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SELECTIONS FROM WHITEHEAD.

THE LAUREATE.

OBLIGED by sack and pension,
Without a subject or invention,
Must certain words in order set,
As innocent as a gazette-

Must some meaning half disguise,
And utter neither truth nor lies.

FROM A CHARGE TO THE POETS.

THE following fact is true

From nobler names and great in each degree,
The pension'd laurel has devolved on me,

To me, ye bards; and what you'll scarce conceive,
Or, at the best, unwillingly believe,

Howe'er unworthily I wear the crown,

Unask'd it came, and from a hand unknown.

ODE FOR THE NEW YEAR, 1761.

AND who is he of regal mien,

Reclined on Albion's golden fleece,
Whose polished brow and eye serene
Proclaim him elder born of Peace?
Another George! ye winds convey

Th' auspicious name from pole to pole!
Thames catch the sound, and tell the subject sea
Beneath whose sway its waters roll.

The hoary monarch of the deep,

Who soothed its murmurs with a father's care,

Doth now eternal Sabbath keep,

And leaves his trident to his blooming Heir.

O, if the muse aright divine,

Fair Peace shall bless his opening reign,

And through its splendid progress shine,
With every art to grace her train,

The wreaths so late by glory won,

Shall weave their foliage round his throne,

Till kings abashed shall tremble to be foes,

And Albion's dreaded strength secure the world's repose.

ODE FOR HIS MAJESTY'S BIRTHDAY, JUNE 4, 1765.
HAIL to the rosy morn, whose ray
To lustre wakes the auspicious day,
Which Britain holds so dear!
To this fair month of right belong
The festive dance, the choral song,
And pastimes of the year.
Whate'er the wintry colds prepar'd,
Whate'er the spring but faintly rear'd,
Now wears its brightest bloom;
A brighter blue enrobes the skies,
From laughing fields the zephyrs rise
On wings that breathe perfume.
The lark in air that warbling floats,
The wood-birds with their tuneful throats,
The streams that murmur as they flow,
The flocks that rove the mountain's brow,
The herds that through the meadows play,
Proclaim 'tis nature's holiday!

And shall the British Lyre be mute,
Nor thrill through all its trembling strings,
With oaten reed, and pastoral flute,
Whilst every vale responsive rings?
To him we pour the grateful lay
Who makes the season doubly gay:
For whom, so late, our lifted eyes,
With tears besought the pitying skies,
And won the cherub Health to crown
A nation's prayer, and ease that breast
Which feels all sorrows but its own
And seeks by blessing to be blest.
Fled are all the ghastly train,
Writhing pain, and pale disease;
Joy resumes his wonted reign,

The sunbeams mingle with the breeze,

And his own month, which Health's gay livery wears,

On the sweet prospect smiles of long succeeding years.

THE JE NE SCAI QUOI.

A SONG.

YES, I'm in love, I feel it now,
And Cælia has undone me;
And yet I'll swear I can't tell how
The pleasing plague stole on me.

'Tis not her face which love creates, For there no graces revel;

'Tis not her shape, for there the Fates Have rather been uncivil.

'Tis not her air, for sure in that

There's nothing more than common; And all her sense is only chat,

Like any other woman.

Her voice, her touch, might give th' alarm
'Twas both perhaps, or neither;
In short, 'twas that provoking charm
Of Cælia all together.

THE DOUBLE CONQUEST.

A SONG.

Of music, and of beauty's power,
I doubted much and doubted long:
The fairest face a gaudy flower,

An empty sound the sweetest song.

But when her voice Clarinda rais'd,
And sung so sweet and smil'd so gay,
At once I listen'd, and I gaz'd;

And heard, and look'd my soul away.

To her, of all his beauteous train,

This wondrous power had Love assign'd,

A double conquest to obtain,

And cure at once the deaf and blind.

ON THE BIRTHDAY OF A YOUNG LADY FOUR YEARS OLD.

OLD creeping Time, with silent tread,
Has stol'n four years o'er Molly's head.
The rose-bud opens on her cheek,
The meaning eyes begin to speak;
And in each smiling look is seen
The innocence which plays within.
Nor is the falt'ring tongue confin'd
To lisp the dawnings of the mind,
But fair and full her words convey
The little all they have to say;
And each fond parent, as they fall,
Find volumes in that little all.
May every charm which now appears
Increase, and brighten with her years!
And may that same old creeping Time
Go on till she has reach'd her prime,
Then, like a master of his trade,
Stand still, nor hurt the work he made.

THE ENTHUSIAST.

AN ODE.

ONCE, I remember well the day,
'Twas ere the blooming sweets of May
Had lost their freshest hues,

When every flower and every hill,
In every vale had drunk its fill
Of sunshine and of dews.

In short, 'twas that sweet season's prime,
When Spring gives up the reins of time
To Summer's glowing hand,
And doubting mortals hardly know
By whose command the breezes blow
Which fan the smiling land.

'Twas there, beside a greenwood shade,
Which clothed a lawn's aspiring head,
I urged my devious way,

With loitering steps regardless where,
So soft, so genial was the air,

So wondrous bright the day.

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"'TWAS THAT SWEET SEASON'S PRIME WHEN SPRING GIVES UP THE REINS OF TIME

TO SUMMER'S GLOWING HAND."-Page 114.

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