NOTES ON ODES OF THE SEVENTH AND EIGHTH CLASS. NOTES ON ODES OF THE SEVENTH CLASS. ODE XXXIII. Page 1. OTHER fair princesses have slipped,] Brantome furnishes us with many examples of royal frailty. 2. Famous for shooting the long bow;] Cydonio arcu -the Cretan or long bow. See St. Paul's Epistle to Titus, chap. i. v. 12. Xρrtes au olay. The Stuart race of princes were as famous as Teucer for the Cretan bow. XXXV. Page 9. To slow Bootes of the North.] I know there is a classical authority for this epithet. Sive est arctophylax, sive est piger ille Bootes. Ov. Fast. iii. 405. Yet I cannot help fancying the author wrote Sly instead of Slow Bootes: he is represented in his northern situation watching his charge with unremitting vigilance; and I am apt to believe, that our Sly Boots is a contraction of Bootes. I have seen the same thought in a manuscript collection of verses composed by the Professors of a famous University upon the Revolution in 1760. It was beautifully pursued in the verses of the Astronomy Professor, which struck me so that I still retain them. Attendant upon Charles's wane, XXXVII. Page 12. See the MONODY, (page 40 of Vol. xvi.) 13. Here GIBBY's and DUNDAS's twang,] Sir Gilbert Elliot, Judge Advocate of Scotland. ib. SAWNEY, bring up your corps of blacks,] Alexander Wedderburne. 14. ELLIS comes next-thou boar of boars,] The Right Honourable Welbore Ellis. ib. Yet INNIS, 'tis agreed,] Late member of Ilchester. ib. THURLOW approach, with ragged Dick.] Attorney General, and Richard Rigby, Paymaster General. ib. While STANLEY and the Surrey cock!] Colonel Onslow. ib. Then pause awhile my dear Sir GREY,] Sir Grey Cooper, Lord North's secretary. 14. BOREAS, whose bloated blust'ring jowl,] Lord North. Page 17. ODE XXXVIII. While Fame revers'd,] The sagacious reader will easily discover, that the position of Fame alludes to Hudibras's description of that double-mouthed goddess. ODE XXXIX. Page 18. It is probable that Mr. Cumberland's Character of Lord Sackville, published soon after that nobleman's decease, occasioned this Ode to be ascribed to him; but however that might be, it is somewhat singular, Mr. Cumberland, when making so solemn an asseveration in respect to anonymous attacks, as the beginning of his character exhibits, should have forgotten his own virulent and nameless Letter, addressed to BISHOP WATSON. ODE XLIII. Page 35. To this Ode the following ADVERTISEMENT was prefixed : "THIS Ode was written at the time of its date, and a few manuscript copies of it then given to the author's friends, with permission to circulate them among their acquaintance. A mode of publication which he adopted for the present, till an opportunity might offer itself of printing it in some future collection of his poems; in which he hoped (more out of respect to the subject than to himself) that it might be preserved, as long as any thing he has written should merit preservation. But, since an inaccurate copy has lately stolen into a public newspaper, he has thought proper to print a more correct edition of it, in this separate form. For, while the enemies of Mr. Keppel seem to attack his cause with increasing virulence, it is surely right to continue the application of every honest antidote.” Whether what occurred on the trial of Sir Hugh Palliser should have induced Mr. Mason to change his opinion, the public is left to determine. 35. Whom to pale death the spectre bore:] Alluding to the well-known allegory of "Sin and Death,” in the second book of Paradise Lost. XLIV. Page 39. No primrose shower from her green lap she throws.] This expression is taken from Milton's song on May morning, to which this stanza in general alludes, and the 4th verse in the next. 40. Hark, and approve! as did thy sire,] The poem of Caractacus was read in MS. by the late Earl of Chatham, who honoured it with an approbation which the author is here proud to record. ib. Rous'd into sounds of scorn th' indignant string.] See Ode to the naval officers of Great Britain, written 1779. ib. While they alone with envy sigh,] See the motto from Pindar. 42. O knit the union firm, and bid an Empire live.] In allusion to a fine and well-known passage in Milton's Lycidas. ODE XLV. Page 43. This Ode and the following are imitations of Callistratus and Alcaeus; but, being evidently written for a political purpose, are inserted amongst other compositions of the kind. We add also in this place a Latin Ode to Liberty, by the same animated author. JULII MELESIGONI AD LIBERTATEM CARMEN. VIRTUS renascens quem jubet ad sonos Quis fortium coetus in auras Quos, Marti amicos, aut hyacinthinis Plausitque visos? Quis modulabitur Quis myrtea ensem fronde reconditum Vix se refrænat fulmineus chalybs, Perforat ictibus haud remissis; |