General and fierce; the meeting lances thrust,
And the black blood seems smoaking on the dust.
With earnest eyes the wondering regent views
The pictured warriors, and their history sues.
But now the ruddy juice, by Noah " found,
In foaming goblets circled fwiftly round,
And o'er the deck fwift rofe the feftive board;
Yet fmiling oft, refrains the Indian lord:
His faith forbade with other tribe to join
The facred meal, esteem'd a rite divine.
In bold vibrations, thrilling on the ear,
The battle founds the Lufian trumpets rear;
Loud burst the thunders of the arms of fire,
Slow round the fails the clouds of fmoke afpire,
And rolling their dark volumes o'er the day,
The Lufian war, in dreadful pomp, display.
In deepest thought the careful regent weigh'd
The

pomp and power at GAMA's nod bewray'd, Yet feem'd alone in wonder to behold

The glorious heroes and the wars half told

In filent poefy-Swift from the board

High crown'd with wine, uprofe the Indian lord;

Both

the ruddy juice by Noah found-Gen. ix. 20. And Noah began

to be an husbandman, and be planted a vineyard, and he drank of the wine, &c.

• His faith forbade with other tribe to join
The facred meal, esteem'd a rite divine.—

The opinion of the facredness of the table is very ancient in the Eaft. It is plainly to be difcovered in the hiftory of Abraham and the Hebrew patriarchs.

Both the bold GAMAS, and their generous peer,
The brave COELLO, rofe, prepared to hear,

Or, ever courteous, give the meet reply:

Fixt and inquiring was the regent's eye:
The warlike image of an hoary fire,

Whofe name fhall live till earth and time expire,
His wonder fixt; and more than human glow'd
The hero's look; his robes of Grecian mode
A bough, his enfign, in his right he waived,
A leafy bough-But I, fond man depraved!
Where would I speed, as mad'ning in a dream,
Without your aid, ye nymphs of Tago's stream!
Or yours, ye Dryads of Mondego's bowers!
Without your aid how vain my wearied powers!
Long yet and various lies
my arduous way
Through louring tempefts and a boundless fea.
Oh then, propitious hear your fon implore,

And guide my veffel to the happy fhore.

Ah! fee how long what per'lous days, what woes
On many a foreign coaft around me rofe,
As dragg'd by fortune's chariot wheels along
I footh'd my forrows with the warlike P song;
Wide ocean's horrors lengthening now around,
And now my footsteps trod the hostile ground;

Yet

the warlike fong.Though Camoëns began his Lufiad in Portugal, almost the whole of it was written while on the ocean, while in Africa, and in India. See his Life.

Yet mid each danger of tumultuous war

Your Lufian heroes ever claimed my care:
As Canace of old, ere a felf-deftroy'd,

One hand the pen, and one the fword employ'd.
Degraded now, by poverty abhorr`d,

The guest dependent at the lordling's board:

Now bleft with all the wealth fond hope could crave,
Soon I beheld that wealth beneath the wave

For ever loft; myself escaped alonė,

On the wild fhore all friendlefs, hopeless, thrown;

My life, like Judah's heaven-doom'd king of yore,
By miracle prolong'd; yet not the more

To end my forrows: woes fucceeding woes
Belied my earnest hopes of sweet repose:
In place of bays around my brows to shed
Their facred honours, o'er my destined head
Foul calumny proclaim'd the fraudful tale,
And left me mourning in a dreary 1 jail.

t

Such

As Canace-Daughter of Eolus. Her father having thrown her incestuous child to the dogs, fent her a fword, with which the flew herself. In Ovid the writes an epiftle to her husband-brother, where the thus defcribes herfelf;

Dextra tenet calamum, ftri&tum tenet altera ferrum.

Soon I bebeld that wealth beneath the wave

For ever loft

See the Life of Camoëns.

My life, like Judah's heaven-doom'd king of yore-Hezekiah. See Ifaiah

Xxxviii.

from

And left me mourning in a dreary jail.-This, and the whole paragraph

Degraded now, by poverty abborr'd

Such was the meed, alas! on me bestow'd,

Bestow'd by those for whom my numbers glow'd,
By thofe who to my toils their laurel honours owed.

Ye gentle nymphs of Tago's rofy bowers,
Ah, fee what letter'd patron-lords are yours!
Dull as the herds that graze their flowery dales,
To them in vain the injured mufe bewails:
No foftering care their barbarous hands beftow,
Though to the muse their fairest fame they owe.
Ah, cold may prove the future priest of fame
Taught by my fate: yet will I not disclaim
Your fmiles, ye muses of Mondego's fhade,
Be ftill my deareft joy your happy aid!

And hear my vow; Nor king, nor loftieft peer
Shall e'er from me the fong of flattery hear;
Nor crafty tyrant, who in office reigns,
Smiles on his king, and binds the land in chains;
His king's worst foe: Nor he whose raging ire,
And raging wants, to fhape his course, conspire;
True to the clamours of the blinded crowd,
'Their changeful Proteus, infolent and loud :
Nor he whofe honeft mien fecures applause,
Grave though he feem, and father of the laws,
Who, but half-patriot, niggardly denies
Each other's merit, and withholds the prize:

Who

alludes to his fortunes in India. The latter circumftance relates particularly to the bafe and inhuman treatment he received on his return to Goa, after his unhappy fhipwreck. See his Life.

Who fpurns the mufe, nor feels the raptured ftrain,
Useless by him efteem'd, and idly vain:

For him, for thefe, no wreath my hand fhall twine;
On other brows th' immortal rays shall shine:

He

"Who fpurns the Mufe.- Similarity of condition has produced similarity of fentiment in Camoëns and Spenfer. Each was the ornament of his country and of his age; and each was cruelly neglected by the men of power, who, in truth, were incapable to judge of their merit, or to relish their writings. We have feen feveral of the ftrictures of Camoëns on the barbarous nobility of Portugal. The fimilar complaints of Spenser will shew that neglect of genius, however, was not confined to the court of Lisbon. O grief of griefs; O gall of all good hearts! To fee that Virtue fhould defpised be Of fuch as first were raised for Virtue's parts, And now broad spreading like an aged tree, Let none shoot up that nigh them planted be. O let not those of whom the Mufe is fcorned, Alive or dead be by the Muse adorned.

Ruins of Time.

It is thought Lord Burleigh, who withheld the bounty intended by Queen Elizabeth, is here meant. But he is more clearly ftigmatized in these remarkable lines, where the mifery of dependence on court-favour is painted in colours which muft recal several strokes of the Lufiad to the mind of the reader.

Full little knoweft thou that haft not tried,
What hell it is, in suing long to bide;

To lofe good days, that might be better spent,
To wafte long nights in penfive discontent;
To speed to-day, to be put back to-morrow,
To feed on hope, to pine with fear and forrow;
To have thy princefs' grace, yet want her peers ;
To have thy afking, yet wait many years;
To fret thy foul with croffes and with cares;
To eat thy heart thro' comfortless despairs;
To fawn, to crowch, to wait, to ride, to run,

To fpend, to give, to want, to be undone. Mother Hubberd's Tale

Thefe lines exafperated ftill more the inelegant, the illiberal Burleigh. So true is the obfervation of Mr. Hughes, that, even the fighs of a miferable man are fometimes refented as an affront by him that is the occasion of them.

The arrival of Gama in India.-In feveral parts of the Lufiad the Portuguefe poet has given ample proof that he could catch the genuine spirit of

Homer