in 1779 died unmarried. The character which her lover bequeathed her was, indeed, not likely to attract courtship. The Elegies were published after his death; and while the writer's name was remembered with fondness, they were read with a refolution to admire them. The recommendatory preface of the editor, who was then believed, and is now affirmed by Dr. Maty, to be the earl of Chesterfield, raised ftrong prejudice in their favour. But of the prefacer, whoever he was, it may be reasonably suspected that he never read the poems; for he profeffes to value them for a very high species of excellence, and recommends them as the genuine effufions of the mind, which expreffes a real paffion in the language of nature. But the truth is, thefe elegies have neither paffion, nature, nor manners. Where there is fiction, there is no paffion; he that defcribes himself as a fhepherd, and his Neæra or Delia as a fhepherdess, and talks of goats and lambs, feels no paffion. He that courts his mistress with Roman imagery deferves to lofe her; for fhe may with good reafon fufpect his fincerity. Hammond has few fentiments drawn from nature, and few images from modern life. He produces nothing but frigid pedantry. It would be hard to find in all his productions three ftanzas that deferve to be remembered. Like other lovers, he threatens the lady with dying; and what then shall follow? Wilt thou in tears thy lover's corfe attend; Το To foothe the hovering foul be thine the care, And cull my afhes with thy trembling hand: Panchaia's odours be their coftly feast, And all the pride of Afia's fragrant year, Give them the treasures of the fartheft Eaft, And, what is ftill more precious, give thy tear. Surely no blame can fall upon a nymph who rejected a fwain of fo little meaning. His verfes are not rugged, but they have no sweetness; they never glide in a ftream of melody. Why Hammond or other writers have thought the quatrian of ten fyllables elegiac, it is difficult to tell. The character of the Elegy is gentleness and tenuity; but this ftanza has been pronounced by Dryden, whofe knowledge of English metre was not inconfiderable, to be the most magnificent of all the measures which our language affords. OF SOMERVILE. F Mr. SOMER VILE's life I am not able to fay any thing that can fatisfy curiofity. He was a gentleman whofe eftate was in Warwickshire; his houfe, where he was born in 1692, is called Edfton, a feat inherited from a long line of ancestors; for he was faid to be of the firft family in his county. He tells of himself, that he was born near the Avon's banks. He was bred at Winchefter-school, and was elected fellow of New College. It does not appear that in the places of his education, he exhibited any uncommon proofs of genius or literature. His powers were first displayed in the country, where he was diftinguished as a poet, a gentleman, and a skilful and ufeful justice of the peace. Of the clofe of his life, thofe whom his poems have delighted will read with pain the following account, copied from the letters of his friend Shenftone, by whom he was too much refembled. "Our old friend Somervile is dead! I did "not imagine I could have been fo forry as I find "myfelf on this occafion.-Sublatum quærimus. I can now excufe all his foibles; impute them to age, and to diftrefs of circumftances: the laft of "thefe confiderations wrings my very foul to "think on. For a man of high fpirit, confcious "of having (at least in one production) generally "pleafed the world, to be plagued and threatened "by wretches that are low in every fenfe; to be "forced to drink himself into pains of the body, in "order to get rid of the pains of the mind, is a mifery." He died July 19, 1742, and was buried at Wotton, near Henley on Arden. His diftreffes need not be much pitied; his eftáte is faid to be fifteen hundred a-year, which by his death has devolved to lord Somervile of Scotland. His mother indeed, who lived till ninety, had a jointure of fix hundred. It is with regret that I find myself not better enabled to exhibit memorials of a writer, who at leaft must be allowed to have fet a good example to men of his own clafs, by devoting part of his time to elegant knowledge; and who has fhewn, by the fubjects which his poetry has adorned, that it is practicable to be at once a fkilful fportfman and a man of letters. Somervile has tried many modes of poetry; and though perhaps he has not in any reached fuch excellence as to raife much envy, it may commonly be faid at least, that "he writes very well for a "gentleman." His ferious pieces are fometimes elevated, and his trifles are fometimes elegant. In his verfes to Addifon, the couplet which mentions Clio is written with the moft exquifite delicacy of praife; it exhibits one of thofe happy ftrokes that are feldom attained. In his Odes to Marlborough there are beautiful lines; but in the second Ode he fhews that he knew little of his hero, when he talks of his private virtues. His fubjects are commonly fuch as require no great depth of thought or energy of expreffion. His fables are generally ftale, and therefore excite no curiofity. Of his favourite, The Two Springs, the fiction is unnatural, and the moral inconfequential. In his Tales there is too much coarfenefs, with too little care of language, and not fufficient rapidity of narration. His great work is his Chace, which he undertook in his maturer age, when his ear was improved to the approbation of blank verfe, of which however his two first lines give a bad fpecimen. To this poem praise cannot be totally denied. He is allowed by sportsmen to write with great intelligenceof his fubject, which is the first requifite to excel lence lence; and though it is impoffible to intereft the common readers of verfe in the dangers or pleasures of the chace, he has done all that tranfition and variety could easily effect; and has with great propriety enlarged his plan by the modes of hunting used in other countries. With ftill lefs judgment did he choose blank verse as the vehicle of Rural Sports. If blank verse be not tumid and gorgeous, it is crippled profe; and familiar images in laboured language have nothing to recommend them but abfurd novelty, which, wanting the attractions of Nature, cannot please long. One excellence of the Splendid Shilling is, that it is fhort. Difguife can gratify no longer than it deceives. SAVAGE. IT has been obferved in all ages, that the advantages of nature or of fortune have contributed very little to the promotion of happinefs; and that thofe whom the splendour of their rank, or the extent of their capacity, have placed upon the fummit of human life, have not often given any juft occafion to envy in those who look up to them from a lower ftation; whether it be that apparent fuperiority incites great designs, and great defigns are naturally |