University of Virginia Library


115

[Lines on Wood's Athenæ Oxonienses]

Time who the Births of All Things brings to Light
Devowres Them likewise with Saturnian Spight.
As if his aged Stomach
To feast it on his own Varieties:
This Boulemie away thy Skill hath tooke,
Disarmd Him of his was[tf]ull Syth, and Hooke.
And given us like Another Hercules
The Gold Fruits of Old Brut[es] Hesp[erides.]
Of what high Worth may be that Worke esteemd
Which Works of lost Creations hath redeemd.
Methinks Old Carews Cornewell does appeare
With Burton his Elaborate Leice[s]tershire,
Industrious Dugdales Warwick crownd wth fame,
Grave Thorotons revived Nottingham,
Wrights Rutland and Plotts Oxford with Its Twin
The well-writt Staffordshire; who All begin
To celebrate wth gratefull Eulogies
The Accession of thy learn'd Antiquities,
Which I would too; had I a Lute well-strung
To sound the Places Praise from whence I sprung.
But Phæbus warnes Me, tis in vaine to strive
To play the Poet well at Eighty five.