Thomas Oldham

Lo! Time, at last, has brought, with tardy flight,
The long-anticipated, wish'd-for night;
How on this blissful night, while yet remote,
Did Hope and Fancy with fond rapture doat!
Like eagles, oft, in glory's dazzling sky,
With full-stretch'd pinions have they soar'd on high,
To greet the appearance of the poet's name,
Dawning conspicuous mid the stars of fame.

Alas! they soar not now; the demon, Fear,
Has hurl'd the cherubs from their heavenly sphere:
Fancy, o'erwhelm'd with terror, grovelling lies;
The world of torment opens on her eyes,
Darkness and hissing all she sees and hears;
        ("The speaker pauses the audience are
            supposed to clap, when he continues,")
But Hope, returning to dispel her fears,
Claps her bright wings; the magic s...

The piece, to-night, is of peculiar kind,
For which the appropriate name is hard to find;
No Comedy, 'tis clear; nor can it be,
With strictest truth, pronounced a Tragedy;
Since, though predominant the tragic tone,
It reigns not uniformly and alone;
Then, that its character be best proclaim'd,
A Tragic-drama let the piece be named.

But do not, Critics! rashly hence conclude,
'Tis a mere Farce, incongruous and rude,
Where incidents in strange confusion blend,
Without connexion, interest, or end:
Not so; far different was the bard's design;
For though, at times, he ventures to combine
With grave Melpomene's impassion'd strain
The gay Thalia's more enlivening vein;
(As all mankind with one consent agree
How strong the charms of sweet variety,)
Yet...

Yes, I could love, could softly yield
To passion all my willing breast,
And fondly listen to the voice
That oft invites me to be blest;

That still, when Fancy, lost in bliss,
Stands gazing on the form divine,
So sweetly whispers to my soul,
O make the heavenly Julia thine!

But hush, thou fascinating voice!
Hence visionary extacy!
Yes, I could love, but ah! I fear
She would not deign to smile on me.

Ere Reason rose within my breast,
    To enforce her sacred law,
Still would some charm, in every maid,
    My veering passions draw.

But now, to calm those gales of night,
    The morn her light displays;
The twinkling stars no more I view,
    For only Venus sways:

The spotless heaven of genuine love
    Unveil'd I wondering see,
And all that heaven, transported, claim
    For Julia and for me.

Come along, jolly Bacchus! no longer delay;
See'st thou not how the table with bottles is crown'd?
See'st thou not how thy votaries, impatient to pay
Their devotion to thee, are all waiting around?
O come then, propitious to our invocation,
To preside of thy rites at the solemnization.

Hark! the voice of Champagne, from its prison set free,
And the music of glasses that merrily ring,
Thy arrival announce, and invite us to glee;
With what gladness we welcome thee, vine-crowned King!
To honour thee, Bacchus! we pour a libation,
And the lofty roof echoes our loud salutation.

On that wine-loaded altar, erected to thee,
Sherry, burgundy, claret, invitingly shine;
While all thy rich gifts thus collected we see,
We greet thy munificence boundless, divine.

Ye scenes beloved! O welcome once again!
Forbidden long to my desiring sight,
Now, now! triumphant o'er disease and pain,
I visit ye with fresh, increased delight.

Vine-mantled Hills, whose heights I joy'd to climb,
The Morn's sweet infant breathings to inhale;
River! whose banks I roved in trance sublime,
While fancy-whispering Eve spread soft her veil;

And thou, O Wood, in whose moon-checkered shade
The nightly songstress oft has charm'd my ear
Till Morning told me I so long had stay'd:
Hail all ye objects to my memory dear!
Once more, to feel the transports ye impart,
Health wakes my every sense and tunes my heart.

Again has Time his annual circle run,
And April ushers in my natal day:
Since first my infant eyes beheld the sun,
How many a year has swiftly roll'd away!
Full half my thread of life the Fates have spun;
What various colours does the web display!
Some dark, some brighter; ere the work be done
The sadder hues will overshade the gay.
Yet not to Melancholy will I yield;
Against Despondency and Discontent
Still Fortitude and Hope shall keep the field;
Swerving from thee, O Virtue! I repent;
Now! to repel Temptation I am steel'd;
To follow thee I'm resolutely bent.

Come, my dear Love, and let us climb yon hill,
The prospect, from its height, will well reward
The toil of climbing; thence we shall command
The various beauties of the landscape round.
Now we have reached the top. O! what a scene
Opens upon the sight, and swallows up
The admiring soul! She feels as if from earth
Uplifted into heaven. Scarce can she yet
Collect herself, and exercise her powers.
While o'er heaven's lofty, wide-extended arch,
And round the vast horizon, the bold eye
Shoots forth her view, with what sublime delight
The bosom swells! See, where the God of day,
Who through the cloudless ether long has rid
On his bright, fiery car, amidst a blaze
Of dazzling glory, and in wrath shot round
His burning arrows, with tyrannic power
Oppressing Natur...

