Savage resided for some time at Richmond.  It was the favorite haunt of Collins, one of the most poetical of poets, who, as Dr. Johnson says, “delighted to rove through the meanders of enchantment, to gaze on the magnificence of golden palaces, to repose by the waterfalls of Elysian gardens.”  Wordsworth composed a poem upon the Thames near Richmond in remembrance of Collins.  Here is a stanza of it.

    Glide gently, thus for ever glide,
    O Thames, that other bards may see
    As lovely visions by thy side
    As now fair river! come to me;
    O glide, fair stream for ever so,
    Thy quiet soul on all bestowing,
    Till all our minds for ever flow
    As thy deep waters now are flowing.

Thomson’s description of the scenery of Richmond Hill perhaps hardly does it justice, but the lines are too interesting to be omitted.

            Say, shall we wind
    Along the streams? or walk the smiling mead? 
    Or court the forest-glades? or wander wild
    Among the waving harvests? or ascend,
    While radiant Summer opens all its pride,
    Thy hill, delightful Shene[026]?  Here let us sweep
    The boundless landscape now the raptur’d eye,
    Exulting swift, to huge Augusta send,
    Now to the sister hills[027] that skirt her plain,
    To lofty Harrow now, and now to where
    Majestic Windsor lifts his princely brow
    In lovely contrast to this glorious view
    Calmly magnificent, then will we turn
    To where the silver Thames first rural grows
    There let the feasted eye unwearied stray,
    Luxurious, there, rove through the pendent woods
    That nodding hang o’er Harrington’s retreat,
    And stooping thence to Ham’s embowering walks,
    Beneath whose shades, in spotless peace retir’d,
    With her the pleasing partner of his heart,
    The worthy Queensbury yet laments his Gay,
    And polish’d Cornbury woos the willing Muse
    Slow let us trace the matchless vale of Thames
    Fair winding up to where the Muses haunt
    In Twit nam’s bowers, and for their Pope implore
    The healing god[028], to loyal Hampton’s pile,
    To Clermont’s terrass’d height, and Esher’s groves;
    Where in the sweetest solitude, embrac’d
    By the soft windings of the silent Mole,
    From courts and senates Pelham finds repose
    Enchanting vale! beyond whate’er the Muse
    Has of Achaia or Hesperia sung! 
    O vale of bliss!  O softly swelling hills! 
    On which the Power of Cultivation lies,
    And joys to see the wonders of his toil.

The Revd.  Thomas Maurice wrote a poem entitled Richmond Hill, but it contains nothing deserving of quotation after the above passage from Thomson.  In the English Bards and Scotch Reviewers the labors of Maurice are compared to those of Sisyphus

    So up thy hill, ambrosial Richmond, heaves
    Dull Maurice, all his granite weight of leaves.