STROPHE.

The curlew scream'd, the Tritons blew

Their shells to celebrate the ravish'd rite;

Old Time exulted as he flew,

And Independence saw the light;

The light he saw in Albion's happy plains,

Where, under cover of a flowering thorn,

While Philomel renew'd her warbled strains,

The auspicious fruit of stolen embrace was born.

The mountain Dyriads seized with joy

The smiling infant to their charge consign'd;

The Doric Muse caress'd the favourite boy;

The hermit Wisdom stored his opening mind:

As rolling years matured his age,

He flourish'd bold and sinewy as his sire;

While the mild passions in his breast assuage

The fiercer flames of his maternal fire.