There while Vernon sat all glorious
From the Spaniards' late defeat,
And his crews, with shouts victorious,
Drank success to England's fleet;
On a sudden, shrilly sounding,
Hideous yells and shrieks were heard;
Then, each heart with fear confounding,
A sad troop of ghosts appeared;
All in dreary hammocks shrouded,
Which for winding-sheets they wore,
And, with looks by sorrow clouded,
Frowning on that hostile shore.
On them gleamed the moon's wan lustre,
When the shade of Hosier brave,
His pale bands were seen to muster,
Rising from their watery grave:
O'er the glimmering wave he hied him,
Where the Burford reared her sail,
With three thousand ghosts beside him,
And in groans did Vernon hail.
"Heed, oh heed our fatal story!
I am Hosier's injured ghost;
You who now have purchased glory
At this place where I was lost:
Though in Portobello's ruin,
You now triumph free from fears,
When you think on my undoing,
You will mix your joys with tears.
"See these mournful spectres sweeping
Ghastly o'er this hated wave,
Whose wan cheeks are stained with weeping;
These were English captains brave.
Mark those numbers, pale and horrid,
Who were once my sailors bold;
Lo! each hangs his drooping forehead,
While his dismal tale is told.
"I, by twenty sail attended,
Did this Spanish town affright; Nothing then its wealth defended, But my orders-not to fight!
Oh! that in this rolling ocean
I had cast them with disdain,
And obeyed my heart's warm motion,
To have quelled the pride of Spain!
"For resistance I could fear none;
But with twenty ships had done
What thou, brave and happy Vernon,
Hast achieved with six alone.
Then the Bastimentos never
Had our foul dishonour seen,
Nor the seas the sad receiver
Of this gallant train had been.
66 Thus, like thee, proud Spain dismaying,
And her galleons leading home,
Though condemned for disobeying,
I had met a traitor's doom:
To have fallen, my country crying,
'He has played an English part,'
Had been better far than dying
Of a grieved and broken heart.
"Unrepining at thy glory,
Thy successful arms we hail;
But remember our sad story,
And let Hosier's wrongs prevail.
Sent in this foul clime to languish,
Think what thousands fell in vain,
Wasted with disease and anguish,
Not in glorious battle slain.
"Hence with all my train attending,
From their oozy tombs below,
Through the hoary foam ascending,
Here I feed my constant woe.
Here the Bastimentos viewing,
We recall our shameful doom,
And, our plaintive cries renewing,
Wander through the midnight gloom.
"O'er these waves for ever mourning
Shall we roam, deprived of rest,
If, to Britain's shores returning,
You neglect my just request;
After this proud foe subduing,
When your patriot friends you see,
Think on vengeance for my ruin,
And for England-shamed in me."
SHENSTONE was born at the Leasowes, in Hales-Owen, Shropshire, in November 1714. Though ambitious of literary fame, he spent most of his time in ornamenting his patrimonial home, which he did with such judgment as made it the admiration of all who saw it. He published some pleasing elegies and ballads, of which the chief are "The Schoolmistress," which appeared in 1742, immortalising his early instructress, and "A Pastoral Ballad." He died at the Leasowes on 11th February 1763.
THE SCHOOLMISTRESS.
Ан me! full sorely is my heart forlorn,
To think how modest worth neglected lies;
While partial fame doth with her blasts adorn
Such deeds alone as pride and pomp disguise;
Deeds of ill sort, and mischievous emprise;
Lend me thy clarion, goddess! let me try
To sound the praise of merit ere it dies ;
Such as I oft have chanced to espy,
Lost in the dreary shades of dull obscurity.
In every village marked with little spire,
Embowered in trees, and hardly known to fame,
There dwells, in lowly shed, and mean attire,
A matron old, whom we schoolmistress name;
Who boasts unruly brats with birch to tame:
They grieven sore, in piteous durance pent,
Awed by the power of this relentless dame;
And ofttimes on vagaries idly bent,
For unkempt hair, or task unconned, are sorely shent
And all in sight doth rise a birchen tree,
Which learning near her little dome did stow;
Whilome a twig of small regard to see,
Though now so wide its waving branches flow,
And work the simple vassals mickle woe;
For not a wind might curl the leaves that blew,
But their limbs shuddered, and their pulse beat low;
And as they looked, they found their horror grew,
And shaped it into rods, and tingled at the view.
Near to this dome is found a patch so green,
On which the tribe their gambols do display ;
And at the door imprisoning board is seen,
Lest weakly wights of smaller size should stray;
Eager, perdie, to bask in sunny day!
The noises intermixed, which thence resound,
Do learning's little tenement betray;
Where sits the dame, disguised in look profound,
And eyes her fairy throng, and turns her wheel around.
Her cap, far whiter than the driven snow,
Emblem right meet of decency does yield:
Her apron died in grain, as blue, I trow,
As is the harebell that adorns the field;
And in her hand, for sceptre, she does wield
Tway birchen sprays; with anxious fear entwined,
With dark distrust, and sad repentance filled;
And steadfast hate, and sharp affliction joined,
And fury uncontrolled, and chastisement unkind.
A russet stole was o'er her shoulders thrown;
A russet kirtle fenced the nipping air;
'Twas simple russet, but it was her own;
'Twas her own country bred the flock so fair!
'Twas her own labour did the fleece prepare;
And, sooth to say, her pupils ranged around,
Through pious awe, did term it passing rare;
For they in gaping wonderment abound,
And think, no doubt, she been the greatest wight on ground
Albeit ne flattery did corrupt her truth,
Ne pompous title did debauch her ear;
Goody, good woman, gossip, n'aunt, forsooth,
Or dame, the sole additions she did hear;
Yet these she challenged, these she held right dear;
Ne would esteem him act as mought behove,
Who should not honoured eld with these revere;
For never title yet so mean could prove,
But there was eke a mind which did that title love.
A PASTORAL BALLAD.
YE shepherds, so cheerful and gay,
Whose flocks never carelessly roam;
Should Corydon's happen to stray,
Oh! call the poor wanderers home.
Allow me to muse and to sigh,
Nor talk of the change that ye find; None once was so watchful as I;
I have left my dear Phyllis behind.
Now I know what it is to have strove
With the torture of doubt and desire; What it is to admire and to love,
And to leave her we love and admire. Ah! lead forth my flock in the morn, And the damps of each evening repel; Alas! I am faint and forlorn
I have bade my dear Phyllis farewell.
Since Phyllis vouchsafed me a look,
I never once dreamt of my vine;
May I lose both my pipe and my crook,
If I knew of a kid that was mine.
I prized every hour that went by,
Beyond all that had pleased me before;
But now they are past, and I sigh,
And I grieve that I prized them no more.
But why do I languish in vain?
Why wander thus pensively here?
Oh! why did I come from the plain,
Where I fed on the smiles of my dear?
They tell me, my favourite maid,
The pride of that valley, is flown;
Alas! where with her I have strayed,
I could wander with pleasure alone.
When forced the fair nymph to forego,
What anguish I felt at my heart!
Yet I thought-but it might not be so-
'Twas with pain that she saw me depart.
She gazed as I slowly withdrew,
My path I could hardly discern;
So sweetly she bade me adieu,
I thought that she bade me return.
The pilgrim that journeys all day
To visit some far-distant shrine,
If he bear but a relic away,
Is happy, nor heard to repine.
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