Struck to the foul at this dread scene,

All motionless the stood !
To view the raven bird obfcene,
Drink up the clotting blood.
What horrors did her breaft invade,
When as the nearer drew?
The features that the raven fed,
Her lover gave to view.

With fhrieks fhe rent th' affrighted air!

To tears had fond recourse;

With frantic hand now tore her hair,
Now funk upon the corfe.

Then throwing round a troubled glance,
With madness' ray inflam'd:
Beheld some travellers advance,
To whom the thus exclaim'd:

Ye base inhuman train, away!
What urg'd you to this deed?
You've turn'd, my gentle love to clay,
And bad me forrow wed.

Hark, hark! the raven flaps her wings-
She drinks his blood again-

Ah! now the feeds on my heart-ftrings-
Oh Jefu! foothe my pain."

This scene of woe what cou'd create,
The travellers admir'd;

While fhrinking at the blow of fate,

She with a groan expir'd.'

This ftory is not lefs affecting than that of Pyramus and Thisbe in Ovid's Metamorphofes, and is told with elegant fimplicity. Our readers will not be displeased with another little piece, entitled

The ROOKERY.

Oh thou who dwell'ft upon the bough,
Whofe tree does wave its verdant brow;
And fpreading fhades the diftant brook,
Accept thefe lines, dear fifter Rook!
And when thou'ft read my mournful lay,
Extend thy wing and fly away,
Left pinion-maim'd by fiery fhot,
Thou should't like me bewail thy lot;

Left

Left in thy rook'ry be renew'd,

The tragic scene which here I view'd.
• The day declin'd, the evening breeze
Gently rock'd the filent trees,

While spreading o'er my peopled nest,
I hush'd my callow young to rest;
When fuddenly an hoftile found,
Explofion dire! was heard around:
And level'd by the hand of fate,
The angry bullets pierc'd my mate;
1 faw him fall from fpray to fpray,
Till on the diftant ground he lay :
With tortur'd wing he beat the plain,
And never caw'd to me again.
Many a neighbour, many a friend,
Deform'd with wounds, invok'd their end I
All screaming, omen'd notes of woe,
'Gainft man our unrelenting foe:
These eyes beheld my pretty brood,
Flutt'ring in their guiltlefs blood:
While trembling on the fhatter'd tree,
At length the gun invaded me;'
But wayward fate feverely kind, !
Refus'd the death, I wish'd to find:
Oh! farewell pleasure, peace, farewell,
And with the gory raven dwell.
Was it for this I fhun'd retreat,
And fix'd near man my focial feat ?
For this deftroy'd the infect train,
That eat unfeen the infant grain !
For this with many an honeft note,
Iffuing from my artless throat;
I chear'd my Lady, liftning near,
Working in her elbow chair?'

It is impoffible to read these concluding lines in which is defcribed the attitude of my Lady, without a smile of approbation.

17. An Ode to Genius. By J. Jennings, Mafter of St. Saviour's Free Grammar School, in Southwark. Fol. Pr. 6d. Cabe.

The province of genius is like a fpacious garden.-Where Mr. Jennings might have gathered many beautiful flowers, he contents himself with felecting two or three daifies. The whole performance is included in four pages.

18. An Effay on Friendship, a Poem. 410. Pr. 1s. Cooke. This Effay contains many falutary precepts concerning friendhip, but nothing uncommon. By the following lines our readers will perceive, that the author's poetical abilities are hot contemptible.

True friendship grows not with the luft of gain,
Nor will fhe fort with pleasure's fenfual train ;
A confcious indigence can never prove
The vig'rous fource of fuch exalted love;
Nor can like manners raife the gen'sous fire
In vicious minds; for vice can ne'er infpire
The facred flame: The flave of vice, forlorn,
E'en on a brother looks with fecret fcorn.
Hail, Virtue, then! 'tis thy intrinfic worth
That can alone give genuine friendship birth:
Yet pleasure, profit, and convenience join

To aid its growth, and make it brighter fhine.?

19. Elegies. By Thomas Ruffel, M. D. 4to. Pr. 1s. 6d. Cadell.

It is difficult to afcertain the true character of thefe Elegies. The author does not appear to want a genius for plaintive poetry. We might produce feveral paffages in which there is agreeable imagery, and an air of folemnity in the flowing of his lines; yet, on the other hand, in many inftances his nunbers are profaic, and his fentiments uncouth. Speaking of a Thipwreck, he fays,

The echoing skies the drowning fallors rend,

In fearful fbrieks, with dying groans combin'd;
Some, muttering their pray'rs, th' abyfs defcend,
Leaving above their fleeting ghofts behind.'

