_Thoughts in a Garden_ will be remembered by the quotations of that exquisite critic, Charles Lamb.

How pleasant is this picture! "What wondrous life is this I lead! Ripe apples drop about my head; The luscious clusters of the vine Upon my mouth do crush their wine; The nectarine and curious peach Into my hands themselves do reach; Stumbling on melons as I pass, Ensnared with flowers, I fall on grass.
"Here at this fountain's sliding foot, Or at the fruit-tree's mossy root, Casting the body's vest aside, My soul into the boughs does glide.
There like a bird it sits and sings, And whets and claps its silver wings; And, till prepared for longer flight, Waves in its plumes the various light.
"How well the skilful gard'ner drew Of flowers and herbs this dial true! Where, from above, the milder sun Does through a fragrant zodiac run; And, as it works, the industrious bee Computes his time as well as we.
How could such sweet and wholesome hours Be reckoned but with herbs and flowers!" One of his longer poems, _Appleton House_, contains passages of admirable description, and many not unpleasing conceits.

Witness the following:-- "Thus I, an easy philosopher, Among the birds and trees confer, And little now to make me wants, Or of the fowl or of the plants.
Give me but wings, as they, and I Straight floating on the air shall fly; Or turn me but, and you shall see I am but an inverted tree.
Already I begin to call In their most learned original; And, where I language want, my signs The bird upon the bough divines.
No leaf does tremble in the wind, Which I returning cannot find.
Out of these scattered Sibyl's leaves, Strange prophecies my fancy weaves: What Rome, Greece, Palestine, e'er said, I in this light Mosaic read.
Under this antic cope I move, Like some great prelate of the grove; Then, languishing at ease, I toss On pallets thick with velvet moss; While the wind, cooling through the boughs, Flatters with air my panting brows.
Thanks for my rest, ye mossy banks! And unto you, cool zephyrs, thanks! Who, as my hair, my thoughts too shed, And winnow from the chaff my head.
How safe, methinks, and strong behind These trees have I encamped my mind!" Here is a picture of a piscatorial idler and his trout stream, worthy of the pencil of Izaak Walton:-- "See in what wanton harmless folds It everywhere the meadow holds: Where all things gaze themselves, and doubt If they be in it or without; And for this shade, which therein shines Narcissus-like, the sun too pines.
Oh! what a pleasure 't is to hedge My temples here in heavy sedge; Abandoning my lazy side, Stretched as a bank unto the tide; Or, to suspend my sliding foot On the osier's undermining root, And in its branches tough to hang, While at my lines the fishes twang." A little poem of Marvell's, which he calls Eyes and Tears, has the following passages:-- "How wisely Nature did agree With the same eyes to weep and see! That having viewed the object vain, They might be ready to complain.
And, since the self-deluding sight In a false angle takes each height, These tears, which better measure all, Like watery lines and plummets fall." "Happy are they whom grief doth bless, That weep the more, and see the less; And, to preserve their sight more true, Bathe still their eyes in their own dew; So Magdalen, in tears more wise, Dissolved those captivating eyes, Whose liquid chains could, flowing, meet To fetter her Redeemer's feet.
The sparkling glance, that shoots desire, Drenched in those tears, does lose its fire; Yea, oft the Thunderer pity takes, And there his hissing lightning slakes.
The incense is to Heaven dear, Not as a perfume, but a tear; And stars shine lovely in the night, But as they seem the tears of light.
Ope, then, mine eyes, your double sluice, And practise so your noblest use; For others, too, can see or sleep, But only human eyes can weep." The Bermuda Emigrants has some happy lines, as the following:-- "He hangs in shade the orange bright, Like golden lamps in a green night." Or this, which doubtless suggested a couplet in Moore's _Canadian Boat Song_:-- "And all the way, to guide the chime, With falling oars they kept the time." His facetious and burlesque poetry was much admired in his day; but a great portion of it referred to persons and events no longer of general interest.

The satire on Holland is an exception.

There is nothing in its way superior to it in our language.