ODE FOR MUSIC.

(IRREGULAR.)

This Ode was performed in the Senate-House at Cambridge, July 1, 1769, at the installation of His Grace Augustus Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Grafton, Chancellor of the University. (This Ode is printed with the divisions adopted by the Composer, Dr. Randall, then Professor of Music at Cambridge. On Dr. Burney's disappointment that he did not set this Øde to music, see Miss Burney's Mem. i. 212; and Cradock's Mem. i. p. 107.)

1. AIR.

"HENCE, avaunt, ('tis holy ground)
Comus, and his midnight-crew,
And Ignorance with looks profound,
And dreaming Sloth of pallid hue,
Mad Sedition's cry profane,

Servitude that hugs her chain,

Nor in these consecrated bowers

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Let painted Flatt'ry hide her serpent-train in flowers.

CHORUS.

Nor Envy base, nor creeping Gain,

V. 1. So Callim. H. in Apoll. ver. 2: 'Ekùç έkùÇ ŐOTIÇ ÚÑITρòç. Virg. Æn. vi. 258: “Procul, O procul este profani." Stat. Sylv. iii. 3: "Procul hinc, procul ite nocentes." Claud. Rap. Pros. i. 3: "Gressus removete profani.”

V. 2.

"Meanwhile welcome joy, and feast,
Midnight shout, and revelry,

Tipsy dance, and jollity." Milt. Com. 102. W. "Though he and his cursed crew.' Milt. Com. 653.

V. 7. "Near to her close and consecrated bower.”

Mids. N. Dr. act iii. sc. 2. W.

V. 9. “Base Envy withers at another's joy." Thomson. Spring. Also," Safe pursuits and creeping cares.” p. iv. Luke.

Liberty,

Dare the Muse's walk to stain,

While bright-eyed Science watches round:
Hence, away, 'tis holy ground!”

II. RECITATIVE.

From yonder realms of empyrean day

Bursts on my ear th' indignant lay: There sit the sainted sage, the bard divine, The few, whom genius gave to shine

Thro' every unborn age, and undiscover'd clime. Rapt in celestial transport they:

Yet hither oft a glance from high

They send of tender sympathy

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V. 13. "From your empyreal bowers, and from the realms of everlasting day." G. West's Poems.

V. 15. There sit] Surely a better word than this, "sit,” in pronunciation and imagery could have been found.

V. 17. “ Nations unborn your mighty name shall sound, And worlds applaud that must not yet be found." Pope. Essay on Criticism, 193.

وو

W.

V. 26. “E'en mitred Rochester would nod the head.' Pope. Prol. to the Sat. 143. W. See Warton. Milt. p. 4. V. 27. “To arched walks of twilight groves, And shadows brown that Sylvan loves."

Il Penser. 133. W. And so Pope, in his Transl. of the Odyssey: "Brown with o'erarching shades."

This stanza, supposed to be sung by Milton, is very judiciously written in the metre which he fixed upon for the stanza of his Christmas Hymn: "Twas in the winter wild," &c. Mason.

Nought have we here but willow-shaded shore,
To tell our Grant his banks are left forlore."
Hall. Sat. b. i. sat. i.

V 30. Wakefield has justly remarked that this stanza is indebted to the following passage in the Il Pens. of Milton, ver. 61:

To bless the place, where on their opening soul First the genuine ardour stole.

'Twas Milton struck the deep-ton'd shell,
And, as the choral warblings round him swell,
Meek Newton's self bends from his state sublime,
And nods his hoary head, and listens to the rhyme.

III. AIR.

"Ye brown o'er-arching groves,
That Contemplation loves,

Where willowy Camus lingers with delight!

Oft at the blush of dawn

I trod your level lawn,

Oft woo'd the gleam of Cynthia silver-bright

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“Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly,
Most musical, most melancholy!*

V. 31. "In long excursion skims the level lawn.'

Thomson. Spring. Luke.

V. 32. With silver-bright who moon enamels.”

* Gaw. Douglas, in his Transl. of Virgil, Prolog, to bk. xiii. p. 450, describes the notes of the nightingale as merry:

"The mery nyghtyngele Philomene,

That on the thorne sat syngand fro the splene,
Quhais myrthfull nottis langing for to here," &c.

