HE hint of the following piece was taken from Chaucer's House of Fame. The defign is in a manner entirely altered, the defcriptions and moft of the particular thoughts my own: yet I could not fuffer it to be printed without this acknowledgment. The reader who would compare this with Chaucer, may begin with his third book of Fame, there being nothing in the two first books that answers to their title: wherever any hint is taken from him, the paffage, itself is fet down in the marginal notes.
N that foft season when defcending fhow'rs
Call forth the greens, and wake the rifing flow'rs; When opening buds falute the welcome day,
And earth relenting feels the genial ray;
As balmy fleep had charm'd my cares to reft,
And love itself was banish'd from my breast,
(What time the morn myfterious vifions brings,
While purer flumbers fpread their golden wings)
A train of phantoms in wild order rofe,
And, join'd, this intellectual fcene compose.
I * ftood, methought, betwixt earth, feas and skies
The whole creation open to my eyes:
In air felf-balanc'd hung the globe below,
Where mountains rife, and circling oceans flow;
Here naked rocks, and empty waftes were seen,
There tow'ry cities, and the forefts green :
Thefe verfes are hinted from the following of Chaucer, Book 2.
Tho beheld I fields and plains,
Now hills, and now mountains,
Now valeis, and now foreftes,
And now unneth great beftes,
Now rivers, now citees,
Now towns, now great trees,
Now hippes fayling in the fee,
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Here failing fhips delight the wand'ring eyes:
-There trees, and intermingl'd temples rife;
Now a clear fun the fhining fcene difplays,
The tranfient landscape now in clouds decays.
O'er the wide profpect as I gaz'd around,
Sudden I heard a wild promifcuous found,
Like broken thunders that at distance roar,
Or billows murm'ring on the hollow fhore:
Then gazing up, a glorious pile beheld,
Whose tow'ring fummit ambient clouds conceal'd.
High on a rock of ice the ftructure lay,
Steep its afcent, and flipp'ry was the way;
The wond'rous rock like Parian marble fhone,
And feem'd, to distant fight, of solid stone.
Infcriptions here of various names I view'd, †
The greater part by hoftile time subdu'd ;
Yet wide was spread their fame in ages paft,
And poets once had promis'd they fhould laft. Some fresh engrav'd appear'd of wits renown'd; look'd again, nor could their trace be found.
Critics I faw, that other names deface,
And fix their own, with labour, in their place:
Their own, like others, foon their place refign'd,
Or disappear'd, and left the firft behind.
Nor was the work impair'd by ftorms alone,
But felt th' approaches of too warm a sun
For fame, impatient of extremes, decays
Not more by envy than excess of praise.
Yet part no injuries + of heav'n could feel,
Like cryftal faithful to the graving steel:
The rock's high fummit, in the temple's fhade,
Nor heat could melt, nor beating storm invade.
There names infcrib'd' unnumber'd ages paft
From time's first birth, with time itself fhall laft;
These ever new, nor fubject to decays,
Spread, and grow brighter with the length of days.
So Zembla's rocks (the beauteous work of froft)
Rife white in air, and glitter o'er the coaft;
Pale funs, unfelt, at diftance roll away,
Add on th' impaffive ice the lightnings play;
Eternal fnows the growing mass supply,
'Till the bright mountains prop th’incumbent sky :
As Atlas fix'd, each hoary pile appears,
The gather'd winter of a thousand years.
* Nor was the work impair'd, &c.
gan I in myne harte cast,
That they were molte away for heate,
And not away with ftormes beate.
Yet part no injuries, &c.
For on that other fide I fey
Of that hill which northward ley,
How it was written full of names
Of folke, that had afore great fames,
Of old time, and yet they were
As fresh, as men had written hem there
The folf day, or that houre
That I on hem gan to poure:
But well I wiste what it made;
It was conferved with the fhade
(All the writing that I fye)
Of the caftle that stoode on high;
And stood eke in fo cold a place,
That heate might it not deface.
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