_In stately frigates most delight you find._
Charles the Second had a strong mechanical genius, and understood ship-building, in particular, more completely than became a monarch, if it were possible that a king of England could be too intimately acquainted with what concerns the bulwark of his empire. The king's skill in matters of navigation is thus celebrated by the author of a Poem upon his Majesty's Coronation, the 22d April, 1661, being St George's day.
The seaman's art, and his great end commerce, Through all the corners of the universe, Are not alone the subject of your care, But your delight, and you their polar-star; And even mechanic arts do find from you, Both entertainment and improvement too.
_Beyond your court flows in the admitted tide._
By the improvements made by Charles the Second on St James's Park, there was a connection made with the river, which Waller has celebrated in these lines, as a work of superior merit to founding a city.
Instead of rivers rolling by the side Of Eden's garden, here flows in the tide. The sea, which always served his empire, now Pays tribute to our prince's pleasure too. Of famous cities we the founders know; But rivers old as seas, to which they go, Are nature's bounty: 'tis of more renown, To make a river, than to build a town.
_On St James's Park, as lately improved by His Majesty._
_Here the mistrustful fowl no harm suspects._
The canal in St James's park formed a decoy for water-fowl, with which it was stocked. This circumstance, like the former, is noticed by Waller:
Whilst over head a flock of new-sprung fowl Hangs in the air and does the sun controul. Darkening the air, they hover o'er, and shrowd The wanton sailors with a feathered cloud.
The water-fowl, thus celebrated, were particular favourites of the king, who fed them with his own hand. His affection for his dogs and ducks is noticed in many a libel.
_Thus from your Royal Oak, like Jove's of old, Are answers sought, and destinies foretold; Propitious oracles are begged with vows, And crowns that grow upon the sacred boughs._
This is in allusion to a device exhibited over the triumphal arch, in Leadenhall street, through which the king passed in his way from the Tower to Whitehall, on the day of his coronation. Behind a picture of the king appeared, deciphered in a large table, "the Royal Oak, bearing crowns and sceptres, instead of acorns; amongst the leaves in a label