Sirmio, of all the shores the gem, The isles where circling Neptune strays; Whether the vast and boisterous main Or lake’s more limpid waves they stem, How gladly on thy waves I gaze! How blest to visit thee again! I scarce believe, while rapt I stand, That I have left the Thynian fields And all Bithynia far behind, And safely view my favourite land. Oh bliss, when care dispersing yields To full repose the placid mind! Then when the mind its load lays down; When we regain, all hazards past, And with long ceaseless travel tired, Our household god again our own; And press in tranquil sleep at last The well-known bed so oft desired— This can alone atonement make For every toil. Hail, Sirmio sweet! Be gay, thy lord hath ceased to roam! Ye laughing waves of Lydia’s lake, Smile all around! thy master greet With all thy smiles, my pleasant home!—ED.] No. XXXIII.[291] June 25, 1798. After the splendid account of BUONAPARTE’S successes in the East, which our readers will find in another part of this paper,[292] and which they will peruse with equal wonder and apprehension, it is some consolation to us to have to state, not only from authority, but in verse, that our government has not been behindhand with that of France; but that aware of the wise and enterprising spirit of the enemy, and of the danger which might arise to our distant possessions from the export of learning and learned men being entirely in their hands, ministers have long ago determined on an expedition of a similar nature, and have actually embarked at Portsmouth on board one of the East India Company’s ships taken up for that purpose (the ship _Capricorn_, Mr. Thomas Truman, Commander), several tons of _savans_, the growth of this country. The whole was conducted with the utmost secrecy and dispatch, and it was not till we were favoured with the following copy of a letter (obligingly communicated to us by the Tunisian gentleman to whom it is addressed) that we had any suspicion of the extent and nature of the design, or indeed of any such design being in contemplation. The several great names which are combined to render this Expedition the most surprising and splendid ever undertaken, could not indeed have been spared from the country to which they are an ornament for any other purpose than one the most obviously connected with the interests of the empire, and the most widely beneficial to mankind.