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Ur^v.of III. Library 
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 KI3 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF ILLINOIS 
 LIBRARY 
 
 From the Library of 
 Professor 
 
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LIBRARY OF THE 
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 { 
 
 A 
 
 
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■■ ' 
 
JAM7rf,S THOMSONS 
 
•Digitized by;the Internet Archive 
 in 2017 with funding from 
 
 University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Alternates 
 
 https://archive.org/details/seasons00thom_4 
 

 % 
 
 i 
 
 ■A 
 
 i 
 
THE 
 
 m 
 
 SEASONS: 
 
 BY 
 
 JAMES THOxMSON. 
 
 TO WHICH IS PREFIXED 
 
 THE LIFE OF THE AUTHOR, 
 
 t 
 
 BY P. MURDOCH, D.D. 
 
 'niC 
 
 PHILADELPHIA : 
 
 KAY & TROUTMAN, 183^ MARKET STREET. 
 PITTSBURGH: — C. H. KAY. 
 
 1848 . 
 
PRINTED BY SMITH & PETERS 
 
 franklin Buildings, Sixth Street below Arch, PhiUdelpbia. 
 
hhoi, 
 
 AN 
 
 2 - / ^ 
 
 ACCOUNT 
 
 I V , 
 
 OF THR 
 
 LIFE AND WRITINGS 
 
 OF 
 
 c 
 
 MR. JAMES THOMSON. 
 
 I f is commonly said, that the life of a g^ood writer 
 » best read in his works ; which can scarce fail to re- 
 ceive a peculiar tincture from his temper, manners, 
 and habits: the distinguishing character of his mind, 
 ^ 1 his ruling passion, at least, will there appear undLs- 
 guised. But however just this observation maj'^ be, 
 ^ and although we might safely rest Mr. Thomson’s 
 t/faine, as a good man, as well as a man of genius, on 
 this sole footing ; yet the desire whic!i the public al- 
 ways showof being more particularly acquainted with 
 '^r tbe history of an eminent author, ought not to be 
 disappointed ; as it proceeds not from mere curiosi- 
 ty, but chiefly from affection and gratitude, to those 
 by whom they have been entertained and instructed. 
 
 To give some account of a deceased friend is often 
 
 I (5 64 
 
4 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 apiece of justice likewise, which ought not to be re- 
 fused to his memory ; to prevent or efface the imper- 
 tinent fictions which officious biographers are so apt 
 to collect and propagate. And we may add, that the 
 circumstances of an author’s life will sometimes 
 throw the best light upon his writings ; instances 
 whereof we shall meet with in the following pages. 
 
 Mr. Thomson wa*s born at Ednam, in the shire of 
 Roxburgh, on the eleventh of September, in the year 
 1700. His father, minister of that place, was but little 
 known beyond the narrow circle of his co-presbyters, 
 and to a few gentlemen in the neighbourhood ; but 
 highly respected by them, for his piety, and his dili- 
 gence in the pastoral duty : as appeared afterw ards, 
 in their kind offices to his widow and orphan family. 
 
 The Reverend Messrs. Riccarton and Gusthart par- 
 ticularly took a most affectionate and friendly part in 
 all their concerns. The former, a man of uncommon 
 penetration and good taste, had very early discover- 
 ed, through the rudeness of young Thomson’s puerile 
 essays, a fund of genius well deserving culture and 
 encouragement. He undertook, therefore, with the 
 father’s approbation, the chief direction of his stu- 
 v-dies, furnished him with the proper books, corrected 
 his performances ; and was daily rewarded with the 
 })leasure of seeing his labour so happily emploj^ed. 
 
 The other reverend gentleman, Mr. Gusthart, who 
 ,8 still living ( 11 ( 52 ), one of the ministers of Edin- 
 burgh, and senior of the Chapel Royal, was no less 
 serviceable to Mrs. Thomson in the management of 
 her little affairs ; which, after the decease of her hus- 
 
MR. JAMES THOMSON. 
 
 6 
 
 band, burdened as she was with a family of nine 
 children, required the prudent counsels and assist- 
 ance of that faithful and generous friend. 
 
 Sir William Bennet likewise, well known for his 
 gay humour and ready poetical wit, was highly de- 
 lighted with our young poet, and used to invite him 
 to pass the summer-vacation at his country-seat : a 
 scene of life which Mr. Thomson always remembered 
 with particular pleasure. But what he wrote during 
 that time, either to entertain Sir William and Mr. 
 Riccarton, or for his own amusement, he destroyed 
 every new-year’s day ; committing his little pieces to 
 the flames, in their due order ; and crowning the so- 
 lemnity with a copy of verses, in which were humor- 
 ously recited the several grounds of their condem- 
 nation. 
 
 After the usual course of school education, under 
 an able master at Jedburgh, Mr. Thomson was sent 
 to tlic university of Edinburgh. But in the second 
 year of his admission, his studies were for some time 
 interrupted by the death of his father ; who was car- 
 ried off so suddenly, that it was not possible for Mr 
 Thomson, with all the diligence he could use, to 
 receive his last blessing. This affected him to an un- 
 common degree j and his relations still remember 
 some extraordinary instances of his grief and filial 
 duty on that occasion. 
 
 Mrs. Thomson, whose maiden name was Hume, 
 and w ho was co-heiress of a small estate in the coun- 
 try , did not sink under this misfortune. She consulted 
 the friend, Mr. Gusthart : and having, by his advice, 
 A 2 
 
6 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 mortgaged her moiety of ilie farm, repaired with her 
 family to Edinburgh ; where she lived in a decent fru- 
 gal manner, till her favourite son had not on'y fin-ish- 
 ed his academical course, but was even distingui'shed 
 and patronised as a man of genius. She was, herself, 
 a person of uncommon natural endowments ; possess- 
 ed of every social and domestic virtue ; with an ima- 
 gination, for vivacity and warmth, scarce inferior to 
 her son’s and which raised her devotional exercises 
 to a pitch bordering on enthusiasm. 
 
 But whatever Jid vantage Mr. Thomson might de- 
 rive from the complexion of his parent, it is certain 
 he owed much to a religious education ; and that his 
 early acquaintance with the sacred writings contri- 
 buted greatly to that sublime, by which his works will 
 be for ever distinguished. In his first pieces, the Sea- 
 sons, we see liiin at once assume the majestic free- 
 dom of an Eastern writer ; seizing the grand images 
 as they rise, clothing tliem in his own expressive lan- 
 guage, and preserving, throughout, the grace, the 
 variety, and tlie dignity, which belong to a just com- 
 position ; unhurt by the stiffness of formal method. 
 
 About this time, the study of poetry was become 
 general in Scotland, the best English authors being 
 universally read, and imitations of them attempted. 
 Addison had lately displayed tlie beauties of Milton's 
 immortal work ; and his remarks on it, together with 
 Mr. Pope’s celebrated Essay, had opened the way to 
 an ac(|uaintance with the best poets and critics. 
 
 But the most learned critic is not always the best 
 judge of poetry ; taste being a gift of nature, th-" 
 
MR. JAMES THOMSON, 
 
 7 
 
 want of which Aristotle and Bossu cannot supply ; nor 
 even the study of the best originals, when the reader’s 
 faculties are not tuned in a certain consonance to 
 those of the poet j and this happened to be the case 
 with certain learned gentlemen, into whose hands a 
 few of Mr. Thomson’s first essays had fallen. Some 
 inaccuracies of style, and those luxuriances which a 
 young writer can hardly avoid, lay open to their ca- 
 vils and censure : so far, indeed, they might be com- 
 petent judges ; but the tire and enthusiasm of the 
 poet had entirely escaped their notice. Mr. Thomson, 
 however, conscious of his own strength, was not dis- 
 couraged by this treatment ; especially as he had 
 some fi lends on whose judgment he could better rely, 
 and who thought very differently of his performances. 
 Only from that time, he began to turn his views to- 
 wards London ; where works of genius may alvvay’s 
 expect a candid reception and due encouragement j 
 and an accident soon after entirely determined him 
 to try his fortune there. 
 
 The divinity chair at Edinburgh was then filled by 
 the reverend and learned Mr. Hamilton; a gentleman 
 universally respected and beloved; and who had par- ^ 
 ticularly endeared himself to the young divines under 
 his care, by his kind offices, his candour, and affabi- 
 lity. Our author had attended his lectures for about 
 ft year, when there was prescribed to him, for the 
 subject of an exercise, a psalm, in which the power 
 and majesty of God are celebrated. Of this psalm he 
 gave a paraphrase and illustration, as the nature of 
 the exercise required ; but in a style so highly poeti- 
 
8 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 cal as surprised the whole audience. Mr. Hamilton, 
 as his custom was, complimented the orator upon his 
 performance, and pointed out to the students the 
 most masterly striking parts of it ; but at last, turn 
 ing to Mr. Thomson, he told him, smiling, that if he 
 thought of being useful to the ministry, he must keep 
 a stricter rein upon his imagination, and expres? 
 himself in language more intelligible to an ordinary 
 congregation. 
 
 This gave Mr. Thomson to understand, that his ex- 
 pectations from the study of theology might be verv 
 precarious ; even though the church had been more 
 his free choice than probably it was. So that hav- 
 ing, soon after, received some encouragement from 
 a lady of quality, a friend of his mother’s, then in 
 London, he quickly prepared himself for his journey. 
 And although this encouragement ended in nothing 
 beneficial, it served for the pretext, to cover the im- 
 prudence of committing himself to the wide world, 
 unfriended and unpatronised, and with the slender 
 stock of money he was then possessed of. 
 
 , But his merit did not long lie concealed. Mr 
 Forbes, afterwards lord president of the session, then 
 attending the service of parliament, having seen a 
 specimen of Mr. Thomson’s poetry in Scotland, re- 
 ceived him very kindly, and recommended him to 
 some of his friends : particularly to Mr Aikman, who 
 lived in great intimacy with many persons of distin- 
 guished rank and worth. This gentleman, from a con- 
 noisseur in painting, was become a professed painter * 
 tind his taste being no less just and delicate in the 
 
MR. JAMES THOMSON, 
 
 0 
 
 Rindred art of descriptive poetry, than in his own, no 
 wonder that he soon conceived a frTendship for our 
 author. What a warm return he met with, and how 
 Mr. Thomson was affected by his friend’s premature 
 death, appears in the copy of verses which he wrote 
 on that occasion. 
 
 In the mean time, our author’s reception, wherever 
 he was introduced, emboldened him to risk the publi 
 cation of his Winter : in which, as himself was a mere 
 novice in such matters, he was kindly assisted by Mr. 
 Mallet, then private tutor to his grace the Duke of 
 Montrose, and his brother the Lord George Graham, 
 so well known afterwards as an able and gallant sea- 
 officer. To Mr. Mallet he likewise owed his first ac- 
 quaintance with several of the wits of that time ; an 
 exact information of their characters, personal and 
 poetical, and how they stood affected to each other. 
 
 The poem of W' inter, published in March 1726, 
 was no sooner read than universally admired ; those 
 oniy excepted who had not been used to feel, or to 
 look for, any thing in poetry, beyond a point of sati- 
 rical or epigrammatic wit, a smart antithesis richly 
 trimmed with rhyme, or the softness of an elegiac 
 complaint. To such, his manly classical spirit could 
 not easily recommend itself ; till after a more atten- 
 tive perusal they had got the better of their prejudi- 
 ces, and either acquired or affected a truer taste. A 
 few others stood aloof, merely because they had long 
 before fixed the articles of their poetical creed, and 
 resigned themselves to an absolute despair of ever 
 seeing any thing new and original. These were some- 
 
10 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 what mortified to find their notions disturbed by the 
 appearance of a poet who seemed to owe nothing" 
 but to nature and his own genius. But in a short 
 time, the applause became unanimous ; every one 
 wondering how so many pictures, and pictures so 
 familiar, should have moved them but faintly to what 
 they felt in his descriptions. His digressions too, the 
 overflowings of a tender, benevolent heart, charmed 
 the reader no less ; leaving him in doubt, whether he 
 should more admire the poet, or love the man. 
 
 From that time, Mr. Tliornson’s acquaintance was 
 courted by all men of taste ; and several ladies of 
 high rank and distinction became his declared pa- 
 tronesses : the Countess of Hartford, Miss Drelin- 
 coiirt, afterwards Viscountess Primrose, Mrs. Stan- 
 ley, and others. But the chief happiness wliich his 
 Winter procured him w^as, tliat it brought him ac- 
 quainted v/ith Dr. Bundle, afterwards Lortl Bishop of 
 Derry : who, upon conversing with Mr. Thomson, 
 and finding in him qualities greater still, and of more 
 value, than those of a poet, received him into his in- 
 timate confidence and friendship ; promoted his cha- 
 racter every where ; introduced him to his great 
 A lend the Lord Chancellor Talbot ; and, some years 
 after, v/hen the oldest son of that nobleman was to 
 make his tour of travelling, recommended Mr. Thom- 
 son as a proper companion for him. His affection 
 and gratitude to Dr. Bundle, and his indignation at 
 the treatment that worthy prelate had met with, are 
 Anely expressed in his poem to the memory of Lord 
 Talbot. The true cause of that undeserved treatment 
 
MR. JAMES THOMSON. 
 
 11 
 
 has been secreted from the public, as well as the dark 
 manoeuvres that were employed: but Mr. Thomson, 
 who had access to the best information, places it to 
 the account of 
 
 Slanderous zeal, and politics infirm, 
 
 .lealous of worth. 
 
 Meanwhile, our poet’s chief care had been, in re- 
 turn for the public favour, to finish the plan which 
 their wishes laid out for him ; and the expectations 
 wliich his Winter had raised, were fully satisfied by 
 the successive publication of the other Seasons: of 
 Summer, in the year 1727 , of Spring-, in the begin- 
 ning- of the following year; and of Autumn, in a 
 c|uarto edition of his works, printed in 1730. 
 
 !n that edition, the Seasons are placed in their na- 
 tural order ; and crowned with that inimitable Hymn, 
 in which we view them in their beautiful succession, 
 as one whole, the immediate effect of infinite Power 
 and Goodness. In imitation of the Hebrew bard all 
 nature is called forth to do homage to the Creator, 
 and the reader is left enraptured in silent adoration 
 and praise. 
 
 Besides these, and his tragedy of Sophonisba, 
 writteii and acted with applause, in the year 1729, 
 Mr. I'homson had in 1727, published his poem to the 
 memory of Sir Isaac Newton, then lately deceased ; 
 containing a deserved encomium of that incompara- 
 ble man, with an account of his chief discoveries ; 
 sublimely poetical ; and yet so just, that an ingenious 
 foreigner, the Count Algarotti, lakes a line of it for 
 
12 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 the text of his philosopliical dialogues, II JVeuionicm- 
 ismo per le dame : this was in part owing to the as- 
 sistance he had of his friend Mr. Gray, a gentleman 
 well versed in the New^tonian philosophy, who, on that 
 occasion, gave him a very exact, though general, ab- 
 stract of its principles. 
 
 That same year, the resentment of our mercllants, 
 for the interruption of their trade by the Spaniards in 
 America, running very high, Mr. Thomson zealously 
 took part in it ; and wrote his poem Britannia, to 
 rouse the nation to revenge. And although this piece 
 is the less read that its subject was but accidental and 
 temporary, the spirited generous sentiments that en- 
 rich it, can never be out of season : they will at least 
 remain a monument of that love of his country, that 
 devotion to the public, w Inch he is ever inculcating as 
 the perfection of virtue, and which none ever felt 
 more pure, or more intense, than himself. 
 
 Our author’s poetical studies were now' to be inter- 
 rupted, or rather improved, by his attendance on the 
 honourable Mr. Charles Talbot in his travels. A de- 
 lightful task indeed ! endowed as that young noble- 
 man was by nature, and accomplished by the care 
 and example of the best of fathers, in whatever could 
 adorn humanity: graceful of person, elegant in man- 
 ners and address ; pious, humane, generous , with an 
 exquisite taste in all the finer arts. 
 
 With this amiable companion and friend, Mr. 
 Thomson visited most of the courts and capita! cities 
 o-f Europe ; and returned wdth his view s greatly en- 
 larged ; not of exterior nature only, and the works of 
 
MR. JAMES THOMSON. 
 
 13 
 
 art, but of human life and manners, of the constitu- 
 tion and policy of the several states, their connexions, 
 and their religious institutions. How particular and 
 judicious his observations were, we see in his poem of 
 Liberty, begun soon after his return to England. We 
 see, at the same time, to what a high pitch his love of 
 his country was raised, by the comparisons he had 
 all along been making of our happy well-poised go- 
 vernment with those of other nations. To inspire his 
 fellow-subjects with the like sentiments, and to show 
 them by what means the precious freedom w^e enjoy 
 may be preserved, and how it may be abused or lost, 
 he employed two years of his life in composing that 
 noble work : upon which, conscious of the importance 
 and dignity of the subject, he valued himself *more^' 
 than upon all his other writings. 
 
 While Mr. Thomson was writing his first part of 
 Liberty, he received a severe shock, by the death of 
 his noble friend and fellow-traveller : which was soon 
 followed by another that was severer still, and of 
 more general concern ; the death of Lord Talbot him- 
 self ; which Mr. Thomson so pathetically and so justly 
 laments in the poem dedicated to his memory. In him 
 the nation saw itself deprived of an imcorrupted pa- 
 triot, the faithful guardian of their rights, on whose 
 wisdom and integrity they had founded their hope^ 
 of lelief from many tedious vexations: and Mr. 
 Tliomson, besides his share in the general mourning, 
 had to bear all the affiiction which a heart like his 
 could feel, for the person whom, of ail mankind, he 
 most revered and loved. At the same time, he found 
 
 B 
 
14 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 himself; from an easy competency, reduced to a state 
 of precarious dependence, in which he passed the re- 
 mainder of his life; excepting” only the two last years 
 of it, during which he enjoyed the place of surveyor- 
 generalof the Leeward islands, procured for him by 
 the generous friendship of Lord Lyttleton. 
 
 Immediately upon his return to England with Mr. 
 Talbot, the chancellor had made him his secretary of 
 briefs ; a place of little attendance, suiting his retired 
 indolent way of life, and equal to all his wants. This 
 place fell with his patron ; and although the noble 
 lord who succeeded to Lord Talbot in office, kept it 
 vacant for some time, probably till Mr. Thomson 
 should apply for it, he was so dispirited, and so list- 
 less to every concern of that kind, that he never took 
 one step in the affair : a neglect which his best friends 
 greatly blamed in him. 
 
 Yet could not his genius be depressed, or his tem- 
 per hurt, by this reverse of fortune. He resumed, 
 with time, his usual cheerfulness, and never abated 
 one article in his way of living ; which, though sim- 
 ple, was genial and elegant. The profits arising from 
 his works were not inconsiderable : his tragedy ol 
 Aeramemnon, acted in 1738, yielded a good sum : 
 Mr. Millar was always at hand, to answer, or even to 
 prevent, his demands; and he had a friend or two be- 
 sides, whose hearts, he knew, were not contracted by 
 the ample fortunes they had acquired ; who would, of 
 themselves, interpose, if they saw any occasion for it. 
 
 But his chief dependence, during this long inter- 
 val, was on the protection and bounty of his iroyal 
 
MR. JAMES THOMSON. 
 
 15 
 
 highness Frederic Prince of Wales ; who, upon ihe 
 recommendation of Lord Lyttelton, then his chief 
 favourite, settled on him a handsome allowance. And 
 afterwards, when he was introduced to his royal 
 highness, that excellent prince, who truly w tis what 
 Mr. Thomson paints him, the friend of mankind and 
 of merit, received him very graciously, and ever after 
 honoured him w ith many marks of [)articular favour 
 and confidence. A circumstance, whicli does equal 
 honour to the patron and the poet, ought not here to 
 be omitted ; that my Lord Lyttelton’s recommenda- 
 tion came altogether unsolicited, and long before 
 Mr. Thomson was personally known to him. 
 
 It happened, however, that the favour of his royal 
 highness was in one instance of some prejudice to 
 our author ; in the refusal of a license for his tragedy 
 of Edward and Eleonora, which he had prepared for 
 the stage in the year 1739. The reader may see that 
 this play contains not a line which could justly give 
 offence ; but the ministry, still sore fron) certain pas- 
 quinades, which had lately produced the stage-act ; 
 and as little satisfied with some part of the prince’s 
 political conduct, as he was with their management of 
 the public affairs ; would not risk the representation 
 of a piece written under his eye, and they might pro- 
 bably think, by his command. 
 
 This refusal drew after it another ; and in a way 
 which, as it is related, was rather ludicrous. Mr. 
 Paterson, a companion of Mr. Thomson, aftcrw ai ds 
 his deputy and then his successor, in the general 
 surveyorship, used to write out fair copies for his 
 
16 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 friead, when such were wanted for the press or fo 
 the stage. This gentleman likewise courted the tra- 
 gic muse ; and had taken for his subject the story of 
 Arminius the German hero. But his guiltless 
 
 as it was, being presented for a license ; no soonei 
 had the censor cast his eyes on the hand-writing in 
 which he had seen Edward and Eleonora, than he 
 cried out, Away with it !” and the author’s profits 
 were reduced to what his bookseller could afford foi 
 a tragedy in distress. , 
 
 Mr. Thomson’s next dramatic performance *vas 
 the m-asque of Alfred ; written, jointly with Mr. Pdal 
 lot, by command of the Prince of Wales, for the en 
 tertainment of his royal highness’s court, at his siui] 
 mer-residence. This piece, with some alterations, 
 and the music new, has been since brought upon the 
 stage by Mr. Mallet : it was originally acted at Clif 
 den, in the year 1740, on the birth-day of her roya) 
 highness the Princess Augusta. 
 
 In the year 1745, his Tancred and Sigismunda. 
 taken from the novel in Gil Bias, was performed with 
 applause ; and from the deep romantic distress of the 
 lovers, continues to draw crow tied houses. The sue 
 cess of this piece was indeed insured from the first 
 by Mr. Garrick and Mrs. Cibber, they appearing in 
 the principal characters ; which they heightened and 
 adorned with all the magic of their never-failing art. 
 
 He had, in the mean time, been finishing his Castle 
 of Indolence, in two cantos. It was, at first, little 
 more than a few detached stanzas, in the way of rail- 
 lery on himself, and on some of his friends, who 
 
MR. JAMES THOMSON. 
 
 would reproach him with indolence, while he thought 
 them at least, as indolent himself. But he saw very 
 soon, that the subject deserved to be treated more 
 seriously, and in a form fitted to convey one of the 
 most important moral lessons. 
 
 The stanza which he uses in this work is that of 
 Spenser, borrowed from the Italian poets ; in which 
 he thought rhymes had their proper place, and were 
 even graceful : the compass of the stanza admitting 
 an agreeable variety of final sounds : while the senst 
 of the poet is not cramped or cut short, nor yet too 
 much dilated j as must often happen, when it is par- 
 celled out into rhymed couplets ; the usual measure 
 indeed of our elegy and satire, but which always 
 weakens the higher poetry, and, to a true ear, will 
 sometimes give it an air of the burlesque. 
 
 This was the last piece Mr. Thoipsori himself pub- 
 lished 3 his tragedy of Coriolanus being only prepar- 
 ed for the theatre, when a fatal accident robbed the 
 world of one of the best of men, and best poets, that 
 lived in it. 
 
 He had always been a timorous horseman j and 
 more so, in a road where numbers of giddy or un- 
 skilful riders are continually passing ; so that, when 
 the weather did not invite him to go by water, he 
 would commonly w^alk the distance between London 
 and Richmond, with any acquaintance that ofiered ; 
 with whom he might chat and rest himself, or per- 
 haps dine, by the way. One summer evening, being 
 alone, in his walk from towm to Hammersmith, he 
 had overheated himself, and, in that condition, im- 
 
18 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 prudently took a boat to carry him to Kew; appje 
 liending- no bad consequence from the chill air on 
 the river, which his walk to his house, at tlie upp er 
 end of Kew-I^ane, had always hitherto preventc d 
 Knt now the cold had so seized him, that next day he 
 tbund himself in a high fever, so much the more to 
 be dreaded that he was of a full habit. This, how- 
 ever, by the use of proper medicines, was removed, 
 so that he was thought to be out of danger: till ti € 
 fine weather having tempted him to expose liinisch 
 once more to the evening dews, his fever returned 
 with violence, and with such symptoms as left t o 
 hopes of a cure. Two days had passed before his iv? 
 lapse was known in town ; at last, Mr. ?»HtrhciIand 
 Mr. Reid, with Dr. Armstrong, being informed of it 
 posted out at midnight to his assistance: but, alas ' 
 came only to endure a sight of all others the morn 
 shocking to nature, the last agonies of tlieir belove.: 
 friend. This lamented death happened on the 27th 
 day of August, 1743. 
 
 His testamentary executors were, the Lord Lyttel 
 ton, whose care of our poet’s fortune and fame ceas 
 od not with his life ; and Mr. Mitchell, a gentlemai 
 equally noted for the truth and constancy of Ins pn i 
 rate friendships, and for his address and spirit as i 
 public minister. By their united interest, the orphiu 
 play of Coriolanus was brought on the stage to tin 
 best advantage: from the profits of which, and tin 
 sale of manuscripts, and other etTccts, all demamk 
 were duly satisfied, and a handsome sum remit ied to 
 ii'vj sisters. My Lord Lyttelton’s prologue to tins 
 
MR, JAMES THOMSON, 
 
 1 ^) 
 
 piece was admired as one of tlie best that had ever 
 been written ; the best spoken it certainly was. The 
 sympathising audience saw that then, indeed, Mr. 
 Quin was no actor ; that tlie tears he siied were those 
 of real friendship and grief. 
 
