The friend shall view yon whitening spire,

And ’mid the varied landscape weep:

But, Thou, who own'st that earthly bed,

Ah! what will every dirge avail?
Or tears, which Love and Pity shed

That mourn beneath the gliding sail !

Yet lives there one, whose lieedless eye

Shall scorn thy pale shrine glimm’ring near ?
With him, sweet bard, may Fancy die,

And Joy desert the blooming year.

But thou, lorn stream, whose sullen tide

No sedge-crown'd Sisters now attend,
Now waft me from the green hill's side

Whose cold turf hides the buried friend !

And see, the fairy valleys fade,

Dun night has veil'd the solemn view!
Yet once again, dear parted shade,
Meek Nature's Child, again adieu !

• The genial meads assign’d to bless

Thy life, shall mourn thy early doom ;

* RICHMOND Church.

* Thomson rezided in the neighbourhood of Richmond some timc before his death.

Their hinds, and shepherd-girls shall dress

With simple hands thy rural tomb.

Long, long, thy stone, and pointed clay

Shall melt the musing Briton's eyes, O! yales, and wild woods, shall He say,

In yonder grave Your Druid lies!

AN ODE, ON THE POPULAR SUPERSTITIONS
OF THE HIGHLANDS OF SCOTLAND.

Considered as the Subject of Poetry.
SUBSCRIBED TO MR. JOHN HOME.

HOME, thou return'st from Thames, whose Naiads long Have seen thee lingering with a fond delay Mid those soft friends, whose hearts some future day Shall melt perhaps to hear thy tragic song. Go, not uninindful of that cordial Youth, Whom, long endear'd, thou leav'st by Lavant's side, Together let us wish him lasting truth, And joy untainted with his destin'd bride. Go, nor regardless, while these numbers boast My short-liv'd bliss, forget my social name: But think, far off, how, on the southern coast, I met thy friendship with an equal flame!

* A gentleman of the name of Barrow, who introduced Home to Collins.

Fresh to that soil thou turn’st, where every vale
Shall prompt the poet, and his song

demand : To thee thy copious subjects ne'er shall fail;

Thou need'st but take thy pencil to thy hand,
And paint what all believe, who own thy genial land.

There must thou take perforce thy Doric quill; "Tis Fancy's land to which thou sett'st thy feet; Where still, 'tis said, the fairy people meet, Beneath each birken shade, on mead or hill. There each trim lass, that skims the milky store, To the swart tribes their creamy bowls allots; By night they sip it round the cottage-door, While airy minstrels warble jocund notes. There, every heril, by sad experience, knows How, wing'd with fate, their elf-shot arrows fiy, When the sick ewe her summer food forgoes, Or, stretch'd on earth, the heart-smit heifers lie. Such airy beings awe th’untutor'd swain : Nor thou, tho' learn’d, bis liomelier thoughts neglect; Let thy sweet Muse the rural faith sustain ; These are the themes of simple sure effect,

That add new conquests to her boundless reign, And fill with double force her heart-commanding strain.

Ev'n yet preserv'd, how often may'st thou hear, Where to the Pole the Boreal mountains run, Taught by the father, to his listening son, Strange lays, whose power load charm’d a Spencer's car.

At every pause, before thy mind possest,
Old Runic bards shall seem to rise around
With uncouth lyres, in many-colour'd vest,
Their matted hair with boughs fantastic crown'd:
Whether thou bidd'st the well-taught hind repeat
The choral dirge that mourns some chieftain brave,
When

every shrieking maid her bosom beat,
And strew'd with choicest herbs his scented grave ;
Or, whether sitting in the shepherd's shiel,*
Thou hear’st some sounding tale of war’s alarms ;
When at the bugle's call, with fire and steel,

The sturdy clans pour’d forth their brawny swarms, And hostile brothers met to prove each other's arms.

'Tis thine to sing, how, framing hideous spells, In Sky's lone isle, the gifted wizzard-seer ; Lodg'd in the wintry cave with Fate's fell spear, Or in the depth of Uist's dark forests dwells : How they, whose sight such dreary dreams engross, With their own vision oft astonish’ıl droop; When, o'er the watery strath, or quaggy moss, They see the gliding ghosts unbodied troop. Or, if in sports, or on the festive green, Their destin'd glance some fated youth descry, Who now, perhaps, in lusty vigour seen, And rosy health, shall soon lamented die.

For them the viewless forms of air obey:
Their bidding heed, and at their beck repair.
They know what spirit brews the stormful day,

And heartless oft, like moody madness stare
To see the phantom train their secret work prepare.

To monarchs dear, some hundred miles astray,
Oft have I seen Fate give the fatal blow!
The Seer in Sky, shrieked as the blood did flow,
When headless Charles warm on the scaffold lay !
As Boreas threw his young Aurora® forth,
In the first year of the first George's reign,
And battles rag'd in welkin of the North,
They mourn’d in air, fell, fell Rebellion slain !
And as, of late, they joy'd in Preston's fight,
Saw, at sad Falkirk, all their hopes near crown'd!
They rav'd! divining thro' their second sight,
Pale, red Culloden, where these hopes were drown'd!
Illustrious William !t Britain's guardian name!
One William sav'd us from a tyrant's stroke ;
He, for a sceptre gain’d heroic fame,

But thou, more glorious, Slavery's chain hast broke,
To reign a private man, and bow to Freedom's yoke !

* It is highly probable, that Collins meant the first appearance of the Northern Lights, which happened about the year 1715; from this circumstance, that no ancient writer has taken notice of them ; nor any modern, previous to the above period.

# The Duke of Cumberland, who defeated the Pretender at Culloden.