We hear from Annopolis-Royal that a play was acted the last Winter for the Entertainment of the Officers and Ladies at that Place and that the following Lines were Part of the Prologue compos'd and spoke on that Occasion.
Whilst to relieve a generous Queen's Distress,
Whom proud, ambitious Potentates oppress:
Our king pursues the most effectual Ways,
Sooths some to Peace, and there the Storm allays;
And against others, who're more loath to yield,
He leads his Britons to the German Field:
Where to his Cost th' insulting Foe has found
What 'tis with Britons to dispute the Ground:
We still enjoying Peace in this cold Clime,
With innocent diversions pass our Time, &c.
Amer. Mag. and Hist. Chron., I-348, Apr. 1744, Boston.
WINTER, A POEM.
By the same [i. e., Annandius].
The twelfth stanza:
Thrice happy they! but why my muse,
To rural pastimes so profuse?
The crouded city surely yields,
More joy than ice and snowy fields?
Here folks are witty and well dress'd,
And blooming beauty is caress'd
In ev'ry form art can devise—
With soothing flattery solemn lies,
And all that nymphs deluded prize
Here fashions reign, and modes prevail,
And in twelve moons again grow stale,
Thus ever vary, ever change,
Yet ever please—a thing most strange!
And here each thing is told that's new
What Loundoun or what Richlieu do,
Each secret expedition too—
And then great Frederick's noble feats,
When he th' imperial forces beats.
Such themes the lazy hours beguile;
There's nothing else that's worth our while.
Amer. Mag. and Mo. Chron., I-238, Feb. 1758, Phila.
To the Proprietors, &c.