Portrait-painting is thus beautifully traced to the Maid of Corinth; or higher ftill, to Love itself.

• Oh! Love, it was thy glory to impart
Its infant being to this fweeteft art!
Infpir'd by thee, the foft Corinthian maid,
Her graceful lover's fleeping form portray'd:
Her boding heart his near departure knew,
Yet long'd to keep his image in her view.
Pleas'd the beheld the steady shadow fall,
By the clear lamp upon the even wall.

The line the trac'd, with fond precision true,
And, drawing, doated on the form the drew:
Nor, as the glow'd with no forbidden fire,
Conceal'd the fimple picture from her fire;
His kindred fancy, ftill to nature juft,
Copied her line, and form'd the mimic bust.
Thus from thy infpiration, Love, we trace
The modell'd image, and the pencil'd face.'

We could with art had been affociated with a lefs general epithet than sweetest, in the second line of this extract; and we should not have been forry had the last line but one been rather more mufical-a point in which this author feldom fails.

Our poet then proceeds to maintain the fuperiority of hifto*rical painting, to enumerate the Grecians who chiefly excelled in it, to account for the failure of the Romans, and for its revival in Italy; when he takes occafion to speak, in the language both of poetry and painting, of the Italian, Flemish, and French painters. The first part concludes with these lines, not lefs juft than elegant, upon the French school.

• Tho' Frefnoy teaches, in Horatian fong,
The laws and limits that to art belong;
In vain he ftrives, with Attic judgment chafte,
To cruth the monsters of corrupted taste;
With ineffectual fire the poet fings,
Prolific ftill the wounded hydra springs :
Gods roll'd on gods encumber every hall,
And faints, convulfive, o'er the chapel fprawl.
Bombaft is grandeur, affectation grace,
Beauty's foft fmile is turn'd to pert grimace;
Loaded with drefs, fupremely fine advance
Old Homer's heroes, with the airs of France.
Indignant Art difclaim'd the motley crew,
Refign'd their empire, and to Britain flew.'

The second part of the poem defcribes the birth, of painting in England, and accounts for her late appearance among us; mentions the rapidity of her growth; weighs the different

merits of her most eminent living favourites, and expresses the poet's wish to fee his friend among the number, and his reafons for hoping it. Our elegant writer then justly obferves how much the painter's reputation depends upon a happy choice of fubjects, fome good ones are recommended from events in our own hiftory, as well as from Milton and Shakfpeare; and the performance concludes with its author's poetical prayers for his friend's fuccefs, which we fincerely hope no evil dæmon will difperfe in air.

One of the fubjects recommended is the affecting story of Margaret, daughter of the famous fir Thomas More.

Shall Roman charity for ever share
Thro' every various fchool each painter's care?
And Britain ftill her bright examples hide
Of female glory, and of filial pride?
Inftruct our eyes, my Romney, to adore
Th' heroic daughter of the virtuous More,
Refolv'd to fave, or in th' attempt expire,
The precious relicts of her martyr'd fire
Before the cruel council let her ftand,
Prefs the dear ghaftly head with pitying hand,
And plead, while bigotry itfelf grows mild,
The facred duties of a grateful child.'

The concluding lines of the poem are these.

May health and joy, in happieft union join'd,
Breathe their warm fpirit o'er thy fruitful mind!
To nobleft efforts raife thy glowing heart,
And ftring thy finews to the toils of art!
May Independance, bursting Fashion's chain,
To eager genius give the flowing rein,
And o'er thy epic canvas fmile to fee
Thy judgment active, and thy fancy free!
May thy juft country, while thy bold defign
Recalls the heroes of her ancient line,
Gaze on the martial group with dear delight,
May youth and valour, kindling at the fight,
O'er the bright tints with admiration lean,
And catch new virtue from the moral scene.
May time himself a fond reluctance feel,
Nor from thy aged hand the pencil fteal,
But grant it ftill to gain increafing praise,
In the late period of thy lengthen'd days,
While fairest fortune thy long life endears,
With Raphael's glory join'd to Titian's years.'

To this highly-finished performance are fubjoined fome entertaining notes, upon which we should bestow more praise had they contained lefs apparent affectation of the knowledge

of

of languages. To understand them, it is neceffary.to underftand French, Italian, Latin, Greek, Spanish. The language of Otaheite is almost the only one which does not grace these notes, and puzzle the gentle reader. In the republic of letters, there is the quoter of unknown authors, as well as the ufer of hard and uncommon words. Both are equally affected; and fhould know, that to confuse women and children, with the affiftance of a dictionary and a common-place book, is far from being difficult.

