Page:Scotish Descriptive Poems - Leyden (1803).djvu/244

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232
PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS.
There saw I them present him laurel crowns,
And with the rest the Tuscan Petrarch came;
Who said—"My son receive these right renowns,
As he who duly doth deserve the fame.
But more triumphant halt thou made thy name
Upon the throne of memory to stand,
To chuse for patron such a worthy dame,
Who only is the Laura of this land."
Then Fowler's laud so loud I heard them sound,
That through the world his praise shall ay rebound.

At this period, Fowler appears to have been a great favourite at court. He prefixed a panegyrical sonnet to The Furies, a composition of James VI. who has performed a similar office for Fowler's Triumphs of Petrarch, in a strain of versification, which for vigour and fluency is vastly superior to his common style, as the reader will perceive:

We find by proof, that into every age,
In Phœbus' art, some glistering star did shine,
Who worthy scholars to the Muses sage,
Full-filled their countries with their works divine:
So Homer was a sounding trumpet fine,
Amongst the Greeks into his learned days;
So Virgil was among the Romans fyne,
A sprite sublimed, a pillar of their praise;
So lofty Petrarch his renown did blaze,
In tongue Italic, in a sugared style;
And to the circled skies his name did raise:
For he by poems that he did compile,
Led in triumph Love, Chasteness, Death, and Fame;
But thou triumphs o'er Petrarch's proper name.