On some base hearts gold has a sov’reign sway, Some pious minds delight in sighs and tears, Fame can the poet’s midnight toil repay, But ale and brandy sooth a soldier’s cares. For thee who by thy natal stars compell’d, Dost touch with artless hand the warbling lyre, If chance, by friendship’s soft regard impell’d, Some kind companion shall thy fate inquire; Haply some brother sub, shall smiling say: “Oft in his tent retir’d the youth was seen, “Scribbling with hasty hand a hum’rous lay, “To fill a page in Urban’s magazine. “There in that field, beside that holy pile, “That rears his Gothic steeple to the sky “Each noon beneath those elms he mus’d awhile, “Then por’d upon a book with greedy eye. “Along the mazes of yon murm’ring stream, “With pensive pace at ev’ning would he stray, “’Till wrapt in wand’ring fancy’s airy dream “He mutter’d metre to the lunar ray. “One morn I sought him vainly through the line, “Among the elms and o’er the verdant lea, “Another came, nor near the house divine, “Nor by the stream, nor in his tent was he. “The next he wrote that, prompted by his muse, “In rural mansions Pegasus he pac’d, “To camps and courts had made his last adieus, “And o’er his antique gate these verses trac’d.” THE INSCRIPTION. Here let me rest in this sequester’d cell, Where pomp and noise and riot are unknown, Where raptur’d Contemplation loves to dwell, And whose low roof Contentment calls her own. Large splendid halls where gold and silver glare, My mind’s undazzled eye would never please; Here am I freed from all that vex’d me――care, And bless’d with all I wish――poetic ease. No more blind folly my desires shall raise, Nor draw my footsteps from this lov’d abode; Here will I breathe the remnant of my days, And court the favors of the tuneful god. H. 1806. ――――:o:―――― ELEGY ON A PAIR OF BREECHES, _Thrown upon a Dust-heap by a Miser._ Here rest my _breeches_ on the _lap_ of earth By Time destroyed, by Pride now cast away; Whose _waistband_ never knew the stretch of mirth, Whose _lining_ long ere this had felt decay. Oft has the _needle_ tried its skill in vain, Patch over _patch_ full oft their _knees_ have borne, Oft have their rents my bosom doom’d to pain, That sympathiz’d with them when they were _torn_. Not half so tough the hide of roasted pig, Not more ambrosial was the damask rose; Not half so comely was the parson’s wig, As ye my Breeches――best of all my clothes! ’Till Time’s unpitying hand (by fate design’d), Your stitches, strength, and youth, hath from you borne So falls the flow’r before the ruthless wind, So from its mate the guiltless turtle’s torn,