At the fame time that the notes take so much pains to prove to us their author's acquaintance with foreign writers, the poem itself convinces us how thoroughly he is intimate with English authors, and how carefully he has formed himself upon the best models in our language. Of Goldfmith, Pope, and even Dryden we were more than once reminded; elegant fimplicity, correct imagination, real poetry, pleafed us in more than one paffage of this epiftle. When ancient Genius charms,

.with spell fublime,

The fcythe of Ruin from the hand of Time,
And moves the mighty Leveller to spare
Models of grace fo exquifitely fair,'

we are in doubt which to admire more, the poet or the painter. But to extract all the paffages we approve, were to copy more than half the performance.

The faults we have to mark it, befides the affectation of the notes, are these. Senfe is fometimes cruelly tortured and lengthened out, in order to fit the iron bed of found, on which are unnaturally engendered a few, and but a few, dull and drawling lines.

• I with inadequate defcription, wrong'

And, with glee, marks them on her cankered fçroll'with another, or two of the fame kind, ftrike the ear more unmufically because all the reft of the poem is fo uniformly har monious.

Rome should not rhyme to assume-rather, it does not rhyme to it. We fhould pronounce it like the Latin Rom-a, not like the English room.-In the article of rhymes this writer is as correct as in almost every other refpect. Hearth is very properly coupled with mirth, and verfed with nurfed. Common converfation pronounces these words in too flovenly a manner, nuffed and barth. He who writes in rhyme fhould be able, like this author, to fpell, as well as to count his fingers.

Of the elegant lines which compare the painters of modern Italy to their brother poets of ancient Italy and Greece,

We

we would juft afk whether the comparifon be not run rather too far? Is there not, after all, more prettiness than truth in it?

We must now quit this pleafing publication. If the author do not prove that we have fome capital painters among us, he makes it evident that we poffefs at least one good poet.

Mifcellaneous Poems confifting of Elegies, Odes, Paftorals, Si together with Calypfo, a Masque. 8vo. 3. Newbery. THIS volume contains four elegies, ten odes, four pastorals, fix cantatas or fongs, and Calypfo, a mafque. Thefe pieces are not diftinguished by brilliancy of language, elaborate defcriptions, or the ftrokes of a bold and vivid imagination. They are not the productions of an enthufiaft, either in religion, politics, or poetry; but a perfon of a calm, ferious, loyal, philofophical difpofition.

-Minuentur atræ

• Carmine curæ,'

fays the motto; by which we may understand, that Care, in the shape of an old black witch, frequently haunts the poet, and cafts a gloom around him. But, upon her approach, he generally flies to a more agreeable lady, one of the nymphs of Caftaly, who expels the old beldam with the harmony of her lyre. That the hag is no agreeable vifitor is intimated in the following line :

No witches gave me gold."

And in his firft ode he confeffes, that he loved

To wanton in the mufes train,

And in their bowers refide."

This tête-à-tête, this dalliance with his favorite mufe, has it feems, been frequently repeated; for we have now before us many proofs of their correfpondence.

Numa pretended, that he met the goddefs Egeria in the night: fimulavit fibi cum deâ Ægeriâ congreffus nocturnos effe.' But he did not choose to difcover the place, where this gallantry was carried on. Our poet more ingenuously points

out the bower.

-In a grot from vulgar eye,
Conceal'd, amidst the fhady grove,
That brows the top of Mona high,

Haunt only of the woodland dove.

Here we leave him and the mufe, retired from vulgar eyes, in a fequestered grotto, with the doves cooing on every fide, to give our readers a little specimen of their amusement.

NIGHT.

NIGHT. In Imitation of CUNNINGHAM,

Softly stealing from the weft,

Over cottage, hill and plain;
Night, in fable garments dreft,
Now begins her awful reign.
• From the gloomy defart vale,
Rifing o'er the mountain's brow,
Mifty vapours thick exhale,

Bred in dewy damps below.
Now like tapers seen from far,
O'er the moor or marthy fen,
Dancing meteors oft appear,
And mislead th' unwary fwain.
Not a gleam of luftre peeps,

Thro' the foreft's dreary fhade; To direct the trav❜ller's fteps,

Save the glow-worm's glimm❜ring aid.

"Till the moon, with aspect bright,
Pleas'd her empire to refume,
Lends her kind enliv'ning light,
To difpel the fullen gloom.
See, the spreads her lucid beams,
O'er yon ivy twisted tower;
Where the blink-ey'd howlet fcreams,
Nightly from her fecret bower.
Where a mild refplendent ray,
Silvers o'er that aged thorn,
Philomel, with plaintive lay,
Warbles till th' approach of morn.
Not a found is heard, nor ftir

Thro' the village hamlet known ;
Saving where the shepherd's cur,
Loudly bays th' inconftant moon:
• Where in filken fetters bound,
Swains oppreft with toil are laid;
Fancy flutters all around,

In her airy veftments clad.

• Colin in his humble lot,

Happier than a monarch feems;
Stretch'd beneath his ftraw thatch'd cot,

Whilft on Mopfa's charms he dreams.
Now the thin aerial sprite,

In the church-yard haunt is feen,

At the folemn noon of night,

Gliding o'er the dufky green.'