Before we had gone far, we were stayed by the Arabs, until they had taken caphar of the rest. The Subassee of Rama, besides, had two Madeins upon every camel. The day thus wasted, did make us misdoubt that we should not get that night unto Jerusalem, but the missing of our way (for the Arabs had led us contrary to the custom), turned our fear to despair. Some six miles beyond Rama, the hills grew bigger and bigger, mixed with fruitful valleys. About two miles further, we ascended the higher mountains, paying by the way two Madeins a-head, but at several places a passage exceeding difficult, straightened with wood, and, as it were, paved with broken rocks; which, by reason of the rain then falling, became no less dangerous to our camels. At length we came to a small village, where we first discovered our erring. Some counselled to stay, others to proceed; both dangerous alike; the way unknown, unsafe, the inhabitants thieves, as are all the Arabians. While we thus debated, the night stole upon us, and bereft us of the election. The much rain enforced us to fly for shelter unto a ruinous chapel, where distrust set the watch, which we carefully kept till the morning. Betimes we forsook the village, descending the way we had ascended, guided by the chief of the town, who for a sum of money had undertaken our conduct to the top of the mountains; having hired asses for our more expedition. Yet others crossing us, as we returned along the valley, with shows of violence, would have extorted more money. Our passage for five hours together lay through a narrow strait of the mountains; much of our way no other than seemed to have been worn by the winter's torrent. We past by a ruinous fort, seated near a fountain, sufficient, when it stood, to have made good that passage. In the way we sprang a number of partridges; others on each side running on the rocks, like in colour to those of Chios.

Ascending by little and little, at length we attained to the top, which over-topped and surveyed all the mountains that we had left behind us. From hence to Jerusalem,

the

way is indifferent even: on each side are round hills with ruins on their top; and valleys, such as are figured in the most beautiful landscapes. The soil, though stony, is not altogether barren, producing both corn and olives about inhabited places. Approaching the North Gate of the city, called in times past, the Gate of Ephraim, and now of Damascus, we only, of all the rest, were not permitted to enter. When compassing the wall unto that of the west, commanded by the castle, we were met by two Franciscan friars, who saluted and conveyed us to their convent."

After his return, Sandys spent much of his time with his sister, Lady Wenman, at Caswell, near Witney, in Oxfordshire. The situation was rendered still more agreeable to him from its proximity to the retreat of his accomplished and amiable friend, Lord Falkland, whom to know was to esteem. In this delightful seclusion he meditated on the dangers he had escaped, and acknowledged the care of that Heavenly Shepherd by whom he had been conducted in all his journeyings. He has expressed his feelings in that admirable poem, Deo. Opt. Max., in which he anticipated the sonorous harmony of Dryden:

O! who hath tasted of thy clemency
In greater measure, or more oft than I?
My grateful verse thy goodness shall display,
O Thou, who went'st along in all my way—
To where the morning, with perfumed wings,
From the high mountains of Panchæa springs,
To that new-found-out-world, where sober night
Takes from the Antipodes her silent flight;
To those dark seas where horrid winter reigns,
And binds the stubborn floods in icy chains;
To Libian wastes, whose thirst no showers assuage,
And where swoll'n Nilus cools the lion's rage.

Thy wonders on the deep have I beheld,
Yet all by those on Judah's hills excelled;
There where the Virgin's Son his doctrine taught,
His miracles and our redemption wrought:
Where I, by Thee inspired, his praises sung,
And on his sepulchre my offering hung;
Which way soe'er I turn my face or feet,
I see thy glory and thy mercy meet;

Met on the Thracian shores, when in the strife
Of frantic Simoans thou preserv'dst my life-
So when Arabian thieves belaid us round,
And when by all abandoned, Thee I found.

*

Then brought'st me home in safety, that this earth
Might bury me, which fed me from my birth.

