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When luckily came by a third;
To him the question they referred:
And begged he'd tell them, if he knew,
Whether the thing was green or blue.

66

"Sirs," cries the umpire, cease your pother;
The creature's neither one nor t' other.
I caught the animal last night,
And viewed it o'er by candlelight:
I marked it well; 'twas black as jet-
You stare-but, sirs, I've got it yet,
And can produce it."-" Pray, sir, do;
I'll lay my life the thing is blue."
"And I'll be sworn, that when you've seen
The reptile, you'll pronounce him green."
"Well, then, at once to ease the doubt,"
Replies the man, "I'll turn him out:
And when before your eyes I've set him,
If you don't find him black, I'll eat him."
He said; and full before their sight
Produced the beast, and lo !-'twas white.
Both stared; the man looked wondrous wise—
"My children," the Chameleon cries-
Then first the creature found a tongue-
"You all are right, and all are wrong:
When next you talk of what you view,
Think others see as well as you:
Nor wonder if you find that none
Prefers your eyesight to his own."

Mark Akenside.

Born 1721.

Died 1770.

AKENSIDE was born at Newcastle-on-Tyne in 1721, of humble but respectable origin. His parents were Dissenters, and intended him for the Church. They sent him to the divinity classes in the Edinburgh University, but his tastes not lying in that direction, he afterwards changed them for those of medicine. In Edinburgh he wrote his poem, “Hymn to Science." Akenside finished his medical education at Leyden, where he took his degree of M.D. in his twenty-third year. In the same year was published his greatest poem, "The Pleasures of Imagination," for which he received from Dodsley, the publisher, L.120 for the copyright. The work had a rapid sale, and is the basis of his fame. He afterwards published a satire and a collection of odes. He died in 1770, in his forty-ninth year.

GOD'S EXCELLENCE.

(From "Pleasures of Imagination.")

FROM heaven my strains begin; from heaven descends The flame of genius to the human breast,

And love, and beauty, and poetic joy,

And inspiration. Ere the radiant sun

Sprang from the east, or 'mid the vault of night
The moon suspended her serener lamp;

Ere mountains, woods, or streams, adorned the globe,
Or Wisdom taught the sons of men her lore,
Then lived the Almighty One; then deep retired
In his unfathomed essence, viewed the forms,
The forms eternal, of created things:

The radiant sun, the moon's nocturnal lamp,
The mountains, woods, and streams, the rolling globe,
And Wisdom's mien celestial. From the first

Of days on them his love divine he fixed,
His admiration, till, in time complete,
What he admired and loved his vital smile
Unfolded into being. Hence the breath
Of life informing each organic frame,

Hence the green earth, and wild resounding waves,
Hence light and shade alternate, warmth and cold,
And clear autumnal skies and vernal showers,
And all the fair variety of things.

A CULTIVATED TASTE.

OH! blest of heaven, whom not the languid songs Of Luxury, the syren! not the bribes

Of sordid Wealth, nor all the gaudy spoils

Of pageant Honour, can seduce to leave

Those ever-blooming sweets, which, from the store
Of nature, fair Imagination culls,

To charm the enlivened soul! What though not all
Of mortal offspring can attain the heights
Of envied life; though only few possess
Patrician treasures, or imperial state;
Yet Nature's care, to all her children just,
With richer treasures, and an ampler state,
Endows at large whatever happy man

Will deign to use them. His the city's pomp,
The rural honours his: whate'er adorns

The princely dome, the column, and the arch,
The breathing marble, and the sculptured gold,
Beyond the proud possessor's narrow claim,
His tuneful breast enjoys. For him the Spring
Distils her dews, and from the silken gem
Its lucid leaves unfolds; for him the hand
Of Autumn tinges every fertile branch
With blooming gold, and blushes like the morn.
Each passing hour sheds tribute from her wings;
And still new beauties meet his lonely walk,
And loves unfelt attract him. Not a breeze
Flies o'er the meadow, not a cloud imbibes
The setting sun's effulgence, not a strain
From all the tenants of the warbling shade
Ascends, but whence his bosom can partake
Fresh pleasure, unreproved: nor thence partakes
Fresh pleasure only, for the attentive mind,
By this harmonious action on her powers,
Becomes herself harmonious; wont so oft
In outward things to meditate the charm
Of sacred order, soon she seeks at home
To find a kindred order, to exert
Within herself this elegance of love,

