5.

O'er fields through which we us'd to run,

And spend the hours in childish play; O'er shades where, when our race was done,

Reposing on my breast you lay ;

6.

Whilst I, admiring, too remiss,

Forgot to scare the hovering flies,

Yet envied every fly the kiss,

It dar'd to give your slumbering eyes :

7.

See still the little painted bark,

In which I row'd you o'er the lake; See there, high waving o'er the park, The elm I clamber'd for your sake.

8.

These times are past, our joys are gone,
You leave me, leave this happy vale;

These scenes, I must retrace alone;

Without thee, what will they avail ?

9.

Who can conceive, who has not prov❜d,
The anguish of a last embrace?

When, torn from all you fondly lov'd,

You bid a long adieu to peace.

10.

This is the deepest of our woes,

For this these tears our cheeks bedew;

This is of love the final close,

Oh, God! the fondest, last adieu !

1805.

FRAGMENTS OF SCHOOL EXERCISES :

FROM THE "PROMETHEUS VINCTUS" OF

ÆSCHYLUS.

Μηδάμ ̓ ὁ πάντα νέμων, κ.τ.λ.

GREAT Jove! to whose Almighty Throne
Both Gods and mortals homage pay,
Ne'er may my soul thy power disown,
Thy dread behests ne'er disobey.

Oft shall the sacred victim fall,

In sea-girt Ocean's mossy hall;

My voice shall raise no impious strain,

'Gainst him who rules the sky and azure main.

How different now thy joyless fate,

Since first Hesione thy bride,
When plac'd aloft in godlike state,

The blushing beauty by thy side,

1. [The Greek heading does not appear in the Quarto, nor in the three first Editions.]

Thou sat'st, while reverend Ocean smil'd,
And mirthful strains the hours beguil'd;

The Nymphs and Tritons danc'd around,

Nor yet thy doom was fix'd, nor Jove relentless frown'd.1

HARROW, December 1, 1804.

LINES

WRITTEN IN LETTERS OF AN ITALIAN NUN AND AN

ENGLISH GENTLEMAN, BY J. J. ROUSSEAU:2 FOUNDED ON FACTS."

'AWAY, away,—your flattering arts

May now betray some simpler hearts;
And you will smile at their believing,
And they shall weep at your deceiving."

i.

ANSWER TO THE FOREGOING, ADDRESSED TO MISS

Dear simple girl, those flattering arts,

(From which thou'dst guard frail female hearts,) ii.

i. Answer to the above.-[4to] ii. From which you'd.-[4to]

1. ["My first Harrow verses (that is, English, as exercises), a translation of a chorus from the Prometheus of Eschylus, were received by Dr. Drury, my grand patron (our headmaster), but coolly. No one had, at that time, the least notion that I should subside into poetry."-Life, p. 20. The lines are not a translation but a loose adaptation or paraphrase of part of a chorus of the Prometheus Vinctus, l. 528, sq.] 2. [A second edition of this work, of which the title is, Letters, etc., translated from the French of Jean Jacques Rousseau, was published in London, in 1784. It is, probably, a literary forgery.]

Exist but in imagination,

Mere phantoms of thine own creation; i
For he who views that witching grace,
That perfect form, that lovely face,
With eyes admiring, oh! believe me,
He never wishes to deceive thee:
Once in thy polish'd mirror glance ii.
Thou❜lt there descry that elegance

Which from our sex demands such praises,

But envy in the other raises.-

Then he who tells thee of thy beauty, iii.

Believe me, only does his duty:

Ah! fly not from the candid youth;

It is not flattery,—'tis truth.iv

July, 1804.

ON A CHANGE OF MASTERS AT A GREAT PUBLIC SCHOOL.1

WHERE are those honours, IDA! once your own,

When Probus fill'd your magisterial throne?

As ancient Rome, fast falling to digrace,

Hail'd a Barbarian in her Cæsar's place,

i. Mere phantoms of your own creation;
For he who sees.-[4to]

ii. Once let you at your mirror glance

You'll there descry that elegance.-[4to]

iii. Then he who tells you of your beauty.― [4to]
iv. It is not flattery, but truth.-[4to]

1. [In March, 1805, Dr. Drury, the Probus of the piece,

So you, degenerate, share as hard a fate,

And seat Pomposus where your Probus sate.
Of narrow brain, yet of a narrower soul,
Pomposus holds you in his harsh controul;
Pomposus, by no social virtue sway'd,
With florid jargon, and with vain parade;
With noisy nonsense, and new-fangled rules,
(Such as were ne'er before enforc'd in schools.).
Mistaking pedantry for learning's laws,

He governs, sanction'd but by self-applause;
With him the same dire fate, attending Rome,
Ill-fated Ida! soon must stamp your doom:
Like her o'erthrown, for ever lost to fame,
No trace of science left you, but the name.

i.

HARROW, July, 1805.

but of a narrower soul.—[4to]

ii. Such as were ne'er before beheld in schools.—[4to]

retired from the Head-mastership of Harrow School, and was succeeded by Dr. Butler, the Pomposus. Dr. Drury," said Byron, in one of his note-books, was the best, the kindest (and yet strict, too) friend I ever had; and I look upon him still as a father." Out of affection to his late preceptor, Byron advocated the election of Mark Drury to the vacant post, and hence his dislike of the successful candidate. He was reconciled to Dr. Butler before departing for Greece, in 1809, and in his diary he says, "I treated him rebelliously, and have been sorry ever since." (See allusions in and notes to "Childish Recollections," pp. 84-106, and especially note 1, p. 88, notes 1 and 2, p. 89, and note 1, p. 91.)]

VOL. I.