The grief is this, that, sunk in Homer's mine,
I lose my precious years now soon to fail,
Handling his gold, which, howsoe'er it shine,

Proves dross when balanced in the Christian scale.
Be wiser thou;-like our forefather Donne,
Seek heavenly wealth, and work for God alone.

TO A YOUNG FRIEND,*

ON HIS ARRIVING AT CAMBRIDGE WET WHEN NO RAIN HAD
FALLEN THERE.

IF Gideon's fleece, which drench'd with dew he found,
While moisture none refresh'd the herbs around,
Might fitly represent the church, endow'd
With heavenly gifts to heathens not allow'd;
In pledge, perhaps, of favours from on high,
Thy locks were wet when others' locks were dry.
Heaven grant us half the omen,-may we see
Not drought on others, but much dew on thee!

INSCRIPTION FOR A HERMITAGE IN THE
AUTHOR'S GARDEN.

[May 1793.]

THIS cabin, Mary, in my sight appears,
Built as it has been in our waning years,
A rest afforded to our weary feet,
Preliminary to-the last retreat.+

* Mr Johnson, to whom the preceding sonnet was addressed.

↑ The poet was disappointed in the object for which this inscription was written, by the ruinous munificence of the carpenter he employed to erect his hermitage. He contemplated merely a rustic shed, and the village architect ran him up a costly pavilion. Cowper, in a letter to Hayley, complains of this expensive compliment to his taste: "Is not this vexatious? I threaten to inscribe it thus:

'Beware of building! I intended

Rough logs and thatch, and thus it ended."

In a subsequent letter, he says:—

"Instead of a pound or two, spending a mint,
Must serve me at least, I believe, with a hint,
That building, and building, a man may be driven
At last out of doors, and have no house to live in."

"Besides, my dearest brother, they have not only built for me what I did not want, but have ruined a noble tetrastic by doing so. I had written one which I designed for a hermitage, and it will by no means suit the fine and affair which they have made instead of one.

pompous

INSCRIPTION FOR A MOSS-HOUSE IN THE
SHRUBBERY AT WESTON.

HERE, free from riot's hated noise,
Be mine, the caliner, purer joys

A friend or book bestows;

Far from the storms that shake the great,
Contentment's gale shall fan my seat,
And sweeten my repose.

THE FOUR AGES.*

(A BRIEF FRAGMENT OF AN EXTENSIVE PROJECTED POEM.)

"I COULD be well content, allow'd the use

Of past experience, and the wisdom glean'd
From worn-out follies, now acknowledged such,
To recommence life's trial, in the hope

Of fewer errors, on a second proof!"

Thus while grey evening lull'd the wind, and call'd

Fresh odours from the shrubbery at my side,

Taking my lonely winding walk, I mused,

And held accustom'd conference with my heart;

When from within it thus a voice replied:

"Couldst thou in truth? and art thou taught at length

This wisdom, and but this, from all the past?

Is not the pardon of thy long arrear,

Time wasted, violated laws, abuse

Of talents, judgment, mercies, better far

Than opportunity vouchsafed to err

With less excuse, and, haply, worse effect?"

*The subject indicated in this fragment was suggested in 1791, by the Rev. Mr Buchanan, who sketched the design of a poem intended to embrace the four stages of human life-infancy, youth, manhood, and old age, and recommended it to Cowper as being peculiarly suited to his powers. Cowper entered zealously into the project, and frequently alluded to it in his correspondence as an undertaking to which he looked forward with pleasure. But he was at this time engrossed by his last labours on Homer, and his contem. plated edition of Milton, and was obliged to postpone it indefinitely. In 1793, he writes, "The Four Ages is a subject that delights me when I think of it; but I am ready to fear that all my ages will be exhausted before I shall be at leisure to write upon it." This fragment, apparently intended as a memorandum for an introduction, was all he accomplished towards the poem. March 1799, when his mind was sinking under the influence of disease, Mr Johnson, endeavouring gently to draw him back into literary occupation, placed before him the paper containing this broken passage. But, after altering a little and adding a few lines, Cowper relinquished the task, observ ing that "it was too great a work for him to attempt in his present situation.' "

In

I heard, and acquiesced: then to and fro
Oft pacing, as the mariner his deck,

My gravelly bounds, from self to human kind
I pass'd, and next consider'd, what is man?
Knows he his origin? Can he ascend
By reminiscence to his earliest date?
Slept he in Adam? And in those from him
Through numerous generations, till he found
At length his destined moment to be born?
Or was he not, till fashion'd in the womb?

Deep mysteries both! which schoolmen must have toil'd
To unriddle, and have left them mysteries still.

