What though the thunder from a cloud,
Or that from female tongue more loud,
Alarm not At the DRAPIER's ear,
Chink but Wood's halfpence, and he'll hear.

HORACE, BOOK I. ODE XIV.

PARAPHRASED AND INSCRIBED TO IRELAND. 1726.

THE INSCRIPTION.

POOR floating isle, tost on ill fortune's waves,
Ordain'd by fate to be the land of slaves;
Shall moving Delos now deep-rooted stand;
Thou fix'd of old, be now the moving land!
Although the metaphor be worn and stale,
Betwixt a state, and vessel under sail;
Let me suppose thee for a ship a while,
And thus address thee in the sailor's style.

UNHAPPY ship, thou art return'd in vain ; *
New waves shall drive thee to the deep again.
Look to thyself, and be no more the sport
Of giddy winds, but make some friendly port.t
Lost are thy oars, that used thy course to guide,
Like faithful counsellors, on either side.‡
Thy mast, which like some aged patriot stood,§
The single pillar for his country's good,

To lead thee, as a staff directs the blind,
Behold it cracks by yon rough eastern wind;
Your cables burst, and you must quickly feel*
The waves impetuous enter at your keel;
Thus commonwealths receive a foreign yoke,
When the strong cords of union once are broke.
Torn by a sudden tempest is thy sail,t
Expanded to invite a milder gale.

As when some writer in a public cause
His pen, to save a sinking nation, draws,
While all is calm, his arguments prevail;
The people's voice expands his paper sail;
Till power, discharging all her stormy bags,
Flutters the feeble pamphlet into rags,
The nation scared, the author doom'd to death.
Who fondly put his trust in popular breath.
A larger sacrifice in vain you vow;
There's not a power above will help you now
A nation thus, who oft Heaven's call neglects,
In vain from injured Heaven relief expects.
'Twill not avail, when thy strong sides are
broke, S

That thy descent is from the British oak;
Or, when your name and family you boast,
From fleets triumphant o'er the Gallic coast.
Such was Ierne's claim, as just as thine,
Her sons descended from the British line;
Her matchless sons, whose valour still remains
On French records for twenty long campaigns;

† Non tibi sunt integra lintea.

Non Dii, quos iterum pressa voces malo.

S Quamvis Pontica pinus,

Sylvæ filia nobilis

Yet, from an empress now a captive grown,
She saved Britannia's rights, and lost her own.
In ships decay'd no mariner confides,*
Lured by the gilded stern and painted sides:
Yet at a ball unthinking fools delight
In the gay trappings of a birth-day night:
They on the gold brocades and satins raved,
And quite forgot their country was enslaved.
Dear vessel, still be to thy steerage just,†
Nor change thy course with every sudden gust;
Like supple patriots of the modern sort,
Who turn with every gale that blows from court.
Weary and sea-sick, when in thee confined,+
Now for thy safety cares distract my mind;
As those who long have stood the storms of state
Retire, yet still bemoan their country's fate.
Beware, and when you hear the surges roar,
Avoid the rocks on Britain's angry shore.
The lie, alas! too easy to be found;
For thee alone they lie the island round.

* Nil pictis timidus navita puppibus

Fidit.

+ Tu nisi ventis

Debes ludibrium, cave.

Nuper sollicitum quæ mihi tædium,
Nunc desiderium, curaque non levis,
Interfusa nitentes

Vites æquora Cycladas.

VERSES

ON THE SUDDEN DRYING UP OF

ST. PATRICK'S WELL,

NEAR TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN. 1726.

By holy zeal inspired, and led by fame,
To thee, once favourite isle, with joy I came ;
What time the Goth, the Vandal, and the Hun,
Had my own native Italy * o'errun.
Ierne, to the world's remotest parts,
Renowned for valour, policy, and arts,

Hither from Colchos,† with the fleecy ore,
Jason arrived two thousand years before.
Thee, happy island, Pallas called her own,
When haughty Britain was a land unknown:‡

* Italy was not properly the native place of St. Patrick, but the place of his education, and whence he received his mission; and because he had his new birth there, by poetical licence, and by scripture figure, our author calls that country his native Italy.— Dub. Ed.

+ Orpheus, or the ancient author of the Greek poem on the Argonautic expedition, whoever he be, says, that Jason, who manned the ship Argos at Thessaly, sailed to Ireland. And Adrianus Junius says the same thing, in these lines :

Illa ego sum Graiis, olim glacialis Ierne

:

Dicta, et Jasonia puppis bene cognita nautis.—Dub. Ed.

Tacitus, in the Life of Julius Agricola, says, that the harbours of Ireland, on account of their commerce, were better known to the world than those of Britain.

From thee, with pride, the Caledonians trace *
The glorious founder of their kingly race:
Thy martial sons, whom now they dare despise,
Did once their land subdue and civilize;

Their dress, their language, and the Scottish name,
Confess the soil from whence the victors came.
Well may they boast that ancient blood which runs
Within their veins, who are thy younger sons.
A conquest and a colony from thee,

The mother-kingdom left her children free;
From thee no mark of slavery they felt:
Not so with thee thy base invaders dealt;
Invited here to vengeful Morrough's aid,t
Those whom they could not conquer they betray'd.
Britain, by thee we fell, ungrateful isle!
Not by thy valour, but superior guile :

Britain, with shame, confess this land of mine
First taught thee human knowledge and divine;
My prelates and my students, sent from hence,
Made your sons converts both to God and sense:
Not like the pastors of thy ravenous breed,
Who come to fleece the flocks, and not to feed.
Wretched Ierne! with what grief I see
The fatal changes time has made in thee!
The Christian rites I introduced in vain :
Lo! infidelity return'd again!

Freedom and virtue in thy sons I found,
Who now in vice and slavery are drown'd.

By faith and prayer, this crosier in my hand,
I drove the venom'd serpent from thy land:

*Fordun, in his Scoti-Chronicon, Hector Boethius, Buchanan, and all the Scottish historians, agree that Fergus, son of Ferquard, King of Ireland, was the first King of Scotland, which country he subdued.

+ In the reign of Henry II. Dermot M'Morrough, king of Leinster, being deprived of his kingdom by Roderick O'Connor, king of Connaught, he invited the English over as auxiliaries.