The modest muse a veil with pity throws
O'er vice's friends and virtue's female foes:
A bash'd she views the bold, unblushing mien
Of modern Manley, Centlivre, and Behn;
And grieves to see one nobly born disgrace
Her modest sex, and her illustrious race.
Though harmony through all their numbers flow'd,
And genuine wit its every grace bestow'd,
Nor genuine wit, nor harmony excuse
The dangerous sallies of a wanton muse:
Nor can such tuneful, but immoral, lays
Expect the tribute of impartial praise :

As soon might Philips, Pilkington, and Vane,*
Deserv'd applause for spotless virtue gain.

But hark! what nymph in Frome's embroider'd vale?
With strains seraphic, swells the vernal gale?
With what sweet sounds the bordering forest rings?
For sportive Echo catches as she sings
Each falling accent, studious to prolong
The warbled notes of Rowe's ecstatic song.
Old Avon pleas'd his reedy forehead rears,
And polish'd O.rery delighted hears.

See with what transport she resigns her breath,
Snatch'd by a sudden, but a wish'd-for, death!
Releas'd from earth, with smiles she soars on high
Amidst her kindred spirits of the sky,

Where faith and love those endless joys bestow,
That warm'd her lays, and fill'd her hopes below.
Nor can her noble friend† escape unseen,

Or from the muse her modest virtues screen ;

Who endeavoured to immortalize their shame by writing and publishing their own memoirs.

+Frances, Countess of Hertford, and afterwards Duchess of Somerset.

Here, sweetly blended, to our wond'ring eyes,
The Peeress, Poetess, and Christian rise:
And though the nine her tuneful strains inspire,
We less her genius, than her heart, admire;
Pleas'd, 'midst the great, one truly good to see,
And proud to tell that Somerset is she.

By generous views, one Peeress

more demands A grateful tribute from all female hands; One, who to shield them from the worst of foes, In their just cause dar'd Pope himself oppose. Their own dark forms deceit and envy wear, By Irwin touch'd with truth's celestial spear :By her disarm'd, ye witlings! now give o'er Your empty sneers, and shock the sex no more. Thus bold Camilla, when the Trojan chief Attack'd her country, flew to its relief';

Beneath her lance the bravest warriors bled,

And fear dismay'd the host which great Æneas led.
But ah! why heaves my breast this pensive sigh?
Why starts this tear unbidden from my eye?
What breast from sighs, what eye from tears refrains,
When sweetly-mournful, hapless Wright+ complains?
And who but grieves to see her generous mind,
For nobler views, and worthier guests design'd,
Admit the hateful form of black despair,
Wan with the gloom of superstitious care?
In pity-moving lays, with earnest cries,
She call'd on Heaven to close her weary eyes,
And long on earth by heart-felt woes opprest
Was borne by friendly death to welcome rest.

* Anne, Viscountess Irwin, sister to the Earl of Carlisle, ̈ + Mrs. Wright, sister to the famous Wesleys,

In nervous strains Cornelia's" polish'd taste Has poetry's successive progress trac'd

From ancient Greece, where first she fix'd her reign,
To Italy, and Britain's happier plain.

Praise well-bestow'd, adorns her glowing lines,
And manly strength, with female softness joins.
So female charms and manly virtues grace,
By her example form'd, her blooming race,
And fram'd alike to please our ears and eyes,
There new Cornelias and new Gracchi rise.
O that you now, with genius at command,
Would snatch the pencil from my artless hand,
And give your sex's portraits, bold and true,
In colours worthy of themselves and you!

Now in ecstatic visions let me rove,

By Cynthia's beams, through Brackley's glimmering grove;

Where still each night by startled shepherds seen,
Young Leapor's + form flies shadowy o'er the green.
Those envy'd honours nature loved to pay

The briar-bound turf, where erst her Shakespear lay,
Now on her darling Mira she bestows;
There o'er the hallow'd ground she fondly strows
The choicest fragrance of the breathing spring,
And bids each year her favourite linnet sing.
Let cloister'd pedants, in an endless round,
Tread the dull mazes of scholastic ground;
Brackley unenvying views the glitt❜ring train,
Of learning's useless trappings idly vain;
For spite of all that vaunted learning's aid,
Their fame is rival!'d by her rural maid.

Mrs. Madan, daughter of Spencer Cowper, Esq. and author of a poem entitled "the Progress of Poetry."

+Mrs. Mary Leapor, of Brackley, in Northamptonshire.

So while,in our Britannia's beechen sprays,
Sweet Philomela trills her mellow lays,
We to the natives of the sultry line

Their boasted race of parrots pleas'd resign:
For though on citron boughs they proudly glow
With all the colours of the wat❜ry bow,

Yet no soft strains are warbled by the throng,
But through the grove harsh discord they prolong,
Though rich in gaudy plumage, poor in song.

Now bear me, Clio, to that Kentish strand,
Whose rude o'erhanging cliffs, and barren sand
May challenge all the myrtle-blooming bow'rs
Of fam'd Italia, when, at evening hours,
Thy own Eliza* muses on the shore
Serene, though billows beat, and tempests roar.
Eliza, hail! your favourite name inspires
My raptur'd breast with sympathetic fires;
Ev'n now I see your lov'd Illyssus lead

His
mazy current through the Athenian mead;
With you 1 pierce through Academic shades,
And join in Attic bowers th' Aonian maids;
Beneath the spreading plane with Plato rove,
And hear his morals echo through the grove.
Joy sparkles in the sage's looks, to find
His genius glowing in a female mind;
Newton admiring sees your searching eye
Dart through his mystic page, and range the sky;
By you his colours to your sex are shown,
And Algarotti's name to Britain known.

While undisturbed by pride, you calmly tread
Through life's perplexing paths, by wisdom led:

* Mrs. Elizabeth Carter, of Deal.

And, taught by her, your grateful muse repays
Her heavenly teacher in nocturnal lays.
So when Prometheus from th' Almighty Sire,
As sings the fable, stole celestial fire,
Swift through the clay the vital current ran,
In look, in form, in speech resembling man;
But in each eye a living lustre glow'd,

That spoke the heavenly source from whence it flow'd.
"What magic powers in Caliu's * numbers dwell
Which thus th' unpractis'd breast with ardor swell
To emulate her praise, and tune that lyre,
Which yet no bard was able to inspire!
With tears her suffering virgin we attend,
And sympathise with father, lover, friend!
What sacred rapture in our bosom glows
When at the shrine she offers up her vows!
Mild majesty and virtue's awful power
Adorn her fall, and grace her latest hour."
Transport me now to those embroider'd meads,
Where the slow Ouze his lazy current leads!
There, while the stream soft-dimpling steals along,
And from the groves the green-hair'd Dryads throng,
O bear me swift to some embowering spray,
For Clio's self, or Flavia,† tunes a lay,
Sweet as the darkling Philomel of May.

Haste, haste, ye nine, and hear a sister sing

The charms of Cynthia, and the joys of spring:
See! night's pale goddess with a grateful beam
Paints her lov'd image in the shadowy stream,

Mrs. Brooke, author of the Tragedy of Virginia. This character was added to the second edition (published in 1757); and communicated to the author from "a sister muse."

+ Miss Ferrar, afterwards Mrs. Peckard.