ELION and Offa flourish fide by fide,
Together in immortal books enrolled :
His ancient dower Olympus hath not fold;
And that infpiring hill, which "did divide
Into two ample horns his forehead wide,"
Shines with poetic radiance as of old;
While not an English mountain we behold
By the celeftial mufes glorified.
Yet round our fea-girt fhore they rife in crowds:
What was the great Parnaffus' felf to thee,
Mount Skiddaw? In his natural fovereignty
Our British hill is fairer far: he shrouds
His double-fronted head in higher clouds,
And pours forth ftreams more sweet than Caftaly.
"Up, Timothy, up, with your staff, and away!
Not a foul in the village this morning will stay;
The hare has just started from Hamilton's grounds,
And Skiddaw is glad with the cry of the hounds."
Of coats and of jackets, grey, scarlet, and green, On the flopes of the paftures all colours were feen; With their comely blue aprons, and caps white as snow, The girls on the hills made a holiday show.
The basin of boxwood, just six months before,
Had stood on the table at Timothy's door.
A coffin through Timothy's threshold had paff'd ;
One child did it bear, and that child was his laft.
Now faft up the dell came the noise and the fray,
The horse and the horn, and the "hark! hark away!"
Old Timothy took up his staff, and he shut,
With a leisurely motion, the door of his hut.
Perhaps to himself at that moment he said,
"The key I must take, for my Helen is dead.”
But of this in my ears not a word did he speak,
And he went to the chase with a tear on his cheek.
For the Spot where the Hermitage Stord
ON ST. HERBERT'S ISLAND, DERWENT-WATER.
This island, guarded from profane approach
By mountains high, and waters widely spread,
Is that recess to which St. Herbert came
In life's decline: a felf- fecluded man,
After long exercise in social cares
And offices humane, intent to adore
The Deity, with undistracted mind,
And meditate on everlasting things.
Stranger! this fhapeless heap of stones and earth
(Long be its moffy covering undisturbed!)
Is reverenced as a veftige of the abode
In which, through many feafons, from the world
Removed, and the affections of the world,
He dwelt in folitude.-But he had left
A fellow-labourer, whom the good man loved
As his own foul. And when within his cave
Alone he knelt before the crucifix,
While o'er the Lake the cataract of Lodore
Pealed to his orifons, and when he paced
Along the beach of this fmall ifle, and thought
Of his companion, he would pray that both
(Now that their earthly duties were fulfilled)
Might die in the fame moment. Nor in vain
So prayed he: as our chronicles report,
Though here the Hermit numbered his last day,
Far from St. Cuthbert his beloved friend,
Those holy men both died in the fame hour.
AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE,
Upon the restoration of Lord Clifford, the Shepherd, to the Estates and Honours of his Ancestors.
IGH in the breathless hall the minstrel fate,
And Emont's murmur mingled with the song,—
The words of ancient time I thus tranflate,
A feftal strain that hath been filent long:-
"From town to town, from tower to tower, The red rofe is a gladsome flower.
Her thirty years of winter past,
The red rofe is revived at laft;
She lifts her head for endless spring,
For everlasting bloffoming:
Both roses flourish, red and white;
In love and fifterly delight,
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