Imágenes de página
PDF
ePub

And view the sea of boiling, foaming wort;

When lo! (a very serious matter)

His star of most malignant nature

[for't;

Sous'd him plump in; who did not thank him

For loud the Drayman roar'd, and vainly toil'd;
And, like a chicken, soon the man was boil'd!
I say, indeed, extremely like a chicken;
As tender quite-but not so pleasant picking.

Lord! what was done? Attend-you'll hear : Compassionating the poor beer,

The Brewer scorn'd to give it a bad name : Not to a single soul he told it,

But, like the former, calmly sold it;

When, strange to tell, it won immortal' fame.

A customer, call'd PETER POT,
Whose lucky, very lucky lot,

Was to be favour'd with this christian beer, Proceeds to THRALE's-proclaims its praise: "Ne'er drank such beer in my born days!

A glorious, glorious brew! liked ev'ry where

"So pleas'd were folks-Sir,hundreds I can name; "So let me always have the very same.

"Your name is up, Sir; you may lie abed"You've hit the nail at last upon the head."

"Well, MASTERPOT,"quoth MISTERTHRALE, "I'm glad the beer had such a sale

"Depend on't, it shall be my constant plan

"To make the next as near it as I can."

What could be fairer? Yet, God wot,

This answer pleas'd not PETER POT.

"As near it as you can!" cried Por

66

Why not the very same?—why not?

"Put in the same materials, and 'twill do." "Damme," quoth THRALE, enrag'd, "dost

"think

"I'll make my conscience always wink,

"And boil a Drayman ev'ry time I brow ?”

ODE TO TIME.

Occasioned by seeing the Ruins of an old Castle.

[blocks in formation]

THOU, who 'mid the world-involving gloom

Sitt'st on yon solitary spire!

Or slowly shak'st the sounding dome,..

Or hear'st the wildly-warbling lyre;
Say, when thy musing soul

Bids distant times unrol,

And marks the flight of each revolving year,
Of years whose slow-consuming pow'r
Has clad with moss yon leaning tow'r,

That saw the race of glory run,

That mark'd Ambition's setting sun,
That shook old Empire's tow'ring pride,
That swept them down the floating tide-
Say, when these long-unfolding scenes appear,
Streams down thy hoary cheek the pity-darting

tear?

I. 2.

Cast o'er yon trackless waste thy wand'ring eye:
Yon hill, whose gold-illumin'd brow,

Just trembling through the bending sky,
O'erlooks the boundless wild below,
Once bore the branching wood

That o'er yon murmuring flood
Hung wildly waving to the rustling gale;
The naked heath, with moss o'ergrown,
That hears the lone owl's nightly moan,
Once bloom'd with Summer's copious store,
Once rais'd the lawn-bespangling flow'r;
Or heard some lover's plaintive lay,

When, by pale Cynthia's silver ray,

All wild he wander'd o'er the lonely dale,

And taught the list'ning Moon the melancholy

tale.

I. 3.

Ye wilds where heaven-rapt Fancy roves!

Ye low-brow'd vaults, ye gloomy cells!

Ye caves, where night-bred Silence dwells!

Ghosts that in yon lonely hall

Lightly glance along the wall;

Or beneath yon ivy'd tow'r,

At the silent midnight hour,
Stand array'd in spotless white,
And stain the dusky robe of Night;
Or with slow and solemn pauses roam
O'er the long-sounding hollow dome!
Say, 'mid yon desert solitary round,
When darkness wraps the boundless spheres,
Does ne'er some dismal, dying sound

On Night's dull serious ear rebound,

That mourns the ceaseless lapse of life-consuming years?

II. 1.

O call th' inspiring glorious hour to view,
When Caledonia's martial train
From yon steep rock's high-arching brow

Pour'd on the heart-struck flying Dane!

« AnteriorContinuar »