Should feel that itching, and that tingling,
With all my purpose intermingling,

To your

intrinsic merit true,

When call'd t' address myself to you.

Mysterious are His ways, whose power
Brings forth that unexpected hour,
When minds, that never met before,
Shall meet, unite, and part no more:
It is th' allotment of the skies,
The hand of the Supremely Wise,
That guides and governs our affections,
And plans and orders our connexions:
Directs us in our distant road,

And marks the bounds of our abode.
Thus we were settled when you found us,
Peasants and children all around us,
Not dreaming of so dear a friend,
Deep in the abyss of Silver-End. *
Thus Martha, ev'n against her will,
Perch'd on the top of yonder hill;
And you, though you must needs prefer
The fairer scenes of sweet Sancerre, t

Are come from distant Loire, to choose
A cottage on the banks of Ouse.

* An obscure part of Olney, adjoining to the residence of Cowper, which faced the market-place.

+ Lady Austen's residence in France.

This page of Providence quite new,
And now just op'ning to our view,
Employs our present thoughts and pains
To guess, and spell, what it contains:
But day by day, and year by year,
Will make the dark ænigma clear;
And furnish us, perhaps, at last,
Like other scenes already past,
With proof, that we, and our affairs,
Are part of a Jehovah's cares :
For God unfolds, by slow degrees,
The purport of his deep decrees;
Sheds every hour a clearer light
In aid of our defective sight;

And spreads, at length, before the soul,
A beautiful and perfect whole,
Which busy man's inventive brain
Toils to anticipate, in vain.

Say, Anna, had you never known
The beauties of a rose full blown,
Could tho' luminous your eye,
you,

By looking on the bud, descry,
Or guess, with a prophetic power,
The future splendor of the flower?

Just so,

th' Omnipotent, who turns

The system of a world's concerns,

From mere minutiæ can educe
Events of most important use;
And bid a dawning sky display
The blaze of a meridian day.

The works of man tend, one and all,

As needs they must, from great to small;
And vanity absorbs at length

The monuments of human strength.
But who can tell how vast the plan
Which this day's incident began?
Too small, perhaps, the slight occasion
For our dim-sighted observation;
It pass'd unnotic'd, as the bird

That cleaves the yielding air unheard,
And yet may prove, when understood,
An harbinger of endless good.

Not that I deem, or mean to call Friendship a blessing cheap or small : But merely to remark, that ours,

Like some of nature's sweetest flowers, Rose from a seed of tiny size,

That seem'd to promise no such prize; A transient visit intervening,

And made almost without a meaning, (Hardly the effect of inclination, Much less of pleasing expectation)

FROM A LETTER TO THE REV. MR. NEWTON. 55

Produc'd a friendship, then begun,
That has cemented us in one;

And plac'd it in our power to prove,

By long fidelity and love,

That Solomon has wisely spoken;

"A threefold cord is not soon broken."

FROM A LETTER TO THE REV. MR. NEWTON, Late Rector of St. Mary Woolnoth,

[Dated May 28, 1782.]

SAYS the pipe to the snuff-box, I can't understand
What the ladies and gentlemen see in your face,
That you are in fashion all over the land,
And I am so much fallen into disgrace.

Do but see what a pretty contemplative air

I give to the company---pray do but note 'em--

You would think that the wise men of Greece were all

there,

Or, at least, would suppose them the wise men of

Gotham.

My breath is as sweet as the breath of blown roses,
While you are a nuisance where'er you appear;
There is nothing but sniv❜ling and blowing of noses,

Such a noise as turns any man's stomach to hear.

Then lifting his lid in a delicate way,

And op'ning his mouth with a smile quite engaging, The box in reply was heard plainly to say,

What a silly dispute is this we are waging!

If you have a little of merit to claim,

You may thank the sweet-smelling Virginian weed, And I, if I seem to deserve any blame,

The before-mentioned drug in apology plead.

Thus neither the praise nor the blame is our own,
No room for a sneer, much less a cachinnus,
We are vehicles, not of tobacco alone,

But of any thing else they may chuse to put in us.

THE

COLUBRIAD.

[1782.]

CLOSE by the threshold of a door nail'd fast
Three kittens sat; each kitten look'd aghast.
I passing swift, and inattentive by,

At the three kittens cast a careless eye;

Not much concern'd to know what they did there; Not deeming kittens worth a poet's care..

But presently a loud and furious hiss

Caus'd me to stop, and to exclaim "what's this?"