Like as a nestling, feather'd gaily o'er, Is meditating towards the stars to soar, And in ambitious flights already vies With the wing'd chiefs that skim along the skies: What though he never has essay'd the air, And needs must trust in plumes untried to bear Unwonted burden heavenward? yet he quivers To stretch his wings, and his fair plumage shivers Round his light shoulders till he flits away, While whispering airs against his pinions play; Nor dreams he will suspend his wandering flight Anywhere short of regions starry bright. But when exhausted by the spaces high And the immeasurable void of sky, Hovering in empty air, far off he sees The fields and hedges and familiar trees-- O, how far off!--which used his sight to please; Then sudden overpower'd behold him sink, And from his hopes and lofty soarings shrink: To his dear mother his whole soul looks back, And down he flutters on the homeward track. That I offer thee these poems, most honourable Sir, is not the ambitious desire to give, but the righteous wish to restore what is due. And I have not chosen thee so much the patron of my little book, as I recognise thee to be its owner. Thine indeed these things are, and mine: nor yet are they so much mine, but that if there is anything good in them, this is wholly thine; nor at the same time are they so far thine, that everything bad in them is not entirely mine. Thus, by a sort of common and joint right, they belong to each of us; lest either I should bring envy to myself, while I presumed to a share of thy praises, or injury to thee, by endeavouring to drag thee down to association with my feebleness. For concerning anything belonging to me, I should not venture even to myself to admit any merit, much less to proclaim it openly, except this one thing, than which there is nothing more excellent--namely, a mind not ungrateful, and cherishing in itself with most punctilious fidelity the record of thy kindnesses. This in the presence of any witnesses, this openly in the face of heaven and to my own conscience, I boast of as my own. I proclaim myself in this particular incapable of enduring a rival; for others of thy admirers [pupils] may venerate thee, and do venerate thee, with more polite attention, but none will be able to do so with observance more sincere and felt. In conclusion; of these rivulets, however slender they may be and of no name, this at least will be the fitting praise--that at all events they know their own Ocean. R. WI. IN OBITUM REV. V. D^{ris} MANSELL, COLL. REGIN. M^{ri} QUI VEN. D^{s} BROOKE [M^{ri} COLL. TRIN.], INTERITUM PROXIME SECUTUS EST.[116]