"Ah! far unlike the nightingale !

she sings

Unceasing thro' the balmy nights of May;

She sings from love and joy." Thomson. Agamem. p. 63.

"Him will I cheare with chanting all this night,

And with that word she 'gan to clear her throate:

But such a lively song, now by this light,

Yet never hearde I such another note.”

Gascoigne. Complaynt of Phylomene.

Mr. Fox has, I think, given no authority but that of Chaucer, for the merry notes of the nightingale; see his Letter to Lord Grey, p. 12. But see Todd. Illust. of Gower.

In cloisters dim, far from the haunts of Folly, With Freedom by my side, and soft-eyed Melancholy."

IV. RECITATIVE.

But hark! the portals sound, and pacing forth s5
With solemn steps and slow,

High potentates, and dames of royal birth,
And mitred fathers in long order go:
Great Edward, with the lilies on his brow
From haughty Gallia torn,

And sad Chatillon, on her bridal morn

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Drummond, son. xii. Luke. "Their arrow that marched hence so silver-bright." K. John. Rogers.

V. 33. Scared in cloisters dim the superstitious herd.”

Thomson. Liberty, pt. iii. Luke.

V. 34. "And sensible soft Melancholy," Pope. On a certain Lady at Court, ver. 8. W. V. Pope. Prol. to Satires, v. 286. Luke.

V. 36. “With wand'ring steps and slow," Par. Lost, b. xii. ver. 648. W. And Pope. Odys. b. x. ver. 286. Dunc. b. iv. ver. 465, as quoted by Mr. Todd. "At every step solemn and slow," Thomson. Summer. Luke.

V. 38. "In long order stand," Dryd. Æn. iii. 533. long order come, v. 133. Rogers,

"Unde omnes longo ordine possit

Adversos legere, et venientum discere vultus.'

"In

Virg. Æn. vi. 754. W.

V. 39. Edward the Third, who added the fleur de lys of France to the arms of England. He founded Trinity College. See Philips, in "Cyder," ii. 592;

"Great Edward thus array'd,

With golden Iris his broad shield emboss'd.”

"Great Edward and thy greater son,

He that the lilies wore, and he that won." Denham.

V. 41. Mary de Valentia, countess of Pembroke, daughter of Guy de Chatillon, comte de St. Paul in France; of whom tradition says, that her husband Audemar de Valentia, earl

That wept her bleeding Love, and princely Clare,
And Anjou's heroine, and the paler rose,
The rival of her crown and of her woes,

And either Henry there,

The murder'd saint, and the majestic lord,
That broke the bonds of Rome.
(Their tears, their little triumphs o'er,
Their human passions now no more,
Save Charity, that glows beyond the tomb.)

ACCOMPANIED.

All that on Granta's fruitful plain
Rich streams of regal bounty pour'd,

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of Pembroke, was slain at a tournament on the day of his nuptials. She was the foundress of Pembroke College or Hall, under the name of Aula Mariæ de Valentia. Gray. But consult a letter to Tyson from Gough in Nicholl. Lit. Anec. viii. 604. Luke. Fotheringay Castle was her property.

V. 42. Elizabeth de Burg, countess of Clare, was wife of John de Burg, son and heir of the Earl of Ulster, and daughter of Gilbert de Clare, earl of Gloucester, by Joan of Acres, daughter of Edward the First. Hence the poet gives her the epithet of princely. She founded Clare Hall. Gray.

V. 43. Margaret of Anjou, wife of Henry the Sixth, foundress of Queen's College. The poet has celebrated her conjugal fidelity in "The Bard," epode 2d, line 13th.

Elizabeth Widville, wife of Edward the Fourth, hence called the paler rose, as being of the house of York. She added to the foundation of Margaret of Anjou.

Gray.

V. 45. Henry the Sixth and Eighth. The former the founder of King's, the latter the greatest benefactor to Trinity College. Gray.

V. 49. “One human tear shall drop, and be forgiven."
Pope. Eloisa, 358. W.

V. 50. "Charity never faileth," St. Paul, 1 Corinth. xiii, 8. W.