detained him with her as the auditor of

her accounts. He often wandered to

London, and amused himself with the conversation of his friends.

He died in 1730, at Easthampftead in Berkshire, the feat of the lady Trumball; and Pope, who had been always his friend, honoured him with an epitaph, of which he borrowed the two firft lines from Crafhaw.

Fenton was tall and bulky, inclined to corpulence, which he did not leffen by much exercife; for he was very fluggifh and fedentary, rofe late, and when he had rifen, fat down to his book or papers. A woman, that once waited on him in a lodging, told him, as she said, that he would lie a-bed, and be fed with a spoon.

a spoon. This, however, was not the worst that might have been prognosticated; for Pope fays, in his Letters, that he died of indolence; but his imme diate diftemper was the gout.

Of his morals and his converfation the account is uniform: he was never named but with praife and fondness, as a man in the highest degree amiable and excellent. Such was the character given him by the earl of Orrery, his pupil; fuch is the teftimony of * Pope, and fuch were the fuffrages of all who could boaft of his acquaintance.

By a former writer of his Life a ftory is told, which ought not to be forgotten. He used, in the latter part of his time,

* Spence.

to

to pay his relations in the country an yearly vifit. An an entertainment made for the family by his elder brother, he

obferved that one of his fifters, who had married unfortunately, was abfent; and found, upon enquiry, that diftress had made her thought unworthy of invitation. As he was at no great distance, he refused to fit at the table till fhe was

called, and, when he had taken her

place, was careful to fhew her particular attention.

His collection of poems is now to be confidered. The ode to the Sun is written upon a common plan, without uncommon fentiments; but its greatest fault is its length. No poem fhould be long of which the purpofe is only to

ftrik!

ftrike the fancy, without enlightening the understanding by precept, ratiocinatión, or narrative. A blaze first pleases, and then tires the fight.

Of Florelio it is fufficient to say that it is an occafional paftoral, which implies fomething neither natural nor artificial, neither comick nor ferious.

The next ode is irregular, and therefore defective. As the fentiments are pious, they cannot eafily be new; for what can be added to topicks on which fucceffive ages have been employed!

Of the Paraphrafe on Ifaiah nothing very favourable can be faid. Sublime and folemn profe gains little by a change to blank verfe; and the paraphraft has deferted his original, by admitting images

2

I

images not Afiatick, at least not Ju

daical:

Returning Peace,

Dove-eyed, and rob'd in white

Of his petty poems fome are very trifling, without any thing to be praised either in the thought or expreffion. He is unlucky in his competitions; he tells the fame idle tale with Congreve, and does not tell it fo well. He tranflates from Ovid the fame epiftle as Pope; but I am afraid not with equal happiness.

To examine his performances one by one would be tedious. His tranflation from Homer into blank verfe will find few readers while another can be had in rhyme. The piece addreffed to Lambarde is no difagreeable fpecimen of epifto