 Mr. Thomson’s remains were deposited in the 
 church of Richmond, under a plain stone, witJiont 
 any inscription ; nor did hi.s brother-poets, at all exert 
 themselves on the occasion, as they liad lately done 
 for one w ho had been tlie terror of poets a!! his life- 
 time. This silence furnished matter to one of his 
 friends for an excellent satirical epigram, which we 
 are sorry we cannot give the reader. Only one 
 gentleman, Mr. Collins, v.ho had lived some time at 
 Richmond, but forsook it v\hcn Mr. Thomson died, 
 wrote an ode to his memory. This for the dirge-like 
 melancholy it breathes, and the warmth of affection 
 that seems to have dictated it, w'e shall subjoin to tl.e 
 present account. 
 
 Our author himself hints, somewhere in his works, 
 that his exterior W'as not the most promising : his 
 make being ratherrobust than graceful ; though it is 
 known that in his youth he had been thought hand- 
 some. His worst appearance was, wh.en j’ou saw him 
 walking alone, in a thoughtful mood : hut let a friend 
 accost him, and enter into conversation, he would in- 
 stantly brighten into a most amiable aspect, hi.s fea- 
 tures no longer the same, and his eye darting a pe- 
 culiar animated fire. The case was much alike in 
 company ; w here, if it was mixed, or verj'^ numerous, 
 he made but an imUflerent figure : but with a few 
 
20 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 «elect iVieuds, he was open sprightly, and entertain- 
 ing. His wit flowed freely, but pertinently, and at 
 due intervals, leaving room for every one to contri- 
 bute his share. Such was his extreme sensibility, so 
 perfect the harmony of his organs with the senti- 
 ments of his mind, that his looks always announced, 
 and half expressed, what he was about to say ; and 
 hjs voice corresponded exactly to the manner and 
 degree in which he was affected. This sensibility 
 had one inconvenience attending it, that it rendered 
 him tile very worst reader of good poetry : a sonnet 
 or a copy of tame verses, he could manage pretty 
 well ; or even improve them in the reading; but a pas- 
 sage of Virgil, Milton, or Shakspeare, would some- 
 times quite oppress him, that you could hear little 
 else than some ill-articulated sounds, rising as from 
 the bottom of his breast. 
 
 He had improved his taste upon the best originals, 
 ancient and modern : but could not bear to write 
 what was not strictly his own, w liat had not more 
 immediately struck his imagination, or touched Ins 
 Heart : so that he is not in the least concerned in tluit 
 <juestion about the merit or demerit of imitators. 
 What he borrows from the ancients, lie gives us iti 
 an avowed faithful paraphrase or translation ; as we 
 see in a few passages taken from Virgil, and in that 
 beautiful picture from Pliny the elder, where the 
 course and gradual increase of the Nile are figured 
 by the stages of man’s life. 
 
 The autumn was his favourite season for poetical 
 composition, and the deep silence of the niglu, ihe 
 
MR. JAMES THOMSON. 
 
 21 
 
 time he commonly chose for such studies ; so that he 
 would often be heard walking- in his library, till near 
 morning-, humming- over, in his way, what he was to 
 correct and write out next day. 
 
 Th.e amusements of his leisure hours w'erc civil 
 and natural history, voyag-cs, and the relations of tra- 
 vellers, the most authentic he could procure: and, 
 had his situation favoured it, he would certainly 
 have excelled in gardening-, agriculture and every 
 rural improvement and exercise. Although he per- 
 formed on no instrument, he was passionately fond of 
 music, and would sometimes listen a full hour at his 
 window to the nightingales in Richmond Gardens. 
 While abroad he had been greatly delighted with the 
 regular Italian drama, such as Metastasio writes ; as 
 it is there heigthened by the charms of the best voices 
 and instruments ; and looked upon our theatrical 
 entertainments, as in one respect, naked and imper- 
 I'cct when comj)ared with the ancient, or with tiiose 
 of Italy ; wishing sometimes that a chorus, at least, 
 and a better recitative, could be introduced. 
 
 Nor was his taste less exquisite in the arts of paint 
 ing, sculpture, and architecture. In his travels he 
 had 'seen all the jnost celebrated monuments of an- 
 tiquity, and the best productions of modern art ; and 
 studied them so miiiutely, and with so true a judg- 
 ment, th.at in some of his descriptions, in the poem of 
 Liberty, we have tlie master-pieces there mentioned 
 })laced in a stronger light perhaps than if we saw 
 them w ith our eyes ; at least more justly delineated 
 than in any other account extant: so superior is a 
 
22 
 
 THE LIFE OF 
 
 natural taste of the grand and beautiful, to tlie tr^. 
 ditiona! lessons of a common virtuosi. His collection 
 of prints, and some drawings from the antique are 
 now in the possession of his friend Mr. Gray, of Rich- 
 mond 11 ii!. 
 
 As fur his nsore distinguishing qualities of mind and 
 lu'art, they are belter represented in his writings 
 ti'.an they can be by the pen of any biographer 
 Tliere, his love of mankind, of his country and 
 friends, his devotion to the Supreme Being, founded 
 on the most elevated and just conceptions of his ope 
 rations and providence, shine out in every page. So 
 unbounded was his tenderness of heart, that it took 
 in even the brute creation ; judge what it must have 
 been towards his own species. He is not indeed 
 Known, through his whole life, to have given any 
 person one moment’s pain, by his w ritings or other- 
 wise. He took no part in the [)oeticaI squabbles 
 which happened in his time ; and was respected and 
 left undisturbed by both sides. He w'ould even re- 
 fuse to take offence when he justly might ; by inter- 
 rupting ally personal story that was brought him, 
 w itii some jest, or some humorous apology for the 
 otTender. Nor was he ever seen ruhled or discom 
 posed, but when he read or heard of some flagrant 
 instance of injustice, oppression, or cruelty: then 
 indeed the strongest marks of horror and indignation 
 were vi-sibie in his countenance. 
 
 These amiable virtues, this divine temper of mind, 
 did not fail of their due reward. His friends loved 
 him with an enthusiastic ardour, and lamented bis 
 
MR. JAMES THOMSON 
 
 23 
 
 untimely fate in the manner that is still fresh in eve- 
 ry one’s memory; the best and greatest men of his 
 time honoured him with their friendship and protec- 
 tion ; the applause of the public attended every ap- 
 pearance he made ; the actors, of whom the more 
 eminent were his friends and admirers, grudging no 
 pains to do justice to his tragedies. At present, in- 
 deed, if we except Tancred, they are seldom called 
 for; the simplicity of his plots, and the models he 
 worked after, not suiting the reigning taste, nor the 
 impatience of an English theatre. They may h.ere- 
 after come to be in vogue ; but we hazard no con 
 jecture upon them, or upon any part of Mr. Tliotn 
 son’s works ; neitlier need tliey any defence or apo- 
 iogy, after the reception the}'^ have had at home, and 
 the foreign languages into which they have been 
 translated. We shall only say, that, to judge f; t):ri 
 the imitations of Ins manner, winch have been f 
 lowing him close from the very first publication of 
 Winter, he seems to have fixed no inconsiderable era 
 if the English poetry. 
 
ODE 
 
 ON THE 
 
 DEATH OF MR. THOMSON, 
 
 I 
 
 BY MR. COLLINS. 
 
 [The scene of the following stanzas is supposed to 
 lie on the Thames, near Richmond.] 
 
 In yonder grave a druid lies, 
 
 Where slowly winds the stealing wave : 
 
 The year’s best sweets shall duteous rise 
 , To deck its poet’s sylvan grave. 
 
 In yon deep bed of whispering reeds 
 His airy harp* shall now be laid, 
 
 That he whose heart in sorrow bleeds. 
 
 May love through life the soothing shade. 
 
 Then maids and youths shall linger here. 
 
 And while its sounds at distance s well. 
 
 Shall sadly seem, in Pity’s ear, 
 
 To hear the woodland pilgrim’s knell. 
 
 * The harp of .^olus, of which see a description 
 in the Castle of Indolence. 
 
ON THE DEATH OF MR. THOMSON. 
 
 Remembrance oft shall haunt the shore 
 
 When Thames in summer-wreaths is drest, 
 
 And oft suspend the dashing oar, 
 
 To bid his gentle spirit rest : 
 
 And oft as Ease and Health retire 
 To breezy lawn, or forest deep, 
 
 The friend shall view yon whitening spire% 
 
 And ’mid the varied landscape weep. 
 
 But thou, who ownest that earthy bed. 
 
 Ah ! what will every dirge avail ; 
 
 Or tears, which love and pity shed. 
 
 That mourn beneath the gliding sail? 
 
 Yet lives there one, whose heedless eye 
 
 Shall scorn thy pale shrine glimmering near ? 
 
 AVith him, sweet bard, may fancy die. 
 
 And joy desert the blooming year. 
 
 But thou, lorn stream, whose sullen tide 
 No sedge-crowned sisters now attend. 
 
 Now waft me from the green hill’s side 
 Whose cold turf hides the buried friend 
 
 And see ! the fairy valleys fade ; 
 
 Dun night has veiled the solemn view ; 
 
 Yet once agcUn, dear parted shade. 
 
 Meek Nature’s child, again adieu ! 
 
 Richmond Church 
 
ON THE DEATH OF MR. THOMSON 
 
 The genial meads assigned to bless 
 Thy life, shall mourn th}^ early doom : 
 Their hinds and shepherd-girls shall dress, 
 With simple hands, thy rural tomb. 
 
 Long, long, thy stone, and pointed clay, 
 Shall melt the musing Briton’s eyes ; 
 
 O ! vales, and wild woods, shall he say, 
 
 In yonder grave your druid lies. 
 
SPRfJVG. 
 
THE ARGUMENT, 
 
 The subject proposed. Inscribed to the Countess oj 
 Hertford. The season is described as it affects the 
 various parts of JVature, ascending from the lower 
 to the higher, with digressions arising from the 
 subject. Its influence on inanimate matter. On 
 vegetables. On brute animals. And last on man. 
 Concluding with a dissuasive from the wild and 
 irregular passion of love, opposed to that of a pure 
 and happy kind. 
 
SPRING 
 
 OOME, gentle Spring ! ethereal Mildness ! come 
 And from the bosom of yon dropping cloud, 
 
 While music wakes around, veil’d in a shower 
 Of shadowing roses, on our plains descend. 
 
 O Hertford, fitted or to shine in courts 
 With unaffected grace, or walk the plain 
 With innocence and meditation join’d 
 In soft assemblage, listen to my song, 
 
 Which thy own Season paints j when Nature all 
 Is blooming.and benevolent, like thee. 
 
 And see where surly Winter passes off, 
 
 Far to the north, and calls his ruffian blasts’ 
 
 His blasts obey, and quit the howling hill, 
 
 The shatter’d forest, and the ravag’d vale ; 
 
 While softer gales succeed, at whose kind touch, 
 Dissolving snows in livid torrents lost, 
 
 The mountains lift their green heads to the sky 
 
 As yet the trembling year is unconfirmed, 
 
 And Winter oft at eve resumes the breeze, 
 
 Cliills the pale morn, and bids his driving sleets 
 Deform the day delightless : so that scarce 
 Tlie bittern knows his time, with bill ingulf’d 
 To shake the sounding marsh ; or from the shore 
 'flio plovers when to scatter o’er the lieath, 
 c2 
 
30 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 And sing their wild notes to fhc listening waste. 
 
 At last from Aries rolls the bounteous sun, 
 
 And the bright Bull receives him. Then no more 
 Th’ expansive atmosphere is cramp’d with cold; 
 
 But, full of life and vivifying soul, 
 
 Lifts the light clouds sublime, and spreads tliern thin 
 I’leccy and white, o’er all-surrounding heaven. 
 
 Forth tly the tepid airs ! and, uncciinn’d, 
 Unbinding earth, the moving softness strays. 
 Joyous, th’ impatior.t husbandman perceives 
 llclenting Nature, and his lusty steers 
 Drives from their stalls, to wherethe vvell-us’d plough 
 Tiies in the furrow, loosen’d from the frost. 
 
 'riierc, unrefusing, to the harness’d yoke 
 They lend their shoulder, and begin their toil, 
 Cheer’d by the. simple song and soaring lark. 
 Meanwhile incumbent o'er the shining share 
 The master leans, removes the obstructing clay, 
 Winds the whole work, and sidelong lays the glebe 
 While thro’ the neighb’ring fields the sower .stalks, 
 With measur’d step ; and liberal throws the grain 
 Into the faithful bosom of the ground • 
 
 The harrow follows harsh, and shuts the scene. 
 
 Be gracious, Heaven ! for now laborious man 
 Has done his part. V"e fostering breezes, blow ! 
 
 Ye softening dews, ye tender showers, descend ! 
 
 And temper all, thou world-reviving suii, 
 
 Into the perfect year ! Nor ye who live 
 In luxury and ease, in pomp and pride, 
 
 'Hiink tliese lost themes unworthy of your car 
 Sucb themes as these the rural Maro sung 
 
SPRING. 
 
 33 
 
 To wide-imperial Rome in the full height 
 Of elegance and taste, by Greece refin'd. 
 
 In ancient times, the sacred plough employ’d 
 The kings, and awful fathers .of mankind : 
 
 And some, with whom compar’d, your insect tribes 
 Are but the beings of a summer’s day. 
 
 Have held the scale of empire, rul’d the storm 
 Of mighty war ; then, witli unwearied hand, 
 Disdaining little delicacies, seiz’d 
 The plough, and greatly independent liv’d. 
 
 Ye generous Britons, venerate the plough ! 
 
 And o’er your hills, and long vvithdrawirig^vales, 
 Let Autumn spread his treasures to tlie sun, 
 Luxuriant and unbounded: as tlie sea, 
 
 Far through his azure turbulent domain, 
 
 Your empire owns, and from a thousand shores 
 Wafts all the pomp of life into your ports; 
 
 So with superior boon may 3'Our rich soil, 
 Kxuberant, Nature’s better blessings pour 
 O’er every land ; the naked nations clothe ; 
 
 And be th’ exhaustless granary of a world. 
 
 Nor only through the lenient air, this change 
 Delicious breathes ; the penetrative sun, 
 
 His force deep darting to the dark retreat 
 Of vegetation, sets the steaming Power 
 At large, to wander o’er the vernant earth, 
 
 Jn various hues ; but chiefly thee, gay green ! 
 
 Thou smiling Nature’s universal robe! 
 
 Uiwte{l light and shade! wheie the sight dwcils 
 With growing strength, and ever-new delight 
 From the moist meadow to the wither’d hill, 
 
32 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Led by the breeze, the vivid verdure runs, 
 
 And swells, and deepens, to the cherish’d eye. 
 
 The hawthorn whitens } and the juicy groves 
 Put forth their buds, unfolding' by degrees, 
 
 Till the whole leafy forest stands display’d 
 In full luxuriance, to the sighing- gales , 
 
 Where the deer rustle through the twining brake, 
 And the birds sing conceal’d. At once array’d 
 In all the colours of the flushing year. 
 
 By Nature’s swift and secret working hand. 
 
 The garden glows, and fills the liberal air 
 With lavish fragrance ; while the promis’d fruit 
 Lies yet a little embryo, unperceiv’d, 
 
 Within its crimson folds. Now from the town, 
 
 Buried in smoke, and sleep, and noisome damps. 
 
 Oft let me wander o’er the dewy fields, [drops 
 
 Where freshness breathes, and dash the trembling 
 From the bent bush, as through the verdant maze 
 Of sweetbriar hedges I pursue my walk ; 
 
 Or taste the smell of dairy ; or ascend 
 Some eminence, Augusta, in thy plains. 
 
 And see the country, far diffus’d around. 
 
 One boundless blush, one white-empurpled shower 
 Of mingled blossoms} where the raptur’d eye 
 Hurries from joy to joy, and, hid beneath 
 The fair profusion, yellow Autumn spies : 
 
 II, brush’d from Russian wilds, a cutting gale 
 Rise not, and scatter from his humid wings 
 The clammy mildew } or, dry-blowing, breathe 
 Untimely frost } before whose baleful blast 
 'i’hc full-blown Spring through all her foliag" shrinks 
 
SPRING. 
 
 33 
 
 Joyless and dead, a wide-dejected waste. 
 
 For oft, engender’d by the hazy north, 
 
 Myriads on myriads, insect armies warp 
 Keen in the poison’d breeze; and wastefid eat, 
 Through buds and bark, into the blacken’d core, 
 Their eager way. A feeble race I yet oft 
 The sacred sons of vengeance ; on whose course 
 Corrosive Famine waits, and kills the year. 
 
 To check this plague, the skilful farmer chaff 
 And blazing straw, before his orchard burns 
 Till, all involv’d in smoke, the latent foe 
 From every cranny suffocated falls : 
 
 Or scatters o’er the blooms the pungent dust 
 Of pepper, fatal to the frosty tribe : 
 
 Or, when ih’ envenom’d leaf begins to curl, 
 
 With sprinkled water drowns them in their nest; 
 Nor, while they pick them up with busy bill. 
 
 The little trooping birds unwisely scares. 
 
 Be patient, swains ; these cruel seeming winds 
 Blow not in v'ain. Far hence they keep repress’d 
 Those deep’ning clouds on clouds, surcharg’d with 
 That o’er the vast Atlantic hither borne, [rain, 
 In endless train, w ould quench the summer-blaze, 
 x\nd, cheerless, drown the crude unripen’d year. 
 
 The north-east spends his rage ; he now shut up 
 Within his iron cave, the effusive south 
 Warms the wide air, and o’er the void of heaven 
 Breathes the big clouds w ith vernal showers distent. 
 At first a dusky wTeath they seem to rise, 
 
 Scarce staining ether ; but by swift degrees, 
 
 In heaps on heaps, the doubling vapour sails 
 
34 
 
 SPRING 
 
 Along the loaded sky , and mingling deep, 
 
 Sits on th’ horizon round a settled gloom ; 
 
 Not such as wintry-storms on mortals shed, 
 Oppressing life ; but lovely, gentle, kind, 
 
 Andftdl of every hope and every joy. 
 
 The wish of Nature. Gradual sinks the breeze 
 Into a perfect calm ; that not a breath 
 Is heard to quiver througli the closing woods, 
 
 Oi rustling turn the many-tvvinkiing leaves 
 Of aspin tall. Th’ uncurling floods, difius’d 
 In glassy breadth, seem through delusive lapse 
 Forgetful of their course. ’Tis silence all. 
 
 And pleasing expectation. Herds and flocks 
 Drop the dry sprig, and, mute-imploring, eye 
 The falling verdure. Husa’d in short suspense, 
 
 The plumy people streak their wings with oil, 
 
 To throw the lucid moisture trickling off. 
 
 And wait th’ approaching sign to strike, at once, 
 
 Into the general choir. E’en iiiountains, vales, 
 
 And forests seem, impatient, to demand 
 The promis’d sweetness. Man superior walks 
 Amid the glad creation, musing praise, 
 
 And looking lively gratitude. At last, 
 
 The clouds consign their treasures to the flelds ; 
 
 And, softly sliaking on the dimpled pool 
 Frelusive drops, let all tlieir moisture flow', 
 
 In large effusion, o’er the freshened world. 
 
 The stealing shower is scarce to patter heard. 
 
 By such as wander through the forest walks, 
 
 Beneath th’ umbrageous multitude of leaves. 
 
 But who can hold the shade, while Heaven descends 
 
SPRING 
 
 35 
 
 In universal bounty, shedding’ neros, 
 
 And fruits, and dowers, on Nature’s ample lap r 
 Swift Fancy fir’d, anticipates their growth ; 
 
 And, while the milky nutriment distils, 
 
 Beholds the kindling country colour round. 
 
 Thus all day long the full-distended clouds 
 Indulge their genial stores, and well-shovver’d ea^tli 
 Is deep enrich’d with vegetable life ; 
 
 Til!, in the western sky, the downward sun 
 Looks out, effulgent, from amid the flush 
 Of broken clouds, gay shifting to his beam. 
 
 The rapid radiance instantaneous strikes 
 
 Til’ illumin’d mountain through the forest streams. 
 
 Shakes on the floods, and in a yellow mist, 
 
 Far smoking o’er th’ interminable plain, 
 
 In twinkling myriads lights the dewy gems. 
 
 Moist, bright, and green, the landscape lauglisaromul ; 
 Full sw'ell the woods ; their every music wakesj 
 Mix’d in wild concert w ith the warbling brooks 
 Increas’d, the distant bleatings of the hills. 
 
 And hollovy lows responsive from the vales. 
 
 Whence blending all the sweeten’d zephyr springs 
 Meantime, refracted from yon eastern cloud, 
 Bestriding earth, the grand ethereal bow 
 Shoots up immense: and every hue unfolds, 
 la fair proportion running from the red, 
 
 To w here the violet fades into the sky. 
 
 Here, awful Newton ! the dissolving clouds 
 Form, fronting on the sun, thy showery prism ; 
 
 And to the sage-instructed eye unfold 
 ’The various twine of light, by thee disclos’d 
 
36 
 
 SPRINCf. 
 
 From the white mingling maze. Not so the boy ; 
 He wondering views the bright enchantment bend, 
 Delightful, o’er the radiant fields, and runs 
 To catch the falling glory ; but amaz’d 
 Beholds th’ amusive arch before him fly, 
 
 Then vanish quite away. Still night succeeds, 
 
 A soften’d shade, and saturated earth 
 Awaits the morning-beam, to give to ligiu, 
 
 Rais’d through ten thousand different plastic tubes. 
 The balmy treasures of the former day. 
 
 Then spring the living herbs, profusely wild. 
 
 O’er all the deep-green earth, beyond the power 
 Of botanists to number up their tribes : 
 
 Whether he steals along the lonely dale. 
 
 In silent search ; or through the forest, rank 
 With what the dull incurious weeds account, 
 
 Bursts his blind way ; or climbs the mountain rock, 
 Fir’d by the nodding verdure of its brow. 
 
 With such a liberal hand has Nature flung 
 Their seeds abroad, blown them about in winds, 
 Innumefous mixed them with the nursing mould. 
 The moistening current, and prolific rain. 
 
 But who their virtues can declare ? who pierce, 
 ^Vith vision pure, into these secret stores 
 Of health, and life, and joy ? The food of Man, 
 While yet he liv’d in innocence, and told 
 A length of golden years ; unflesh’d in blood, 
 
 A stranger to the savage arts of life, 
 
 Death, rapine, carnage, surfeit, and disease ; 
 
 The lord, and not the tyrant, of the world. 
 
 The first fresh dawn then wak’d the gladden’d race 
 
SPRING. 
 
 37 
 
 Of uncorrupted Man, nor blush’d to see 
 The sluggard sleep beneath its sacred beam , 
 
 For their light slumbers gently fum’d away ; 
 
 And up they rose as vigorous as the sun, 
 
 Or to the culture of the willing glebe, 
 
 Or to the cheerful tendance of the flock. 
 
 Meantime the song went round ; and dance and sport. 
 Wisdom and friendly talk, successive, stole 
 Their hours away : while in the rosy vale 
 Love breath’d his infant sighs, from anguish free. 
 And full replete with bliss } save the sweet pain, 
 That, inly thrilling, but exalts it more. 
 iNoryet injurious act, nor surly deed, 
 
 AVas known among those happy sons of heaven ; 
 
 For reason and benevolence were law. 
 
 Harmonious Nature too look’d smiling on ; 
 
 Clear shone the skies, cool’d with eternal gales, 
 
 And balmy spirit all. The youthful sun 
 Shot his best rays, and still the gracious clouds 
 Dropp’d fatness down ; as o’er the swelling mead, 
 The herds and flocks, commixing, play’d secure. 
 
 This when, emergent from the gloomy wood. 
 
 The glaring lion saw, his horrid heart 
 Was meekened, and he join’d his sullen joy ; 
 
 For music held the whole in perfect peace ; 
 
 Soft sigh’d the flute ; the tender voice was heard, 
 ^Varbling the varied heart ; the woodlands round 
 Apply’d their choir; and winds and waters flow’d 
 In consonance. Such were those prime of days. 
 
 But now those white unblemlsh’d manners, whence 
 'Fhc fabling poets took their golden ngo, 
 
 D 
 
38 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Are found no more amid these iron times, 
 
 These dregs of life ! now the distemper’d mind 
 Has lost chat concord of harmonious powders, 
 
 Which forms the soul of happiness ; and all 
 
 Is off the poise within : the passions all 
 
 Have burst their bounds ; and reason, half extinct, 
 
 Or impotent, or else approving, sees 
 
 Tlie foul disorder. Senseless, ancl deform’d, 
 
 Convulsive anger storms at large ; or pale, 
 
 And silent, settles into fell revenge. 
 
 Base envy withers at another’s joy. 
 
 And hates that excellence it cannot reach. 
 Desponding fear, of feeble fancies full, 
 
 Weak and unmanly, loosens every power. 
 
 E’en love itself is bitterness of soul, 
 
 A pensive anguish pining at the heart ; 
 
 Or, sunk to sordid interest, feels no more 
 That noble wish, that never-cloy’d desire. 
 
 Which, selfish joy disdaining, seeks alone 
 To bless the dearer object of its flame. 
 
 Hope sickens with extravagance ; and grief. 
 
 Of life impatient, into madness swells ; 
 
 Or in dead silence w^astes the weeping hours. 
 
 These, and a thousand mixt emotions more, 
 
 From ever-changing views of good and ill, 
 
 Form’d infinitely various, vex the mind 
 
 With endless storm : whence, deeply rankling, grows 
 
 The partial thought, a listless unconcern, 
 
 (^old, and averting from our neighbour’s good } 
 
 Then dark disgust, and hatred, winding wiles, 
 Cow'ard deceit, and ruffian violence ; 
 
SPRING. 
 
 it last, extinct each social feeling, fell 
 
 And joyless inhumanity pervades 
 
 And petrifies the heart. Nature disturbM 
 
 Is deem’d vindictive, to have chang’d her course. 
 
 Hence, in old dusky time, a deluge came : 
 
 Wlicn the dedp-clcft disparting orb, that arch’d 
 'j'lie central waters round, impetuous rush’d, 
 
 ■\Vith universal burst, into the gulf 
 
 And o’er the high-pil’d hills of fractur’d eartli 
 
 Wide dash’d the waves, in undulation vast ; 
 
 Till, from the centre to the streaming clouds, 
 
 A shoreless ocean tumbled round the globe. 
 
