WILLIAM SHENSTONE.

1714-1763.

SHENSTONE was in love twice, if so lazy a fellow as he was, can be said to have been in love. His first innamorata was a Miss Graves, sister of one of his college friends, Mr. Richard Graves, author of "THE SPIRITUAL QUIXOTE," and other works. He became acquainted with her in 1735, and had a sort of Platonic feeling towards her for several years. A parting from her on one occasion was the cause of his commencing the "PasTORAL BALLAD." In 1743 he went to Cheltenham, where he met a Miss C——— (how provoking these blanks are!) and his bosom, as the novelists of that day would have said, was for the second time awakened to the tender passion. He grew melancholy and poetical, as was his wont, and, on parting from his charmer, re-wrote the Ballad, and divided it into four parts, as it now stands. He also wrote a number of songs, in which she figured as Delia. She seems never to have known of his passion, at least from him.

Marriage was not once the subject of our conversation,” he says, in one of his letters, nor even love." But it was just as well so, if we may credit Mr. Graves, who hints, in his "RECOLLECTIONS OF SHENSTONE," that the lady would never have married a man of the poet's means, because she had a sister who had married a baronet!

The "PASTORAL BALLAD" was modelled after "THE DESPAIRING SHEPHERD" of Rowe, which Shenstone admired greatly. It was very popular in its time, and is still, with old-fashioned readers.

A PASTORAL BALLAD.

IN FOUR PARTS.

1743.

I. ABSENCE.

Ye shepherds, so cheerful and gay,
Whose flocks never carelessly roam;

Should Corydon's happen to stray,

O call the poor wanderers home!

Allow me to muse and to sigh,

Nor talk of the change that ye find; None once was so watchful as I;

I have left my dear Phyllis behind.

Now I know what it is to have strove

With the torture of doubt and desire; What it is to admire and to love,

And to leave her we love and admire. Ah! lead forth my flock in the morn,

And the damps of each evening repel ; Alas! I am faint and forlorn ;

I have bade my dear Phyllis farewell.

Since Phyllis vouchsafed me a look,

I never once dreamed of my vine; May I lose both my pipe and my crook, If I knew of a kid that was mine.

I prized every hour that went by,

Beyond all that had pleased me before;

But now they are past, and I sigh,

And I grieve that I prized them no more.

But why do I languish in vain?

Why wander thus pensively here?

O why did I come from the plain,

Where I fed on the smiles of my dear?

They tell me, my favourite maid,

The pride of that valley, is flown;
Alas! where with her I have strayed,
I could wander with pleasure alone.

When forced the fair nymph to forego,
What anguish I felt at my heart:
Yet I thought-but it might not be so-
"Twas with pain that she saw me depart.

She gazed as I slowly withdrew,

My path I could hardly discern ;

So sweetly she bade me adieu,

I thought that she bade me return.

The pilgrim that journeys all day

To visit some far distant shrine,

If he bear but a relic away,

Is happy, nor heard to repine. Thus widely removed from the fair,

Where my vows, my devotion, I owe;

Soft Hope is the relic I bear,

And my solace wherever I go.

II. HOPE.

My banks they are furnished with bees,
Whose murmur invites one to sleep;
My grottoes are shaded with trees,

And my hills are white over with sheep.

I seldom have met with a loss,

Such health do my fountains bestow; My fountains, all bordered with moss, Where the harebells and violets grow.

Not a pine in my grove is there seen,

But with tendrils of woodbine is bound; Not a beech's more beautiful green,

But a sweetbriar entwines it around. Not my fields, in the prime of the year, More charms than my cattle unfold; Not a brook that is limpid and clear, But it glitters with fishes of gold.

One would think she might like to retire
To the bower I have laboured to rear ;
Not a shrub that I heard her admire,
But I hasted and planted it there.
O how sudden the jessamine strove
With the lilac to render it gay!

Already it calls for my love

To prune the wild branches away.

From the plains, from the woodlands and groves,
What strains of wild melody flow!
How the nightingales warble their loves,
From thickets of roses that blow!
And when her bright form shall appear,
Each bird shall harmoniously join

In a concert so soft and so clear,

As she may not be fond to resign.

I have found out a gift for my fair;

I have found where the wood-pigeons breed ;

But let me that plunder forbear,

She will say 't was a barbarous deed. For he ne'er could be true, she averred,

Who could rob a poor bird of its young; And I loved her the more when I heard Such tenderness fall from her tongue.

I have heard her with sweetness unfold
How that pity was due to a dove;
That it ever attended the bold,

And she called it the sister of Love.
But her words such a pleasure convey,
So much I her accents adore,
Let her speak, and whatever she say,
Methinks I should love her the more.

Can a bosom so gentle remain

Unmoved when her Corydon sighs? Will a nymph that is fond of the plain, These plains and this valley despise? Dear regions of silence and shade!

Soft scenes of contentment and ease! Where I could have pleasingly strayed,

If aught in her absence could please.

But where does my Phyllida stray,

And where are her grots and her bowers? Are the groves and the valleys as gay,

And the shepherds as gentle as ours? The groves may perhaps be as fair,

And the face of the valleys as fine;

The swains may in manners compare,
But their love is not equal to mine.

III. SOLICITUDE.

Why will you my passion reprove?
Why term it a folly to grieve,
Ere I show you the charms of my love?
She is fairer than you can believe.
With her mien she enamours the brave,
With her wit she engages the free,
With her modesty pleases the grave;
She is every way pleasing to me.

O you that have been of her train,
Come join in my amorous lays ;

I could lay down my life for the swain,

That will sing but a song in her praise. When he sings, may the nymphs of the town Come trooping, and listen the while;

Nay, on him let not Phyllida frown,

But I cannot allow her to smile.

For when Paridel tries in the dance

Any favour with Phyllis to find,

O how, with one trivial glance,

Might she ruin the peace of my mind!

In ringlets he dresses his hair,

And his crook is bestudded around

;

And his pipe-O my Phyllis, beware
Of a magic there is in the sound.