[Footnote 2:  ‘Ogilby:’  a poor translator.]

* * * * *

  FRIENDSHIP:  AN ODE.

  PRINTED IN THE GENTLEMAN’S MAGAZINE, 1743.

  1 Friendship, peculiar boon of Heaven,
      The noble mind’s delight and pride—­
    To men and angels only given,
      To all the lower world denied!

  2 While love, unknown among the blest,
      Parent of thousand wild desires,
    The savage and the human breast
      Torments alike with raging fires;

  3 With bright, but oft destructive gleam,
      Alike o’er all his lightnings fly;
    Thy lambent glories only beam
      Around the favourites of the sky.

  4 Thy gentle flows of guiltless joys,
      On fools and villains ne’er descend;
    In vain for thee the tyrant sighs,
      And hugs a flatterer for a friend.

  5 Directress of the brave and just,
      Oh, guide us through life’s darksome way! 
    And let the tortures of mistrust
      On selfish bosoms only prey.

  6 Nor shall thine ardours cease to glow,
      When souls to peaceful climes remove: 
    What raised our virtue here below,
      Shall aid our happiness above.

* * * * *

  IMITATION OF THE STYLE OF[1] * * *

  1 Hermit hoar, in solemn cell
      Wearing out life’s evening gray,
    Strike thy bosom, sage, and tell
      What is bliss, and which the way.

  2 Thus I spoke, and speaking sigh’d,
      Scarce repress’d the starting tear,
    When the hoary sage replied,
      ‘Come, my lad, and drink some beer.’

* * * * *

  ONE AND TWENTY.

  1 Long-expected one-and-twenty,
      Lingering year, at length is flown: 
    Pride and pleasure, pomp and plenty,
      Great * * *, are now your own.

  2 Loosen’d from the minor’s tether,
      Free to mortgage or to sell,
    Wild as wind, and light as feather,
      Bid the sons of thrift farewell.

  3 Call the Betsies, Kates, and Jennies,
      All the names that banish care;
    Lavish of your grandsire’s guineas,
      Show the spirit of an heir.

  4 All that prey on vice and folly
      Joy to see their quarry fly: 
    There the gamester, light and jolly;
      There the lender, grave and sly.

  5 Wealth, my lad, was made to wander,
      Let it wander as it will;
    Call the jockey, call the pander,
      Bid them come and take their fill.

  6 When the bonny blade carouses,
      Pockets full, and spirits high—­
    What are acres? what are houses? 
      Only dirt, or wet, or dry.

  7 Should the guardian friend or mother
      Tell the woes of wilful waste: 
    Scorn their counsel, scorn their pother,
      You can hang or drown at last.