 The Seasons since have, with severer sway, 
 Oppress’d a broken world : the Winter keen 
 Shook forth his waste of snows ; and Summer shot 
 His pestilential heats. Great Spring, before, 
 GreenM all the year; and fruits and blossoms blush’d, 
 In social sweetness, on the self-same bough. 
 
 Pure was the temperate air; an even calm 
 Perpetual reign’d, save what the zephyrs bland 
 Breath'd o’er the blue expanse : for then nor stoims 
 Were taught to blow, nor hurricanes to rage ; 
 
 Sound slept the waters • no sulphureous glooms 
 Swell'd in the sky, and sent the lightning forth; 
 While sickly damps, and cold autumnal fogs, 
 
 Hung not, relaxing, on the springs of life. 
 
 But now, of turbid elements the sport, 
 
 From clear to cloudy tost, from hot to cold, 
 
 And dry to moist, with inward-eating change. 
 
 Our drooping da3i^s are dwindled down to nought, 
 Their period finish’d ere ’tis well begun. 
 
40 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 And yet the wholesome herb neglected dies ; 
 Though with the pure exhilarating soul 
 Of nutriment and health, and vital powers, 
 
 Beyond the search of art, ’tis copious blest. 
 
 For, with hot ravine fir’d, ensanguin’d Man 
 Is now become the lion of the plain. 
 
 And worse. The wolf, who from the nightly fold 
 Fierce drags the bleating prey, ne’er drunk her milk, 
 Nor wore her warming fleece : nor has the steer, 
 
 At whose strong chest the deadly tiger hangs, 
 
 E’er plough’d for him. They too are temper’d high, 
 With hunger stung and wild necessity, 
 
 Nor lodges pity in their shaggy breast. 
 
 But Man, w hom Nature form’d of milder clay, 
 
 V/ith every kind emotion in his heart. 
 
 And taught alone to weep ; while from her lap 
 She pours ten thousand delicacies, herbs. 
 
 And fruits, as numerous as the drops of rain, 
 
 Or beams that gave them birth : shall he, fair form ! 
 Who wears sweet smiles, and looks erect on heaven. 
 E’er stoop to mingle w ith the prowling herd. 
 
 And dip his tongue in gore ? The beast of prey, 
 Blood-stain’d, deserves to bleed ; b^tyou, ye flocks, 
 AVhat have ye done; ye peaceful people, what, 
 
 To merit death ? you, who have given us milk 
 In luscious streams, and lent us jmur own coat 
 Against the Winter’s cold ? And the plain ox. 
 
 That harmless, honest, guileless animal, 
 
 In what has he offended ? he, whose toil, 
 
 Patient and ever ready, clothes the land 
 With all the pomp of harvest ; shall he bleed, 
 
SPRING 
 
 41 
 
 And struggling groan beneath the cruel hands 
 E’en of the clown he feeds ? and that, perhaps, 
 
 To swell the riot of th’ autumnal feast, 
 
 VV’^on by his labour? Thus the feeling heart 
 Would tenderly suggest : but ’tis enough, 
 
 In this late age, adventurous, to have touch I 
 Light on the numbers of the Samian sage. 
 
 High Heaven forbids the bold presumptuous strain. 
 Whose wisest will has fix’d us in a state 
 That must not yet to pure perfection rise. 
 
 Now when the first foul torrent of the brooks, 
 Swell’dwith the vernal rains, is ebb’d away. 
 
 And whitening, down their mossy-tinctur’d stream 
 Descends the billowy foam : now is the time, 
 
 While yet (he dark -brown water aids the guile. 
 
 To tempt the trout. The well-dissembled fly, 
 
 The rod fine tapering with elastic spring. 
 
 Snatch’d from the hoary steed the floating line, 
 And all thy slender wat’ry stores prepare. 
 
 But let not on thy hook the tortur’d worm. 
 Convulsive, twist in agonizing folds ; 
 
 Which by rapacious hunger swallow’d deep, 
 
 Gives, as you tear it from the bleeding breast 
 Of the weak helpless uncomplaining wretch. 
 
 Harsh pain and horror to the tender hand. 
 
 When with his lively ray the potent sun 
 Has pierc’d the streams, and rous’d the finny race. 
 Then, issuing cheerful, to thy sport repair ; 
 
 C/hief should the western breezes curling play. 
 
 And light o’er ether bear the shadowy clouds. 
 
 High to their fount, this day, amid the hills, 
 
 D 2 
 
42 
 
 SPRING 
 
 And woodlands warbling- round, trace u]) the brooks 
 The next, pursue their rocky channel’d maze, 
 Down to the river, in whose ample wave 
 Their little naiads love to sport at large. 
 
 Just in the dubious point, where with the pool 
 Is mix’d the trembling stream, or where it boils 
 Around the stone, or from the hollow’d bank 
 Reverted plays in undulating flow, 
 
 There throv/, nicc-judging, the delusive fly ; 
 
 And as you lead it round in artful curve, 
 
 With eye attentive mark the springing game. 
 Straight as above the surface of the flood 
 Thev wanton rise, or urg’d by hunger leap, 
 
 Then fix, with gentle twitch, the barbed hook : 
 
 Some lightly tossing to the grassy bank, 
 
 And to the shelving shore slow^-dragging some, 
 IVith various hand proportion'd to their force. 
 
 If yet too young, and easily deceiv'd, 
 
 A worthless prey scarce bends your pliant rod, 
 Him, piteous of his jmuth, and the short space 
 He has enjoy’d the vital light of heaven, 
 
 Soft disengage, and back into the stream 
 j'he speckled captive throw'. But should you hur 
 From his dark haunt, beneath the tangled roots 
 Of pendent trees, the monarch of the brook, 
 Behooves you then to ply your finest art. 
 
 T^ong time he, following cautious, scans the fly ; 
 And oft attempts to seize it, but as oft 
 The dimpled water speaks his jealous fear. 
 
 At last, while haply o’er the shaded sun 
 I’asses a cloud, he desperate takes the death, 
 
SPRING. 
 
 43 
 
 With sullen plunge. At once he darts along, 
 Deep-struck, and runs out all the lengthened line ; 
 Then seeks the furthest ooze, the sheltering weed, 
 The cavern’d bank, his old secure abode ; 
 
 And flies aloft, and flounces round tlie pool, 
 Indignant of the guile. With yielding hand, 
 
 'Fhat feels him still, yet to his furious course 
 Gives way, you, now retiring, following now 
 Across the stream, exhaust his idle rage : 
 
 Till, floating broad upon his breathless side. 
 
 And to his fate abandon’d, to the shore 
 You gaily drag your unresisting prize. 
 
 Thus pass the temperate hours ; but when the sun 
 Shakes from his noonday throne thescatteringcloiids, 
 E’en shooting listless languor through the deeps , 
 Then seek the bank where flowering elders crowd ; 
 Where scattered wild the lily of the vale 
 Its balmy essence breathes ; where cowslips hang 
 The dewy head ; where purple violets lurk, 
 
 With ail the lowly children of the shade : 
 
 Or lie reclin’d beneath yon spreading ash. 
 
 Hung o’er the steep ; whence, borne on liquid wing, 
 The sounding culver shoots ; or where the hawk, 
 High, in the beetling cliff, his eyry builds. 
 
 There let the classic page thy fancy lead 
 Through rural scenes ; such as the Mantuan swain 
 Paints in the matchless harmony of song. 
 
 Or catch thyself the landscape, gliding swift 
 Athwart imagination’s vivid eye : 
 
 Or by the vocal woods and waters lull’d, 
 
 And lost in lonely musing ; in the dream, 
 
44 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Confus’d, of careless solitude, where mix 
 Ten thousand wandering images of things, 
 
 Sooth every gust of passion into peace ; 
 
 All but the swellings of the soften’d heart, 
 
 That waken, not disturb, the tranquil mind. 
 
 Behold yon breathing prospect bids the Muse 
 Throw all her beauty forth. But who can paint 
 I /ike Nature ? Can imagination boast, 
 
 #\mid Its gay creation, hues like hers ? 
 
 Or can it mix them with that matchless skill, 
 
 And lose them in each other, as appears 
 In every bud that blows ^ If fancy then 
 Unequal fails beneath the pleasing task, 
 
 Ah, what shall language do? Ah, where find words 
 Ting’d with so many colours, and whose power, 
 
 To life approaching, may perfume my lays 
 With that fine oil, those aromatic gales, 
 
 That inexhaustive flow continual round ? 
 
 Yet, though successless, will the toil delight. 
 
 Come then, ye virgins and ye youths, whose hearts 
 Have felt the raptures of refining love ; 
 
 And thou, Amanda, come, pride of my song ' 
 
 Form’d by the Graces, loveliness itself 1 
 Come with those downcast eyes, sedate and sweet, 
 Those looks demure, that deeply pierce the soul, 
 Where, w ith the light of thoughtful reason mix’d, 
 Shines lively fancy and the feeling heart : 
 
 Oh come ! and while the rosy-footed May 
 Steals blushing on, together let us tread 
 The morning dews, and gather in their prime 
 Fresh-blooming flowers, to grace thy braided hair, 
 
SPRING 
 
 4o 
 
 And thy lov’d bosom (hat improves their sweets. 
 See, where the winding- vale its lavish stores, 
 Irriguous, spreads. See, how the lily drinks 
 TIjc latent rill, scarce oozing through tlie grass, 
 
 Of growth luxuriant ; or the humid bank. 
 
 In fair profusion, decks. Long let us walk, 
 
 Where the breeze blows from yon extended field 
 Oi blossom’d beans. Arabia cannot boast 
 A fuller gale of joy, than, liberal, thence 
 Bi eaihes through the sense, and takes the ravish’d soul 
 Nor is the mead unworthy of thy foot. 
 
 Full of fresh verdure, and imnumber’d flowers. 
 
 The negligence of Nature, wide, and wild *, 
 
 W here, undisguis’d by mimic Art, she spreads 
 Unbounded beauty to the roving eye. 
 
 Here their delicious task the fervent bees. 
 
 In swarming millions, tend : around, athwart, 
 Through the soft air, the busy nations fly. 
 
 Cling to the bud, and with inserted tube. 
 
 Suck its pure essence, its ethereal soul ; 
 
 And oft, with bolder wing, they soaring dare 
 The »)urple heath, or where the wild thyme grows, 
 And yellow load them with the luscious spoil. 
 
 At length the finish’d garden to the view 
 its vistas opens, and its alleys green. 
 
 Snatch’d through the verdant maze, the hurried e}e 
 Distracted wanders ; now the bowery walk 
 Of covert close, where scarce a speck of day 
 f alls on the lengthen’d gloom, protracted sweeps 
 Now' meets the bending sky ; the river now 
 
46 
 
 SPRINb 
 
 Dimpling along, the breezy ruffled lake, 
 
 The forest darkening round, the glittering spire, 
 Th’ ethereal mountain, and the distant main. 
 
 But why so far excursive ? when at hand, 
 
 Along these blushing borders, bright with dew, 
 And in yon mingled wilderness of flowers, 
 
 Fair handed Spring unbosoms every grace ; 
 Throws out the snow-drop, and the crocus first 
 The daisy, primrose, violet darkly blue. 
 
 And polyanthus of unnumbered dyes ; 
 
 The yellow wall-flower, stain’d with iron brown 
 And lavish stock that scents the garden round : 
 From the soft wing of vernal breezes shed, 
 Anemonies ; auriculas, enrich’d 
 With shining meal o’er all their velvet leaves ; 
 
 And full ranunculas, of glowing red. 
 
 Then comes the tulip-race, where Beauty plays 
 Her idle freaks j from family diffus’d 
 To family, as flies the father-dust. 
 
 The varied colours run ; and, while they break 
 On the charm’d eye, th’ exulting florist marks. 
 With secret pride, the wonders of his hand. 
 
 No gradual bloom is w anting ; from the buJ, 
 First-born of Spring, to Summer’s musky tribes 
 Nor hyacinths, of purest virgin white, 
 
 Low-bent, and blushing inward ; nor jonquilles. 
 Of potent fragrance ; nor Narcissus fair, 
 
 As o’er the fabled fountain hanging still ; 
 
 Nor broad carnations, nor gay-spotted pinks ; 
 Nor, shower’d from every bush, the damask- rose. 
 
SPRING, 
 
 4 : 
 
 Infinite numbers, delicacies, smells, 
 
 With hues on hues expression cannot paint, 
 
 I'.he breath of Nature, and her endless bloom. 
 
 Hail, Source of Being ! Universal Soul 
 Of heaven and earth ! Essential Presence, hail ! 
 
 To Thee I bend the knee ; to Thee my thoughts. 
 Continual, climb ; who, with a master hand. 
 
 Hast the great whole into perfection touch’d. 
 
 By Thee the various vegetative tr ibes. 
 
 Wrapt in a filmy net, and clad with leaves. 
 
 Draw the live ether, and imbibe the dew : 
 
 By Tliee dispos’d into congenial soils, 
 
 Stands each attractive plant, and sucks, and swells 
 The juicy tide j a twining mass of tubes. 
 
 At Thy command the vernal sun awakes 
 The torpid sap, detruded to the root 
 By wintry winds ; that now in fluent dance, 
 
 And lively fermentation, mountirig, spreads 
 All this innumerous-coloured scene of things. 
 
 As rising from the vegetable world 
 My theme ascends, with equal wing ascend. 
 
 My panting Muse; and hark, how loud tiie woods 
 Invite you forth in all your gayest trin*. 
 
 Lend me your song, ye nightingales ! oh, pour 
 The mazy-running soul of melody 
 Into my varied verse ! while I deduce, 
 
 From the first note the hollow cuckoo sings, 
 
 The symphony of Spring, and touch a theme 
 Unknown to fame — tlie Passion of the Groves 
 
 When first the soul of love is sent abroad, 
 
 Warm through the vital air, and on the heart 
 
48 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Harmonious seizes, the ga.y troops begin, 
 
 In gallant thought, to plume the painted wing ; 
 
 And try again the long-forgotten strain. 
 
 At first faint-warbled. But no sooner grows 
 The soft infusion prevalent, and wide, 
 
 Than, all alive, at once their joy o’erflows 
 In music unconfin’d. Up springs the lark, 
 Shrill-voic’d, and loud, the messenger of morn , 
 Ere yet the shadows fiy, he mounted sings 
 Amid the dawning clouds, and from their haunts 
 Calls up the tuneful nations. Every copse 
 Depp tangled, tree irregular, and bush 
 Bending with dewy moisture, o’er the heads 
 Of the coy choristers that lodge within. 
 
 Are prodigal of harmony. The thrush 
 And woodlark, o’er the kind contending throng 
 Superior heard, run through the sweetest length 
 Of notes ; when listening Philomela deigns 
 To let them joy, and purposes, in thought 
 Elate, to make her night excel their day. 
 
 The black-bird whistles from the thorny brake ; 
 The mellow bullfinch answers from the grove ; 
 
 Nor are the linnets, o’er the flowering furze 
 Pour’d out profusely, silent. Join’d to these, 
 Innumerous songsters, in the freshening shade 
 Of new-sprung leaves, their modulations mix 
 Mellifluous. The jay, the rook, the daw. 
 
 And each harsh pipe, discordant heard alone. 
 
 Aid the full concert : while the stock-dove breatnes 
 A melancholy murmur through the whole. 
 
 ’Tis love creates their melody, and all 
 
SPRING. 
 
 4 ^^ 
 
 This waste of music is the voice of Jove ; 
 
 That e’en to birds and beasts, the tender arts 
 Of pleasing teaches. Hence the gloss nino 
 Try every winning way inventive love 
 Can dictate, and in courtship to their ma^es 
 Four forth their little souls. First wide ai OMud, 
 With distant awe, in airy ringsthey rove, 
 Endeavouring by a thousand tricks to catcii 
 The cunning, conscious, half-averted glance 
 Of their regardless charmer. Should she seem. 
 Softening, the least approvance to bestow, 
 
 Their colours burnish, and by hope inspir’d, 
 
 They brisk advance ; then, on a sudden struck, 
 Retire disorder’d ; then again approach ; 
 
 In fond rotation spread the spotted wing, 
 
 And shiver every feather with desire. 
 
 Connubial leagues agreed, to the deep woods 
 They haste away, all as their fancy leads, 
 Pleasure, or food, or secret safety promp.ts ; 
 
 That Nature’s great command may be obey’d • 
 Nor all the sweet sensations they perceive 
 Indulg’d in vain. Some to the holly-lu'dge 
 Nestling repair, and to the thicket some ; 
 
 Some to the rude protection of the thorn 
 Commit their feeble offspring : The cleft tree 
 Offers its kind concealment to a few , 
 
 Their food its insects, and its moss their nests. 
 Others apart far in the grassy dale. 
 
 Or roughening waste, their humble texture weave. 
 But most in woodland solitudes delight ; 
 
 In unfrequented glooms, or shaggy banks, 
 
 4 B 
 
50 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Steep, and divided by a babbling brook, 
 
 Whose murmurs sooth them all the live-long day, 
 When by kind duty fix’d. Among the roots 
 Of hazel, pendent o’er the plaintive stream. 
 
 They frame the first foundation of their domes j 
 Dry sprigs of trees, in artful fabric laid. 
 
 And bound with clay together. Now ’tis nought 
 But restless hurry through the busy air. 
 
 Beat by unnumbered wings. The swallow sweeps 
 The slimy pool, to build his hanging house 
 Intent. And often, from the careless back 
 Of herds and flocks, a thousand tugging bills 
 Pluck hair and wool ; and oft, when unobserv’d, 
 Steal from the barn a straw : till soft and warm 
 Clean and complete, their habitation grows. 
 
 As thus the patient dam assiduous sits. 
 
 Not to be tempted from her tender task. 
 
 Or by sharp hunger, or by smooth delight. 
 
 Though the whole loosen’d Spring around her blows 
 Her sympathizing lover takes his stand 
 High on th’ opponent bank, and ceaseless sings 
 The tedious time away ; or else supplies 
 Her place a moment, while she sudden flits 
 To pick the scanty meal. Th’ appointed time 
 With pious toil fulfill’d, the callow young. 
 
 Warm’d and expanded into perfect life. 
 
 Their brittle bondage break ; and come to light, 
 
 A helpless family, demanding food 
 
 With constant clamour : 0 what passions then, 
 
 What melting sentiments of kindly care. 
 
 On the new parents seize I Away they fly 
 
SPRING. 
 
 51 
 
 Affectionate, and undesiring- bear 
 I’he most delicious morsel to their young ; 
 
 Which equally distributed, again 
 
 The search begins. E’en so a gentle pair, 
 
 By fortune sunk, but form’d of generous mould, 
 
 And charm’d with cares beyond the vulgar breast 
 In some lone cot amid the distant woods. 
 
 Sustain’d alone by providential Heaven ; 
 
 Oft, as they weeping eye their infant train, 
 
 Check their own appetites, and give them all. 
 
 Nor toil alone they scorn : Exalting love. 
 
 By the great Father of the Spring inspir’d, 
 
 Gives instant courage to the fearful race. 
 
 And to the simple, art. With stealthy wing, 
 
 Should some rude foot their woody haunts molest, 
 Amid a neighbouring bush they silent drop, 
 
 And whirring thence, as if alarm’d, deceive 
 Th’ unfeeling school-boy. Hence around the head 
 Of wandering swain, the white-wing’d plover wheels 
 Her sounding flight ; and then directly on 
 in long excursion skims the level lawn. 
 
 To tempt him from her nest. The wild-duck, hence, 
 O’er the rough moss, and o’er the trackless waste j *2 
 The heath-hen flutters, pious fraud ! to lead / ^ 
 The hot pursuing spaniel far astray. 
 
 Be not the muse asham’d here to bemoan ^ 
 
 Her brothers of the grove, by tyrant Man 
 inhuman caught, and in the narrow cage ^ 
 
 From liberty confin’d, and boundless air. 
 
 Dull are the pretty slaves, their plumage dull, , >• 
 Bagged, and all its brightening lustre 
 
SPRING 
 
 0‘i 
 
 iNoj is that sprightly wildness in their notes, 
 
 Which, clear and vigorous, warbles from the beech. 
 O then, ye friends of love and love-taught song, 
 Spare the soft tribes, this barbarous art forbear ; 
 
 If on your bosom innocence can win, 
 
 Music engage, or piety persuade. 
 
 But let not chief the nightingale lament 
 Her ruin’d care, too delicately fram’d 
 To brook the harsh confinement of the cage. 
 
 Oft when, returning with her loaded bill, 
 
 Th’ astonish’d mother finds a vacant nest, 
 
 By the hard hand of unrelenting clowns 
 Robb’d, to the ground the vain provision falls 
 Her pinions rufile, and, low-drooping, scarce 
 Can bear the mourner to the poplar shade ; 
 
 Where, all abandon’d to despair, she sings 
 
 Her sorrows through the night ; and on the bough. 
 
 Sole-sitting, still at every dying fall 
 
 Takes up again her lamentable strain 
 
 Of winding wo ; till, wide around, the woods 
 
 Sigh to her song, and with her wail resound. 
 
 But now the feather’d youth their former bounds, 
 Ardent, disdain ; and, weighing oft their wings, 
 Demand the free possession of the sky : 
 
 This one glad ofiice more, and then dissolves 
 Parental love at once, now needless grown. 
 
 Unlavish Wisdom never works in vain. 
 
 ’Tis on some evening, sunny, grateful, mild, 
 
 When nought but balm is breathing thro’ the woods, 
 With yellow lustre bright, that the new tribes 
 Visit the spacious heavens, and look abroad 
 
SPRING, 
 
 63 
 
 On Nature’s common, far as they can see, 
 
 Or wing-, their range and pasture. O’er the boughs 
 Dancing about, still at the giddy verge 
 Their resolution fails ; their pinions still, 
 
 In loose libration stretch’d, to trust the void 
 Tremfding refuse : Till dowm before them fly 
 The parent guides, and chide, exhort, command. 
 
 Or push them off. The surging air receives 
 Its pli^my burden ; and their self-taught wings 
 Winnow the waving element. On ground 
 Alighted- bolder up again they lead, 
 
 Further attd further on, the lengthening flight ; 
 
 I'ill vanish’d every fear, and every power 
 Rous’d into life and action, light in air 
 Th’ acquitted parent see their soaring race, 
 
 4nd, once rejoicing, never know them more 
 
 High from the summit of a craggy cliff, 
 
 Ilun-g o’er the deep, such as amazing frowns 
 On utmost Kilda’s* shore ; whose lonely race 
 Resign the setting sun to Indian worlds. 
 
 The royal eagle draws his vigorous young, 
 Slrong-poLinc’d, and ardent with parental fire; 
 
 Now fit to raise a kingdom of their own. 
 
 He drives them from his fort, the towering seat, 
 
 For ages, of his empire ; which, in peace. 
 
 Unstain’d he holds, while many a league to sea 
 He wings his course, and preys in distant isles. 
 
 Should I my steps turn to the rural seat, 
 
 Whose lofty elms, and venerable oaks, 
 
 * Tlie furthest of the ivestern islands of Scvllnna. 
 
 £ 2 
 
64 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Invite the rook, who high amid the boughs, 
 
 In early Spring, his airy city builds, 
 
 And ceaseless caws amusive ; there, well-pleas’d, 
 
 I might the various polity survey 
 
 Of the niixt household kind. The careful hen 
 
 Calls all her chirping family around, 
 
 F ed and defended by the fearless cock ; 
 
 Whose breast with ardour flames, as on he walks. 
 Graceful, and crows defiance. In the pond, 
 
 The finely-checker’d duck, before her train. 
 
 Rows garrulous. The stately-sailing swan 
 Gives out his snowy plumage to the gale ; 
 
 And, arching proud his neck, with oary feet 
 Bears forward fierce, and guards his osier-isle, 
 Protective of his young. The turkey nigh, 
 Loud-threatening,reddens; while the peacock spreads 
 His every-colour’d glory to the sim. 
 
 And swims in radiant majesty along. 
 
 O’er the whole homely scene, the cooing dove 
 Flies thick in amorous chase, and wanton rolls 
 The glanceing eye, and turns the changeful neck. 
 
 While thus the gentle tenants of the shade 
 Indulge their })urer loves, the rougher world 
 Of brutes, below, rush furious into flame. 
 
 And fierce desire. Through all his lusty veins 
 The bull, deep-scorch’d, the raging passion feels. 
 
 Of pasture sick, and negligent of food. 
 
 Scarce seen, he wades among the yellow broom. 
 While o’er his ample sides the rambling sprays 
 Luxuriant shoot ; or through the mazy wood 
 Dejected wanders ; nor th’ enticing bud 
 
SPRING. 
 
 Crops, though it presses on his careless sense. 
 
 Aud oft, in jealous madd’ning fancy wrapt, 
 
 He seeks the fight; and idly-butting feigns 
 His rival gor’d in every knotty trunk. 
 
 Him should he meet, the bellowing war begins : 
 Their eyes flash fury ; to the hollow’d earth 
 Whence the sand flies, they mutter bloody deeds, 
 And groaning deep, the impetuous battle mix * 
 
 While the fair heifer, balmy-breathing, near. 
 
 Stands kindling up their rage. The trembling steed, 
 With this hot impulse seized in every nerve, 
 
 Xor heeds the rein, nor hears the sounding thong : 
 Blows are not felt ; but tossing high his head. 
 
 And by the well-known joy to distant plains 
 Attracted strong, all wild he bursts away ; 
 
 O’er rocks, and woods, and craggy mountains flies ; 
 And, neighing, on tli’ aerial summit takes 
 Th’ exciting gale ; then, steep- descending, cleaves 
 The headlong torrents foaming down the hills, 
 
 K’en where the madness of the straiten’d stream 
 Turns in black eddies round : such is the force 
 With which his frantic heart and sinews swell. 
 
 Nor undelighted by the boundless Spring 
 Are the broad monsters of the foaming deep*. 
 
 From the deep ooze and gelid cavern rous’d, 
 
 They flounce and tumble in unw ieldy joy. 
 
