And many a sullen look askance is sent,
Which for his dame's annoyance he designs;

And still the more to pleasure him she's bent,
The more doth he, perverse, her 'haviour past resent.

Ah me! how much I fear lest pride it be! But if that pride it be, which thus inspires, Beware, ye dames, with nice discernment see Ye quench not, too, the sparks of nobler fires: Ah! better far than all the Muse's lyres, All coward arts, is valour's generous heat; The firm fixt breast, which fit and right requires Like Vernon's patriot soul,* more justly great Than craft that pimps for ill, or flowery false deceit.

Yet, nurs'd, with skill, what dazzling fruits appear!
Ev'n now sagacious foresight points to show

A little bench of heedless bishops here,
And there a chancellor in embryo,

Or bard sublime (if bard may e'er be so)

As Milton, Shakspeare, names that ne'er shall die, Though now he crawl along the earth so low, Nor, weeting how the Muse should soar on high, Wisheth, poor starvling elf! his paper kite may fly.

And this perhaps, who, censuring the design,
Low lays the house which that of cards doth build,
Shall Dennis be,† if rigid fate incline,

And many an epic to his rage shall yield;
And many a poet quit the Aonian field;
And, sour'd by age, profound he shall appear

*Admiral Vernon, the conqueror of Porto Bello.
The famous snarling critic.

As he who now, with 'sdainful fury thrill'd,

Surveys mine work, and levels many a sneer,

And furls his wrinkly front, and cries, "What stuff is here!"

But now Don Phoebus gains the middle skie,
And liberty unbars her prison-door,

And like a rushing torrent out they fly,
And now the grassy cirque han covered o'er
With boisterous revel-rout and wild uproar;
A thousand ways in wanton rings they run;
Heaven shield their short-liv'd pastimes, I implore !
For well may Freedom, erst so dearly won,
Appear to British elf more gladsome than the sun.

Enjoy, poor imps! enjoy your sportive trade,
And chace gay flies, and cull the fairest flowers;
For when my bones in grass-green sods are laid,
Then never may ye taste more careless hours
In knightly castles or in ladies' bowers.
O vain to seek delight in earthly things!
But most in courts, where proud ambition towers.
Deluded wight! who weens fair peace can spring
Beneath the pompous dome of kesar or of king.

Sce in each sprite some various bent appear!
These rudely carol must incondite lay;
Those sauntering on the green with jocund leer,
Salute the stranger passing on his way ;
Some to the standing lake their courses bend,
Some builden fragile tenements of clay;

With pebbles smooth at duck and drake to play;
Thilk to the huxter's savory cottage tend,

In pastry kings and queens th' allotted mite to spend.

Here as each season yields a different store,
Each season's stores in order rangèd been;
Apples with cabbage-net y-covered o'er,
Galling full sore th' unmoney'd wight are seen;
And gooseb'rie, clad in livery red and green;
And here, of lovely dye, the catherine pear;
Fine pear as lovely for thy juice, I ween;
0 may no wight e'er pennyless come there,
Lest smit with ardent love he pine with hopeless care.

See! Cherries here, ere cherries yet abound, With thread so white in tempting posies ty'd, Scattering like blooming maid their glances round, With pamper'd look draw little eyes aside, And must be bought, though penury betide. The plum all azure, and the nut all brown, And here, each season, do those cakes abide, Whose honour'd names th' inventive city own, Rendering through Britain's isle Salopia's praises known.*

Admired Salopia! that with venial pride

Eyes her bright form in Severn's ambient wave,
Fam'd for her loyal cares in perils try'd,†
Her daughters lovely, and her striplings brave;
Ah! midst the rest, may flowers adorn his grave,
Whose art did first these dulcet cates display;

A motive fair to Learning's imps he gave,
Who cheerless o'er her darkling region stray,
Till Reason's morn arise, and light them on their way.

*Shrewsbury cakes.

+Shrewsbury, the capital of Shenstone's native county, was devoted to the cause of Charles the First.

Grown Schoolboys.

A LETTER FROM HORACE WALPOLE TO HIS FRIEND GEORGE

MONTAGU.

GEORGE MONTAGU, one of Horace Walpole's schoolfellows at Eton, was of the Halifax branch of the family of that name. He became Member of Parliament for Northampton, and Private Secretary to Lord North while Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Walpole, who was now at Cambridge, in his nineteenth year, does not write so correctly as he did afterwards; yet the germ of his wit is very evident in this letter; also of his foppery or effeminacy; and some may think, of his alleged heartlessness. A wit he was of the first water; effeminate too, no doubt, though he prided himself on his open-breasted waistcoats in his old age, and possessed exquisite good sense and discernment, where party-feelings did not blind him. But of the charge of heartlessness, his zeal and painstaking in behalf of a hundred people, and his beautiful letter to his friend Conway in particular, offering, in a way not to be doubted, to share his fortune with him (see Correspondence, vol. i. p. 358), ought to acquit him by acclamation.

The letter, here presented to the reader, is (with some qualification as to prettiness of manner) a perfect exhibition of the thoughts and feelings that go through the mind of a romantic schoolboy. How good is his wishing to have had a kingdom, "only for the pleasure of being driven from it, and living disguised in an humble vale !”

EAR GEORGE,

DEAR

KING'S COLLEGE, May 6th, 1736.

I agree with you entirely in the pleasure you take in talking over old stories, but can't say but I meet every day with new circumstances, which will be still more pleasure

to me to recollect. I think at our age 't is excess of joy, to think, while we are running over past happiness, that, it is still in our power to enjoy as great. Narrations of the greatest actions of other people are tedious in comparison of the serious trifles that every man can call to mind of himself while he was learning those histories. Youthful passages of life are the chippings of Pitt's diamond, set into little heart-rings with mottos; the stone itself more worth, the filings more gentle and agreeable. Alexander, at the head of the world, never tasted the true pleasure that boys of his own age have enjoyed at the head of a school. Little intrigues, little schemes, and policies engage their thoughts; and at the same time that they are laying the foundations for their middle age of life, the mimic republic they live in furnishes materials of conversation for their latter age; and old men cannot be said to be children a second time with greater truth from any one cause, than their living over again their childhood in imagination. To reflect on the season when first they felt the titillation of love, the budding passions, and the first dear object of their wishes! how unexperienced they gave credit to all the tales of romantic loves! Dear George, were not the playing fields at Eton food for all manner of flights? No old maid's gown, though it had been tormented into all the fashions from King James to King George, ever underwent so many transformations as those poor plains have in my idea. At first I was contented with tending a visionary flock, and sighing some pastoral name to the echo of the cascade under the bridge. How happy should I have been to have had a kingdom, only for the pleasure of being driven from it, and living disguised in an humble vale! As I got further into Virgil and Clelia,* I found myself transported from Arca

* An old French romance, founded on Roman history.