Resistless fortune and relentless fate
Placed where thou see'st me. Phœbus, and
The nymph Carmentis, with maternal care,
Attendant on my wand'rings, fix'd me here.
He said, and show'd him the Tarpeian rock,
And the rude spot, where now the capitol
Stands all magnificent and bright with gold,
Then overgrown with thorns. And yet e'en then
The swains beheld that sacred scene with awe;
The grove, the rock, inspired religious fear.
This grove, he said, that crowns the lofty top
Of this fair hill, some deity, we know,
Inhabits, but what deity we doubt.
Th' Arcadians speak of Jupiter himself,
That they have often seen him, shaking here
His gloomy Egis, while the thunder-storms
Came rolling all around him. Turn thy eyes,
Behold that ruin; those dismantled walls,
Where once two towns, Ianiculum—
By Janus this, and that by Saturn built,
Saturnia. Such discourse brought them beneath
The roof of poor Evander, thence they saw,
Where now the proud and stately forum stands,
The grazing herds wide scatter'd o'er the field.
Soon as he enter'd-Hercules, he said,
Victorious Hercules, on this threshold trod,
These walls contain'd him, humble as they are
Dare to despise magnificence, my friend,
Prove thy divine descent by worth divine,
Nor view with haughty scorn this mean abode.
So saying, he led Æneas by the hand,
And plac'd him on a cushion stuff'd with leaves,
Spread with the skin of a Libistian bear.
[The Episode of Venus and Vulcan omitted
While thus in Lemnos Vulcan was employed
Awaken'd by the gentle dawn of day,
And the shrill song of birds beneath the eaves
Of his low mansion, old Evander rose.
His tunick, and the sandals on his feet,
And his good sword well-girded to his side,
A panther's skin dependent from his left,
And over his right shoulder thrown aslant,
Thus was he clad. Two mastiffs followed him,
His whole retinue and his nightly guard.
OVID. TRIST. LIB. V. ELEG. XII
You bid me write t'amuse the tedious hours,
And save from with'ring my poetick pow'rs.
Hard is the task, my friend, for verse should flov
From the free mind, not fetter'd down by wo;
Restless amidst unceasing tempests tost,
Whoe'er has cause for sorrow, I have most.
Would you bid Priam laugh, his sons all slain,
Or childless Niobe from tears refrain,
Join the gay dance, and lead the festive train ?
Does grief or study most befit the mind,
To this remote, this barb'rous nook confin'd?
Could you impart to my unshaken breast,
The fortitude by Socrates possess'd,
Soon would it sink beneath such woes as mine,
For what is human strength to wrath divine?
Wise as he was, and Heav'n pronounc'd him so,
My sufferings would have laid that wisdom low.
Could I forget my country, thee and all,
And e'en th' offence to which I owe my fall,
Yet fear alone would freeze the poet's vein,
While hostile troops swarm o'er the dreary plain
Add that the fatal rust of long disuse
Unfits me for the service of the muse.
Thistles and weeds are all we can expect
From the best soil impov'rish'd by neglect ;
Unexercis'd, and to his stall confin'd,
The fleetest racer would be left behind;
The best built bark that cleaves the wat'ry way,
Laid useless by, would moulder and decay-
No hope remains that time shall me restore,
Mean as I was, to what I was before.
Think how a series of desponding cares
Benumbs the genius, and its force impairs.
How oft, as now on this devoted sheet,
My verse constrain'd to move with measur'd feet,
Reluctant and laborious limps along,
And proves itself a wretched exile's song.
What is it tunes the most melodious lays?
"Tis emulation and the thirst of praise,
A noble thirst, and not unknown to me,
While smoothly wafted on a calmer sea.
But can a wretch like Ovid pant for fame:
No, rather let the world forget my name.
Is it because that world approv'd my strain,
You prompt me to the same pursuit again?
No, let the Nine th' ungrateful truth excuse,
charge my hopeless ruin on the Muse,
And, like Perillus, meet my just desert,
The victim of my own pernicious art.
Fool that I was, to be so warn'd in vain,
And shipwreck'd once to tempt the deep again
Ill fares the bard in this unletter'd land,
None to consult, and none to understand.
The purest verse has no admirers here,
Their own rude language only suits their ear
Rude as it is, at length familiar grown,
I learn it, and almost unlearn my own--
Yet to say truth, e'en here the Muse disdains
Confinement, and attempts her former strains,
But finds the strong desire is not the pow'r,
And what her taste condemns, the flames devour.
A part, perhaps, like this, escapes the doom,
And tho' unworthy, finds a friend at Rome.
But oh the cruel art, that could undo
Its vot'ry thus, would that could perish too.
WHICH HAPPENED IN JANUARY, 1799.
WHERE Humber pours his rich commercial stream, There dwelt a wretch who breath'd but to blaspheme In subterraneous caves his life he led,
Black as the mine in which he wrought for bread. When on a day emerging from the deep,
A sabbath-day, (such sabbaths thousands keep!)
The wages of his weekly toil he bore
To buy a cock-whose blood might win him more As if the noblest of the feather'd kind
Were but for battle and for death design'd;
As if the consecrated hours were meant
For sport, to minds on cruelty intent;
It chanc'd (such chances Providence obey)
He met a fellow-lab'rer on the way,
Whose heart the same desires had once inflam'd ;
But now the savage temper was reclaim'd.
Persuasion on his lips had taken place;
For all plead well, who plead the cause of grace.
His iron-heart with scripture he assail'd,
Woo'd him to hear a sermon, and prevail'd
His faithful bow the mighty preacher drew,
Swift, as the lightning-glimpse, the arrow flew.
He wept; he trembled; cast his eyes around,
To find a worse than he; but none he found.
He felt his sins, and wonder'd he should feel,
Grace made the wound, and grace alone could heal.
Now farewell oaths, and blasphemies, and lies!
He quits the sinner's for the martyr's prize.
That holy day which wash'd with many a tear,
Gilded with hope, yet shaded too by fear.
The next, his swarthy brethren of the mine
Learn'd, by his alter'd speech-the change divine ! Laugh'd when they should have wept, and swore the
Was nigh, when he would swear as fast as they.
"No, (said the penitent,) such words shall share
This breath no more; devoted now to pray'r.
O! if thou see'st (thine eye the future sees)
That I shall yet again blaspheme like these;
Now strike me to the ground on which I kneel,
Ere yet this heart relapses into steel;
Now take me to that Heaven I once defied,
Thy presence, thy embrace !"-He spoke and died
VOL. III.
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