 Dire were the strain, and dissonant, to sing 
 The cruel raptures of the savage kind : 
 
 How by this flame their native wrath sublim’d, 
 
 They roam, amid the fury of their heart, ^ 
 
 The far-resounding w aste in fiercer bands, ( 
 
56 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 And growl their horrid loves. But this the theme 
 } sing, enraptur’d, to the British fair, 
 
 Forbids, and leads me to the mountain -brow, 
 
 Where sits the shepherd on the grassy turf 
 Inhaling, hcathful, the descending sun. 
 
 Around him feeds his many-bleating flock, 
 
 Of various cadence ; and his sportive lambs, 
 
 ! This way and tnat convolv’d, in friskful glee, 
 
 ■ Their frolics play. And now the sprightly race 
 Invites them forth ; when swift, the signal given. 
 They start away, and sweep the mossy mound 
 That runs around the hill ; the rampart once 
 Of iron war, in ancient barbarous times, 
 
 When disunited Britain ever bled. 
 
 Lost in eternal broil : ere yet she grew 
 To this deep-laid indissoluble state, 
 
 ^Vhere Wealth and Commerce lift their golden heads} 
 And o’er our labours. Liberty and Law, 
 impartial, watch ; the wonder of a world ! 
 
 What is this mighty breath, ye sages, say, 
 
 That, in a powerful language, felt, not heard. 
 Instructs the fowls of heaven I and through their breast 
 These arts of love diflfuses ? What, but God ! 
 Inspiring God ! who, boundless Spirit all. 
 
 And unremitting Energy, pervades. 
 
 Adjusts, sustains, and agitates the whole. 
 
 He ceaseless works alone; and yet alone 
 Seems not to work : With such perfection fram’d 
 h this complex stupendous scheme of things. 
 
 But, though conceaTd, to every purer eye 
 Tli’ informing Author in his works appears 
 
SPRING. 
 
 57 
 
 Chief, lovely Spring ! in thee, and thy soft scenes. 
 The Smiling God is seen ; while water, earth, 
 
 And air attest his bounty ; which exalts 
 The brute creation to this finer thought. 
 
 And annual melts their undesigning hearts 
 Profusely thus in tenderness and joy. ,, 
 
 Still let my song a nobler note assume. 
 
 And sing tli’ infusive force of Spring on man ; 
 
 ^Vhen heaven and earth, as if contending, vie 
 To raise his being, and serene his soul. 
 
 Can he forbear to join the general smile 
 Of Nature ? Can fierce passions vex his breast 
 While every gale is peace, and every grove 
 Is melody ? hence 1 from the bounteous walks 
 Of flowing Spring, ye sordid sons of earth. 
 
 Hard, and unfeeling of another’s wo ; 
 
 Or only lavish to yourselves ; away ! 
 
 But come, ye generous minds, in whose wide thought, 
 Of all his works, creative Bounty burns 
 With warmest beam ; and on your open front 
 And liberal eye, sits, from his dark retreat 
 Inviting modest Want. Nor, till invok’d. 
 
 Can restless goodness wait : your active search 
 Leaves no cold wintry corner unexplor’d ; 
 liike silent-working Heaven, surprising oft 
 The lonely heart with unexpected good. 
 
 For you the roving spirit of the wind 
 Blows Spring abroad ; for you the teeming clouds 
 Descend in gladsome plenty o’er the world } 
 
 And the sun sheds his kindest rays for you, 
 
 Vc flower of human race ! In these green days. 
 
68 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Reviving Sickness lifts her languid head ; 
 
 Life flows afresh ; and young-eyed Health exalts 
 The whole creation round. Contentment walks 
 The sunny glade, and feels an inward bliss 
 Spring o’er his mind, beyond the power of kings 
 To purchase. Pure serenity' apace 
 Induces thought and contemplation still 
 By swift degrees the love of Nature works 
 And warms the bosom j till at last sublim’d 
 To rapture, and enthusiastic heat. 
 
 We feel the present Deity, and taste 
 The joy of God to see a happy world ! 
 
 These are the sacred feelings of thy heart. 
 
 Thy heart inform’d by reason’s purer ray, 
 
 O Lyttelton, the friend! thy passions thus 
 And meditations vary, as at large. 
 
 Courting the Muse, thro’ Hagly Park thou stray ’st ; 
 Thy British Tempe 1 there along the dale. 
 
 With woods o’er-hung,and shagg’d w ith mossy rocki, 
 Whence on each hand the gushing w'aters play. 
 
 And down the rough cascade white-dashing fall, 
 
 Or gleam in lengthen’d vista through the trees. 
 
 You silent steal ; or sit beneath the shade 
 Of solemn oaks, that tuft the swelling mounts 
 Thrown graceful round by Nature’s careless hand 
 And pensive listen to the various voice 
 Of rural peace. The herds and flocks, the birds, 
 The hollow-whispering breeze, the plaint of rills. 
 That, purling down amid the twisted roots 
 Which creep around, their dewy murmurs shake 
 On the sooth’d ear. From these abstracted oft, 
 
SPRING. 
 
 You wander through the philosophic world ; 
 
 Where in bright train continual wonders rise, 
 
 Or to the curious or the pious eye. 
 
 And oft, conducted by historic truth, 
 
 You tread the long extent of backward time ; 
 Planning, with warm benevolence of mind, 
 
 And honest zeal unwarp’d by party rage, 
 i Britannia s weal; how from the venal gulf 
 j To raise her virtue, and her arts revive. 
 
 Or, turning thence thy view, these graver thoughts 
 ' The Muses charm : While, with sure taste refin’d, 
 
 , You draw the inspiring breath of ancient song ; 
 
 Till nobly rises, emulous, thy own. 
 
 Perhaps thy lov’d Lucinda shares thy walk, 
 
 With soul to thine attun’d. Then Nature all 
 Wears to the lover’s eye a look oflove ; 
 
 And all the tumult of a guilty world. 
 
 Tost by ungenerous passions, sinks away 
 The tender heart is animated peace ; 
 
 And as it pours its copious treasures fortn, 
 
 In varied converse, softening every theme. 
 
 You, frequent pausing, turn, and from her eyer, 
 ^Vhere meeken’d sense, and amiable grace, 
 
 And lively sweetness dwell, enraptur’d, drink 
 That nameless spirit of ethereal joy, 
 
 Unutterable happiness ! which love 
 Alone bestows, and on a favour’d few. 
 
 Meantime you gain the height, from whose fair brow 
 The bursting prospect spreads immense around ; 
 
 And snatch’d o’er hill and dale, and wood and lawn 
 And verdant field, and darkening heath between 
 
m 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 And villages embosom’d soft in trees, 
 
 And spiry towns by surging columns mark’d 
 Of household smoke, your eye excursive roams : 
 Wide-stretching from the hall, in whose kind haunt 
 The hospitable Genius lingers still. 
 
 To where the broken landscape, by degrees. 
 Ascending, roughens into rigid hills j 
 O’er which the Cambrian mountains, like far clouds 
 That skirt the blue horizon, dusky rise. 
 
 Flush’d by the spirit of the genial year, 
 
 Now from the virgin’s cheek a fresher bloom 
 Slioots, less and less, the live carnation round ; 
 
 Her lips blush deeper sweets; she breathes of youth ; 
 The shining moisture swells into her eyes. 
 
 In brighter flow ; her wishing bosom heaves, 
 
 With palpitations wild ; kind tumults seize 
 Her veins, and all her yielding soul is love. 
 
 F rom the keen gaze her lover turns away, 
 
 Full of the dear ecstatic power, and sick 
 With sighing languishment. Ah then, ye fair ! 
 
 Be greatly cautious of your sliding hearts : 
 
 Dare not th’ infectious sigh ; the pleading look, 
 Downcast, and low, in meek submission drest. 
 
 But full of guile. Let not the fervent tongue, 
 Prompt to deceive, with adulation smooth, 
 
 Gain on your purpos’d will. Nor in the bower, 
 Where woodbines flaunt, and roses shed a couch. 
 While Evening draws her crimson curtains round. 
 Trust your soft minutes with betraying Man. 
 
 And let th’ aspiring youth beware of love. 
 
 Of the smooth glance beware ; for ’tis too late. 
 
SPRING. 
 
 61 
 
 When on his heart the torrent softness pours ; 
 
 Then wisdom prostrate lies, and fading- fame 
 Dissolves in air away ; wliile the fond soul, 
 
 Wrapt in gay visions of unreal bliss, 
 
 Still paints the illusive form ; the kindling grace; 
 Th’ enticing smile ; the modest-seeming eye, 
 Beneath whose beauteous beams, belying heaven, 
 Lurks searchless cunning, cruelty, and death : 
 
 And still false-warbling in his cheated ear. 
 
 Her siren-voice, enchanting, draws him on 
 To guileful shores, and meads of fatal joy. 
 
 E'en present, in the very lap of love 
 Inglorious laid ; while music flows around, 
 Perfumes, and oils, and wine, and wanton hours ; 
 Amid the roses fierce repentance rears 
 Her snaky crest : a quick-returning pang 
 Shoots thro’ the conscious heart ; where honour still, 
 And great design, against th’ oppressive load 
 Ot luxury, by fits, impatient heave. 
 
 But absent, what fantastic woes, arous’d, 
 
 Rage in each thought, by restless musing fed, . 
 
 Chill the warm cheek, and blast the bloom of life 
 Neglected fortune flies ; and sliding swift, 
 
 Prone into ruin, fall his scorn’d affairs. 
 
 ’Tis nought but gloom around : The darken’d sun 
 Loses his light ; The rosy bosom’d Spring 
 To weeping Fancy pines ; and yon bright arch, 
 
 Coi eracted, bends into a dusky vault. 
 
 All Nature fades extinct ; and she alone 
 Hesjrd, felt, and seen, possesses every thought, 
 
 Fills every sense, and pants in every vein. 
 
 F 
 
02 
 
 SPRING 
 
 Books are but formal dulness, tedious friends ; 
 And sad amid the social band he sits, 
 
 Lonely, and unattentive. F rom his tongue 
 Th’ unfinish’d period falls : while, borne away 
 On swelling thought, his wafted spirit flies 
 To the vain bosom of his distant fair ; 
 
 And leaves the semblance of a lover, fix’d 
 In melancholy site, with head declin’d. 
 
 And love-dejected eyes. Sudden he starts. 
 
 Shook from his tender trance, and restless runs 
 To glimmering shades, and sympathetic glooms ' 
 Where the dun umbrage o’er the falling stream, 
 Romantic, hangs ; there through the pensive dusk 
 Strays, in heart-thrilling meditation lost, 
 Indulging all to love : Or on the bank 
 Thrown, amid drooping lilies, swells the breeze 
 With sighs unceasing, and the brook with tears. 
 
 Thus in soft anguish he consumes the day. 
 
 Nor quits his deep retirement, till the Moon 
 Peeps through the chambers of the fleecy east, 
 Enlightened by degrees, and in her train 
 Leads on the gentle hours ; then forth he walks 
 Beneath the trembling languish of her beam. 
 
 With soften’d soul, and woos the bird of eve 
 To mingle woes with his : « r, while the world 
 And all the sons of Care lie hush’d in sleep, 
 Associates with the midnight shadows drear ; 
 
 And, sighing to the lonely taper, pours 
 His idly tortur’d heart into the page. 
 
 Meant for the moving messenger of love ; 
 
 Where rapture burns on rapture, every line 
 
SPRING. 
 
 63 
 
 With rising frenzy fir’d. But if an bed 
 Delirious flung, sleep from his pillow flies 
 All night he tosses, nor the balmy power 
 In any posture finds ; till the gray Morn 
 Lifts her pale lustre on the paler wretch. 
 Exanimate by love ; and then perhaps 
 Exhausted Nature sinks awhile to rest , 
 
 Still interrupted by distracted dreams, 
 
 That o’er the sick imagination rise. 
 
 And in black colours paint the mimic scene. 
 
 Oft with the enchantress of his soul he talks 
 Sometimes in crowds distress’d ; or if retir’d 
 To secret winding flower-enwoven bowers. 
 
 Far from the dull impertinence of Man ; 
 
 Just as he, credulous, his endless cares 
 Begins to lose in blind oblivious love, 
 
 Snatch’d from her yielded hand, he knows not how 
 Through forests huge, and long untravell’d heaths 
 With desolation brown, he wanders waste, 
 
 In night and tempest wrapt ; or shrinks aghast. 
 Back, from the bending precipice ; or wades 
 The turbid stream below, and strives to reach 
 The further shore ; where succourless and sad. 
 
 She w ith extended arms his aid implores ; 
 
 But strives in vain : borne by th’ outrageous flood 
 To distance down, he rides the ridgy wave. 
 
 Or whelm’d beneath the boiling eddv sinks. 
 
 These are the charming agonies of love, 
 
 Whose misery delights. But though the heart 
 Shouldjealousy its venom once diffuse, 
 
 ’ i is then delightful miserv no more ; 
 
64 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 But agony unmix’d, incessant gall, 
 
 Corroding every thought, and blasting all 
 Love’s paradise. Ye fairy prospects then 
 Ye beds of roses, and ye bowers of joy, 
 
 Farewell ! ye gleamings of departed peace, 
 
 Shine out your last ! the yellow-tinging plague 
 internal vision taints, and in a night 
 Of livid gloom imagination wraps. 
 
 Ah then, instead of love-enliven’d cheeks, 
 
 Of sunny features, and of ardent eve«5 
 
 With flowing rapture bright, dark looks succeed, 
 
 Suffus’d and glaring with untender Are ; 
 
 A clouded aspect and a burning clieek, 
 
 Where the whole poison’d soul malignant sits. 
 
 And frightens love away. Ten thousand fears 
 Invented wild, ten thousand frantic views 
 Of horrid rivals, hanging on the charms 
 For which he melts in fondness, eat him up 
 With fervent anguish, and consuming rage. 
 
 In vain reproaches lend their idle aid, 
 
 Deceitful pride, and resolution frail, 
 
 Giving false peace a moment. Fancy pours, 
 Afresh her beauties on his busy thought, 
 
 Her first endearments twining round the soul, 
 
 With all the witchcraft of ensnaring love. 
 
 Straight the fierce storm involves his mind anew , 
 Flames through the nerves, and boils along the veins 
 While anxious doubt distracts the tortur’d heart : 
 For e’en the sad assurance of his fears 
 Were ease to w'hat he feels. Thus the warm youth 
 Whom love deludes into his thorny wilds, 
 
SPRING. 
 
 o5 
 
 llirough flowery-temptirig paths, or leads a life 
 Of fever’d rapture, or of cruel care ; 
 
 His brightest flames extinguish’d all, and all 
 His lively moments running down to waste. 
 
 But happy they ! the happiest of their kind ! 
 Whom gentler stars unite ; and in one fate 
 Their hearts, their fortunes, and their being blend. 
 ’Tis not the coarser tie of human laws, 
 
 Unnatural oft, and foreign to the mind. 
 
 That binds their peace, but harmony itself, 
 
 Attuning all their passions into love ; 
 
 Where friendship full exerts her softest power. 
 Perfect esteem enlivened by desire 
 Ineffable, and sympathy of soul ; 
 
 Thought meeting thought, and will preventing will, 
 With boundless confidence : For nought but love 
 Can answer love, and render bliss secure. 
 
 Let him, ungenerous, who, alone intent 
 To bless himself, from sordid parents buys 
 The loathing virgin, in eternal care 
 Well-merited, consume his nights and days ; 
 
 Let barbarous nations, whose inhuman love 
 Is wild desire, fierce as the suns they feel ; 
 
 Let eastern tyrants from the light of heaven 
 Seclude their bosom-slaves, meanly possess’d 
 Of a mere lifeless, violated form ; 
 
 While those whom love cements in holy faith 
 And equal transport, free as Nature live. 
 
 Disdaining fear. What is the world to them ? 
 
 Its pomp, its pleasure, and its nonsense all, 
 
 Who in each other clasp whatever fair 
 5 F 2 
 
^ SPRING. 
 
 Hig’h fancy forms, and lavish hearts can wish ; 
 Something than beauty dearer, should they look 
 Or on the mind, or mind-illumin*d face ; 
 
 Truth, goodness, honour, harmony, and love, 
 The richest bounty of indulgent heaven ? 
 Meantime a smiling oifspring rises round. 
 
 And mingles both their graces. By degrees, 
 The human blossom blows ; and every day, 
 
 Soft as it rolls along, sliows some new charm, 
 The father^s lustre, and the mother’s bloom. 
 Then infant reason grows apace, and calls 
 For the kind hand of an assiduous care. 
 
 Delightful task ! to rear the tender thouglit. 
 To teach the young idea how to shoot. 
 
 To pour the fresh instruction o’er the mind, 
 
 To breathe th’ enlivening spirit, and to fix 
 1 he generous purpose in the glov/ing breast. 
 
 Oh, speak the joy I ye, whom the sudden tear 
 Surprises often, while you look around. 
 
 And nothing strikes your eye but sights of bliss, 
 All various Nature pressing on the heart; 
 
 An elegant sufficiency, content, 
 
 Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books, 
 
 Ease and alternate labour, useful life, 
 Progressive virtue, and approving Heaven ! 
 
 These are the matchless joys of virtuous love ; 
 And thus their moments fly. The Seasons thus, 
 As ceaseless round a jarring world they roll. 
 Still find them happy ; and consenting Spring 
 Sheds her own rosy garland on their heads : 
 
 Till evening comes at last, serene and mild * 
 
SPRING. 
 
 When after the long vernal day of life, 
 Enamour’d more, as more remembrance swells 
 With many a proof of recollected love, 
 Togetiier down they sink in social sleep ; 
 Together freed, their gentle spirits fly 
 To scenes where love and bliss inonortal reig® 
 
the seasons. 
 
 SUMMER- 
 
THE ARGUMENT, 
 
 The subject proposed. Invocation. Addrei^ to Mr 
 Dodington. An introductory reflection on the mo- 
 tion of the heavenly bodies : whence the succession oj 
 the seasons. As the face of JVature in this season is 
 almost uniform j the progress of the poem is a de- 
 scription of a summer's day. The daum. Sun- 
 rising. Hymn to the sun. Forenoon. Summer 
 insects described. Hay-making. Sheep-shearing. 
 JVoon-day. A woodland retreat. Group of herds 
 and flocks. A solemn grove : how it affects a con- 
 templative mind. A cataract^ and rude scene. 
 View of Summer in the torrid zone. Stoi'm of 
 thunder and lightning. A tale. The storm over, 
 n serene afternoon. Bathing. Hour of walking. 
 Transition to the prospect of a rich, well-cultivated 
 country ; which introduces a panegyric on Great 
 Britain. Sunset. Evening. JVight. Summe? 
 meteors. A comet. The whole concluding with 
 the praise of philosophy. 
 
SUMMER 
 
 Jb ROM brightening fields of ether fair disclos’d, 
 Child of the Sun, refulgent Summer comes, 
 hi pride of youth, and felt through Nature’s deptfc 
 He comes attended by the sultry hours, 
 
 And ever-fanning breezes, on his way ; 
 
 While, from his ardent look, the turning Spring 
 Averts her blushful face ; and earth, and skies, 
 ^ll-smiling, to his hot dominion leaves. 
 
 Hence let me haste into the mid-wood shade, 
 Where scarce a sun-beam wanders through the glooiv 
 And on the dark-green grass, beside the brink 
 Of haunted stream, that by the roots of oak 
 Rolls o’er the rocky channel, lie at large, 
 
 And sing the glories of the circling year. 
 
 Come, Inrpiration ! from thy herrnit-seat, 
 
 By mortal seldom found • may fancy dare, 
 
 From thy fix’d serious eye, and raptur’d glance 
 Shot on surrounding heaven, to steal one look 
 Creative of the Poet, every power 
 Exalting to an ecstacy of soul. 
 
 And thou, my youthful Muse’s early friend, 
 
 In whom the human graces all unite : 
 
 Pure light of mind, and tenderness of heart ; 
 Genius, and wisdom ; the gay social sense, 
 
72 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 By decency chastis’d ; goodness and wit, 
 
 In seldom meeting' harmony combin’d ; 
 
 U.iblemish’d honour, and an active zeal 
 For Britain’s glory, Liberty, and Man . 
 
 O Dodington ! attend my rural song-, 
 to my theme, inspirit every line, 
 
 And teach me to deserve thy just applause. 
 
 With what an awful world-revolving- power 
 ^Vere first the unwieldy planets launch’d along 
 i'll’ illimitable void ! Thus to remain. 
 
 Amid the flux of many thousand years, 
 i'hat oft has swept the toiling race of men, 
 
 And all their labour’d monuments, away, 
 
 Firm, unremitting, matchless, in their course ; 
 
 To the kind temper’d change of night and day, 
 
 And of the seasons ever stealing round. 
 
 Minutely faithful : such th’ All-perfect Hand . 
 
 That pois’d, impels, and rules the steady whole. 
 
 When now no more th’ alternate Twins are fir’d, 
 And Cancer reddens with the solar blaze, 
 r^^hort is the doubtful empire of the night ; 
 
 And soon observant of approaching day. 
 
 The meek-ey’d Morn appears, mother of dews. 
 
 At first faint gleaming in the dappled east : 
 
 Till far o'er ether spreads the widening glow ; 
 
 And, from before the lustre of her face, 
 
 AVliite break the clouds away. With quicken’d step, 
 Brown Night retires : young Day pours in apace 
 And opens all the lawny prospect wide. 
 
 The dripping rock, the mountain’s misty top 
 Swell on the sight, and brighten with the daw n. 
 

 73 
 
 Blue, through the dusk, the smoking currents shine ; 
 And from the bladed field the fearful hare 
 Limps, awkward : while along the forest-glade 
 The wild deer trip, and often turning gaze 
 At early passenger. Music awakes 
 The native voice of undissembled joy ; 
 
 And thick around the woodland hymns arise. 
 Roused by the cock, the soon-clad shepherd leaves 
 His mossy cottage, where with Peace he dwells ; 
 And from the crowded fold, in order, drives 
 His flock, to taste the verdure of the morn. 
 
 F alsely luxurious ! will not man awake ; 
 
 And, springing from the bed of sloth, enjoy 
 The cool, the fragrant, and the silent hour, 
 
 To meditation due and sacred song ? 
 
 f For is there aught in sleep can charm the wise ? 
 
 To lie in dead oblivion, losing half 
 The fleeting moments of too short a life ; 
 
 Total extinction of the enlighten’d soul ! 
 
 Or else to feverish vanity alive, 
 
 Wilder’d, and tossing through distemper’d dreams ^ 
 Who wouW in such a gloomy state remain 
 Longer than nature craves ; when every Muse 
 And every blooming pleasure wait without. 
 
 To bless the wildly devious morning walk ? 
 
 But yonder comes the powerful King of day, 
 Rejoicing in the east. The lessening cloud, 
 
 i The kindling azure, and the mountains brow 
 Illum’d with fluid gold, his near approach 
 Betoken glad. Lo ! now, apparent ail, 
 
 / Aslant the devv-bright earth, and colour’d air. 
 
74 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 He looks in boundless majesty abroad ; 
 
 And sheds the sinning- day, that burnish’d plays 
 On rocks and hills, and to\v’rs,and wand’ring streams, 
 High gleaming from afar. Prime cheerer, Light ! 
 Of all material beings first, and best I 
 Efflux divine ! Nature’s resplendent robe ! 
 
 Without whose vesting beauty all were wrapt 
 In unessential gloom ; and thou, 0 Sun ! 
 
 Soul of surrounding worlds ! in whom best seen 
 Shines out thy Maker ? may I sing of thee ? 
 
 ’Tis by thy secret, strong, attractive force. 
 
 As with a chaid indissoluble bound. 
 
 Thy system rolls entire : from the far bourne 
 Of utmost Saturn, wheeling wide his round 
 Of thirty years ; to Mercury, whose disk 
 Can scarce be caught by philosophic eye, 
 
 Lost in the near effulgence of thy blaze. 
 
 Informer of the planetary train ! 
 
 Without whose quick’ning glance their cumbrous orbs 
 Were brute unlovely mass, inert and dead. 
 
 And not, as now, the green abodes of life. 
 
 How many forms of being wait on thee, % 
 
 Inhaling spirit ! from the unfetter’d mind. 
 
 By thee sublim’d, down to the daily race. 
 
 The mixing myriads of thy setting beam. 
 
 The vegetable world is also thine. 
 
 Parent of Seasons ‘ who the pomp precede 
 That waits thy throne, as through thy vast domain, 
 Annual, along the bright ecliptic road. 
 
 In world-rejoicing state, it moves sublime. 
 r4eantime th’ expecting nations, circled gay 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 75 
 
 With all the various tribes of foodful earth, 
 
 Implore thy bounty, or send grateful up 
 A common hymn ; while, round thy beaming car, 
 High-seen, the Seasons lead, in sprightly dance 
 Harmonious knit, the rosy-finger’d Hours; 
 
 The Zephyrs floating loose ; the timely Rains ; 
 
 Of bloom ethereal the light-footed Dews ; 
 
 And soften’d into joy the surly Storms. 
 
 These, in successive turn, with lavish hand. 
 
 Shower every beauty, every fragrance shower. 
 Herbs, flowers, and fruits ; till, kindhng at thy touch 
 From land to land is flush’d the vernal year. 
 
 Nor to the surface of enliven’d earth. 
 
 Graceful with hills and dales, and leafy woods, 
 
 Her liberal tresses, is thy force confin’d : 
 
 But, to the bowel’d cavern darting deep. 
 
 The mineral kinds confess thy mighty power. 
 Effulgent, hence the veiny marble shines ; 
 
 Hence labour draws his tools ; hence burnish’d War 
 Gleams on the day ; the nobler works of Peace 
 Hence bl^s mankind ; and gen’rous Commerce binds 
 The round of nations in a golden chain. 
 
 Th’ unfruitful rock itself, impregn’d by thee. 
 
 In dark retirement forms the lucid stone. 
 
 The lively diamond drinks thy purest rays. 
 
