And bellow in the Circus) yet will start,
And shake them at the name of liberty,
Stung by a senseless word, a vain tradition,
As there were magic in it? Wrinkled beldams
Teach it their grandchildren, as somewhat rare
That anciently appear'd, but when, extends
Beyond their chronicle-oh! 'tis a cause
To arm the hand of childhood, and rebrace
The slacken'd sinews of time-wearied age.

Yes, we may meet, ungrateful boy, we may ! Again the buried Genius of old Rome

Shall from the dust uprear his reverend head, Roused by the shout of millions: there before His high tribunal thou and I appear.

Let majesty sit on thy awful brow,

And lighten from thy eye: around thee call The gilded swarm that wantons in the sunshine Of thy full favour; Seneca be there

In gorgeous phrase of labour'd eloquence

To dress thy plea, and Burrhus strengthen it
With his plain soldier's oath and honest seeming.
Against thee, liberty and Agrippina :

The world, the prize; and fair befall the victors.
But soft! why do I waste the fruitless hours
In threats unexecuted? Haste thee, fly
These hated walls that seem to mock my shame,
And cast me forth in duty to their lord.

ACER. 'Tis time to go, the sun is high advanced, And, ere mid-day, Nero will come to Baiæ.

AGRIP. My thought aches at him; not the basilisk More deadly to the sight, than is to me The cool injurious eye of frozen kindness. I will not meet its poison. Let him feel Before he sees me.

ACER. Why then stays my sovereign, Where he so soon may

AGRIP. Yes, I will be gone,

But not to Antium-all shall be confess'd,
Whate'er the frivolous tongue of giddy fame

Has spread among the crowd; things, that but whis per'd

Have arch'd the hearer's brow, and riveted

His eyes in fearful ecstasy: no matter
What; so't be strange, and dreadful.-Sorceries,
Assassinations, poisonings-the deeper
My guilt, the blacker his ingratitude.

And you, ye manes of ambition's victims,
Enshrined Claudius, with the pitied ghosts

Of the Syllani, doom'd to early death,

(Ye unavailing horrors, fruitless crimes!)

If from the realms of night my voice ye hear,
In lieu of penitence, and vain remorse,
Accept my vengeance. Though by me ye bled,
He was the cause. My love, my fears for him,

Dried the soft springs of pity in my heart,
And froze them up with deadly cruelty.

Yet if your injured shades demand my fate,
If murder cries for murder, blood for blood,
Let me not fall alone; but crush his pride,
And sink the traitor in his mother's ruin.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II. OTHO, POPPEA.

OTHо. Thus far we're safe. Thanks to the rosy

queen

Of amorous thefts: and had her wanton son

Lent us his wings, we could not have beguiled
With more elusive speed the dazzled sight
Of wakeful jealousy. Be gay securely;
Dispel, my fair, with smiles, the timorous cloud
That hangs on thy clear brow. So Helen look'd,
So her white neck reclined, so was she borne
By the young Trojan to his gilded bark
With fond reluctance, yielding modesty,
And oft reverted eye, as if she knew not
Whether she fear'd or wish'd, to be pursued

HYMN TO IGNORANCE.

A FRAGMENT.

HAIL, horrors, hail! ye ever gloomy bowers,
Ye gothic fanes, and antiquated towers,
Where rushy Camus' slowly-winding flood
Perpetual draws his humid train of mud:
Glad I revisit thy neglected reign,

Oh take me to thy peaceful shade again.
But chiefly thee, whose influence breathed from high
Augments the native darkness of the sky;

Ah, Ignorance! soft salutary power!
Prostrate with filial reverence I adore.
Thrice hath Hyperion roll'd his annual race,
Since weeping I forsook thy fond embrace.
Oh say, successful dost thou still oppose
Thy leaden ægis 'gainst our ancient foes?
Still stretch, tenacious of thy right divine,
The massy sceptre o'er thy slumbering line?
And dews Lethean through the land dispense
To steep in slumbers each benighted sense ?

If any spark of wit's delusive ray
Break out, and flash a momentary day,
With damp, cold touch forbid it to aspire,
And huddle up in fogs the dangerous fire.

Oh say she hears me not, but, careless grown, Lethargic nods upon her ebon throne. Goddess! awake, arise! alas, my fears! Can powers immortal feel the force of years? Not thus of old, with ensigns wide unfurl'd, She rode triumphant o'er the vanquish'd world; Fierce nations own'd her unresisted might, And all was ignorance, and all was night.

Oh sacred age! Oh times for ever lost!

(The schoolman's glory and the churchman's boast.)
For ever gone-yet still to fancy new,
Her rapid wings the transient scene pursue,
And bring the buried ages back to view.

High on her car, behold the grandam ride Like old Sesostris with barbaric pride;

*** a team of harness'd monarchs bend