+Half of thy heart we consecrate, "(The web is wove. The work is done.)" Stay, oh stay! nor thus forlorn Leave me unbleffed, unpitied, here to mourn: "In yon bright track, that fires the western skies, They melt, they vanish from my eyes. "But oh! what folemn fcenes on Snowdon's height Defcending flow their glitt'ring skirts unroll? • Vifions of glory, fpare my aching fight, 'Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my foul! 'No more our long-loft Arthur we bewail, All-hail, ye genuine Kings, Britannia's Mue, hail 'Girt with many a Baron bold, Sublime their ftarry fronts they rear; 'And gorgeous Dames, and Statesmen old • In bearded majesty, appear. In the midst a Form divine! Her eye proclaims her of the Briton-Line; + Eleanor of Caftile died a few years after the conquest of Wales. The heroic proof fhe gave of her affection for her Lord is well known. The monuments of his regret, and forrow, for the lofs of her, are ftill to be seen in feveral parts of England. Acceffion of the line of Tudor. 'Her 'Her lyon-port, her awe-commanding face, Attemper'd sweet to virgin-grace. "What strings fymphonious tremble in the air, What strains of vocal transport round her play! Hear from the grave, great Talieffin*, hear; "They breathe a foul to animate thy clay. Bright Rapture calls, and foaring, as the fings, 'Waves in the eye of Heav'n her many-colour'd wings. III. 3. "The verse adorn again 'Fierce War, and faithful Love, And Truth fevere, by fairy Fiction drest. In bufkin'd measures move Pale Grief, and pleasing Pain, "With Horrour, Tyrant of the throbbing breaft. A Voice, as of the Cherub-Choir, Gales from blooming Eden bear; ⚫ And diftant warblings leffen on my ear, • That loft in long futurity expire. Fond impious Man, think'ft thou, yon fanguine cloud, Rais'd by thy breath, has quench'd the Orb of day? • Talieffin, Chief of the Bards, flourish'd in the VIth Century. His works are ftill preferved, and his memory held in high veneration among his Countrymen. To-morrow To-morrow he repairs the golden flood, 'The different doom our Fates affign. To triumph, and to die, are mine." He spoke, and headlong from the mountain's height Deep in the roaring tide he plung'd to endless night. AVING now, by the advice and affiftance of my friends, brought this Collection of POEMS to a competent size, it has been thought proper that the farther progrefs of its growth fhould here be ftop'd. From the loofe and fugitive pieces, fome printed, others in manufcript, which for forty or fifty years paft have been thrown into the world, and carelessly left to perish; I have here, according to the most judicious opinions I could obtain in diftinguishing their merits, endeavour'd to felect and preferve the beft. The favourable reception which the former volumes have met with, demands my warmeft acknowledgments, and calls for all my care in compleating the Collection; and in this respect, if it appear that I have not been altogether negligent, I fhall hope to be allow'd the merit, which is all I claim, of having furnish'd to the Public an elegant and polite Amusement. Little more need be added, than to return my thanks to several ingenious friends, who have obligingly contributed to this Entertainment. If the reader fhould happen to find, what I hope he feldom will, any pieces which he may think unworthy of having been inferted; as it would ill become me to attribute his diflike of them to his own want of Tafte, fo I am too conscious of my own deficiencies not to allow him to impute the infertion of them to mine. R. DODSLEY. INDEX to the Sixth Volume. HYMN to the Naiads. 1746 Page Ode to the Right Hon. Francis E. Inferiptions, 1. For a Grotto 38 Lady on a Landscape of ber 160 162 2. For a Statue of Chaucer at Ode to Cupid on Valentine's Woodstock Day 40 To the Hon. and Rev. F.C. 164 174 6. For a Column at Runny To a Lady very handsome, but too Ode mede Ode to the Tiber Elegies, 1. Written at the Convent of pagne, 1754 5་ Ode III: 182 185 An Imitation of Horace, Book IIÍ. - 186 190 A Reply to a Copy of Verfes made. |