It is an evil incident to man,

And of the worst, that unexplored he leaves
Truths useful and attainable with ease,
To search forbidden deeps, where mystery lies
Not to be solved, and useless, if it might.
Mysteries are food for angels; they digest
With ease, and find them nutriment; but man,
While yet he dwells below, must stoop to glean
His manna from the ground, or starve and die.

ON A PLANT OF VIRGIN'S BOWER,

DESIGNED TO COVER A GARDEN-SEAT.

THRIVE, gentle plant! and weave a bower
For Mary and for me,

And deck with many a splendid flower,
Thy foliage large and free.

Thou camest from Eartham, and wilt shade
(If truly I divine),

Some future day the illustrious head

Of him who made thee mine.

Should Daphne shew a jealous frown,
And Envy seize the bay,
Affirming none so fit to crown

Such honour'd brows as they,

Thy cause with zeal we shall defend,
And with convincing power;
For why should not the Virgin's friend
Be crown'd with Virgin's Bower?

TO WILLIAM HAYLEY, ESQ.*
[June 1793.]

DEAR architect of fine chateaux in air,
Worthier to stand for ever, if they could,
Than any built of stone, or yet of wood,
For back of royal elephant to bear;

Oh for permission from the skies to share,
Much to my own, though little to thy good,
With thee (not subject to the jealous mood!)
A partnership of literary ware!

But I am bankrupt now; and doom'd henceforth
To drudge, in descant dry, on others' lays;
Bards, I acknowledge, of unequall'd worth!
But what is commentator's happiest praise?
That he has furnish'd lights for other eyes,
Which they who need them use, and then despise.

A TALE.+

[June 1793.]

IN Scotland's realm, where trees are few,
Nor even shrubs abound;

But where, however bleak the view,

Some better things are found;

* Hayley proposed at this time a literary partnership to Cowper, but what the work was to be does not appear. In these lines, Cowper pleads his occupations-Homer and Milton-as a reason for declining to engage in the project. He is still more explicit in the letter that accompanied them. "I know my. self too well not to know that am nobody in verse, unless in a corner, and alone, and unconnected in my operations. I am so made up-I will not enter into a metaphysical analysis of my strange composition, in order to detect the true cause of this evil; but on a general view of the matter, I suspect that it proceeds from that shyness which has been my effectual and almost fatal hindrance on many other important occasions, and which I should feel, I well know, on this, to a degree that would perfectly cripple me." He adds, that he could not attempt anything in concert with any man, even his own father or brother were they alive, unless it should please God to give him another nature. There is a scrap of verse in one of these letters to Hayley which should not be lost. It is complaining of the heat, which disables him from writing:

"Ah! brother poet! send me of your shade,
And bid the zephyrs hasten to my aid!
Or, like a worm unearth'd at noon, I go,
Despatch'd by sunshine, to the shades below."

This tale is founded on an article which appeared in the Buckinghamshire Herald, Saturday, June 1, 1793:-"Glasgow, May 23. In a block, or pulley, near the head of the mast of a gabert, now lying at the Broomielaw, there is a chaffinch's nest and four eggs. The nest was built while the vessel lay

For husband there and wife may boast
Their union undefiled,

And false ones are as rare almost

As hedgerows in the wild;

In Scotland's realm forlorn and bare
The history chanced of late-

The history of a wedded pair,
A chaffinch and his mate.

The spring drew near, each felt a breast
With genial instinct fill'd;

They pair'd, and would have built a nest,
But found not where to build.

The heaths uncover'd and the moors
Except with snow and sleet,
Sea-beaten rocks and naked shores
Could yield them no retreat.

Long time a breeding-place they sought,
Till both grew vex'd and tired;
At length a ship arriving brought
The good so long desired.

A ship?-could such a restless thing
Afford them place of rest?

Or was the merchant charged to bring
The homeless birds a nest?

Hush!-silent hearers profit most-
This racer of the sea

Proved kinder to them than the coast,
It served them with a tree.

But such a tree! 'twas shaven deal,
The tree they call a mast,

And had a hollow with a wheel

Through which the tackle pass'd.

Within that cavity aloft

Their roofless home they fix'd,
Form'd with materials neat and soft,
Bents, wool, and feathers mix'd.

Four ivory eggs soon pave its floor,
With russet specks bedight;

The vessel weighs, forsakes the shore,
And lessens to the sight.

at Greenock, and was followed hither by both birds. Though the block is occasionally lowered for the inspection of the curious, the birds have not forsaken the nest. The cock, however, visits the nest but seldom, while the hen never leaves it but when she descends to the hull for food."