 Collected light, compact ; that, polish’d bright, 
 
 And all its native lustre let abroad. 
 
 Dares, as it sparkles on the fair one’s breast, 
 
 With vain ambition emulate her eyes. 
 
 At thee the ruby lights its deepening glow, 
 
 A.nd with a waving radiance inward flames. 
 
76 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 From thee the sapphire, solid ether, takes 
 Its hue cerulean ; and, of evening tinct. 
 
 The purple-streaming amethyst is thiiie. 
 
 With thy own smile the yellow topaz burns. 
 
 Nor deeper verdure dyes the robe of Spring, 
 When first she gives it to the southern gale. 
 
 Than the green emerald shows. But, all combin’ 
 Thick through the whitening opal play thy beams 
 Or, flying several from its surface, form 
 A trembling variance of revolving hues, 
 
 As the site varies in the gazer’s hand. 
 
 The very dead creation, from thy touch. 
 Assumes a mimic life. By thee refin’d. 
 
 In brighter mazes the relucent stream 
 Plays o’er the mead. The precipice abrupt, 
 Projecting horror on the blacken’d flood. 
 
 Softens at thy return. The desert joys, 
 
 Wildly, through all his melancholy bounds. 
 
 Rude ruins glitter ; and the briny deep, 
 
 Sfe>en from some pointed promontory’s top, 
 
 F»r to the blue horizon’s utmost verge. 
 
 Restless, reflects a floating gleam. But this, 
 
 And all the much-transported Muse can sing, 
 
 Are I ) thy beauty, dignity, and use, 
 
 Uneqi al far ; great delegated source 
 Of light, and life, and grace, and joy below ! 
 
 How shall I then attempt to sing of Hiivi ’ 
 
 Who, Light Himself, in uncreated light 
 Invested deep, dwells awfully retir’d 
 From mortal eye, or angel’s purer ken ; 
 
 Whose single smile has, from the fit st of time, 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 77 
 
 Fill’d, overflowing, all those lamps of heaven 
 That beam for ever through the boundless sky : 
 
 But, should h€^ hide his face, th’ astonish’d sun, 
 
 And all the extinguish’d stars, would loosening reel 
 Wide from their spheres, and Chaos come again. 
 
 And yet was every faltering tongue of Man, 
 Almighty Father ! silent in thy praise ; 
 
 Thy Works themselves would raise a general voice, 
 E’en in the depth of solitary woods 
 By human foot untrod ; proclaim thy power. 
 
 And to the choir celestial Thee resound, 
 
 Th’ eternal cause, support, and end of all ! 
 
 To me be Nature’s volume broad-display’d ; 
 
 And to peruse its all-instructing page, 
 
 Or, haply catching inspiration thence. 
 
 Some easy passage, raptur’d to translate. 
 
 My sole delight ; as through the falling glooms 
 Pensive I stray, or with the rising dawn 
 On fancy’s eagle-wing excursive soar. 
 
 Now, flaming up the heavens, the potent sun 
 Melts into limpid air the high-rais’d clouds. 
 
 And morning fogs, that hover’d round the hills 
 In party coloured bands ; till wide unveil’d 
 The face of Nature shines, from where earth seems, 
 Far stretch’d around, to meet the bending sphere. 
 
 Half in a blush of clustering roses lost. 
 Dew-dropping Coolness to the shade retires ; 
 There, on the verdant turf, or flowery bed. 
 
 By gelid founts and careless rills to muse ; 
 
 W ljile tyrant Heat, dispreading through the sky, 
 
 G 2 
 
78 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 With rapid sway, his burning- influence darts 
 On man, and beast, and herb, and tepid stream. 
 
 Who can unpitying see the flowery race, 
 
 Shed by the morn, their new-flushed bloom resign, 
 Before the parching beam ? so fade the fair. 
 
 When fevers revel through their azure veins. 
 
 But one, the lofty follower of the sun. 
 
 Sad when he sets, shuts up her yellow leaves, 
 Drooping all night ; and, when he warm returns, 
 Points her enamour’d bosom to his ray. 
 
 Home from his morning task the swain retreats 
 His flock before him stepping to the fold : 
 
 While the full-udder’d mother lows around 
 The cheerful cottage, then expecting food, 
 
 The food of innocence and health ! The daw. 
 The rook, and magpie, to the gray-grown oaks 
 That the calm village in their verdant arras, 
 Sheltering, embrace, direct their lazy flight ; 
 Where on the mingling boughs they sit embower’d, 
 All the hot noon, till cooler hours arise. 
 
 Faint, underneath, the household fowls convene ; 
 And, in a corner of the buzzing shade, 
 
 The house-dog, with the vacant grayhound, lies, 
 Outstretch’d and sleepy. In his slumbers one 
 Attacks the nightly thief, and one exults 
 O’er hill and dale; till, waken’d by the wasp, 
 
 They starting snap. Nor shall the Muse disdain 
 
 To let the little noisy summer-race 
 
 Live in her lay, and flutter through her song : 
 
 Not mean though simple ; to the sun ally’d, 
 
 From him they draw' their animating fire. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 70 
 
 Wak’d by his warmer ray, the reptile young 
 Come wing’d abroad ; by the light air upborne, 
 Lighter, and full of soul. From every chink, 
 
 And secret corner, where they slept away 
 The wintry storms ; or rising from their tombs, 
 
 To higher life ; by myriads, forth at once, 
 
 Swarming they pour ; of all the varied lines 
 Their beauty-beaming parent can disclose. 
 
 Ten thousand forms, ten thousahd different tribes. 
 People the blaze. To sunny waters some 
 By fatal instinct fly : where on the pool 
 They, sportive, wheel; or, sailing down the stream, 
 Are snatch’d immediate by the quick-ey’d trout. 
 
 Or darting salmon. Through the green-wood glade 
 Some love to stray ; there lodg’d, amus’d, and fed. 
 In the fresh leaf. Luxurious, others make 
 The meads their choice, and visit every flower, 
 
 And every latent herb : for the sweet task. 
 
 To propagate their kinds, and where to wrap. 
 
 In what soft beds, their young yet undisclos’d, 
 Employs their tender care. Some to the house, 
 
 The fold, and dairy, hungry, bend their flight ; 
 
 Sip round the pail, or taste the curdling cheese : 
 
 Oft, inadvertent, from the milky stream 
 They meet their fate ; or, weltering in the bowl, 
 
 With powerless wings around them wrapt, ex[)ire. 
 
 But chief to heedless flies the window proves 
 A constant death ; where, gloomily retir’d. 
 
 The villain spider lives, cunning, and fierce, 
 
 Rlixture abhorr’d ! amid a mangled heap 
 Of carcasses, in eager watch he sits, 
 
80 
 
 SUMMER, 
 
 O’erlooking all his waving snares around. 
 
 Near the dire cell the dreadless wanderer oft 
 Passes, as oft the ruffian shows his front ; 
 
 The prey at last ensnar’d, he dreadful darts, 
 
 With rapid glide, along the leaning line ; 
 
 And, fixing in the wretch his cruel fangs. 
 
 Strikes backward grimly pleas’d ; the fluttering wing, 
 And shriller sound, declare extreme distress. 
 
 And ask the helping hospitable hand. 
 
 Resounds the living surface of the ground : 
 
 Nor undelightful is the ceaseless hum. 
 
 To him who muses through the woods at noon ; 
 
 Or drowsy shepherd, as he lies reclin’d, 
 
 With half- shut eyes beneath, the floating shade 
 Of willows gray, close-crowding o’er the brook. 
 
 Gradual, from these what numerous kinds descend 
 Evading e’en the microscopic eye ! 
 
 Full nature swarms with life ; one wondrous mass 
 Of animals, or atoms organized, 
 
 Waiting the vital breath, when parent Heaven 
 Shall bid his spirit blow. The hoary fen, 
 
 In putrid streams, emits the living cloud 
 Of pestilence. Through subterranean cells. 
 
 Where searching sunbeams scarce can find a way, 
 Earth animated heaves. The flowery leaf 
 Wants not its soft inhabitants. Secure, 
 
 Within its winding citadel, the stone 
 
 Holds multitudes. But chief the forest boughs, 
 
 That dance unnumber’d to the playful breeze ; 
 
 The downy orchard, and the melting pulp 
 Of mellow fruit, the nameless nations feed 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 81 
 
 Of evanescent insects. Where the pool 
 Stands mantled o’er with green, invisible, 
 
 Amid the floating verdure millions stray. 
 
 Each liquid too, whether it pierces, soothes, 
 Inflames, refreshes, or exalts the taste. 
 
 With various forms abounds. Nor is the stream 
 Of purest crystal, nor the lucid air, 
 
 Though one transparent vacancy it seems. 
 
 Void of their unseen people. These, conceal’d 
 By the kind art of forming Heaven, escape 
 The grosser eye of man : for, if the worlds 
 In worlds enclos’d should on his senses burst, 
 From cates ambrosial, and the nectar’d bowl, 
 
 He would abhorrent turn ; and in dead night. 
 When silence sleeps o’er all, be stunn’d with noise. 
 
 Let no presuming impious railer tax 
 Creative Wisdom, as if aught were form’d 
 In vain, or not for admirable ends. 
 
 Shall little haughty Ignorance pronounce 
 His works unwise, of which the smallest part 
 Exceeds the narrow vision of her mind.^ 
 
 As if upon a full-proportion’d dome. 
 
 On swelling columns heav’d, the pride of art ! 
 
 A critic-fly, whose feeble ray scarce spreads 
 An inch around, with blind presumption bold. 
 Should dare to tax the structure of the whole ! 
 
 And lives the Man, whose universal eye 
 
 Has swept at once th’ unbounded scheme of thing* 
 
 Mark’d their dependence so, and firm accord, 
 
 As with unfaltering accent to conclude 
 That this availeth naught ! Has any seen 
 6 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 S2 
 
 The mighty chain of beings, lessening down 
 From Infinite Perfection to the brink 
 Of dreary nothing, desolate abyss ! 
 
 From which astonish’d thought, recoiling, turns ? 
 Till then alone let zealous praise ascend. 
 
 And hymns of holy wonder, to that Power, 
 
 Whose wisdom shines as lovely on our minds. 
 
 As on our smiling eyes his servant sun. 
 
 Thick in yon stream of light a thousand ways, 
 Upward, and downward, thwarting, and convolv’d, 
 The quivering nations sport ; till, tempest-wing’d, 
 Fierce Winter sw^eeps them from the face of day. 
 E’en so luxurious men, unheeding, pass 
 An idle summer life in fortune’s shine, 
 
 A season’s glitter! Thus they flutter on 
 From toy to toy, from vanity to vice ; 
 
 Till, blown away by death, oblivion comes 
 Behind, and strikes them from the book of life. 
 
 Now swarms the village o’er the jovial mead 
 The rustic youth, brown with meridian toil, 
 Healthful and strong ; full as the summer-rose 
 Blown by prevailing suns, the ruddy maid, 
 
 Half naked, swelling on the sight, and all 
 Her kindled graces burning o’er her cheek. 
 
 E'en stooping age is here ; and infant hands 
 Trail the long rake, or, with the fragrant loeid 
 O’ercharg’d, amid the kind oppression roll. 
 
 Wide flies the tedded grain ; all in a row 
 Advancing broad, or wheeling round the field, 
 They spread their breathing harvest to the sun, 
 That throws refreshful round a rural smell 
 
SUMMER, 
 
 S3 
 
 Or, as they rake the green-appearhig^ ground, 
 
 And drive the dusky wave along the mead, 
 
 The russet hay-cock rises thick behind, 
 
 In order gay. While heard from dale to dale. 
 Waking the breeze, resounds the blended voice 
 Of happy labour, love, and social glee. 
 
 Or rushing thence, in one diffusive band 
 They drive the troubled flocks, by many a dog 
 Compeird,to where the mazy-running brook 
 Forms a deep pool ; this bank abrupt and high, 
 
 And that fair-spreading in a pebbled shore. 
 
 Urg’d to the giddy brink, much is the toil. 
 
 The clamour much, of men, and boys, and dogs. 
 
 Ere the soft fearful people to the flood 
 Commit their woolly sides. And oft the swain. 
 
 Oil some impatient seizing, hurls them in : 
 Embolden’d then, nor hesitating more, 
 
 Fast, fast, they plunge amid the flashing wave, 
 
 And panting labour to the furthest shore. 
 
 Repeated this, till deep the well-wash’d fleece 
 Has drunk the flood, and from his lively haunt 
 The trout is banish’d by the sordid stream ; 
 
 Heavy, and dripping, to the breezy brow 
 
 Slow move the harmless race j where, as they spread 
 
 Their swelling treasures to the sunny ray. 
 
 Inly disturb’d, and wondering what this wild 
 Outrageous tumult means, their loud complaints 
 The countr}" fill ; and, toss’d from rock to rock. 
 Incessant bl eatings run around the hills. 
 
 At last, of snowy white, the gather’d flocks 
 Are in the wattled pen innumerous press’d, 
 
SUMMER, 
 
 SA 
 
 Head above head : and rang’d in lusty rows 
 The shepherds sit, and whet the sounding shears. 
 The housewife waits to roll her fleecy stores, 
 
 With all her gay drest maids attending round. 
 
 One, chief, in gracious dignity enthron'd, 
 
 Shines o’er the rest, the pastoral queen, and rays 
 Her smiles, sweet-beaming, on her shepherd-king , 
 While the glad circle round them yield their souls 
 To festive mirth, and wit that knows no gall. 
 Meantime, their joyous task goes on apace : 
 
 Some mingling stir the melted tar, and some, 
 
 Deep on the new-shorn vagrant’s heaving side, 
 
 To stamp his master s cipher ready stand ; 
 
 Others th’ unwilling wether drag along ; 
 
 And, glorying in his might, the sturdy boy 
 Holds by the twisted horns th’ indignant ram. 
 Behold where bound, and of its robe bereft, 
 
 By needy Man, that all-depending lord, 
 
 How meek, how patient, the mild creature lies ' 
 What softness in its melancholy face. 
 
 What dumb complaining innocence appears ! 
 
 Fear not, ye gentle tribes, ’tis not the knife 
 Of horrid slaughter that is o’er you wav’d > 
 
 No, 'tis the tender swain’s well-guided shears. 
 
 Who having now, to pay his annual care. 
 
 Borrow’d your fleece, to you a cumbrous load, 
 
 Will send you bounding to your hills again. 
 
 A simple scene! yet hence Britannia sees 
 Her solid grandeur rise : hence she commands 
 Th’ exalted stores of every brighter clime, 
 
 Tlie treasures of the Sun without his rage ; 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 85 
 
 Heiice, fervent all, with culture, toil, and arts, 
 
 Wide g-lows her land: her dreadful thunder hence 
 Rides o’er the waves sublime ; and now, e’en now, 
 Impending’ hangs o’er Gallia’s humbled coast ; 
 Hence rules the circling deep, and awes the woild. 
 
 ’Tis raging noon ; and, vertical, the sun 
 Darts on the head direct his forceful rays. 
 
 O’ci heaven and earth, far as the ranging eye 
 Can sweep, a dazzling deluge reigns ; and all 
 FrOiO pole to pole is undistinguish’d blaze, 
 hi vain the sight, dejected to the ground. 
 
 Stoops for relief} thence hot-ascending steams 
 And keen reflection pain. Deep to the root 
 Of vegetation parch’d, the cleaving fields 
 Avid slippery lawn an arid hue disclose } 
 
 Kiast Fancy’s bloom, and wither e’en the soul. 
 Echo no more returns the cheerful sound 
 Of sharpening scythe : the mower sinking heaps 
 O’er him the humid hay, with flowers perfum’d ; 
 And scarce a chirping grasshopper is heard 
 Through the dumb mead. Distressful nature pants 
 The very streams look languid from afar; 
 
 Or, through tli’ unshelter’d glade, impatient, seem 
 To hurl into the covert of the grove. 
 
 All-conquering Heat! oh, intermit thy wratli ; 
 And on my throbbing temples potent thus 
 Beam not so fierce! incessant still you flow, 
 
 And still another fervent flood succeeds, 
 i*oiir'd on the head profuse. In vain I sigh, 
 
 And restless turn, and look around for night} 
 
 Mght is far off} and hotter hours approach. 
 
 H 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 S(3 
 
 Thric^ happy he ! who on the sunless side 
 Of a romantic mountain, forest-crowii’d, 
 
 Beneath the whole collected shade reclines ; 
 
 Or in the gelid caverns, woodbine-wrought, 
 
 And fresh bedew’d with ever-spouting streams, 
 
 Sits coolly calm ; while all the world without, 
 Unsatisfied, and sick, tosses in noon. 
 
 Emblem instructive of the virtuous man, 
 
 Who keeps his temper’d mind, serene, and pure ; 
 And every passion aptly harmoniz’d. 
 
 Amid a jarring world with vice inflam’d. 
 
 Welcome, ye shades! ye bowery thickets, hail! 
 Ye lofty pines 1 ye venerable oaks! 
 
 Ye ashes wild, resounding o’er the steep ! 
 
 Delicious is your shelter to the soul. 
 
 As to the hunted hart the sallying spring, 
 
 Or stream full-flowing, that his swelling sides 
 Laves, as he floats along the herbag’d brink. 
 
 Cool, thro’ the nerves, your pleasing comfpri glides ; 
 The heart beats glad ; the fresh-expanded eye 
 And ear resume their watch ; the sinews knit ; 
 
 And life shoots swift through all the lighten’d limbs. 
 
 Around th’ adjoining brook, that purls along 
 The vocal grove, now fretting o’er a rock, 
 
 Now scarcely moving through a reedy pool, 
 
 Now starting to a sudden stream, and now 
 Gently diffus’d into a limpid plain ; 
 
 A various group the herds and flocks compose, 
 
 Rural confusion ! on the grassy bank 
 
 Some ruminating lie ; while others stand 
 
 Half in the flood, and often bending, sip , 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 S7 
 
 The circling surface. In the middle droops 
 The strong laborious ox, of honest front, 
 
 Which incompos’d he shakes ; and from his sides 
 'i'he troublous insects lashes with his tail, 
 
 Returning still. Amid his subjects safe. 
 
 Slumbers the monarch-swain ; his careless arm 
 Thrown round his head, on downy moss sustain’d ; 
 Here laid his scrip, with wholesome viands fill’d ; 
 There, listening every noise, his watchful dog. 
 
 Light fly his slumbers, if perchance a flight 
 Of angry gad-flies fasten on the herd ; 
 
 That startling scatters from the shallow brook. 
 
 In search of lavish stream. Tossing the foam, 
 
 They scorn the keeper’s voice, and scour the plain, 
 Through all the bright severity of noon } 
 
 While, from their labouring breasts, a hollow moan 
 Proceeding, runs low-bellowing round the hills. 
 
 Oft in this season too the horse, provok’d, 
 
 While his big sinews full of spirits swell ; 
 
 Trembling with vigour, in the heat of blood, 
 
 Springs the high fence ; and, o’er the field efius’d. 
 Darts on the gloomy flood, with steadfast eye, 
 
 \nd heart estrang’d to fear : his nervous chest. 
 Luxuriant, and erect, the seat of strength, 
 
 Bears down th’ opposing stream: quenchless his thirst; 
 He takes the river at redoubled draughts ; 
 
 And with wide nostrils, snorting, skims the wave. 
 
 Still let me pierce into the midnight depth 
 Of yonder grove, of wildest, largest growth ; 
 
 That, forming high in air a woodland choir. 
 
 Nods o’er the mount beneath. At every step, 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 •'SS 
 
 Solemn, and slow, the shadows blacker fall, 
 
 And all is awfal listening gloom around. 
 
 These are the haunts of Meditation, these 
 The scenes where ancient bards th’ inspiring breath, 
 Ecstatic, felt ; and, from this world retir’d 
 Convers’d with angels, and immortal forms. 
 
 On gracious errands bent : to save the fall 
 Of virtue struggling on the brink of vice ; 
 
 In waking whispers, and repeated dreams, 
 
 To hint pure thought, and warn the favour’d so^l 
 For future trials fated to prepare; 
 
 To prompt the poet, who devoted gives 
 His muse to better themes ; to sooth the pangs 
 Of dying worth, and from the patriot’s breast 
 (Backward to mingle in detested war, 
 
 But foremost when engag’d) to turn the death 
 And numberless such offices of love, 
 
 Dally, and nightly, zealous to perform. 
 
 Shook sudden from the bosom of the sky 
 A thousand shapes or glide athwart the dusk, 
 
 Or stalk majestic on. Deep-rous’d, I feel 
 A sacred terror, a severe delight, 
 
 Creep through my mortal frame ; and thus, methinks, 
 A voice, than human more, th’ abstracted ear 
 Of fancy strikes : — ^‘Be not of us afraid, 
 
 Poor kindred man ! thy fellow creatures, we 
 From the same Parent Power our beings drew-, 
 
 The same our Lord, and law^s, and great pursuit. 
 Once some of us, like thee, through stormy life, 
 Toil’d tempest-beaten, ere wx could attain 
 This holy calm, this harmony of mind, 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 
 Where purity and peace immingle charms. 
 
 Then fear not us ; but with responsive song, 
 
 Amid these dim recesses, undisturb’d 
 By noisy folly and discordant vice, 
 
 Of Nature sing with us, and Nature’s God. 
 
 Here frequent, at the visionary hour, 
 
 When musing midnight reigns, or silent noon, 
 Angelic harps are in full concert hetjrd. 
 
 And voices chanting from the wood-crown’d hill, 
 The deepening dale, or inmost sylvan glade ; 
 
 A privilege bestow’d by us, alone. 
 
 On Contemplation, or the hallow’d ear 
 Of poet, swelling to seraphic strain.” 
 
 And art thou, Stanley,* of that sacred band ? 
 Alas, for us to soon ! though rais’d above 
 The reach of human pain, above the flight 
 Of human joy ; yet, with a mingled ray 
 Of sadly pleas’d remembrance, must thou feel 
 A mother’s love, a mother’s tender wo : 
 
 Who seeks thee still, in many a former scene ; 
 vSeeks thy fair form, thy lovely-beaming eyes, 
 
 Thy pleasing converse, by gay lively sense 
 Inspir’d : where moral wisdom mildly shone. 
 Without the toil of art ; and virtue glow’d. 
 
 In all her smiles, without forbidding pride. 
 
 But, O thou best of parents ! wipe thy tears ; 
 
 Or rather to Parental Nature pay 
 
 tears of grateful joy ; who for a while 
 
 * A youn^ lady j well known to the author, loho d%ed 
 at the age of eighteen, in the year 1738. 
 
 H 2 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 Lent thee this younger self, this opening bloom 
 Of thy enlightened mind and gentle worth. 
 
 Believe the Muse ; the wintry blast of death 
 Kills not the buds of virtue ; no, they spread. 
 Beneath the heavenly beam ofbrighter suns, 
 Through endless ages, into higher powers. 
 
 Thus up the mount, in airy vision wrapt, 
 
 I stray, regardless whither ; till the sound 
 Of a near fall of water every sense [back, 
 
 Wakes from the charm ot thought : swift-shrinking 
 1 check my steps, and view the broken scene. 
 
 Smooth to the shelving brink a copious flood 
 Rolls fair, and placid ; where collected all. 
 
 In one impetuous torrent, down the steep 
 It thundering shoots, and shakes the country round 
 At first, an azure sheet, it rushes broad ; 
 
 Then whitening by degrees, as prone it falls, 
 
 And from the loud-resounding rocks below 
 Dash’d in a cloud of foam, it sends aloft 
 A hoary mist, and forms a ceaseless shower. 
 
 Nor can the tortur’d wave here find repose } 
 
 But, raging still amid the shaggy rocks. 
 
 Now flashes o’er the scatter’d fragments, now 
 Aslant the hollow’d channel rapid darts ; 
 
 And falling fast from gradual slope to slope. 
 
 With wild infracted course, and lessen’d roar, 
 
 It gains a safer bed ; and steals, at last. 
 
 Along the mazes of the quiet vale. 
 
 Invited from the cliff, to whose dark brow 
 He clings, the steep-ascending eagle soars, 
 
 \Vith upward pinions through the flood of day 3 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 And, giving full his bosom to the blaze, 
 
 Gains on the sun ; while all the tuneful race, 
 Smit by th’ afflictive noon, disorder’d droop, 
 j Deep in the thicket ; or, from bower to bower 
 [ Responsive, force an interrupted strain. 
 
 The stock- dove only through the forest coos, 
 i Mournfully hoarse ; oft ceasing from his plaint ; 
 I Short interval of weary wo ! again 
 : The sad idea of his murder’d mate. 
 
 Struck from his side by savage fowler's guile, 
 Across his fancy comes ; and then resounds 
 A louder song of sorrow through the grove. 
 
 ' Beside the de%vy border let me sit. 
 
 All in the freshness of the humid air : 
 
 I There in that hallow’d rock, grotesque and wild, 
 
 I An ample chair moss-lin’d, and over head 
 I By flowering umbrage shaded ; where the bee 
 ! Strays diligent, and with th’ extracted balm 
 I Of fragrant woodbine loads his little thigh. 
 
 Now, while I taste the sweetness of the shade, 
 
 * While Nature lies around deep-lull’d in noon, 
 
 ! Now come, bold Fancy, spread a daring flight, 
 
 I And view the wonders of the torrid zone ; 
 
 1 Climes unrelenting ! with whose rage compar’d, 
 
 I Ton blaze is feeble, and yon skies are cool. 
 
 See, how at once the bright-efiulgent sun, 
 
 ; Rising direct, swift chases from the sky 
 ■ The short-liv’d twilight ; and with ardent blaze 
 Looks gaily fierce through all the dazzling air ; 
 
 He mounts his throne ; but kind before him sends, 
 
 I Issuing from out the portals of the morn. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 92 
 
 The g^enerai breeze to mitigate his fire, 
 
 And breathe refreshment on a fainting world. 
 
