Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Hunt and Lee, comps. The Book of the Sonnet. 1867.

II. After Seeing the Collection of Pictures at Wilton House

Thomas Warton (1728–1790)

FROM Pembroke’s princely dome, where mimic Art

Decks with a magic hand the dazzling bowers,

Its living hues where the warm pencil pours,

And breathing forms from the rude marble start—

How to life’s humbler scene can I depart,

My breast all glowing from these gorgeous towers?

In my low cell how cheat the sullen hours?

Vain the complaint; for Fancy can impart

(To Fate superior, and to Fortune’s doom)

Whate’er adorns the stately-storied hall.

She, ’mid the dungeon’s solitary gloom,

Can dress the Graces in their Attic pall;

Bid the green landscape’s vernal beauty bloom,

And in bright trophies clothe the twilight wall.