Thefe Elegies are four in number, viz. The Storm, Strephon, a Love-Elegy, and one on the death of Dr. Young.

20. State Neceffity not confidered as a Question of Law. 4to. Pri Is. Kearfly.

The feeming abfurdity of this title is compenfated by the good intention of the fubject. The author thinks very properly, that in the game of chefs, the pawns (which by the bye ought to be spelt Pions, and in the Eastern language fignifies common men) are the ftrength of the state,

Without whofe aid, king, queen, and all,
Unguarded ftand, and foon muft fall.

VoL, XXIII. March, 1767.

The

The author has fummed up his doctrine in the following lines, which are far from being deftitute of good fenfe and poetical merit.

It matters not one single pin,

Who's in or out-who lofe or win:
What hand, of state, affumes the rule ;
Who acts the knave, or plays the fool:
Borne down, by this enormous weight,
Rufhes the ftructure of the state,
And till we pay this mighty score,
Reform, grow wife, contract no more;
Trust me, the nation drags a chain,
Of which the people may complain.
For howfoe'er the game is play'd,
What minifters, or peers are made;
The publick treafure, how expended;
The state patch'd up, or wholly mended:
A million voted ev'ry year;

Exchequer fums however clear :

By whomfoe'er thefe fweets are tasted;
The people are codill'd and basted.

21. The Buck. A Poem. 4to. Pr. Is. Smith.

This is a very decent moral poem, and executed with a confiderable degree of genius. The moral the author inculcates is what we may properly call Anti-Buckism, and we are pleafed to have an opportunity of recommending to the younger part of our readers the following picture, which is but too faithfully drawn from the life.

Languifhing o'er his morning tea,.

This victim of intemperance fee;

Who fcarce with trembling hand can fill
The draught, to wash down last night's pill.
His blood no more its courfe maintains,

Through the nice filaments of veins;

The way where acrid falts impede, ..

Forcing the current to recede;
Which ftagnating upon the heart,
Mocks all the vigilance of art.

But let the mufe, with friendly veil,

His dreadful clofe of life conceal!

22. Some Obfervations on the Caufes of the Dearness of Provifions in general; and Corn in particular. 8vo. Pr. is. Bladon. This author fays, It is generally allowed by farmers that mipot at four fhillings the bufhel on an average is dear enough

for

for them, and I think, with fome other people, except in years of fcarcity, it is in the power of the legiflature to keep the price of the best of that grain between three and five fhillings the bufhel, if a general and standing law was made that no bounty fhould be given when the price of good merchantable wheat exceeded four fhillings a bufhel, and all exportation (except to our own ports and colonies) prohibited on a fevere penalty, when the price of fuch wheat exceeds five fhillings a bufhel Winchester measure.

And here I would premife the enforcement of a law that no other measure than that fhould be used in the kingdom, the prefent inequality being productive of a great many dif putes and quarrels, and fome law-fuits; this is the ancient ftanding measure of the country, and the ufe of it was intended to be general, and no doubt but it would be better if it was fo, for all forts of pulfe and grain except wheat; which I think in all reafon ought to be fold by weight every where, as the custom is now in fome places; what that weight should be must be determined by better judges than myself, but as the cuftomary weight of four bushels of meal at London is two hundred and a quarter, I should suppose somewhat thereabout might ferve for wheat all over the kingdom: perhaps the Effex millers may object to this weight; as their cuftom in fomet part of that country is fourteen pounds in a fack more, and I fuppofe the farmers who have not been used to the custom of felling by weight, will object to weighing at all, and be defirous to continue the custom of felling that grain by measure ftill, but there are many obvious reasons why it fhould not be fo,'

As we do not profess ourselves judges of this fubject, we can only submit the fentiments of every author who writes upon it to the public. Those of the pamphlet before us are among the most rational and practicable of any we have feen.

23. Important Confiderations upon the Act of the thirty first of George II. relative to the Affize of Bread. 8vo. Pr. If Woodfall.

This writer thinks that Mr. Alderman Dickenson, who ob tained the act of the 31ft of George II. chap. 2d, 29, being mifled by fome interested cornfactors, mealmen, and bakers, upon pretence of improving the quality and reducing the price of bread in favour of the poor, undertook, and prevailed on parliament, to pafs an act, repealing the former: by which, new act, the three different fpecies of aflized bread, were reduced to two only, viz. Wheaten and Houfhold; and new prices and new tables of affize, regulating the faid prices in

troduced