All' Inghilterra..

ENGLAND, with all thy faults, I love thee stillMy country! and, while yet a nook is left Where English minds and manners may be found, Shall be (1) constrain'd to love thee. Though thy clime Be fickle, and thy year most part deform'd With dripping rains, or wither'd by a frost, I would not yet exchange thy sullen skies, And fields without a flower, for warmer France With all her vines; nor for Ausonia's groves Of golden fruitage, and her myrtle bowers. To shake thy Senate, and from heights sublime Of patriot eloquence to flash down fire Upon thy foes, was never meant my task: But I can feel thy fortunes, and partake Thy joys and sorrows, with as true a heart As any thunderer there (2). And I can feel Thy follies, too, and with a just disdain Frown at effeminates, whose very looks Reflect dishonour on the land I love. How, in the name of soldiership and sense, Should England prosper, when such things, as smooth And tender as a girl, all essenced o'er

With odours, and as profligate as sweet;

Who sell their laurel as a myrtle wreath,

And love when they should fight; when such as these
Presume to lay their hands upon the ark

Of her magnificent and awful cause?

Time was when it was praise and boast enough
In every clime, and travel where we might (3),
That we were born her children. Praise enough
To fill the ambition of a private man,

That Chatham's language was his mother's tongue,
And Wolfe's great name compatriot with his own (4).

(1) Dovrò pur sempre amarti.

(2) Cioè: quanto qualunque oratore che tuoni nel tuo Parlamento. (3) In qualunque paese e ovunque viaggiassimo. .

(4) William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, fu il più grande uomo di Stato inglese del sec. XVIII. Walpole, soleva dire Johnson, fu un ministro

Farewell those honours, and farewell with them
The hope of such hereafter! They have fallen
Each in his field of glory; one in arms,
And one in council-Wolfe upon the lap
Of smiling victory that moment won,
And Chatham heart-sick of his country's shame!
They made us many soldiers. Chatham, still
Consulting England's happiness at home,
Secured it by an unforgiving frown,

If any wronged her. Wolfe, where'er he fought,
Put so much of his heart into his act,
That his example had a magnet's force,
And all were swift to follow whom all loved.
Those suns are set. Oh, rise some other such!
Or all that we have left is empty talk
Of old achievements, and despair of new.

Ad una lepre addomesticata.

THEY love the country, and none else, who seek
For their own sake its silence and its shade.

Delights which who would leave, that has a heart (1)
Susceptible of pity, or a mind

Cultur'd and capable of sober thought,

For all the savage din of the swift pack,

And clamours of the field? Detested sport, (2)
That owes its pleasures to another's pain;
That feeds upon the sobs and dying shrieks
Of harmless nature, dumb, but yet endued
With eloquence, that agonies inspire,
Of silent tears and heart-distending sighs!
Vain tears, alas, and sighs, that never find
A corresponding tone in jovial souls!

Well-one at least is safe. One sheltered hare

dato dal re al popolo inglese, ma Chatham fu un ministro dato dal popolo al re. Quanto al generale Wolfe confronta l'elegia di Gray e la nota che riguarda il valoroso espugnatore di Quebec.

(1) I quali diletti chi s'indurrebbe a lasciare, il quale abbia un in cambio del selvaggio fragore...

cuore... g

(2) Cioè la caccia.

Has never heard the sanguinary yell
Of cruel man, exulting in her woes.
Innocent partner of my peaceful home,
Whom ten long years' experience of my care
Has made at last familiar; she has lost
Much of her vigilant instinctive dread,

Not needful here, beneath a roof like mine.
Yes-thou may'st eat thy bread, and lick the hand
That feeds thee; thou may'st frolic on the floor
At evening, and at night retire secure

To thy straw couch, and slumber unalarm'd ;
For I have gain'd thy confidence, have pledged
All that is human in me to protect

Thine unsuspecting gratitude and love.
If I survive thee I will dig thy grave;
And, when I place thee in it, sighing say,
I know at least one hare that had a friend.

L'inverno.

O WINTER, ruler of the inverted year,
Thy scattered hair with sleet like ashes fill'd,
Thy breath congeal'd upon thy lips, thy cheeks
Fringed with a beard made white with other snows
Than those of age, thy forehead wrapt in clouds,
A leafless branch thy sceptre, and thy throne
A sliding car, indebted to no wheels,

But urged by storms along its slippery way!—
I love thee, all unlovely as thou seemest,
And dreaded as thou art! Thou hold'st the sun
A prisoner in the yet undawning east,
Shortening his journey between morn and noon,
And hurrying him, impatient of his stay,
Down to the rosy west; but kindly still
Compensating his loss with added hours
Of social converse and instructive ease,
And gathering, at short notice, in one group
The family dispersed, and fixing thought,
Not less dispersed by daylight and its cares.

I crown thee king of intimate delights,
Fire-side enjoyments, home-born happiness,
And all the comforts that the lonely roof
Of undisturb'd retirement, and the hours
Of long uninterrupted evening, know.

A Mary Unwin.

MARY! I want a lyre with other strings (1);

Such aid from Heaven as some have feign'd they drew, An eloquence scarce given to mortals, new, And undebased by praise of meaner things! That (2), ere through age or woe I shed my wings, I may record thy worth, with honour due, In verse as musical as thou art true, Verse, that immortalizes whom it sings! But thou hast little need: there is a book, By seraphs writ with beams of heavenly light, On which the eyes of God not rarely look; A chronicle of actions just and bright! There all thy deeds, my faithful Mary, shine, And since thou own'st that praise, I spare thee mine.

Pensieri e sentenze varie.

God made the country, and man made the town.

Variety's the very spice of life
That gives it all its flavour.

Ye powers who rule the Tongue, if such there are,
And make colloquial happiness your care,

Preserve me from the thing I dread and hate,
A duel in the form of a debate.

) Mi occorre una lira con corde diverse da quelle solite. (2) Affinchè.

The clash of arguments and jar of words,
Worse than the mortal brunt of rival swords,
Decide no question with their tedious length,
(For opposition gives opinion strength)
Divert the champions, prodigal of breath,
And put the peaceably disposed to death.
Oh, thwart me not, sir Soph, at ev'ry turn,
Nor carp at ev'ry flaw you may discern;
Though syllogisms hang not on my tongue,
I am not surely always in the wrong!
"Tis hard if all is false that I advance

A fool must now and then be right, by chance.

Vociferated logic kills me quite.

A noisy man is always in the right.

The heart

May give a useful lesson to the head,
And Learning wiser grow without his books.

Beware of desperate steps. The darkest day,
Live till to-morrow, will have passed away.

He is the freeman whom the truth makes free,
And all are slaves besides.

William Wordsworth.

Ha dato il nome a un intero periodo della poesia inglese, il quale va dal 1798 al 1830 ed è giustamente chiamato romantico. Ebbe i natali nel Cumberland, e precisamente a Cockermouth, in un paese cioè montagnoso, ricco di laghi, fatto apposta per parlare alla fantasia d'un poeta. Quando John Wordsworth, amministratore degli affari di Sir James Lowther divenuto più tardi Earl of Lonsdale, e Anne Cook