 Great are the scenes, with dreadful beauty crown M 
 And barbarous wealth, that see, each circling year. 
 Returning Suns and double seasons! pass : 
 
 Rocks rich in gems, and mountains big with mines, 
 That on the high equator ridgy rise, 
 
 AVhence many a bursting stream auriferous plays , 
 Majestic woods, of every vigorous green, 
 
 Stage above stage, high waving o’er the hills ; 
 
 Or to the far horizon wade diffus’d, 
 
 A boundless deep immensity of shade. ^ 
 
 Here lofty trees, to ancient song unknown, ' 
 
 The noble sons of potent heat and floods, * 
 
 Prone-rushing from the clouds, rear high to heaven 
 Their thorny stems ; and broad around them tlirow ^ 
 Meridian gloom. Here, in eternal prime, , 
 
 Unnumber'd fruits, of keen delicious taste 
 And vital spirit, drink amid the cliffs, ; 
 
 And burning sands that bank the shrubby vales, : 
 Redoubled day ; yet in their rugged coats * 
 
 A friendly juice to cool its rage contain. • 
 
 * Which blows constantly between the tropics from i 
 the east} or the collateral points^ the north-east and south- \ 
 east ; caused by the pressure of the rarefied air on that , 
 before according to the diurnal mot ion of the sun • 
 from east to west. i 
 
 f In all climates between the tropiesy the sun^ as j 
 he passes and repasses in his annual motioiiy is twice a • 
 year vertical^ which produces this effect. 
 
 iJ 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 93 
 
 j Bear me, Pomona ! to thy citron groves ; 
 
 To where the lemon and the piercing lime, 
 
 : With the deep orange, glowing through the green, 
 Their lighter glories blend. Lay me reclin’d 
 Beneath the spreading tamarind that shakes, 
 f'ann’d by the breeze, its fever-cooling fruit. 
 
 I Deep in the night the massy locust sheds. 
 
 Quench my hot limbs ; or lead me through the maze. 
 Embowering endless, of the Indian fig ; 
 
 Or thrown at gayer ease, on some fair brow. 
 
 Let me behold, by breezy murmurs cool’d. 
 
 Broad o’er my head the verdant cedar wave. 
 
 And high palmetos lift their graceful shade. 
 
 ,Oh, stretch’d amid these orchards of the sun, 
 
 Give me to drain the cocoa’s milky bowl. 
 
 And from the palm to draw its freshening wine ! 
 
 I More bounteous far than all the frantic juice 
 I Which Bacchus pours. Nor, on its slender twigs 
 ' Low-bending, be the full pomegranate scorn’d ; 
 
 I Nor, creeping through the woods, the gelid race 
 1 Of berries. Oft in humble station dwells 
 Unboastful worth, above fastidious pomp. 
 
 Witness thou best anana, thou the pride 
 Of vegetable life, beyond whate’er 
 I The poets imag’d in the golden age ; 
 
 Quick let me strip thee of thy tufty coat, 
 
 Spread thy ambrosial stores, and feast with Jove ! 
 
 ! From these the prospect varies. Plains immense 
 Lie stretch’d below, interminable meads. 
 
 And vast savannahs, where the wandering eye, 
 LTifixt, is in a verdant ocean lost. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 D4 
 
 Another Flora there, of bolder hues, 
 
 And richer sweets, beyond our garden’s pride, 
 
 Plays o’er the fields, and showers with sudden hand 
 Exuberant spring : for oft these valleys shift 
 Their green-embroider’d robe to fiery brown. 
 
 And swift to green again, as scorching suns. 
 
 Or streaming dews and torrent rains, prevail. 
 
 Along these lonely regions, where retir’d 
 From little scenes of art, great Nature dwells 
 In awful solitude, and nought is seen 
 But the wild herds that own no master’s stall. 
 Prodigious rivers roll their fattening seas : 
 
 On whose luxuriant herbage, half-conceal’d, 
 
 Like a fall’n cedar, far diffus’d his train. 
 
 Cas’d in green scales, the crocodile extends. 
 
 The flood disparts : behold! in plaited mail. 
 Behemoth^ rears his head. Glanc’d from his side, 
 The darted steel in idle shivers flies : , 
 
 He fearless walks the plain, or seeks the hills ; 
 Where, as he crops the varied fare, the herds. 
 
 In widening circle round, forget their food, 
 
 And at the harmless stranger wondering gaze. 
 
 Peaceful, beneath primeval trees, that cast 
 Their ample shade o’er Niger’s yellow stream. 
 
 And where the Ganges rolls his sacred wave ; 
 
 Or mid the central depth of blackening woods, 
 High-rais’d in solemn theatre around. 
 
 Leans the huge elephant ; wisest of brutes I 
 O truly wise ! with gentle might endow’d ; 
 
 The, Hippopotamus, or river-horse. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 95 
 
 Though pow ^rful, not destructive ! here he sees 
 Revolving a/?es sweep the changeful earth, 
 
 And empires rise and fall ; regardless he 
 
 Of what the l ever resting-race of men 
 
 Project ; thrcce happy ! could he ’scape their guile, 
 
 Who mine from cruel avarice, his steps ; 
 
 Or with his towery grandeur swell their state, 
 
 The pride oC kings ’ or else his strength pervert. 
 
 And bid hL i rage amid the mortal fray. 
 
 Astonish’d at the madness of mankind. 
 
 Wide o’er the winding umbrage of the floods. 
 
 Like vivid blossoms glowing from afar, 
 
 Thick swarm the brighter birds. For Nature’s hand, 
 That with a sportive vanity has deck’d 
 The plumy nations, there her gayest hues 
 Profusely pours. But, if she bids them shine. 
 
 Array’d in all the beauteous beams of day, 
 
 Yet frugal still, she humbles them in song.* 
 
 Nor envy we the gaudy robes they lent 
 Proud Montezuma’s realm, whose legions cast 
 A boundless radiance waving on the sun. 
 
 While Philomel is ours ; while in our shade. 
 
 Through the soft silence of the listening night, 
 
 The sober-suited songstress thrills her lay. 
 
 But come,miy Muse, the desert-barrier burst, 
 
 A wide expanse of lifeless sand and sky 
 And, swifter than the toiling caravan, 
 
 * In all the regions of the torrid zone, the birdsy 
 though more beautiful in their plumage^ are observed 
 to be less melodious than ours. 
 
SUMMER, 
 
 9Cl 
 
 Shoot o’er the vale of Sennar ; ardent climb 
 The Nubian mountains, and the secret bounds 
 Of jealous Abyssinia boldly pierce, 
 riiou art no ruffian, who beneath the mask 
 Of social commerce com’st to rob their wealth ; 
 
 No holy fury thou, blaspheming- Heaven, 
 
 With consecrated steel to stab their peace, 
 
 And through the land, yet red from civil wounds, 
 To spread the purple tyranny of Rome. 
 
 Thou, like the harmless bee, may’st freely range, 
 From mead to mead bright with exalted flowers ; 
 From jasmine grove to grove, may’st wander gay ; 
 Through palmy shades and aromatic woods. 
 
 That grace the plains, invest the peopled hills, 
 
 Aid up the more than Alpine mountains wave. 
 There on the breezy summit, spreading fair, 
 
 F or many a league ; or on stupendous rocks, 
 
 That from the sun-redoubling valley lift. 
 
 Cool to the middle air, their lawney tops ; 
 
 Where palaces, and fanes, and villas rise ; 
 
 And gardens smile around, and cultur’d fields; 
 And fountains gush ; and careless herds and flocks 
 Securely stray ; a world within itself, 
 
 Disdaining all assault : there let me draw 
 Ethereal soid ; there drink reviving gales. 
 Profusely breathing from the spicy groves. 
 
 And vales of fragrance ; there at distance hear 
 The roaring floods, and cataracts that sweep 
 From disembowell’d earth the virgin gold; 
 
 And o’er the varied landscape, restless, rove* 
 Fervent with life of every fairer kind: 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 97 - 
 
 A land of wonders ! which the sun still eyes 
 With ray direct, as of the lovely realm 
 Enamour’d, and delighting there to dwell. 
 
 How changed the scene ! in blazing height of noouj 
 The sun, oppress’d, is plung’d in thickest gloom. 
 
 Still horror reigns ! a dreary twilight round, 
 
 Of struggling night and day maligmint mix’d ! 
 
 For to the hot equator crowding fast, 
 
 Where, highlj^ rarefied, the yielding air 
 Admits their stream, incessant vapours roll, 
 
 Amazing clouds on clouds continual heap’d; 
 
 Or whirl’d tempestuous by the gusty wind. 
 
 Or silent borne along, heavy, and slow. 
 
 With the big stores of steaming oceans charg’d 
 Meantime, amid these upper seas, condens’d 
 Around the cold aerial mountain’s brow, 
 
 I And by conflicting winds together dash’d, 
 
 I The thunder holds his black tremendous throne ; 
 
 ' From cloud to cloud the rending lightnings rage ; 
 i Till, in the furious elemental war 
 Dissolv’d the whole precipitated mass 
 Unbroken floods and solid torrents pours. t 
 
 I The treasures these, hid from the bounded search 
 ^ Of ancient knowledge ; whence with annual pomp, 
 
 : Rich king of floods ' o’erflows the swelling Nile. 
 
 From his two springs, in Gojam’s sunny realm, 
 
 I Pure-swelling out, he through the lucid lake 
 i Of fair Dambea rolls his infant stream. 
 
 1 There, by the naiads nurs’d he sports away 
 His playful youth, amid the fragrant isles, 
 
 That with unfading verdure smile around. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 9S 
 
 Ambitious, thence, the manly river breaks ; 
 
 And g^athering- many a flood, and copious fed 
 With aii the mellow’d treasures of the sky, 
 
 Winds in progressive majesty along: 
 
 Tiu'oiigh splendid kiiigdoms now devolves his maze , 
 
 Now wanders wild o’er solitary tracts 
 Of life-deserted sand ; till, glad to quit 
 The joyless desert, down the Nubian rocks 
 From thundering steep to steep, he pours his urn, 
 
 And Fgypt joys beneath the spreading wave. 
 
 His brother Niger too, and ail the floods = 
 
 In which the full-forin’d maids of Afric lave ’ 
 
 Tiieir jetty limbs; and all that from the tract I 
 
 Of woody mountains stretch’d through gorgeous Ind ! 
 Fall on Cormandei’s coast, or Malabar; tj 
 
 Fi oin Menam’s* orient stream, that nightly shines 
 With insect-lamps, to where Aurora sheds •: 
 
 On Indus’ smiling banks the rosy shower ; 
 
 All, at this bouiiteous season, ope tlieir urns, 
 
 And pour untoiiing harvest o’er the land. 
 
 Nor less thy world, Columbus, drinks refresh’d • 
 
 i^^'he lavish moisture of the melting year. ( 
 
 Wide o’er his isles, the branching Oronoque | 
 
 Rolls a browm deluge ; and the native drives 
 To dwell aloft on life-suflicing trees, ^ 
 
 At once his dome, his robe, his food, and arms. J 
 
 Sweil’d by a thousand streams, impetuous hurl’d || 
 
 * TJie river ihat runs through Siam; omvhose banks 
 i! vast multitude of those insects, called fire-flies, make 
 a beautiful appearance in the night. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 99 
 
 F roni all the roaring Andes, hugh, descends 
 The mighty Orellana * Scarce the Muse 
 Dares stretch her wing o’er this enormous mass 
 Of rushing water ; scarce she dares attempt : 
 
 The sea-like Plata ; to whose dread expanse, 
 Continuous depth, and wondrous length of course. 
 Our floods are rills. With unabated force, 
 
 In silent dignity they sweep along ; 
 
 And traverse realms unknown, and blooming wilds 
 And fruitful desarts, worlds of solitude ! 
 
 Where the sun smiles and seasons teem in vain, 
 Unseen, and unenjoy’d. Forsaking these. 
 
 O’er peopled plains they far diffusive flow. 
 
 And many a nation feed, and circle safe, 
 
 In their soft bosom, many a happy isle ; 
 
 The seat of blameless Pan, yet undisturb’d 
 By Christian crimes and Europe’s cruel sons. 
 
 Thus pouring on they proudly seek the deep. 
 
 Whose vanquish’d ti.de, recoiling from the shock, 
 i Yields to this liquid weight of half the globe ; 
 
 And ocean trembles for his green domain. 
 
 1 But what avails this wondrous waste of wealth ^ 
 
 ; This gay profusion of luxurious bliss ? 
 j Tnis pomp of Nature ? what their balmy meads, 
 
 I Their powerful herbs, and Ceres void of pain ? 
 
 By vagrant birds dispers’d, and wafting winds. 
 
 What their unplanted fruits ? what the cool draughts, 
 Th’ ambrosial food, rich gums, and spicy health, 
 
 I Their forests yield ? their toiling insects what ? 
 
 The river of the Amasons, 
 
100 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 Their silky pride, and veg-etabde robes ? 
 
 Ah! what avail their fatal treasures, hid 
 Deep in the bowels of the pitying- earth, 
 
 Golconda’s gems, and sad Potosi’s mines ; 
 
 Where dwelt the gentlest children of the sun ? 
 
 What all that Afric’s golden rivers roll. 
 
 Her odorous wmods, and shining ivory stores ? 
 Ill-fated race ! the softening arts of Peace, 
 
 Whate’er the humanizing Muses teach ; 
 
 The godlike wisdom of the temper’d breast ; 
 Progressive truth ; the patient force of thought ; 
 Investigation calm, whose silent powers 
 Command the world ; the light that leads to heaven , 
 Kind equal rule ; the government of laws, 
 
 And all-protecting Freedom, which alone 
 Sustains the name and^dignity of man ; 
 
 These are not theirs. The parent-sun himself 
 Seems o’er this wo.dd of slaves to tyrannize ; 
 
 And, with oppressive ray, the roseate bloom 
 Of beauty blasting, gives the gloomy hue, 
 
 And feature gross : or worse, to ruthless deeds, 
 
 Mad jealousy, blind rage, and fell revenge. 
 
 Their fervid spiritiires. Love dwells not there * 
 
 The soft regards, the tenderness of life, 
 
 The heart-shed tear, th’ ineffable delight 
 Of sweet humanity : these court the bea>n 
 Of milder climes 5 in selfish fierce desire, 
 
 And the wild fury of voluptuous sense. 
 
 There lost. The very brute creation there 
 This rage partakes, and burns with horrid fire. 
 
 Lo ! the green serpent, from his dark abode, 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 101 
 
 Whici. e’en Imag-ination fears to tread, 
 
 At noon forth-issuing, gathers up his train 
 In orbs immense ; then, darting out anew, 
 
 Seeks the refreshing fount ; by wliich diffus’d 
 He throws his folds : and while, with threat’ning 
 And deathful jaws erect, the monster curls [tongue. 
 His flaming crest, all other thirst appall’d, 
 
 Or shivering flies, or check’d at distance stands. 
 
 Nor d’ares approach. But still more direful he, 
 
 The small close-lurking minister of fate, 
 
 Whose high concocted venom through the veins 
 A rapid lightning darts, arresting swift 
 The vital current. Form’d to humble man. 
 
 This child of vengeful Nature ! there, sublim’d 
 To fearless lust of blood, the savage race 
 Roam, licens’d by the shading hour of guilt. 
 
 And foul misdeed, when the pure day has shut 
 His sacred eye. The tiger darting fierce 
 Impetuous on the prey his glance has doom’d : 
 
 The lively-shining leopard, speckled o’er 
 With many a spot, the beauty of the waste ; 
 
 And, scorning all the taming arts of man, 
 
 I'he keen hyena, fellest of the fell 
 These, rushing from th intiospiiable woods 
 Of Mauritania, or the tufty isles 
 lliat verdant rise amid the Lybianwild, 
 
 Innumerous glare around their shaggy king. 
 Majestic, stalking o’er the printed sand ; 
 
 And, with imperious and repeated roars. 
 
 Demand their fated food. The fearful flocks 
 Crowd near the guardian swain ; the nobler herds, 
 
 i2 
 
102 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 Where round their lordly bull, in rural ease, 
 They ruminating lie, with horror hear 
 The coming rage. Th’ awaken’d village starts ; 
 And to her fluttering breast the mother strains 
 Her thoughtless infant. From the pirate’s den, 
 Or stern Morocco’s tyrant fang escap’d. 
 
 The wretch half-wishes for his bonds again : 
 While, uproar all, the wilderness resounds, 
 From Atlas eastward to the frightened Nile. 
 
 Unhappy he ! who from the first of joys, 
 Society, cut ofi*, is left alone 
 Amid this world of death. Day after day, 
 
 Sad on the jutting eminence he sits. 
 
 And views the main that ever toils below ; 
 
 Still fondly forming in the furthest verge. 
 
 Where the round ether mixes with the wave, 
 Ships, dim-discover’d, dropping from the clouds 
 At evening, to the setting sun he turns 
 A mournful eye, and down his dying heart 
 Sinks helpless . while the wonted roar is up, 
 And hiss contiiiual through the tedious night. 
 Yet here, e’en here, into these black abodes 
 Of monsters, unappall’d from stooping Rome, 
 And guilty C?Esar, Liberty retir’d. 
 
 Her Cato following through Nurnidian wilds : 
 Disdainful of Campania’s gentle plains. 
 
 And all the green delights Ausonia pours ; 
 
 Wlien for them she must bend the servile knee. 
 And fawning take the splendid robber’s boon. 
 
 Nor stop the terrors of these regions here. 
 Commission’d demons oft, angels of wrath ! 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 103 
 
 Let loose the raging elements. Bieath’d hot, 
 
 From all the boundless furnace of the sky, 
 
 And the wide glittering waste of burning sand, 
 
 A suffocating wind the pilgrim smites 
 
 With instant death. Patient of thirst and toil, 
 
 Son of the desert ! e’en the camel feels, 
 
 Shot through his witlier’d heart, the fiery blast. 
 
 Or from the black-red ether, bursting broad, 
 
 Sallies the sudden whirlwind. Straight the sands, 
 Commov’d around, in gathering eddies play ; 
 
 Nearer and nearer still they darkening come ; 
 
 Till, with the general all-involving stonii 
 Swept up, the whole continuous wilds arise ; 
 
 And by their noonday fount dejected thrown. 
 
 Or sunk at night in sad disastrous sleep. 
 
 Beneath descending hills, the caravan 
 Is buried deep. In Cairo’s crowded streets 
 Th’ impatient merchant, wondering, waits in vain, 
 And Mecca saddens at the long delay. 
 
 But chief at sea, whose every flexile wave 
 Obeys the blast, the aereal tumult swells. 
 
 In the dread ocean, undulating wide, 
 
 Beneath the radiant line that girts the globe. 
 
 The circling Typhon,* whirl’d from point to point, 
 Exhausting ail the rage of all the sky. 
 
 And dire Ecnephia* reign. Amid the heavens, 
 Falsely serene, deep in a cloudy speckf 
 
 * Typhon and Ecnephia, names of particular storms 
 or hurricanes, known only between the tropics. 
 
 t Called by sailors the Ox-eye, being in appearance 
 at first no bigger 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 ilH 
 
 Compress’d the mightj tempest brooding dwells : 
 
 Of no regard, save to the skilful eye, 
 
 Fiery and foul, the small prognostic hangs * 
 
 Aloft, or on the promontory’s brow 
 Musters its force. A faint deceitful calm, 
 
 A fluttering gale, the demon sends before, 
 
 To tempt the spreading sail. Then down at once. 
 Precipitant, descends a mingled mass 
 Of roaring winds, and flame, and rushing floods. 
 
 In wild amazement fix’d the sailor stands. 
 
 Art is too slow : by rapid fate oppress’d 
 
 His broad-wing’d vessel drinks the whelming tide. 
 
 Hid in the bosom of the black abyss. 
 
 With such mad seas the daring Gama* fought. 
 
 For many a day, and many a dreadful night. 
 Incessant, labouring round the stormy Cape ; 
 
 By bold ambition led, and bolder thirst 
 Of gold. For then from ancient gloom emerg’d 
 The rising world of trade : the Genius, then. 
 
 Of navigation, that in hopeless sloth, 
 
 Had slumber’d on the vast Atlantic deep. 
 
 For idle ages, starting, heard at last 
 
 The Lusitanian Prince ;t who, Heav’n-inspir’d, 
 
 To love of useful glory rous’d mankind, 
 
 Anti in unbounded commerce mix’d the world. 
 
 * Vasco de Gama^ the first who sailed round Africa f 
 by the Cape of Good Hope, to the' East Indies. 
 
 i Don Henry, third son to fohn the first. King of 
 Portugal. His strong gtnhis to the discovery of new 
 countries was the chief source of all the modern im~ 
 provements in navigation. 
 
SUMMER 
 
 10 , 
 
 Increasing still the terrors of these storms, 
 
 His jaws horrific arm’d with threefold fate, 
 
 Here dwells the direful shark. Lur’d by the scent 
 Of steaming crowds, of rank disease, and death. 
 Behold ! he rushing cuts tJie briny flood. 
 
 Swift as the gale can bear the ship along ; 
 
 And, from the partners of that cruel trade, 
 
 Wliich spoils unhappy Guinea of her sons, 
 
 Demands his share of prey — demands themselves. 
 The stormy fates descend : one death involves 
 Tyrants and slaves ; when straight, their mangled liml 
 Crashing at once, he dyes the purple seas 
 With gore, and riots in the vengeful meal. 
 
 When o’er this world, by equinoctial rains 
 Flooded immense, looks out the joyless sun, 
 
 And draws the copious stream : from swampy fens 
 Where putrefaction into life ferments. 
 
 And breaths destructive myriads; or, from woods. 
 Impenetrable shades, recesses foul, 
 
 In vapours rank and blue corruption wrapt, 
 
 Whose gloomy horrors yet no desperate foot 
 Has ever dared to pierce ; then wasteful, forth 
 Walks the dire power of pestilent disease. * 
 
 A thousand hideous fiends her course attend, 
 
 Sick Nature blasting, and to heartless wo. 
 
 And feeble desolation casting down 
 The towering hopes and all the pride of Man 
 Such as, of late, at Carthagena quench’d 
 The British fire. You, gallant Vernon ! saw 
 The miserable scene ; you, pitying, saw 
 To infant weakness sunk the w^arrior’s arm, 
 
106 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 Saw the deep-racking pang, the ghastly form, 
 
 The lip pale-quivering, and the beamless eye 
 No more with ardour bright : you heard the groans 
 Of agonizing ships, from shore to shore ; 
 iTeard, nightly plung’d amid the sullen waves, 
 
 The frequent corse ; while on each other fix’d, 
 
 In sad presage, the blank assistants seem’d, 
 
 Silent, to ask, whom Fate would next demand. 
 
 What need I mention those inclement skies, 
 Where, frequent o’er the sickening city. Plague, 
 
 The fiercest child of Nemesis divine. 
 
 Descends ? From Ethiopia’s poison’d woods. 
 
 From stifled Cairo’s filth, and fetid fields 
 With locust-armies putrifying heap’d 
 This great destroyer sprung.* Her awful rage 
 The brutes escape : Man is her destin'd prey. 
 Intemperate Man ! and, o’er hi« guilty domes, 
 
 She draws a close incumbent cloud of death ; 
 Uninterrupted by the living winds. 
 
 Forbid to blow a wholesome breeze ; and stain’d 
 With many a mixture by the sun suflfus’d. 
 
 Of angry aspect. Princely wisdom, then. 
 
 Dejects his watchful eye ; and from the hand 
 
 Of feeble justice, ineffectual, drop 
 
 The sword and balance : mute the voice of joy, 
 
 And hush’d the clamour of the busy world. 
 
 Empty the streets, with uncouth verdure clad ; 
 
 * These are the causes supposed to be the first origin 
 of the plague, in Dr. Mead's elegant book on that sub- 
 ject. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 107 
 
 Into the worst of deserts sudden turn’d 
 The cheerful haunt of men ; unless escap’d [reigns ; 
 From the doom’d house, where matchless horror 
 Shut up by barbarous fear, the smitten wretch. 
 
 With frenzy wild, breaks loose ; and, loud to Heaven 
 Screaming, the dreadful policy arraigns. 
 
 Inhuman, and unwise. The sullen door. 
 
 Yet uninfected, on its cautious hinge 
 Fearing to turn, abhors society : 
 
 Dependants,' friends, relations. Love himself, 
 Savag’d by wo, forget the tender tie, 
 
 The sweet engagement of the feeling heart. 
 
 But vain their seltlsh care : the circling sky, 
 
 The wide enlivening air is full of fate ; 
 
 And, struck by turns, in solitary pangs 
 They fall, iinblesl, untended, and unmouni’d. 
 
 Thus o’er the prostrate city black Despair 
 Extends her raven wing ; while, to complete 
 The scene of desolation, stretch’d around. 
 
 The grim guards stand, denying all retreat, 
 
 And give the flying wretch abetter death. 
 
 Much yet remains unsung: the rage intense 
 Of brazen-vaulted skies, of iron fields. 
 
 Where drought and famine starve the blasted year t 
 Fir’d by the torch of noon to tenfold rage, 
 
 Th’ infuriate hill that shoots the pillar’d flame ; 
 
 And, rous’d within the subterranean v/orld, 
 
 Th’ expanding earthquake, that resistless shakes 
 Aspiring cities from their solid base. 
 
 And buries mountains in the flaming gulf. 
 
 But ’tis enough ; return, my vagrant Muse : 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 lOS 
 
 A nearer scene of horror calls thee home. 
 
 Behold, slow-settling- o’er the lurid grove, 
 
 Unusual darkness broods ; and growing gains 
 The full possession of the surcharg’d 
 With wrathful vapour, from the secret beds 
 Where sleep the mineral generations, drawn. 
 
 Thence nitre, sulphur, and the fiery spume 
 Of fat bitumen, steaming on the day. 
 
 With various-tinctur’d trains of latent flame, 
 
 Pollute the sky ; and in yon baleful cloud, 
 
 A reddening gloom, a magazine of fate, 
 
 Ferment; till, by the touch ethereal rous’d. 
 
 The dash of clouds, or irritating war. 
 
 Of fighting winds, while all is calm below, 
 
 They furious spring. A boding silence reigns. 
 Dread through the dun expanse ; save the duil sound 
 That from the mountain, previous to the storm. 
 
