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without an attempt to elaborate or make the most of them. He was not a poet of high imagination, he did not attempt any of the more difficult branches of the art, but courted the inspiration of the humbler muses. He excels in tender complimentary lyrics, which, if they want the freshness of nature, are generally glittering, happy, and fanciful. His stanzas To a Lady singing a Song of his composing' contain the same fine image which Byron in his English Bards and Scotch Reviewers has enlarged and applied to the fate of Kirke White.*

Chloris! yourself you so excel,

6

When you vouchsafe to breathe my thought,

That, like a spirit, with this spell

Of my own teaching, I am caught.

That eagle's fate and mine are one,

Which, on the shaft that made him die,

Espied a feather of his own,

Wherewith he wont to soar so high.

Had Echo, with so sweet a grace,

Narcissus' loud complaints returned,

Not for reflection of his face,

But of his voice, the boy had burned.

I pass over, amongst his addresses to political characters, the panegyric to my Lord Protector on the present greatness and joint interest of his Highness and the nation,' but will quote a few of his lines on the death of Cromwell:

*The simile was borrowed by Waller himself from the Greek.

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After the Restoration, Waller was equally ready with verses 'To the King upon His Majesty's happy Return.' Charles the Second however remarked that they were very inferior to those upon the death of the Protector; and Waller's reply at once shewed the superiority of his wit to his principle: "Poets, Sir," he replied, "succeed better in fiction than in truth."

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SIR JOHN DENHAM's popular work is Cooper's Hill, the most polished and classical specimen of descriptive poetry which then existed. Pope calls him the 'lofty,' 'the majestic Denham;' and his verses have all that terseness and elegance of expression which distinguish the best of Pope's-that beautiful ease yet conciseness, that high temper and refinement, which make them resemble those curious remains of mosaic work, where the hardest and the brightest of gems and marbles are carved and inlaid into one compact and solid figure by the

Such is his description of

cunning hand of the artificer.

the Thames, as true as it is popular.

Thames! the most lov'd of all the Ocean's sons,

By his old sire, to his embraces runs,
Hasting to pay his tribute to the sea,
Like mortal life to meet eternity;

Though with those streams he no resemblance hold,
Whose foam is amber, and their gravel gold:

His genuine and less guilty wealth t' explore,
Search not his bottom, but survey his shore,
O'er which he kindly spreads his spacious wing,
And hatches plenty for th' ensuing spring;

Nor then destroys it with too fond a stay,

Like mothers which their infants overlay ;

Nor with a sudden and impetuous wave,

Like profuse kings, resumes the wealth he gave.

No unexpected inundations spoil

The mower's hopes, nor mock the ploughman's toil;

But godlike his unwearied bounty flows;

First loves to do, then loves the good he does.

Nor are his blessings to his banks confin'd,

But free and common as the sea or wind;
When he, to boast or to disperse his stores,
Full of the tributes of his grateful shores,
Visits the world, and in his flying tow'rs

Brings home to us, and makes both Indies ours;
Finds wealth where 'tis, bestows it where it wants,

Cities in deserts, woods in cities plants.

So that to us no thing, no place is strange,

While his fair bosom is the world's exchange.

O could I flow like thee! and make thy stream

My great example, as it is my theme;

Though deep yet clear, though gentle yet not dull;
Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full.

Denham was a true royalist, and wrote many political pasquinades for his party, which are curious relics of the

pointed doggrel to which the contentions of the period gave rise. But the most extraordinary work that sprang out of the state of society after the Restoration was BUTLER'S Hudibras, a poem which, even now when the race of characters it celebrates, and the feelings it embodies have passed away, is still popular from the pungency of its wit, the remarkable fluency of its verse, and cleverness of its rhymes; while to those who are well acquainted with the opinions and habits of the great parties which existed after the return of the Stuarts, it derives new charms from the merit of its caricature, sketched in the spirit of Cervantes and with much of his skill.

I have not time to enter at length into the adventures of Sir Hudibras, his equipment, his exploits and his arguments, his encounters in the field, his imprisonment and release by the widow who restored his person to liberty but took his affections captive; his interview with the magician Sidrophel, his unrequited passion and sad mischances, his letter to the widow, or the answer he received; these form the framework of the poem which supports a continued and biting satire on the thoughts, principles, and actions of the Puritans-a party exposed by their rigid notions and uncompromising habits to that ridicule which lays hold on the outward peculiarities of men, and by a slight overcoloring places them in a most ludicrous light. The style is so diffuse that it is difficult to select an extract of moderate length, which is intelligible when separated from the context, but here is Ralpho's story of the Cobbler who killed the Indian:

Justice gives sentence many times
On one man for another's crimes,
Our brethren of New England use
Choice malefactors to excuse,
And hang the guiltless in their stead,
Of whom the churches have less need;
As lately 't happened: In a town
There liv'd a cobbler, and but one,

That out of doctrine could cut use,

And mend men's lives, as well as shoes.
This precious brother having slain,

In times of peace, an Indian,

Not out of malice, but mere zeal,
(Because he was an Infidel)
The mighty Tottipottymoy
Sent to our elders an envoy,
Complaining sorely of the breach

Of league, held forth by Brother Patch,
Against the articles in force

Between both churches, his and ours,

For which he crav'd the saints to render
Into his hands, or hang th'offender;

But they maturely having weigh'd
They had no more but him o' th' trade,
(A man that served them in a double
Capacity, to teach and cobble)
Resolv'd to spare him; yet, to do
The Indian Hoghan Moghan too-
Impartial Justice, in his stead did

Hang an old weaver that was bed rid.

ANDREW MARVEL was one of the purest and most consistent of the patriots of the Commonwealth—he was not swayed by those motives of self-interest which in an unsettled period often determine a man's course, and lead him to purchase a doubtful popularity by advocating principles which he is ready to sacrifice at the first ascendancy of the

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