ts has a neat copy of this portrait.
Dr. Graves wrote "Recollections of the late William Shenstone." He also
dedicated an urn to him, and inscribed these lines thereon:--

Stranger! if woods and lawns like these,
If rural scenes thy fancy please,
Ah! stop awhile, and pensive view
Poor Shenstone's urn: who oft, like you,
These woods and lawns well-pleased has rov'd,
And oft these rural scenes approv'd.
Like him, be thou fair virtue's friend,
And health and peace thy steps attend.

Mr. Shenstone died in 1763, and is buried in Hales Owen church yard. An
urn is placed in the church to his memory, thus inscribed:--

Whoe'er thou art, with reverence tread
These sacred mansions of the dead.--
Not that the monumental bust
Or sumptuous tomb HERE guards the dust
Of rich or great: (Let wealth, rank, birth,
Sleep undistinguish'd in the earth;)
This simple urn records a name
That shines with more exalted fame.
Reader! if genius, taste refined,
A native elegance of mind;
If virtue, science, manly sense;
If wit, that never gave offence;
The clearest head, the tenderest heart,
In thy esteem e'er claim'd a part;
Ah! smite thy breast, and drop a tear,
For, know, THY Shenstone's dust lies here.

Mr. Mason thus speaks of Shenstone:

----"Nor thou
Shalt pass without thy meed, thou son of peace,
Who knew'st perchance to harmonize thy shades
Still softer than thy song; yet was that song
Nor rude nor unharmonious, when attuned
To pastoral plaint, or tales of slighted love."

And Mr. Whateley pays his memory the following tribute, previous to his
masterly survey of his far-famed and enchanting seat: "An allusion to
the ideas of pastoral poetry evidently enters into the design of the
Leasowes, where they appear so lovely as to endear the memory of their
author, and justify the reputation of Mr. Shenstone, who inhabited, made
and directed that celebrated place. It is a perfect picture of his mind,
simple, elegant, and amiable, and will always suggest a doubt whether
the spot inspired his verses, or whether, in the scenes which he formed,
he only realized the pastoral images which abound in his songs."[85]
George Mason, in many pages, pays high compliments to Shenstone's taste:
"Paine's Hill has every mark of creative genius, and Hagley of
correctest fancy; but the most intimate _alliance with nature_ was
formed by Sh