from the town he represented; (2s. a-day was probably the sum ;) and his constituents were wont, besides, to send him barrels of ale as tokens of their regard. Marvell spoke little in the House; but his heart and vote were always in the right place. Even Prince Rupert continually consulted him, and was sometimes persuaded by him to support the popular side; and King Charles having met him once in private, was so delighted with his wit and agreeable manners, that he thought him worth trying to bribe. He sent Lord Danby to offer him a mark of his Majesty's consideration. Marvell, who was seated in a dingy room up several flights of stairs, declined the proffer, and, it is said, called his servant to witness that he had dined for three successive days on the same shoulder of mutton, and was not likely, therefore, to care for or need a bribe. When the Treasurer was gone, he had to send to a friend to borrow a guinea. Although a silent senator, Marvell was a copious and popular writer. attacked Bishop Parker for his slavish principles, in a piece entitled 'The Rehearsal Transposed,' in which he takes occasion to vindicate and panegyrise his old colleague Milton. His anonymous 'Account of the Growth of Arbitrary Power and Popery in England' excited a sensation, and a reward was offered for the apprehension of the author and printer. Marvell had many of the elements of a first-rate political pamphleteer. He had wit of a most pungent kind, great though coarse fertility of fancy, and a spirit of independence that nothing could subdue or damp. He was the undoubted ancestor of the Defoes, Swifts, Steeles, Juniuses, and Burkes, in whom this kind of authorship reached its perfection, ceased to be fugitive, and assumed classical rank. He Marvell had been repeatedly threatened with assassination, and hence, when he died suddenly on the 16th of August 1678, it was surmised that he had been removed by poison. The Corporation of Hull voted a sum to defray his funeral expenses, and for raising a monument to his memory; but owing to the interference of the Court, through the rector of the parish, this votive tablet was not at the time erected. He was buried in St Giles-in-the-Fields. 'Out of the strong came forth sweetness,' saith the Hebrew 6 6 record. And so from the sturdy Andrew Marvell have proceeded such soft and lovely strains as The Emigrants,' 'The Nymph complaining for the Death of her Fawn,' 'Young Love,' &c. The statue of Memnon became musical at the dawn; and the stern patriot, whom no bribe could buy and no flattery melt, is found sympathising in song with a boatful of banished Englishmen in the remote Bermudas, and inditing Thoughts in a Garden,' from which you might suppose that he had spent his life more with melons than with men, and was better acquainted with the motions of a bee-hive than with the contests of Parliament, and the distractions of a most distracted age. It was said (not with thorough truth) of Milton, that he could cut out a Colossus from a rock, but could not carve heads upon cherry-stones-a task which his assistant may be said to have performed in his stead, in his small but delectable copies of verse. THE EMIGRANTS. 1 Where the remote Bermudas ride, 2 What should we do but sing His praise 3 Where he the huge sea-monsters racks, Safe from the storms and prelates' rage. 4 'He gave us this eternal spring 5 He hangs in shades the orange bright, Like golden lamps in a green night; And in these rocks for us did frame 6 'Oh, let our voice his praise exalt 7 Thus sung they in the English boat, And all the way, to guide their chime, THE NYMPH COMPLAINING FOR THE DEATH OF HER FAWN The wanton troopers riding by It cannot die so. But, O my fears! Keeps register of every thing, And nothing may we use in vain: Even beasts must be with justice slain Inconstant Sylvio, when yet I had not found him counterfeit, With this, and very well content Than love it? How could I less Oh, I cannot be It wax'd more white and sweet than they: hand? It had so sweet a breath; and oft And all the spring-time of the year Among the beds of lilies I Have sought it oft where it should lie, Had it lived long, it would have been |