famed;
  To Dorset he directs his artful Muse,
  In numbers such as Dorset’s self might use. 
  How negligently graceful he unreins
  His verse, and writes in loose familiar strains! 
  How Nassau’s godlike acts adorn his lines,
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  And all the hero in full glory shines! 
  We see his army set in just array,
  And Boyne’s dyed waves run purple to the sea. 
  Nor Simois choked with men, and arms, and blood;
  Nor rapid Xanthus’ celebrated flood,
  Shall longer be the poet’s highest themes,
  Though gods and heroes fought promiscuous in their streams. 
  But now, to Nassau’s secret councils raised,
  He aids the hero, whom before he praised. 
     I’ve done at length; and now, dear friend, receive
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  The last poor present that my Muse can give. 
  I leave the arts of poetry and verse
  To them that practise them with more success. 
  Of greater truths I’ll now prepare to tell,
  And so at once, dear friend and Muse, farewell.

A LETTER FROM ITALY,

TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE CHARLES LORD HALIFAX, IN THE YEAR 1701.

                Salve magna parens frugum Saturnia tellus,
                Magna virum! tibi res antiquae laudis et artis
                Aggredior, sanctos ausus recludere fontes. 
      VIRG., Geor. ii.

  While you, my lord, the rural shades admire,
  And from Britannia’s public posts retire,
  Nor longer, her ungrateful sons to please,
  For their advantage sacrifice your ease;
  Me into foreign realms my fate conveys,
  Through nations fruitful of immortal lays,
  Where the soft season and inviting clime
  Conspire to trouble your repose with rhyme. 
     For wheresoe’er I turn my ravished eyes,
  Gay gilded scenes and shining prospects rise,
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  Poetic fields encompass me around
  And still I seem to tread on classic ground;
  For here the Muse so oft her harp has strung,
  That not a mountain rears its head unsung,
  Renowned in verse each shady thicket grows,
  And every stream in heavenly numbers flows. 
     How am I pleased to search the hills and woods
  For rising springs and celebrated floods! 
  To view the Nar, tumultuous in his course,
  And trace the smooth Clitumnus to his source,
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  To see the Mincio draw his watery store
  Through the long windings of a fruitful shore,
  And hoary Albula’s infected tide
  O’er the warm bed of smoking sulphur glide. 
     Fired with a thousand raptures I survey
  Eridanus[5] through flowery meadows stray,
  The king of floods! that, rolling o’er the plains,
  The towering Alps of half their moisture drains,
  And proudly swoln with a whole winter’s snows,
  Distributes wealth and plenty where he flows.
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     Sometimes, misguided by the tuneful throng