Amid the jingle of the rhyming throng
I mark with transport some diviner song;
Sweet to their native heaven the strains aspire,
Commanding silence to the vulgar quire;
Apollo smiles, and all the tongues of Fame
Through the poetic realm Delille proclaim.

O let a British Bard, admiring, greet
Thy glorious triumph, and thy praise repeat!
When merit claims the panegyric lay,
Envy he scorns, and joys the debt to pay.
Painter of Nature hail! to thee belong
Unrivall'd talents for descriptive song:
While others, fired with more ambitious views,
Invoke the Epic, or the Tragic Muse,
And, throned in Glory's temple, shine sublime,
Proud of their laurel-wreaths that fear not Time,
Thy Genius fondly stoops to softer themes,
The landscape's beauties flowers, and g...

O! what a nameless feeling of delight
Stole o'er my wondering spirit, like a gleam
From opening heaven! dost thou, then, Fancy, deign
Once more to visit me? thou dost! thou dost!
That breath of extacy, that heavenly light,
Flow'd from the wafture of thy angel wings,
And from thy smiling eyes: divinest Power!
Welcome, thrice welcome! O vouchsafe to make
My breast thy temple, and my heart thy shrine!
Still will I worship thee, and thou shalt keep,
In peace, thy new abode, nor fear the approach
Of aught profane or hostile, to disturb
Thy holy mysteries; for I will chase
Far from the hallow'd precincts where thou dwell'st
Each worldly passion, every grovelling thought,
And all the train of Vice; striving to make
The shrine well-worthy its celestial guest.
Sti...

Should Phoebus e'er desert my mind,
And should the Nine their aid refuse,
Enchanting Girl! I still could find
A theme in thee, in thee a Muse.

Can Fiction any charms devise
That proudly may with thine compare?
On thee she turns her wondering eyes,
And drops the pencil in despair.

Far sweeter are thy notes to me
Than sweetest poet ever sung;
And true perfection would it be
To sing thy beauties with thy tongue.

Let Phoebus, then, desert my mind!
And let the Nine their aid refuse!
Ever, my Julia! shall I find
In thee a theme, in thee a Muse.

Sing, lovely Girl! to hear Thee sing
    Hush'd is the listening air;
My spirit trembles on the wing,
    And no delay can bear.

Those down-cast eyes, that smile supprest,
    Thy conscious power betray;
Yet, Siren! grant the bold request;
    Come, steal my heart away.

See, see, those ruby lips divide;
    An ivory shrine appears;
There Harmony and Love reside,
    To ravish mortal ears.

And hark! they from that sweet recess
    Breathe their celestial lays;
The enchanting sounds my thought possess
    With rapture and amaze.

Still pressing on with strong control
    I feel the lavish strain,
Till drunk with bliss, my wilder'd soul
    Reels on the brink of pain.

Ah! how could I so rashly dare
    Contend...

Long to the world have all the mouths of Fame,
O Paganini! thunder'd forth thy name;
Nations have vied their plausive voice to raise,
And swell the general chorus of thy praise.
Though not so loud, more dear the applause to thee
Of all the favour'd sons of harmony,
Who, with one full consent, admiring own    }
Thee as their master monarch thee alone; }
And humbly bow before thee on thy throne.    }

O'er all musicians thou stand'st far apart;
Thou hast created for thyself an art.
As, in the natural world, around the sun
The planets their career of brightness run,
Each moving in an orbit of its own,
And all obeying laws to science known.
Musicians thus, each blest with his degree
Of talent by the God of harmony,
Shine forth distinguish'd in their seve...

Fairest and loveliest of the sun-born train
That o'er the varying year alternate reign;
Whose eye, soft-beaming with thy father's fire,
Fond Nature woos with ever-fresh desire,
Enchanting Spring! O let thy votary's lay
Invite thy angel smile, thy genial sway!

Still do thy beauties, to my partial heart,
Whene'er I gaze, superior joys impart:
When winter's cloudy veil thou draw'st away                            }
And, vested with the sun's mild, dewy ray,                            }
First to the longing earth thy charms thou dost display; }
Or when Aurora, to the lark's gay song,
Full of thy spirit, lightly trips along;
With joyful kisses greets the first-born flowers,
And o'er them breathes thy warm, refreshing showers;
Or when, on shadowy pillow in the west...

No longer Beauty's many-colour'd robe
Adorns the autumnal scene; no longer play
The Zephyrs with her tresses; she has fled
To happier regions, and has left the year
Naked and void of charms; the leafless woods
Tremble no more with rapture at the voice
Of harmony: ah! how is Nature changed!
Silent, and sad, she anxiously awaits
Thy coming, mighty King! and, as the sun
Less bright, less ardent, more and more declines
Towards the horizon, with alarm she marks
Thy shadow lengthening in the nightly shade
And towering o'er her, prostrate as she lies,
More threatening, more gigantic; till, at length,
Boreas, thy harbinger, forth-rushing fierce,
Tears from chill'd Autumn's head the withering Crown,
And blustering loud in her affrighted ear,
O Winter! tells thy te...