In 1636, he published his Paraphrase of the Psalms, and two years after, renewed his contributions to sacred poetry by a Paraphrase upon Job and Ecclesiastes. The two last productions will not add to his reputation, although Waller composed some verses in their praise. Passages of vigour, and lines glowing with a tender beauty, might be selected, but the poems are cold and frequently inharmonious. Even the sublimer and more masculine genius of Young sank under the splendour of the Oriental Imagination. A metrical version of the Song of Solomon, and a translation of a Latin tragedy of Grotius,-the Passion of Christ,-appeared in the same year, 1642. It is written in rhyme, and the lyric portions display the easy sweetness of his versification. The hymn sung by the Chorus of Jewish Women is very graceful and tender:

CHORUS OF JEWISH WOMEN.

The rapid motion of the spheres
Old night from our horizon bears;
And now declining shades give way
To the return of cheerful day.

And Phosphorus, who leads the stars,
And day's illustrious path prepares,
Who last of all the host retires,

Nor yet withdraws those radiant fires;

Nor have our trumpets summoned
The Morning from her dewy bed:
As yet her roses are unblown,
Nor by her purple mantle known.
All night we in the Temple keep,
Not yielding to the charms of sleep;
That so we might with zealous prayer
Our thoughts and cleansed hearts prepare,
To celebrate the ensuing light.
This annual Feast to Memory
Is sacred, nor with us must die.

*

What numbers from the sun's up-rise,
From where he leaves the morning skies,
Of our dispersed Abrahamites,
This Vesper to their homes invites !
Yet we, in yearly triumph still,
A Lamb for our deliverance kill.
Since liberty our confines fled,
Given with the first unleavened bread,
She never would return; though bought
With wounds, and in destruction sought;
Some stray to Libya's scorched sands,
Where horned Hammon's temple stands:
To Nilus some, where Philip's son,
Who all the rifled Orient won,
Built his proud city; others gone
To their old prison, Babylon :
A part to freezing Taurus fled;
And Tiber, now the ocean's head-
Our ruins all the world have filled:
But you, by use in suffering skilled,
Forgetting in remoter climes
Our vanisht glory, nor those times,
Those happy times, compare with these,
Your burdens may support with ease.
More justly we of fate complain
Who servitude at home sustain ;
We to perpetual woes designed,

In our own country Egypt find.

The following verses, by the same Chorus are equally

touching and harmonious:—

Yet this no less our grief provokes,

Our kindred bear divided yokes;

One part by Roman bondage wrung;
The other two by brothers, sprung
From savage Idumæans, whom
Our fathers have so oft o'ercome.
O Thou, the Hope, the only One
Of our distress, and ruin'd throne;
Of whom with a prophetic tongue,
To Judah dying Jacob sung:
The crowned muse on ivory lyre,
His breast inflamed with holy fire,

This oft foretold,-That thou should'st free
The people consecrate to thee;

That Thou, triumphing, should'st revoke
Sweet Peace, then never to be broke;
When freed Judæa should obey
Our Lord, and all affect his sway.
O when shall we behold thy face,
So often promised to our race?
If prophets, who have won belief,
By our mishaps and flowing grief,
Of joyful change, as truly sung;
Thy absence should not now be long.
Thee, by thy virtue, we entreat;
The Temple's veil, the Mercy's Seat,
That Name by which our fathers sware,
Which in our vulgar speech we dare
Not utter, to compassionate

Thy kindred's tears, and ruined state.
Hast to our great redemption, hast,
O, thou most Holy! and at last

Bless with thy Presence, that we may
To Thee our vows devoutly pay.

Sandys was gathered to his fathers in the beginning of March, 1643. He expired at Bexley, the residence of his niece, Lady Margaret Wyat, who was married to a descendant of the poetical friend of Surrey, and was buried in the parish church upon the 7th of March. One of his contemporaries, Phillpot of Clare Hall, compared his death to the sudden departure of a flowery spring. But the simile was not happily chosen. He had not, indeed, exhausted the allotted term of human existence, and the setting of so mild and cheering a star might well awaken the sigh of regret;