entitled, "New Court-Songs, and Poems. By R. V. Gent. London, printed for R. Paslac at the Stationer's Arms and Ink-Bottle in Lumbard Street, 1672."
The line in italics was added by the editor for the sake of the rhyme.
P. 159. This poem alludes, I imagine, to the abdication of James II. in 1688. Albina, is Albion, or England, and Albanius the king, who, before he ascended the throne, was Duke of York in England, and Albany, in Scotland; the titles of his present majesty's second son.
I grieve to loose my pleasing paine
And call my wishes back again.
So Gray, in those well-known pathetic lines:
This pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd;
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day
Nor cast one longing, ling'ringlook behind?
Ere ide a thought or wish obtain
That honour thinks amiss.
Thus Dido, in that most beautiful passage of the fourth book of the Æneid:
Vel pater omnipotens adigat me fulmine ad umbras,
Pallentes umbras Erebi, noctemque profundam,
Ante, Pudor! quam te violo, aut tua jura resolvo.
P. 164. These solemn stanzas, which commemorate one of the most memorable and tragical events of Roman history, the death of Pompey the Great, were written by the most deservedly admired Mrs Katherine Phillips, the matchless Orinda, as she is stiled in the title-page of her poems, printed in 1667. She translated the Pompée of Corneille, which was published with the following advertisement:
