Poetry Codex

Romantic

William Lisle Bowles

1762–1850

William Lisle Bowles (1762–1850) was an English clergyman and poet, rector of Bremhill in Wiltshire. His Fourteen Sonnets (1789), written during journeys through England, Scotland and the Rhineland, were warmly admired by the young Coleridge and helped to revive the sonnet as a form of personal reflection.

His longer poems include The Spirit of Discovery (1804), The Missionary (1813) and several narrative and devotional poems. In the 1820s he took part in a famous controversy with Byron and others about the poetry of Pope. The texts here are from Gilfillan's edition (Edinburgh, Nichol, 1855), volumes I and II; translations, the editor's memoir and notes are omitted.

Major Works (1)

  1. The Spirit of Discovery by Sea — Historical poem, 1804

Poems (187)

  1. At Tynemouth Priory, after a Tempestuous Voyage
  2. Bamborough Castle
  3. The River Wainsbeck
  4. The Tweed Visited
  5. On Leaving a Village in Scotland
  6. Evening
  7. To the River Itchin
  8. On Resigning a Scholarship of Trinity College, Oxford, and Retiring to a Country Curacy
  9. Dover Cliffs
  10. On Landing at Ostend
  11. The Bells of Ostend
  12. The Rhine
  13. Influence of Time on Grief
  14. The Convent
  15. The River Cherwell
  16. On Entering Switzerland
  17. Distant View of England from the Sea
  18. Hope
  19. To a Friend
  20. Absence (There is strange music in the stirring wind)
  21. Bereavement
  22. Oxford Revisited
  23. In Memoriam
  24. On the Death of the Rev. William Benwell, M.A
  25. At Malvern
  26. Netley Abbey
  27. Associations
  28. Music (O harmony! thou tenderest nurse of pain)
  29. Approach of Summer
  30. At Oxford, 1786
  31. At Dover, 1786
  32. Retrospection
  33. On Accidentally Meeting a Lady, Now No More
  34. On Hearing "The Messiah" Performed in Gloucester Cathedral, Sept. 18, 1835
  35. Woodspring Abbey, 1836
  36. Lacock Nunnery, 1837
  37. On a Beautiful Landscape
  38. Art and Nature: the Bridge Between Clifton and Leigh Woods
  39. Picture of an Old Man
  40. Picture of a Young Lady
  41. Hour-glass and Bible
  42. Milton: In Youth
  43. Milton: In Age
  44. To Sir Walter Scott
  45. Elegy Written at the Hotwells, Bristol
  46. Monody on Henry Headley
  47. Howard's Account of Lazarettos
  48. The Grave of Howard
  49. Shakspeare
  50. Abbe Thule's Lament for His Son Prince Le Boo
  51. Southampton Water
  52. The Philanthropic Society
  53. The Dying Slave
  54. Song of the American Indian
  55. Monody, Written at Matlock
  56. The Right Honourable Edmund Burke
  57. On Leaving a Place of Residence
  58. Elegiac Stanzas Written during Sickness at Bath
  59. On Leaving Winchester School
  60. Hope: an Allegorical Sketch
  61. The Battle of the Nile
  62. A Garden-Seat at Home
  63. In Horto Rev. J. Still
  64. Greenwich Hospital
  65. A Rustic Seat near the Sea
  66. Wardour Castle
  67. Pole-vellum, Cornwall
  68. On a Beautiful Spring
  69. On a Cenotaph to the Memory of Lieut-Col. Isaac
  70. St Michael's Mount
  71. On an Unfortunate and Beautiful Woman
  72. Hymn to Woden
  73. Coombe-Ellen
  74. Summer Evening at Home
  75. Winter Evening at Home
  76. The Spirit of Navigation
  77. Water-party on Beaulieu River, in the New Forest
  78. Monody on the Death of Dr Warton
  79. Epitaph on H. Walmsley, Esq., in Alverstoke Church, Hants
  80. Age
  81. On a Landscape by Rubens
  82. The Harp, and Despair, of Cowper
  83. Stanzas for Music
  84. Music (O Music! if thou hast a charm)
  85. Absence (How shall I cheat the heavy hours, of thee)
  86. Fairy Sketch
  87. Inscription
  88. Sketches in the Exhibition, 1805
  89. Sketches in the Exhibition, 1807
  90. Southampton Castle
  91. The Winds
  92. On William Sommers of Bremhill
  93. The Visionary Boy
  94. Cadland, Southampton River
  95. The Last Song of Camoens
  96. The Sylph of Summer
  97. The Harp of Hoel
  98. Avenue in Savernake Forest
  99. Dirge of Nelson
  100. Death of Captain Cooke, of "The Bellerophon"
  101. Battle of Corruna
  102. Sketch from Bowden Hill after Sickness
  103. Sun-Dial in the Churchyard of Bremhill
  104. The Missionary
  105. Banwell Hill: A Lay of the Severn Sea
  106. The Grave of the Last Saxon; Or, The Legend of the Curfew
  107. St John in Patmos
  108. The Sorrows of Switzerland
  109. Path of Life
  110. Sunrise
  111. Summer's Evening
  112. Spring--Cuckoo
  113. Sheepfold
  114. Hen and Chickens
  115. Poor Man's Grave
  116. Sabbath Morning
  117. The Primrose
  118. The Hour-Glass
  119. The Bird's Nest
  120. The Mower
  121. Saturday Night
  122. Sunday Night
  123. The April Shower
  124. The Robin Redbreast
  125. The Butterfly and the Bee
  126. The Glow-worm
  127. The Convict
  128. The Blind Grandfather
  129. The Old Labourer
  130. The Swan
  131. The Village Bells
  132. The Caged Bird
  133. The Dutiful Child Reading the Story of Joseph to a Sick Father
  134. Little Mary's Linnet
  135. The Shepherd and His Dog
  136. The Withered Leaf
  137. The Gipsy's Tent
  138. My Father's Grave
  139. The Swallow and the Redbreast: an Apologue
  140. The Blind Man of Salisbury Cathedral
  141. The Blind Soldier and His Daughter
  142. The Little Sweep
  143. The Blacksmith
  144. Hymn for the Anniversary of the Death of the Princess Charlotte
  145. The Children's Hymn for Their Patroness
  146. Easter Day
  147. Christmas Hymn
  148. SONG OF THE CID
  149. Childe Harold's Last Pilgrimage
  150. The Egyptian Tomb
  151. Chantrey's Sleeping Children
  152. On Miss Fitzgerald and Lord Kerry Planting Two Cedars in the Churchyard of Bremhill
  153. The Greenwich Pensioners
  154. Glastonbury Abbey and Wells Cathedral. Written after Viewing the Ruins of the One, and Hearing the Church Service in the Other
  155. Silchester, the Ancient Caleva
  156. Restoration of Malmesbury Abbey
  157. On the Funeral of Charles the First, at Night, in St George's Chapel, Windsor
  158. On Seeing Plants in the Windows of Seth Ward's College, Endowed for Widows of Clergymen, at Salisbury
  159. Morley's Farewell to the Cottage of Isaak Walton
  160. The Grave of Bishop Ken
  161. The Legend of St Cecilia and the Angel
  162. Supposed Address to Bishop Ken
  163. On an Eclipse of the Moon at Midnight
  164. To Lady Valletort, on Hearing Her Sing "Gloria in Excelsis," with Three Other Young Ladies, at Lacock Abbey, October 1831
  165. On Seeing a Bust of R. B. Sheridan, from a Cast Taken after Death
  166. Return of George III. to Windsor Castle
  167. On Meeting Some Friends of Youth at Cheltenham, for the First Time Since We Parted at Oxford
  168. The Lay of Talbot the Troubadour: a Legend of Lacock Abbey
  169. The Ark: a Poem for Music
  170. Written after the Consecration of the New Church at Kingswood
  171. On the Death of Dr Burgess, the Late Bishop of Salisbury
  172. Lines Written on Fonthill Abbey
  173. Epitaph on Benjamin Tremlyn, an Old Soldier, Buried in Bremhill Churchyard, at the Age of Ninety-two
  174. Epitaph on Robert Southey
  175. Sonnet, Written in a Copy of Falconer's "Shipwreck"
  176. On First Hearing Caradori Sing
  177. Salisbury Cathedral
  178. Lockswell
  179. On Mozart
  180. Epitaph on John Harding, in the Churchyard of Bremhill
  181. On the Death of William Linley, Esq
  182. Inscribed to the Marchioness of Lansdowne
  183. Hymn for Music, after the Battle of Waterloo
  184. On a Tree Commanding a View of the Whole Extent of Bowood
  185. On a Rural Seat
  186. On the Front of a Hermitage, Near a Dial
  187. Quieti Et Musis

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