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Death of Captain Cooke, of "The Bellerophon" 217 Battle of Corruna 218 Sketch from Bowden Hill after Sickness 219 Sun-Dial in the Churchyard of Bremhill 223     THE SPIRIT OF DISCOVERY:           A Descriptive and Historical Poem 225     Book the First 231     Book the Second 245     Book the Third 258     Book the Fourth 266     Book the Fifth 285     THE MISSIONARY 295     Introduction 297     Canto First 298     Canto Second 309     Canto Third 318     Canto Fourth 330     Canto Fifth 339     Canto Sixth 344     Canto Seventh 350     Canton Eighth 359

The Memoir and Critical Dissertation being unavoidably delayed, will be prefixed to Vol. II.

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PREFACE.

A Ninth Edition of the following Poems having been called for by the public, the author is induced to say a few words, particularly concerning those which, under the name of Sonnets, describe his personal feelings.

They can be considered in no other light than as exhibiting occasional reflections which naturally arose in his mind, chiefly during various excursions, undertaken to relieve, at the time, depression of spirits. They were, therefore, in general, suggested by the scenes before them; and wherever such scenes appeared to harmonise with his disposition at the moment, the sentiments were involuntarily prompted.

Numberless poetical trifles of the same kind have occurred to him, when perhaps, in his solitary rambles, he has been "chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancy;" but they have been forgotten as he left the places which gave rise to them; and the greater part of those originally committed to the press were written down, for the first time, from memory.

This is nothing to the public; but it may serve in some measure to obviate the common remark on melancholy poetry, that it has been very often gravely composed, when possibly the heart of the writer had very little share in the distress he chose to describe.

But there is a great difference between natural and fabricated feelings, even in poetry. To which of these two characters the poems before the reader belong, the author leaves those who have felt sensations of sorrow to judge.

They who know him, know the occasions of them to have been real; to the public he might only mention the sudden death of a deserving young woman, with whom,

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INTRODUCTION TO THE EDITION OF 1837.

To account for the variations which may be remarked in this last edition of my Sonnets, from that which was first published fifty years ago, it may be proper to state, that to the best of my recollection, they now