 Rolls o’er the muttering earth, disturbs the flood, 
 And shakes the forest-leaf without a breath. 
 
 Prone, to the lowest vale, the afirial tribes 
 Descend : the tempest-loving raven scarce 
 Dares wing the dubious dusk. In rueful gaze 
 The cattle stand, and on the scowling heavens 
 Cast a deploring eye ; by man forsook. 
 
 Who to the crowded cottage hies him fast. 
 
 Or seeks the shelter of the downward cave. 
 
 ’Tis listening fear, and dumb amazement all : 
 When to the startled eye the sudden glance 
 Appears far south, eruptive through the cloud 
 And following slower, in explosion vast. 
 
 The thunder raises his tremendous voice. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 109 
 
 At fu st, heard solemn o’er the verge of heaven, 
 The tempest growls ; but as it nearer comes, 
 
 And rolls its awful burden on the wind. 
 
 The lightnings flash a larger curve, and more 
 The noise astounds : till over head a sheet 
 Of livid flame discloses wide ; then shuts. 
 
 And opens wider ; shuts and opens still 
 Expansive, wrapping ether in a blaze. 
 
 F ollow's the loosen’d aggravated roar, 
 
 Enlarging, deepening, mingling ; peal on peal 
 Crush’d horrible, convulsing heaven and earth. 
 
 Down comes a deluge of sonorous hail. 
 
 Or prone-descending rain. Wide-rent, the clouds 
 Pour a whole flood ; and yet, its flame unquenrh’d, 
 Th’ unconquerable lightning struggles through. 
 Ragged and fierce, or in red whirling, balls, 
 
 And fires the mountain with redoubled rage. 
 
 Black from the stroke, above, the smould’ring pine 
 Stands a sad shatter’d trunk ; and, stretch’d below 
 A lifeless group the blasted cattle lie : i 
 
 Here the soft flocks, with that same harmless lock 
 They wore alive, and ruminating still 
 In fancy’s eye; and there the frowning bull. 
 
 And ox half-rais’d. Struck on the castled clilf. 
 
 The venerable tower and spiry fane 
 Resign their aged pride. The gloomy woods 
 Start at the flash, and from their deep recess, 
 Wide-flaming out, their trembling inmates shake. 
 Amid Caernarvon’s mountains rages loud 
 The repercussive roar . with mighty 
 Into the flashing deep, from the rude rocks 
 K 
 
110 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 OfPenmanmaur heap’d hideous to the sky, 
 
 Tumble the smitten cliffs ; and Snowden’s j)eak, 
 Dissolving-, instant yields his wintry load. 
 
 Far seen, the heights of heathy Cheviot blaze., 
 
 And Thule bellows through her utmost isles. 
 
 Guilt hears appall’d, with deeply-troubled thought. 
 And yet not always on the guilty head 
 Descends the fated flash. Young Celadon 
 And his Amelia were a matchless pair ; 
 
 With equal virtue form’d, and equal grace, 
 
 The same, distinguish’d by their ^ex alone: 
 
 Hers the mild lustre of the blooming morn. 
 
 And his the radiance of the risen day. 
 
 They lov’d : but such their guileless passion was, 
 As in the dawn of time inform’d the heart 
 Of innocence, aud undissembling truth. 
 
 ’Twas friendship, heighten’d by the mutual wish, 
 The enchanting hope, and sympathetic glow, 
 Beam’d from the mutual eye. Devoting all 
 To love, each was to each a dearer self ; 
 
 Supremely happy in th’ awaken’d power 
 Of givingjoy. Alone, amid the shades, 
 
 Still in harmonious intercourse they liv’d 
 The rural day, and talk’d the flowing heart, 
 
 Or sigh’d and look’d unutterable things. 
 
 So pass’d their life, a clear united stream, 
 
 By care unruffled ; till, in evil hour, 
 
 The tempest caught them on the tender walk, 
 Heedless how far and where its mazes stray’d : 
 While, w ith each other blest, creative love 
 Still bade eternal Eden smile around. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Presaging instant fate, her bosom heav’d 
 Unwonted sighs, and stealing oft a look 
 Of the big gloom, on Celadon her eye 
 Fell tearful, wetting her disorder’d cheek. 
 
 In vain assuring love, and confidence 
 In Heaven, repress’d her fear; it grew, and shook 
 Her frame near dissolution. He perceiv’d 
 Th’ unequal conflict; and as angels look 
 On dying saints, his eyes compassion shed, 
 
 VV'^hh love illumin’d high. “ Fear not,” he said, 
 
 ‘‘ Sweet innocence ! thou stranger to offence. 
 
 And inward storm! He, who yon skies involves 
 In frowns of darkness, ever smiles on thee 
 With kind regard. O’er thee the secret shaft 
 That wastes at midnight, or th’ undreaded hour 
 Of noon, flies harmless : and that very voice. 
 Which thunders terror through the guilty heart, 
 With tongues of seraphs whispers peace to thine. 
 ’Tis safety to be near thee sure, and thus 
 To clasp perfection!” From his void embrace, 
 (Mysterious Heaven !) that moment, to the ground, 
 A blacken’d corse, was struck the beauteous maid. 
 But who can paint the lover, as he stood. 
 
 Pierc’d by severe amazement, hating life, 
 Speechless, and fix’d in all the death of wo ! 
 
 So, faint resemblance! on the marble tomb. 
 
 The well-dissembled mourner stooping stands, 
 
 For ever silent, and forever sad. 
 
 As from the face of heaven the shatter’d clouds 
 Tumultuous rove, th’ interminable sky 
 Sublimer swells, and o’er the world expands 
 
112 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 A purer azure. Through the lighten’d air 
 A higher lustre and a clearer calm, 
 
 Diffusive, tremble} viMe, as if in sign 
 Of danger past, a glittering robe of joy, 
 
 Set off abundant by the yellow ray. 
 
 Invests the fields } and Nature smiles, reviv'd. 
 
 ’Tis beauty all, and grateful song around. 
 
 Join’d to the low of kine, and numerous bleat 
 •Of flocks thick-nibbling through the clover’d vale. 
 And shall the hymn be marr’d by thankless Man, 
 Most favour’d ; who with voice articulate 
 Should lead the chorus of this lower world ? 
 
 Shall he, so soon forgetful of the Hand 
 That hush’d the thunder, and serenes the sky, 
 Extinguish’d feel that spark the tempest wak’d 
 That sense of powers exceeding tar his own. 
 
 Ere yet his feeble heart has lost its fears ? 
 
 Cheer’d by the milder beam, the sprightly youth 
 Speeds to the well known pool, whose crystal depth 
 A sandy bottom shows. Awhile he stands 
 Gazing the inverted landscape, half afraid 
 To meditate the blue profound below ; 
 
 Then plunges headlong down the circling flood. 
 
 His ebon tresses and his rosy cheek 
 
 Instant emerge } and through the obedient wave, 
 
 At each short breathing by his lip repell’d, 
 
 V/ith arms and legs according well, he makes, 
 
 As humour leads, an easy-winding patli : 
 
 While from his polish d sides a dewy light 
 Effuses on the pleas’d spectators round. 
 
 'i'iiis is the purest exercise of health, 
 
SUMMER, 
 
 113 
 
 The kind refresher of the summer heats; 
 
 IVor, when cold Winter keens the brig^htening’ flood, 
 Would I wcak-shivering- linger on the brink. 
 
 Thus life redoubles, and is oft preserv’d, 
 
 By the bold swimmer, in the swift iliapse 
 Of accident disastrous . Hence the limbs 
 Knit into force ; and the same Roman arm. 
 
 That rose victorious o’er the conquer’d earth. 
 
 First learned, while tender, to subdue the wave. 
 
 E’en from the body’s purity, the mind 
 Receives a secret sympathetic aid. 
 
 Close in the covert of a hazel copse. 
 
 Where winded into pleasing solitudes 
 Runs out the rambling dale, young Damon sat. 
 Pensive, and pierc’d with love’s delightful pangs 
 There to the stream that down the distant rocks 
 Hoarse murmuring fell, and plaintive breeze that 
 Among the bending willows ; falsely he [play’d 
 Of Musidora’s cruelty complain’d. 
 
 She felt his flame ; but deep within her breast 
 In bashful coyness, or in maiden pride. 
 
 The soft return conceal’d; save when.it stole 
 In side-long glances from her downcast eye. 
 
 Or from her swelling soul in stifled sighs. 
 
 Touch’d by the scene, no stranger to his vow's, 
 
 He fram’d a melting lay, to try her heart ; 
 
 And, if an infant passion struggled there. 
 
 To call that passion forth. Thrice happy swaiii ' 
 
 A lucky chance, that oft decides the fate 
 Of mighty monarchs, then decided thine. 
 
 For lo! conducted by the laughing Loves, 
 
 8 K 2 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 This cool retreat his Musidora sought : 
 
 Warm in her cheek the sultry season glow’d * 
 
 And rob’d in loose array, she came to bathe 
 FTer fervent limbs in the refreshing stream. 
 
 What shall he do ? In sweet confusion lost, 
 
 And dubious flutterings, he awile remain’d : 
 
 A pure ingenuous elegance of soul, 
 
 A delicate refinement known to few, 
 
 Perplex’d his breast, and urged him to retire : 
 
 But love forbade. Ye prudes in virtue, say, 
 
 Say, ye severest, what would you have done ? 
 
 Meantime, this fairer nymph than ever blest 
 Arcadian stream, with timid eye around 
 The banks surveying, stripp’d her beauteous liinbs> 
 To taste the lucid coolness of the flood. 
 
 Ah then ! not Paris on the piny top 
 
 Of Ida panted stronger, when aside 
 
 The rival goddesses the veil divine 
 
 Cast unconfin’d, and gave him all their charms, 
 
 Then, Damon, thou ; as from the snowy leg. 
 
 And slender foot, th’ inverted silk she drew ; 
 
 As the soft touch dissolv’d the virgin zone ; 
 
 And, through the parting robe, the alternate breast 
 With youth wild-throbbing, on thy lawless gaze 
 In full luxuriance rose. But, desperate youth, 
 
 How durst thou risk the soul-distracting view ? 
 
 As from her naked limbs of glowing white, 
 Harmonious sw^ell’dby Nature’s finest hand. 
 
 In folds loose floating fell the fainter lawn ; 
 
 And fair-expos’d she stood, shrunk from herself, 
 With fancy blushing, at the doubtful breeze 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 115 
 
 Alarm’d, and starting- like the fearful fawn ? 
 
 'I'iien to the flood she rush’d ; the parted tlood 
 Its lovely 'guest with closing waves receiv’d ; 
 
 And every beauty softening, every grace 
 Flushing anew, a mellow lustre shed : 
 
 As shines the lily through the crystal mild ; 
 
 Or as the rose amid the morning dew, 
 
 Fresh from Aurora’s hand more sweetly glows. 
 \Vhile thus she wanton’d, now beneath the wave 
 But ill-conceal’d ; and now with streaming locks, 
 That half embrac’d her in a humid veil. 
 
 Rising again the latent Damon drew 
 
 Such madd’ning draughts of beauty to the soul, 
 
 As for awhile o’erwhelm’d his raptur’d thouglit 
 With luxury too daring. Check’d at last. 
 
 By love’s respectful modesty, he deem’d 
 
 The theft profane, if aught profane to love 
 
 Can e’er be deem’d ; and, stiuggling from thc.shadey 
 
 Wdth headlong hurry fled ; but first these lines, 
 
 Ti tic’d by his ready pencil, on the bank 
 Witli trembling hand he threw : — Bathe on, my fair, 
 Yet unbcheld save by the sacred eye 
 Of faithful love ; I go to guard thy haunt, 
 
 J'o keep from thy recess each vagrant foot, 
 
 And each licentious eye.” With wild surprise, 
 
 As if to marble struck, devoid of sense, 
 
 A stupid moment motionless she stood ; 
 
 So stands the statue* that enchants the world, 
 
 So bending tries to veil the matchless boast, 
 
 * Tht Venus of Medici 
 
116 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 The mingled beauties of exulting Greece, 
 Recovering, swift she flew to fuid those robes 
 Which blissful Eden knew not; and, array’d 
 In careless haste, th’ alarming paper snateird. 
 
 But, when her Damon’s well-known hand she saw, 
 Her terrors vanish’d, and a softer train 
 Of mixt emotions, hard to be describ’d, 
 
 Her sudden bosom seized : shame void of guih, 
 
 The charming blush of innocence, esteem, 
 
 And admiration of her lover’s flame, 
 
 By modesty exalted : e’en a sense 
 Of self-approving beauty stole across 
 Her busy thought. At length, a tender calm 
 Hush’d by degrees the tumult of her soul ; 
 
 And on the spreading beech, that o’er the stream 
 Incumbent hung, she with the sylvan pen 
 Of rural lovers this confession carv’d. 
 
 Which soon her Damon kiss’d with wee])ing joy : 
 
 Dear youth 1 sole judge of what these verses mean 
 By fortune too much favour’d, but by love, 
 
 Alas ! not favour’d less, be still as now 
 Discreet : tlie tiiiie may come you need not fly.” 
 
 The sun has lost his rage: his downward orb 
 Slioots nothing now but animating warmth, 
 
 And vital lustre ; that, with various ray. 
 
 Lights up the clouds, those beauteous robes oflieaven 
 Incessant roll’d into romantic .«hapes, 
 
 The dream of waking fancy. Broad below, 
 
 Cover’d with ripening fruits, and swelling fast 
 Into the perfect year, the pregnant earth 
 And all her tribes rejoice. r^Jow the soft hour 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 117 
 
 Of walking comes : for him who lonely loves 
 To seek the distant hills, and there converse 
 With Nature ; there to harmonize his heart, 
 
 And in pathetic song to breathe around 
 The harmony to others. Social friends, 
 
 Attun’d to happy unison of soul ; 
 
 To whose exalting eye a fairer world. 
 
 Of which the vulgar never had a glimpse, 
 
 Displays its charms ; whose minds are richly fraught 
 Wiih philosophic stores, superior light; 
 
 And in whose breast, enthusiastic burns 
 Virtue, the sons of interest deem romance; 
 
 Now call’d abroad enjoy the falling day: 
 
 Now to the verdant Portico of woods, 
 
 To Nature’s vast Lyceum, forth they walk; 
 
 By that kind Scliool where no proud master reigns, 
 The full free converse of the friendly heart,. 
 Improving and improv’d. Now from the world. 
 Sacred to sweet retirement, lovers steal. 
 
 And pour their souls in transport; which the Sire 
 Of love, approving, hears and calls it good. 
 
 Which way, Amanda, shall we bend our course ? 
 
 The choice perplexes. Wherefore should we choose? 
 
 I All is the same with thee. S ay, shall we wind 
 Along the stream? or walk the smiling mead? 
 
 ^ Or court the forest glade ? o r wander wild 
 Among the waving harvest? or ascend. 
 
 While radiant Summer open, all its pride. 
 
 Thy hill, delightful Shene?* Here let us sweep 
 
 * The old name of Richmond, signifying, m Saxon, 
 
 \ Shining, or Splendour. 
 
ns 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 The boundless landscape: now the raptur’d eye, 
 Exulting- swift, to huge Augusta send ; 
 
 Now to the Sister-Hil4* that skirt her plain, 
 
 To lofty Harrow now, and now to where 
 Majestic Windsor lifts his prinedy brow. 
 
 In lovely contrast to this glorious view, 
 
 Calmly magnificent, then will v/e turn 
 To where the silver Thames first rural grows. 
 There let the feasted eye unwearied stray : 
 Luxurious, there, rove through the pendent woods 
 That nodding hang o’er Harrington’s retreat ; 
 
 And, stooping thence to Ham’s embowering walks. 
 Beneath whose shades in spotless peace retir’d. 
 With her the pleasing partner of his heart, 
 
 The worthy Queensbury yet laments his Gay ; 
 
 And polished Cornbury woos the willing Muscj 
 Slow let us trace the matchless vale of Thames ; 
 Fair-winding up to where the Muses haunt 
 In Twit’nam’s bowers, and for their Pope implore 
 The healing God to royal Hampton’s pile, 
 
 To Clermont’s terrac’d height, and Esher’s groves 
 Where in the sweetest solitude, embrac’d 
 By the soft windings of the silent mole. 
 
 From courts and senates Pelham finds repose. 
 Enchanting vale ! beyond whate’er the Muse 
 Has of Achaia or Hesperia sung ! 
 
 O vale of bliss ! O softly -swelling hills ! 
 
 On which the Power of Cultivation lies, 
 
 And joys to see the wonders of his toil. 
 
 ^ High gate and Hampstead. 
 
 1 In his last sickness. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 119 
 
 Heavens! wbat a goodly prospect spieads around, 
 Of hills, and dales, and woods, and lawns, and spires, 
 And glittering towns, and gilded streams, till all 
 The stretching landscape into smoke decays ! 
 
 Happy Britannia ! where the Queen of Arts, 
 
 Inspiring vigour. Liberty abroad 
 
 Walks, unconfin’d, e’en to thy furthest cots, 
 
 And scatters plenty with unsparing hand. 
 
 Rich is thy soil, and merciful thy clime ; 
 
 Thy streams unfailing in the summer’s drought ; 
 Unmatch’d thy guardian oaks; thy valleys float 
 With golden waves ; and on thy mountains flecks 
 Bleat numberless ; while roving round their sides. 
 Bellow the blackening herds in lusty droves. 
 Beneath, thy meadows glow, and rise unquell’d 
 Against the mower’s scythe. On every hand 
 Thy villas shine. Thy country teems with wealth ; 
 And property assures it to the swain. 
 
 Pleas’d, and unwearied in his guarded toil. 
 
 Full are thy cities with the sons of Art ; 
 
 And trade and joy, in every busy street. 
 
 Mingling are heard ; e’en Drudgery himself, 
 
 As at the car he sweats, or dusty hews 
 
 The palace-stone, looks gay. Thy crowded ports, 
 
 ’Where rising mas-ts an endless prospect yield ; 
 
 With labour burn ; and echo to the shouts 
 
 Of hurried sailor, as he hearty waves 
 
 Hi , last adieu ; and loosening every sheet, 
 
 .lesigns the spreading vessel to the wind. 
 
 Bold, firm, and graceful, are thy generous youth, 
 C} liardship sln^^w’d and by danger fir’d , 
 
120 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 Scattering the nations where they go ; and first 
 Or on the listed plain, or stormy seas. 
 
 Mild are thy glories too, as o’er the plans 
 Of thriving peace thy thoughtful sires preside j 
 In genius, and substantial learning high; 
 
 For every virtue, every worth, renown’d ; 
 
 Sincere, plain -hearted, hospitable, kind ; 
 
 Vet like the mustering thunder when provok’d, 
 The dread of tyrants, and the soul resource 
 Of those that under grim oppression groan. 
 
 Thy sons of glory many ! Alfred thine ; 
 
 In whom the splendour of heroic war, 
 
 And more heroic peace, when govern’d well. 
 Combine ; whose hallow’d name tlie Virtues saint, 
 And his own muses love ; the best of kings ! 
 
 With him thy Edwards and thy Henrys shine. 
 Names dear to fame ; the first who deep impress’d 
 On haughty Gaul the terror of thy arms. 
 
 That awes her genius still. In statesmen thou, 
 And patriots, fertile. Thine a steady More, 
 
 Who, with a generous though unshaken zeal, 
 Withstood a brutal tyrant’s useful rage : 
 
 Like Cato firm, like Aristides just. 
 
 Like rigid Cincinnatus nobly poor; 
 
 A dauntless soul erect, who smil’d on death. 
 
 Frugal, and wise, a Walsingham is thine, 
 
 A Drake, who made thee mistress of the deep. 
 
 And bore thy name in thunder round the world. 
 Then flam d thy spirit high: but who can speak 
 The numerous worthies of the Maiden Reign } 
 
 In Raleigh mark their every glory mix’d; 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 121 
 
 Raleig-Ii, the scourge of Spain! whose breast with all 
 The sage, the patriot, and the hero burn’d. 
 
 Nor sunk his vigoyr, when a coward reign 
 The warrior fetter’d, and at last resign’d, 
 
 To glut the vengeance of a vanquish’d' foe. 
 
 7’hen, active still and unrestrain’d, liis mind 
 Explor’d the vast extent of ages past. 
 
 And with his prison-hours enrich’d the world ; 
 
 Yet found no times, in all the long research, 
 
 So glorious, or so base, as those he prov’d. 
 
 In which he conquer’d, and in which he bled. 
 
 Nor can the Muse the gallant Sidney pass, 
 
 The plume of w'ar 1 with early laurels crov/n’d, 
 
 The lover’s myrtle, and the poet’s bay. 
 
 A Hampden too is thine, illustrious land! 
 
 Wise, strenuous, firm, of unsubmitting soul, 
 
 Who stemm'd the torrent of a downward age 
 To slavery prone, and bade thee rise again, 
 
 In all thy native pomp of freedom bold. 
 
 Bright, at his call, the Age of Men effulg’d. 
 
 Of men on whom late time a kindling eye 
 Shall turn, and tyrants tremble while they read. 
 Bring every sweetest flower, and let me strew 
 The grave where Russel lies; whose temper’d blood, 
 With calmest cheerfulness for thee resign’d, 
 
 Stain’d the sad annals of a giddy reign; 
 
 Aiming at lawless power, though meanly sunk 
 
 In loose inglorious luxury. With him 
 
 His friend, the British Cassius,* fearless bled ; 
 
 Algernon Sidney. 
 
122 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 Of high detern ‘n’d «pirit. roughly brave, 
 
 By ancient lear -ng to tli’ enlighten’d love 
 Of ancient freedom warm’d. Fair thy renown 
 In aw^ful sages and in noble bards ; 
 
 Soon as the light of dawning Science spread 
 Her orient ray, and wak'dthe Muses’ song. 
 
 Thine is a Bacon ^ hapless in his choice, 
 
 Unfit to stand the civil storm of state, 
 
 And through the smooth barbarity of courts. 
 
 With firm but pliant virtue, forward still 
 To urge his course; him for the studious shade 
 Kind Nature form’d ; deep, comprehensive, clear, 
 Exact, and elegant ; in one rich soul, 
 
 Plato, the Stagyrite, and Tully join’d. 
 
 The great deliverer he ; who from the gloom 
 Of cloister’d monks, and jargon-teaching schools. 
 Led forth the true Philosophy, there long 
 Held in the magic chain of words and forms. 
 
 And definitions void: he led her forth, 
 
 Daughter of Heaven I that slow-ascending still, 
 Investigating sure the chain of things, 
 
 With radiant finger points to heaven again. 
 
 The generous Ashley* thine, the friend of man 
 Who scann’d his nature with a brother's eye, 
 
 His weakness prompt to shade, to raise his aim, 
 To touch the finer movements of the mind. 
 
 And with the moral beauty charm the heart. 
 
 Why need I name thy Boyle, whose pious search 
 Amid the dark recesses of his works, 
 
 * Anthony Ashley Cooper^ Earl of Shaftesbury. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 123 
 
 The great Creator sought ? and why thy Locke, 
 Who made the whole internal \v6rld his own ? 
 
 Let Newton, pure intelligence ! whom God 
 To mortals lent to trace his boundless works 
 From laws sublimely simple, speak thy fame 
 In all philosophy. For lofty sense^ 
 
 Creative fancy, and inspection keen 
 Through the deep windings of the human heart, 
 Is not wild Shakspeare thine and Nature’s boast 
 Is not each great, each amiable Muse 
 Of classic ages in thy Milton met ? 
 
 A genius universal as his theme ; 
 
 Astonishing as chaos, as the bloom 
 Of blowing Eden fair, as heaven sublime ! 
 
 Nor shall my verse, that elder bard forget, 
 The gentle Spenser, Fancy’s pleasing son ; 
 
 Who, like a copious river, pour’d his song 
 O’er all the mazes of enchanted ground : 
 
 Nor thee, his ancient master, laughing sage, 
 Chaucer, whose native manners-painting verse. 
 Well moraliz’d, shines through the gothic cloud 
 Of time and language o’er thy genius thrown. 
 
 May my song soften, as thy daughters I, 
 Britannia, hail ! for beauty is their own, 
 
 The feeling heart, simplicity of life, 
 
 And elegance, and taste : the faultless form, 
 Shap’d by the hand of harmony ; the cheek, 
 Where the live crimson, through the native white 
 Soft-shooting, o’er the face diffuses bloom. 
 
 And every nameless grace ; the parted lip. 
 
 Like the red rose-bud moist wdth morning-dew, 
 
124 
 
 SUMMER- 
 
 Breathing delight; and, under flowing jet, 
 
 Or sunny ringlets, or of circling brown, 
 
 The neck slight-shaded, and the swelling breast : 
 The look resistless, piercing to the soul, 
 
 And by the soul inform’d, when drest in loye 
 She sits high-smiling in the conscious eye. 
 
 • Island of bliss ! amid the subject seas. 
 
 That thunder round thy rocky coast, set up, 
 
 At once the wonder, terror, and delight, 
 
 Of distant nations ; whose remotest shores 
 Can soon be shaken by thy naval arm ; 
 
 Not to be shook thyself, but all assaults 
 Baffling, as thy hoar cliffs the loud sea-wave. 
 
 O Thou ! by whose Almighty nod the scale 
 Of empire rises, or alternate falls. 
 
 Send forth the saving Virtues round the land. 
 
 In bright patrol ; white Peace and social Love ! 
 The tender looking Charity, intent 
 On gentle deeds, and shedding tears through smiles 
 Undaunted Truth, and Dignity of mind : 
 
 Courage compos’d, and keen; sound Temperance, 
 Healthful in heart and look ; clear Chastity, 
 
 With blushes reddening as she moves along, 
 Disorder’d at the deep regard she draws ; 
 
 Bough Industry; Activity untir’d. 
 
 With copious life inform’d, and all awake; 
 
 While in the radiant front, superior shines 
 That first Paternal virtue. Public Zeal ; 
 
 Who throws o’er all an equal wide survey, 
 
 And, ever musing on the common vA^eal, 
 
 Still labours glorious with some great design. 
 
