

O Music, sphere-descended maid,
Friend of pleasure, wisdom's aid,
Why, goddess, why, to us denied,
Layst thou thy ancient lyre aside?
As in that loved Athenian bower,
You learned an all-commanding power,
Thy mimic soul, O nymph endeared,
Can well recal what then it heard.
Where is thy native simple heart,
Devote to Virtue, Fancy, Art?
Arise, as in that olden time,
Warm, energic, chaste, sublime!
Thy wonders, in that godlike age,
Fill thy recording sister's page-
'T is said, and I believe the tale,
Thy humblest reed could more prevail,
Had more of strength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard age,
E'en all at once together found
Cecilia's mingled world of sound.

O, bid our vain endeavours cease,
Revive the just designs of Greece,
Return, in all thy simple state!
Confirm the tales her sons relate!

COLLINS.

The Cotter's Saturday Night.

INSCRIBED TO ROBERT AIKEN, ESQ.

Let not ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile,
The short and simple annals of the poor.

GRAY.

My loved, my honoured, much respected friend!
No mercenary bard his homage pays!

With honest pride I scorn each selfish end,

My dearest meed—a friend's esteem and praise:
To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays,
The lowly train in life's sequestered scene;
The native feelings strong, the guileless ways;
What Aiken in a cottage would have been;

Ah! though his worth unknown, far happier there I ween!

November chill blaws loud wi' angry sugh;
The shortening winter-day is near a close,
The miry beasts retreating frae the pleugh;
The blackening trains o' craws to their repose:

The toil-worn cotter frae his labour goes,
This night his weekly moil is at an end,
Collects his spades, his mattocks, and his hoes,
Hoping the morn in ease and rest to spend,

And weary, o'er the moor, his course does hameward bend.

At length his lonely cot appears in view,

Beneath the shelter of an aged tree;

The expectant wee things, toddlin', stacher through,
To meet their dad, wi' flichtering noise and glee.

His wee-bit ingle blinkin' bonnilie,

His clean hearth-stane, his thriftie wifie's smile,
The lisping infant prattling on his knee,
Does a' his weary kiaugh and care beguile,

An' makes him quite forget his labour an' his toil.

Belyve the elder bairns come drapping in,
At service out amang the farmers roun';
Some ca' the pleugh, some herd, some tentie rin
A cannie errand to a neebor town:

Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown,
In youthfu' bloom, love sparkling in her e'e,
Comes hame, perhaps, to show a braw new gown,
Or deposite her sair-won penny-fee,

To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be.

With joy unfeigned, brothers an' sisters meet,
And each for other's weelfare kindly spiers;
The social hours, swift-winged, unnoticed fleet;
Each tells the unco's that he sees or hears;
The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years;
Anticipation forward points the view.