Fancy, whose various figure-tinctur'd vest
Was ever changing to a different hue;
Her head with varied bays and flowrets drest,
Her eyes two spangles of the morning dew.

With dancing attitude she swept thy string;
And now she soars, and now again descends;
And now reclining on the Zephyr's wing,
Unto the velvet-vested mead she bends.

Peace, deckt in all the softness of the dove,
Over thy passions spread her silver plume;
The rosy veil of harmony and love,
Hung on thy soul in one eternal bloom.

Peace, gentlest, softest of the virtues, spread
Her silver pinions, wet with dewy tears,
Upon her best distinguish'd poet's head,
And taught his lyre the music of the spheres.
Temp'rance, with health and beauty in her train
And massy-muscled strength in graceful pride,
Pointed at scarlet luxury and pain,
And did at every frugal feast preside.
Black melancholy stealing to the shade,
With raging madness, frantic loud and dire,
Whose bloody band displays the reeking blade,
Were strangers to thy heaven-directed lyre.
Content, who similes in every frown of fate,
Wreath'd thy pacific brow and sooth'd thy ill;
In thy own virtues and thy genius great,
The happy Muse laid every trouble still.

But see the sickening lamp of day retires,
And the meek evening shakes the dusky grey;
The west faint glimmers with the saffron fires,
And like thy life, O Phillips! flies away.

Here, stretch'd upon this Heaven-ascending hill,
I'll wait the horrours of the coming night,
I'll imitate the gently-plaintive rill;
And by the glare of lambient vapours write.
Wet with the dew the yellow hawthorns bow;
The rustic whistles thro' the echoing cave;
Far o'er the lea the breathing cattle low,
And the full Avon lifts the darken'd wave.

Now as the mantle of the evening swells
Upon my mind, I feel a thick'ning gloom;
Ah could I charm by necromantic spells,
The soul of Phillips, from the deathy tomb!

Then would we wander thro' this darken'd vale;
In converse such as heavenly spirits use,
And, borne upon the pinions of the gale,
Hymn the Creator, and exert the Muse.

But, horrour to reflection! now no more,
Will Phillips sing, the wonder of the plain!
When, doubting whether they might not adore,
Admiring mortals heard his nervous strain.

See! see! the pitchy vapour hides the lawn,
Nought but a doleful bell of death is heard,
Save where into a blasted oak withdrawn
The scream proclaims the curst nocturnal bird.

• Note on this verse by Chatterton," Expunged as too flowery for grief."

Now rest, my Muse, but only rest to weep,
A friend made dear by every sacred tie;
Unknown to me be comfort, peace, or sleep:
Phillips is dead! 'tis pleasure then to die.

Few are the pleasures Chatterton e'er knew,
Short were the moments of his transient peace;
But melancholy robb'd him of those few,
And this hath bid all future comfort cease.

And can the Muse be silent, Phillips gone!
And am I still alive? My soul, arise!
The robe of immortality put on,
And meet thy Phillips in his native skies.

[Transcribed from a MS. in Chatterton's hand-
writing.]

HERVENIS, harping on the hackney'd text',
By disquisitions is so sore perplex'd,
He stammers, instantaneously is drawn,
A border'd piece of inspiration lawn,
Which being thrice unto his nose apply'd,
Into his pineal gland the vapours glide;
And now again we hear the doctor roar
On subjects he dissected thrice before;
I own at church I very seldom pray,
For vicars, strangers to devotion, bray.
Sermons, tho' flowing from the sacred lawn,
Are flimsy wires from reason's ingot drawn;
And to confess the truth, another cause
My every prayer and adoration draws;
In all the glaring tinctures of the bow,
The ladies front me in celestial row;
(Tho' when black melancholy damps my joys,
I call them Nature's trifles, airy toys;
Yet when the goddess Reason guides the strain,
I think them, what they are, a heavenly train;)
The amorous roiling, the black sparkling eye,
The gentle hazle, and the optic sly;
The easy shape, the panting semi-globes,
The frankness which each latent charm disrobes;
The melting passions, and the sweet severe,
The easy amble, the majestic air;
The tap'ring waste, the silver-mantled arms,
All is one vast variety of charms.
Say, who but sages stretch'd beyond their span
Italian singers, or an unman'd man,
Can see Elysium spread upon their brow,
And to a drousy curate's sermon bow.
If (but 'tis seldom) no fair female face
Attracts my notice by some glowing grace,

These lines occur in the Extract from Ker Gardens, p. 477,

An excellent scheme! My joy 's beyond expres- | Cone drink, my boy