This fair inspired delight: her tempered powers
Refine at length, and every passion wears
A chaster, milder, more attractive mien.
But if to ampler prospects, if to gaze
On Nature's form, where, negligent of all
These lesser graces, she assumes the port
Of that Eternal Majesty that weighed
The world's foundations,--if to these the mind
Exalts her daring eye, then mightier far

Will be the change, and nobler. Would the forms
Of servile custom cramp her generous powers?
Would sordid policies, the barbarous growth
Of ignorance and rapine, bow her down
To tame pursuits, to indolence and fear?
Lo she appeals to Nature, to the winds
And rolling waves, the sun's unwearied course,
The elements and seasons; all declare
For what the eternal Maker has ordained

The powers of man: we feel within ourselves
His energy divine; he tells the heart,

He meant, he made us to behold and love
What he beholds and loves, the general orb
Of life and being: to be great like him,
Beneficent and active. Thus the men

Whom nature's works can charm, with God himself
Hold converse; grow familiar, day by day,
With his conceptions; act upon his plan;
And form to his the relish of their souls.

Tobias George Smollet.

Born 1721.

Died 1771.

BETTER known as a novelist than a poet; was born near Renton, in Dumbartonshire. His poems are all short, but they show he could have excelled in verse if he had cultivated the talent.

ODE TO LEVEN WATER.

ON Leven's banks, while free to rove,
And tune the rural pipe to love,
I envied not the happiest swain
That ever trod the Arcadian plain.

Pure stream, in whose transparent wave
My youthful limbs I wont to lave;
No torrents stain thy limpid source,
No rocks impede thy dimpling course,
That sweetly warbles o'er its bed,

With white, round, polished pebbles spread;
While, lightly poised, the scaly brood
In myriads cleave thy crystal flood;
The springing trout in speckled pride;
The salmon, monarch of the tide;
The ruthless pike, intent on war;
The silver eel, and mottled par.
Devolving from thy parent lake,
A charming maze thy waters make,
By bowers of birch, and groves of pine,
And edges flowered with eglantine.
Still on thy banks so gaily green,

May numerous herds and flocks be seen:
And lasses chanting o'er the pail,

And shepherds piping in the dale;
And ancient faith that knows no guile,
And industry embrowned with toil;
And hearts resolved, and hands prepared,
The blessings they enjoy to guard!

John Skinner.

Born 1721.

Died 1807.

AN Episcopal clergyman in Aberdeenshire, who composed some very spirited and patriotic songs. He was also author of an Ecclesiastical History of Scotland.

TULLOCHGORUM.

COME gie's a sang, Montgomery cried,
And lay your disputes all aside;
What signifies't for folks to chide

For what's been done before them?

Let Whig and Tory all agree,
Whig and Tory, Whig and Tory,
Let Whig and Tory all agree

To drop their Whigmegmorum.
Let Whig and Tory all agree
To spend this night with mirth and glee,
And cheerfu' sing alang wi' me
The reel of Tullochgorum.

O, Tullochgorum's my delight;
It gars us a' in ane unite;

And ony sumph that keeps up spite,

In conscience I abhor him.

Blithe and merry we's be a',
Blithe and merry, blithe and merry,
Blithe and merry we's be a',

And mak a cheerfu' quorum.

Blithe and merry we's be a',
As lang as we hae breath to draw,
And dance, till we be like to fa',
The reel of Tullochgorum.

There need na be sae great a phrase
Wi' dringing dull Italian lays;
I wadna gie our ain strathspeys

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