With cheerful hop from spray to spray,
They sport along the meads;

In social bliss together stray,
Where love or fancy leads.

Through Spring's gay scenes each happy pair
Their fluttering joys pursue;

Its various charms and produce share,
For ever kind and true.

Their sprightly notes from every shade
Their mutual loves proclaim;
Till Winter's chilling blasts invade,
And damp the' enlivening flame.

Then all the jocund scene declines,
Nor woods nor meads delight;
The drooping tribe in secret pines,
And mourns the' unwelcome sight.

Go, blissful warblers! timely wise,
The' instructive moral tell;
Nor thou their meaning lays despise,
My charming Annabelle!

HAMLET'S SOLILOQUY,

IMITATED.

To print, or not to print-that is the question. Whether 'tis better in a trunk to bury

The quirks and crotchets of outrageous fancy, Or send a well wrote copy to the press,

And, by disclosing, end them? To print, to doubt

No more; and by one act to say we end
The headach, and a thousand natural shocks
Of scribbling frenzy--'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To print—to beam
From the same shelf with Pope, in calf well bound:
To sleep, perchance, with Quarles-Ay, there's

the rub

For to what class a writer may be doom'd,
When he hath shuffled off some paltry stuff,
Must give us pause.-There's the respect that
makes

The' unwilling poet keep his piece nine years.
For who would bear the' impatient thirst of fame,
The pride of conscious merit, and 'bove all,
The tedious importunity of friends,

When as himself might his quietus make
With a bare inkhorn? Who would fardles bear?
Το groan and sweat under a load of wit?
But that the tread of steep Parnassus' hill,
That undiscover'd country, with whose bays
Few travellers return, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear to live unknown,
Than run the hazard to be known, and damn'd.
Thus Critics do make cowards of us all.
And thus the healthful face of many a poem
Is sicklied o'er with a pale manuscript;
And enterprisers of great fire and spirit,
With this regard, from Dodsley turn away,
And lose the name of authors.

ROUNDELAY.

Written for the Jubilee at Stratford upon Avon.

CELEBRATED BY MR. GARRICK IN HONOUR OF SHAKSPEARE, SEPTEMBER, 1769.

Set to Music by Mr. Dibdin.

SISTERS of the tuneful train,
Attend your parent's jocund strain,
'Tis Fancy calls you; follow me
To celebrate the Jubilee.

On Avon's banks, where Shakspeare's bust Points out and guards his sleeping dust, The sons of scenic mirth agree

To celebrate the Jubilee.

Come, daughters, come, and bring with you The' aerial Sprites and Fairy crew,

And the sister Graces three,

To celebrate the Jubileer

Hang around the sculptured tomb

The broider'd vest, the nodding plume,

And the mask of comic glee,

To celebrate the Jubilee.

From Birnam Wood, and Bosworth Field,

Bring the standard, bring the shield,

With drums and martial symphony,

To celebrate the Jubilee.

In mournful numbers now relate
Poor Desdemona's hapless fate,
With frantic deeds of jealousy,
To celebrate the Jubilee.

Nor be Windsor's Wives forgot,
With their harmless merry plot,
The whitening mead, and haunted tree,
To celebrate the Jubilee.

Now in jocund strains recite

The humours of the braggart Knight,
Fat Knight, and Ancient Pistol he,
To celebrate the Jubilee.

But see in crowds the gay, the fair,
To the splendid scene repair,
A scene as fine as fine can be,
To celebrate the Jubilee.

THE BLACKBIRDS.

AN ELEGY.

THE sun had chased the mountain snow, His beams had pierced the stubborn soil, The melting streams began to flow,

And ploughmen urged their annual toil.

"Twas then, amidst the vocal throng
Whom Nature waked to mirth and love,
A blackbird raised his amorous song,
And thus it echo'd through the grove.

'O fairest of the feather'd train!

For whom I sing, for whom I burn, Attend with pity to my strain,

And grant my love a kind return.

For see, the wintry storms are flown,
And zephyrs gently fan the air;
Let us the genial influence own,
Let us the vernal pastime share.

The Raven plumes his jetty wing, To please his croaking paramour; The Larks responsive carols sing,

And tell their passion as they soar:

But does the Raven's sable wing Excel the glossy jet of mine? Or can the Lark more sweetly sing, Than we, who strength with softness join?

'O let me then thy steps attend!

I'll point new treasures to thy sight: Whether the grove thy wish befriend, Or hedge-rows green, or meadows bright.

'I'll guide thee to the clearest rill,
Whose streams among the pebbles stray:
There will we sip, and sip our fill,
Or on the flowery margin play.

'I'll lead thee to the thickest brake,
Impervious to the schoolboy's eye;
For thee the plaster'd nest I'll make,
And to thy downy bosom fly.