An Answer To A Copy Of Verses Sent Me To Jersey

As to a northern people (whom the sun

Uses just as the Romish church has done

Her prophane laity, and does assign

Bread only both to serve for bread and wine)

A rich Canary fleet welcome arrives;

Such comfort to us here your letter gives,

Fraught with brisk racy verses; in which we

The soil from whence they came, taste, smell, and see:

Such is your present to us; for you must know,

Sir, that verse does not in this island grow,

No more than sack; one lately did not fear

(Without the Muses’ leave) to plant it here;

But it produc’d such base, rough, crabbed, hedge-

Rhymes, as ev’n set the hearers’ ears on edge:

Written by – – Esquire, the

Year of our Lord six hundred thirty-three.

Brave Jersey Muse! and he’s for this high style

Call’d to this day the Homer of the Isle.

Alas! to men here no words less hard be

To rhyme with, than * Mount Orgueil is to me;

Mount Orgueil! which, in scorn o’ th’ Muses’ law,

With no yoke-fellow word will deign to draw.

Stubborn Mount Orgueil! ‘t is a work to make it

Come into rhyme, more hard than ‘t were to take it.

Alas! to bring your tropes and figures here,

Strange as to bring camels and elephants were;

And metaphor is so unknown a thing,

‘T would need the preface of “God save the King.”

Yet this I’ll say, for th’ honour of the place,

That, by God’s extraordinary grace

(Which shows the people have judgment, if not wit)

The land is undefil’d with Clinches yet;

Which, in my poor opinion, I confess,

Is a most singular blessing, and no less

Than Ireland’s wanting spiders. And, so far

From th’ actual sin of bombast too they are,

(That other crying sin o’ th’ English Muse)

That even Satan himself can accuse

None here (no not so much as the divines)

For th’ motus primò primi to strong lines.

Well, since the soil then does not naturally bear

Verse, who (a devil) should import it here?

For that to me would seem as strange a thing

As who did first wild beasts into islands bring;

Unless you think that it might taken be

As Green did Gondibert, in a prize at sea:

But that’s a fortune falls not every day;

‘Tis true Green was made by it; for they say

The parliament did a noble bounty do,

And gave him the whole prize, their tenths and fifteens too.

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Poems in English 

• Astrophel and Stella: III by Sir Philip Sidney by Philip Sidney
• Astrophel and Stella: I by Sir Philip Sidney by Philip Sidney
• Astrophel And Stella-First Song by Sir Philip Sidney by Philip Sidney
• To The Honble Commodore Hood on His Pardoning a Deserter by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• To Mrs. Leonard on The Death of Her Husband by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• Phillis Wheatley – Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• On The Death of Mr. Snider Murder’d By Richardson by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• On Messrs Hussey and Coffin by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• On Friendship by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• To The Honble Commodore Hood on His Pardoning a Deserter by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• His Excellency General Washington by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• On Friendship by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• America by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• To The University Of Cambridge, In New-England by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• To The Right Honourable William, Earl Of Dartmouth, His Majesty’s Principal Secretary Of The State For North-America, by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• To the Rev. Dr. Thomas Amory by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• To The King’s Most Excellent Majesty by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• To The Honourable T. H. Esq; On the Death Of His Daughter by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• To S.M., A Young African Painter, On Seeing His Works by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley
• To Mæcenas by Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley

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Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.

 

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