SUMMER. 
 
 125 
 
 Low walks the sun, and broadens by degrees, 
 Just o’er the verge of day. The shifting clouds 
 Assembled gay, a richly-gorgeous train, 
 
 Jn'all their pomp attend his setting throne. 
 
 Air, earth, and ocean, smile immense. And now. 
 As if his weary chariot souglit the bowers 
 Of Amphitrite, and her tending nymphs, 
 
 (So Grecian fable sung) he dips his orb ; 
 
 Now half-imme'*s’d ; and now a golden curve 
 Gives one bright glance, then total disappears 
 Lor ever running an enchanted round. 
 
 Passes the day, deceitful, vain, and void ; 
 
 As fleets the vision o’er the formful brain. 
 
 This moment hurrying wild th’ impassioned soul, 
 The next in nothing lost. ’Tis so to him. 
 
 The dreamer of this earth, an idle blank ; 
 
 A sight of horror to tlie cruel wretch, 
 
 Who all day long in sordid pleasure roll’d, 
 
 H imself a useless load, has squander’d vile, 
 
 Upon his scoundrel train, what might have cheer’d 
 A drooping family of modest worth. 
 
 But to the generous still-improving mind, 
 
 'J'hat gives the hopeless heart to sing for joy, 
 Diffusing kind benehcence around, 
 
 Boastless; as now descends the silent dew ; 
 
 To him the long review of order’d life 
 is inward rapture, only to be felt. 
 
 Confess’d from yonder slow extinguish’d clouds, 
 All ether softening, sober Evening takes 
 Her wonted station in the middle air ; 
 
 A thousand shadows at her beck. First this 
 L 2 
 
126 
 
 SUMMER, 
 
 She sends on earth ; then that of deeper dj'e 
 Steals soft behind; and then a deeper still, 
 
 In circle following circle, gathers round, 
 
 To close the face of things. A fresher gale 
 Begins to wave the wood, and stir the strcajn, 
 Sweeping with shadowy gusts the fields of corn 
 While the quail clamours for his running mate. 
 Wide o’er the thistly lawn, as swells the breeze 
 A whitening shower of vegetable down 
 Amusive floats. The kind impartial care 
 Of Nature nought disdains : thoughtful to feed 
 Her lowest sonsj and clothe the coming year, 
 From field to field the feather’d seeds she wings 
 His folded dock secure, the shepherd home 
 Hies, merry-hearted ; and by turns relieves 
 The ruddy milk-maid of her brimming pail ; 
 
 The beauty whom perhaps his witless heart, 
 Unknowing what the joy-mixt anguish means, 
 Sincerely loves, by that best language shown 
 Of cordial glances, and obliging deeds. 
 
 Onward they pass, o’er many a panting height, 
 And valley sunk, and unfrdquented ; where 
 At fall of eve the fairy people throng. 
 
 In various game, and revelry, to pass 
 The summer-night, as village-stories tell. 
 
 But far about they wander from the grave 
 Of him, whom his ungentle fortune urg’d 
 Against his own sad breast to lift the hand 
 Of impious violence. The lonely tower 
 Is also shunn’d ; whose mournful chambers hold, 
 So night-struck Fancy dreams, the yelling ghost. 
 
SUMMER, 
 
 m 
 
 Amongthe crooked lanes, on every hedge, 
 
 The glow-worm lights his gem ; and, through the dark, 
 A moving radiance twinkles. Evening yields 
 The world to Night ; not in her winter-robe 
 Of massy Stygian woof, but loose array'd 
 In mantle dun. A faint erroneous ray, 
 
 Glanc’d from th’ imperfect surfaces of things, 
 
 Flings' half an image on the straining eye ; 
 
 While wavering woods, and villages, and streams, 
 And rocks, and mountain-tops, that long retain’d 
 Th’ ascending gleam, are all one swimming scene; 
 Uncertain if beheld. Sudden to heaven 
 Thence weary vision turns ; where, leading soft 
 The silent hours of love, with purest ray 
 Sweet Venus shines; and from hei genial rise, 
 
 When daylight sickens till it springs afresh, 
 
 Unrivall’d reigns, the fairest lamp of Night. 
 
 As thus th’ effulgence tremulous I drink, 
 
 With cherish’d gaze, the lambent lightnings shoot 
 Across the sky ; or horizontal dart 
 In wondrous shapes; by fearful murmuring crowds 
 Portentous deem’d. Amid the radiant orbs, 
 
 That more than deck, that animate the sky. 
 
 The life-infusing suns of other worlds; 
 
 Lo! from the dread immensity of space 
 Returning, with accelerated course. 
 
 The rushing comet to the sun descends ; 
 
 And as he sinks below the shading earth, 
 
 With awful train projected o’er the heavens, 
 
 The guilty nations tremble. But, above 
 'I'hose superstitious horrors that enslave 
 
1£8 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 The fond sequacious herd, to mystic faith 
 And blind amazement prone ; th’ enlighten’d few, 
 Whose godlike minds Philosophy exalts, 
 
 The glorious stranger hail. They feel a joy * 
 Divinely great ; they in their powers exult, [spurns 
 That wondrous force of thought, which mounting 
 This dusky spot, and measures all the sky ; 
 
 While, from his far excursion through the wilds 
 Of barren ether, faithful to his time. 
 
 They see the blazing wonder rise anew; 
 
 In seeming terror clad, but kindly bent 
 To work the will of ail-sustaining Love : 
 
 From his huge vapoury train perhaps to shake 
 Reviving moisture on the numerous orbs, 
 
 Through which his long ellipsis winds ; perhaps 
 To lend new fuel to declining suns. 
 
 To light up worlds, and feed th’ eternal fire. 
 
 With thee, serene Philosophy, with thee. 
 
 And thy bright garland, let me crown my song ; 
 Effusive source of evidence, eaid truth ! 
 
 A lustre shedding o'er th’ ennobled mind. 
 
 Stronger than summer-noon; and pure as that, 
 Whose mild vibrations sooth the parted soul, 
 
 New to the dawning of celestial daj'. [tliee, 
 
 Hence through her nourish’d powers, enlarg'd by 
 She springs aloft, with elevated pride, 
 
 Above the tangling mass of low desires 
 
 That bind the fluttering crowd; aaid, angel- wing’d, 
 
 The heights of science and of virtue gains, 
 
 Where all is calm and clear; with Nature round, 
 
 Or in the starry regions, or th’ abyss. 
 
SUMMER, 
 
 V29 
 
 To Reason’s and to Fancy’s eye display’d: 
 
 The first up-tracing, from the dreai^y void, 
 
 The chain of causes and effects, to Him, 
 
 The wo rid -producing Essence, who alone 
 Possesses being ; while the last receives 
 The whole magnificence of heaven and earth. 
 And every beauty, delicate or bold. 
 
 Obvious or more remote, with livelier sense, 
 Diffusive painted on the rapid mind. 
 
 Tutor’d by thee, hence Poetry exalts 
 Her voice to ages; and informs the page 
 With music, image, sentiment, and thought. 
 Never to die ! the treasure of mankind ! 
 
 Their highest honour, and their truest joy ! 
 Without thee what were unenlighten'd Man ? 
 
 A savage roaming through the woods and wilds 
 In quest of prey; and with the unfashioncd fur 
 Rough-clad ; devoid of every finer art, 
 
 And elegance of life. Nor happiness 
 Domestic, mix’d of tenderness and care. 
 
 Nor moral excellence, nor social bliss, 
 
 Nor guardian law were his ; nor various skill 
 To turn the furrow, or to guide the tool 
 Mechanic ; nor the heaven-conducted prow 
 Of navigation bold, that fearless braves 
 The burning line, or dares the wintry pole! 
 Mother severe of infinite delights ! 
 
 Nothing, save rapine, indolence, and guile. 
 
 And woes on woes, a still-revolving train! 
 Whose horrid circle had made human life 
 Than non-existence worse : but, taught by thee, 
 9 
 
330 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 Ours are the plans of policy and peace ; 
 
 To live like brothers, and conjunctive all , 
 Embellish life. While thus laborious crowds 
 Ply the tough oar, Philosophy directs 
 The ruling helm ; or, like the liberal breath 
 Of potent heaven, invisible, the sail 
 Swells out, and bears the inferior world along 
 Nor to this evanescent speck of earth 
 poorly confin’d; the radiant tracts on high 
 Are her exalted range ; intent to gaze 
 Creation through ; and, from that full complex 
 Of never-ending wonders, to conceive 
 Of the Sole Being right, who spoke the Word, 
 And Nature mov’d complete. With inward view 
 Thence on the ideal kingdom swift she turns 
 Her eye ; and instant, at her powerful glance, 
 
 Th’ obedient phantoms vanish or appear ; 
 Compound, divide, and into order shift, 
 
 Each to his rank, from plain perception up 
 To the fair forms of Fancy’s fleeting train : 
 
 To reason then, deducing truth from truth ) 
 
 And notion quite abstract ; where first begins 
 The V. orld of spirits, action all, and life 
 Unfetter’d, and unmixt. But here the cloud. 
 
 So wills Eternal Providence, sits deep. 
 
 Enough for us to know that this dark state. 
 
 In way ward passions lost, and vain pursuits. 
 
 This Infancy of Being, cannot prove 
 The final issue of the works of God j 
 By boundless Love and perfect WTsdoni form’d, 
 And ever rising with the rising mind. 
 
THE SEASONS. 
 
 AUTUMN- 
 
THE ARGUMENT. 
 
 The subject. proposed. Addressed to Mr. Onslow A 
 prospect of the fields ready for harvest. Reflections 
 in praise of Industry raised by that vie w. Reaping. 
 A tale relative lo it. A harvest storm. Shooting 
 and huntings their barbarity. A ludicrous account 
 of fox-hunting. A view of an orchard. Wallfruii 
 A vineyard. A description of fogs, frequent in u\e 
 latter part of Autumn: whence a digression, inquire 
 ihginto the rise of fountains and rivers. Birds of 
 season considered, that now shift their habitation. 
 The prodigious number of them that cover the north- 
 ern and western isles of Scotland. Hence a view 
 of the country. A prospect of the discoloured, fad- 
 ing woods. After a geiitle dusky day, moonlight. 
 Autumnal meteors. Morning: to which succeeds hi 
 calm, pure, sunshiny day, such as usually shuts up 
 the season. The harvest being gathered in, the coun- 
 try dissolved in joy. The whole concludes with a 
 fanegyrk on a philosophical country life 
 
AUTUMN 
 
 CkOWN’D with the sickle and the v/heaten sheaf, 
 While Autumn, nodding o’er the yellow plain, 
 Comes jovial on ; the Doric reed once more, 
 Well-pleased, I tuni;, Whate’er the wintry frost 
 Nitrous prepar’d ; the various- blossom’d Spring 
 Put in white promise forth; and Summer-suns 
 Concocted strong, rush boundless now to view ; 
 Full, perfect all, and swell my glorious theme. 
 
 Onslow ! the Muse, ambitious of thy name, 
 
 To grace, inspire, and dignify her song. 
 
 Would from the public voice thy gentle ear 
 AVvhile engage. Thy noble cares she knows, 
 
 The patriot virtues that distend thy thought, 
 
 Spread on thy f ront; and in tliy bosom glow. 
 
 While listeiiing senates hang upon thy tongue ; 
 Devolvingthrough tlie maze of eloquence 
 A roll of periods, sweeter than her song. 
 
 But she too pants for public virtue ; she, 
 
 Though weak of power, yet strong in ardent w ill, 
 Whene’er her country rushes on her heart, 
 
 Assumes a bolder note ; and fondly tries 
 To mix the patriot’s with the poet’s flame. 
 
131 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 Wlien the bright Virgin gives the beauteous days. 
 And Libra weighs in equal scales the year ; 
 
 From heaven’s high cope the fierce effulgence shook 
 Of parting Summer, a serener blue, 
 
 With golden light enliven’d, wide invests 
 '1 he happy world. Attemper’d suns arise, 
 Sweet-beam’d and shedding oft through lucid clouds 
 A pleasing calm ; while broad, and brown, below 
 Kxtensive harvests hang the heavy head. 
 
 Rich, silent, deep, they stand ; for not a gale 
 Rolls its light billows o’er the bending plain : 
 
 A calm of plenty ! till the rufiled air 
 
 Falls from its poise, and gives thr breeze to blow. 
 
 Kent is the fleecy mantle of the sky ; 
 
 The clouds fly different ; and the sudden sun 
 By fits effulgent gilds th’ illumin’d field, 
 
 And black by fits the shadows sweep along. 
 
 A gaily-chequer’d heart-expanding view, 
 
 Far as the circling eye can shoot around, 
 
 Unbounded tossing in a flood of corn. 
 
 These are thy blessings. Industry I rough power ! 
 Whom labour still attends, and sweat, and pain ; 
 
 Yet the kind source of every gentle art. 
 
 And all the soft civility of life : 
 
 Raiser of humankind ! by Nature cast, 
 
 Naked and helpless, out amid the woods 
 And wilds, to rude inclement elements ; 
 
 With various seeds of art deep in the mind 
 Implanted, and profusely pour’d around 
 Materials infinite, but idle all. 
 
 Still unexerted, in th’ unconscious breast 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 135 
 
 Slept the lethargic powers; Corruption still, 
 Voracious, swallow’d what the liberal hand 
 Of bounty scatter’(^ o’er the savage year: 
 
 And still the sad barbarian, roving, mix’d 
 With beasts of prey, or for his acorn* meal 
 Fought the fierce tusky boar; a shivering wretch! 
 Aghast and comfortless, when the bleak north. 
 With winter charg’d, let the mixt tempest fly, 
 
 Hail, rain, and snow, and bitter-breathing frost* 
 Then to the shelter of the hut he fled ; 
 
 And the wild season, sordid, pin’d away. 
 
 For home he had not; home is the resort 
 Of love, of joy, of peace, and plenty, where, 
 Supporting and supported, polish’d friends, 
 
 And dear relations, mingle into bliss. 
 
 But this the rugged savage never felt, 
 
 E’en desolate in crowds ; and thus his days 
 Koil’d heavy, dark, and unenjoy’d along: 
 
 A waste of time ! till Industry approach’d, 
 
 And rous’d him from his miserable sloth ; 
 
 His faculties unfolded ; pointed out, 
 
 Where lavish Nature the directing hand 
 Of Art demanded! show’d him how to raise 
 His feeble force by the mechanic powers, 
 
 To . dig the mineral from the vaulted earth ; 
 
 On what to turn the piercing rage of fire ; 
 
 On what the torrent, and the gather’d blast ; 
 
 Gave the tall ancient forest to his axe ; 
 
 Taught him to chip the wood, and hew the stone, 
 Till by degrees the finish’d fabric rose; 
 fore from his limbs the blood-polluted fur. 
 
136 
 
 AUTUMN- 
 
 And wrapped them in the woollv vestment wann ; 
 
 Or bright in glossy silk, and flowing lawn ; 
 
 With wholesome viands fill’d his table ; pour’d 
 The generous glass around, inspir’d to wake 
 The life-refining soul of decent wit ; 
 
 Nor stopp’d at barren bare necessity; 
 
 But still advancing bolder, led him on 
 To pomp, to pleasure, elegance, and grace ; 
 
 And, breathing high ambition through his soul, 
 
 Set science, wisdom, glory in his view, 
 
 And bade him be the Lord of all below. [bin’d. 
 Then gathering men their natural powers com- 
 And form’d a public ; to the general good 
 Submitting, aiming, and conducting all. 
 
 For this the Patriot-Council met, the full. 
 
 The free, and fairly represented Whole ; 
 
 For this they plann’d the holy guardian laws, 
 Distinguish’d orders, animated arts. 
 
 And with joint force Oppression chaining, set 
 Imperial Justice at the helm ; yet still 
 To them accountable; nor slavish dream’d 
 That toiling millions must resign their weal, 
 
 And all the honey of their search, to such 
 As for themselves alone themselves have rais’d. 
 Hence every form of cultivated life 
 In order set, protected, and inspir’d, 
 
 Into perfection wrought. Uniting all. 
 
 Society grew numerous, high, polite. 
 
 And happy. Nurse of art! the city rear’d 
 In beauteous pride her tower-encircled head ; 
 
 And, stretching street on street, by thousands drew. 
 
AUTUMN, 
 
 137 
 
 From twining woody haunts, or the tough yew 
 To bows strong-straining, her aspiring sons. 
 
 Then Commerce brought into the public walk 
 The busy merchant; the big warehouse built ; 
 
 Kais’d the strong crane ; chok’d up the loaded street 
 With foreign plenty; and thy stream, 0 Thames, 
 Large, gentle, deep, majestic, king of floods! 
 
 Chose for his grand resort. On either hand. 
 
 Like a long wintry forest, groves of masts 
 Shot up their spires; the bellying sheet between 
 Possess’d the breezy void ; the sooty hulk 
 Steer’d sluggish on ; the splendid barge along 
 Row’d, regular, to harmony; around. 
 
 The boat, light skimming, stretch’d its oary wings. 
 While deep the various voice of fervent toil 
 From bank to bank increas’d: whence ribb’d witli 
 To bear the British thunder, black, and bold, [oak, 
 The roaring vessel rush’d into the main. 
 
 Then, too, the pillar’d dome, magnific, heav’d 
 Its ample roof;'' and Luxury within 
 Pour’d out her glitt’ring stores: the canvass smooth, 
 W ith glowinglife protuberant, to the view 
 Embodied rose; the statue seem’d to breathe. 
 
 And soften into flesh ; beneath the touch 
 Of forming art, imagination flushed. 
 
 All is the gift of Industry ; whate’er 
 Exalts, embellishes, and renders life 
 Delightful. Pensive W^inter cheer’d by him 
 Sits at the social fire, and happy hears 
 Th’ excluded tempest idly rave along; 
 
 His harden’d fingers deck the gaudy Spring; 
 
 M 2 
 
13S 
 
 AUTUMN, 
 
 Without him Summer were an arid waste , 
 
 Nor to th’ Autumnal months could thus transmit 
 Those full, mature, immeasurable stores. 
 
 That, waving round, recall my wandering song. 
 
 Soon as the morning trembles o’er the sky. 
 And, unperceiv’d, unfolds the spreading day; 
 Before the ripen’d field the reapers stand, 
 hi fair array; each by the lass he loves; 
 
 To bear the rougher part, and mitigate 
 By nameless gentle offices her toil. 
 
 At once they stoop and swell the lusty sheaves ; 
 While through their cheerful band, the rural talk, 
 The rural scandal, and the rural jest. 
 
 Fly harmless ; to deceive the tedious time. 
 
 And steal unfelt the sultry hours away. 
 
 Belund the master walks, builds up the shocks ; 
 And, conscious, glancing oft on everj^ side 
 His sated eye, feels his heart heave with joy. 
 
 The gleaners spread around, and here and there. 
 Spike after spike their scanty harvest pick. 
 
 Be not too narrow, husbandmen ! but fling 
 From the full sheaf, with charitable stealth. 
 
 The liberal handful. Think, oh ! grateful think! 
 
 1 low good the God of harvest is to you ; 
 
 Who pours abundance o’er your flowing fields; 
 While these unhappy partners of your kind 
 Wide-hover round you, like the fowls of heaven, 
 And ask their humble dole. The various turns 
 Of fortune ponder; that your sons may want 
 What now’, w iih hard reluctance, faint, ye give. 
 'The lovely young Lavinia once had friends. 
 
AUTUMN, 
 
 13S 
 
 ^nd Fortune smil’d, deceitful, on her birth. 
 
 F or, in her helpless years depriv’d of all, 
 
 Of every stay, save Innocence and Heaven, 
 
 She, with her widow’d mother, feeble, old, 
 
 And poor, liv’d in a cottage, far retir’d 
 Among the windings of a woody vale ; 
 
 By solitude and deep surrounding shades. 
 
 But more by bashful modesty conceal’d. 
 
 Together thus they shunn’d the cruel scorn 
 Which virtue, sunk to poverty, would meet 
 From giddy passion and low-minded pride ; 
 
 Almost on Nature’s common bounty fed ; 
 
 Like the gay birds that sung them to repose. 
 Content, and careless of to-morrow’s fare. 
 
 Her form was fresher than the morning rose. 
 
 When the dew wets its leaves ) unstain’d, and pure, 
 As is the lily, or the mountain snow. 
 
 The modest Virtues mingled in her eyes. 
 
 Still on the ground dejected, darting all 
 Their humid beams into the blooming flowers: 
 
 Or #hen the mournful tale her mother told, 
 
 Of what her faithless fortune promis’d once. 
 Thrill’d in her thought, they like the dewy star 
 Of evening, shone in tears. A native grace 
 Sat fair proportion’d on her polish’d limbs. 
 
 Veil’d in a simple robe, their best attire. 
 
 Beyond the pomp of dress; for loveliness 
 Needs not the foreign aid of ornament. 
 
 But is, when unadorn’d, adorn’d the most. 
 Thoughtless of beauty, she was Beauty’s self. 
 Recluse amid the close-embowering woods. 
 
140 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 As in the hollow breast of Appeniiie, 
 
 Beneath the shelter of encircling hills, 
 
 A myrtle rises far from human eye, 
 
 And breathes its balmy fragrance o’er the wild ; 
 So flourish’d blooming, and unseen by all. 
 
 The sweet Lavinia; till, at length, corapell’d 
 By strong Necessity’s supreme command. 
 
 With smiling patience in her looks, she went 
 To glean Palemon’s fields. The pride of swains 
 Palemon was, the generous, and the rich ; 
 
 Who led the rural life in all its joy 
 And elegance, such as Arcadian song 
 Transmits from ancient uncorrupted times ; 
 When tyrant custom had not shackled man. 
 
 But free to follow Nature was the mode. 
 
 He then, his fancy with autumnal scenes 
 Amusing, chanc’d beside his reaper-train 
 To walk, when poor Lavinia drew his eye ; 
 Unconscious of her power, and turning quick 
 With unaffected blushes from his gaze : 
 
 He saw her charming, but he saw not half 
 The charms her downcast modesty conceal’d. 
 That very moment love and chaste desire 
 Sprung in his bosom, to himself unknown ; 
 
 For still the world prevail’d, aud its dread laugh, 
 Which scarce the firm philosopher can scorn, 
 Should his heart own a gleaner in the field ; 
 
 And thus in secret to his soul he sigh’d ; — 
 WTiatpity! that so delicate a form. 
 
 By beauty kindled, where enlivening sense 
 And more than vulgar goodness seem to dwell, 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 141 
 
 Should be devoted to the rude embrace 
 Of some indecent clown ! she looks, raethinks, 
 
 Of old Acasto’s line ; and to my mind 
 Recalls that patron of my happy life, 
 
 From whom my liberal fortune took its rise ; 
 
 Now to the diist gone down ; his houses, lands. 
 
 And once fair-spreading family, dissolv’d. 
 
 ’4'is said, that in some lone obscure retreat. 
 
 Urg’d by remembrance sad, and decent pride. 
 
 Far from those scenes which knew their better days, 
 His aged v/idow and his daughter live. 
 
 Whom yet my fruitless search could never find. 
 Romantic wish ! would this the daughter werel 
 When, strict inquiring, from herself he found 
 She was the same, the daughter of his friend, 
 
 Of bountiful Acasto ; who can speak 
 
 The mingled passions that surpris’d his heart, 
 
 And through his nerves in shivering transport ran ? 
 Then blaz’d his smother’d flame, avow’d, and bold ; 
 And as he view ’d her, ardent, o’er and o’er, 
 
 Lovll, gratitude, and pity wept at once. 
 
 Confus’d, and frighten’d at his sudden tears, 
 
 Her rising beauties flush’d a higher bloom, 
 
 As thus Palemon, passionate, and just. 
 
 Pour’d out the pious rapture of his soul : 
 
 ‘‘ And art thou then Acasto’s dear remains ? 
 
 She, whom my restless gratitude has sought, 
 
 So long in vain ? 0 heavens ! the very same. 
 
 The soften’d image of my noble friend ; 
 
 Alive his every look, his every feature. 
 
 More elegantly touch’d. Sweeter than Spring ! 
 
142 
 
 AUTUMN, 
 
 Tbou sole surviving blossom from the root 
 That nourish’d up my fortune ! say, ah where, 
 in what sequester’d desert, hast thou drawn 
 The kindest aspect of delighted heaven ? 
 
 Into such beauty spread, and blown so fair ; 
 
 Though Poverty’s cold wind, and crushing rain, 
 
 Beat keen, and heavy, on thy tender years ? 
 
 O let me now, into a richer soil, 
 
 Transplant thee safe! where vernal suns, andshow<*^s, 
 Diffuse their warmest, largest influence ; 
 
 And of my garden be the pride, and joy ! 
 
 It ill befits thee, oh I it ill beflts 
 Acasto’s daughter, his, whose open stores, 
 
 Though vast, were little to his ampler heart. 
 
 The father of a country, thus to pick 
 The very refuse of those harvest-fields. 
 
 Which from his bounteous friendship I enjoy. 
 
 Then throw that shameful pittance from thy hand 
 But ill applied to such a rugged task ; 
 
 The fields, the master, all, my fair, are thine ; 
 
 If to the various blessings v/hich thy house 
 Has on me lavish’d, thou wilt add that bliss, 
 
 That dearest bliss, the power of blessing thee 
 
 Here ceas’d the youth: yet still his speaking cv ^ 
 Express’d the sacred triumph of his soul, 
 
 With conscious virtue, gratitude, and love, 
 
 Above the vulgar joy divinely rais’d. 
 
 Nor v/aited he reply. Won by the charm 
 
 Of goodness irresistible, and all 
 
 In sweet disorder lost, she blush’d consent. 
 
 The news immediate to her mother brought, 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 UJ 
 
 While, pierc’d with anxious thought, she pin’d away 
 The lonely moments for Lavinia’s fate ; 
 
 Amaz’d, and scarce believing what she heard, 
 
 Joy seiz’d her wither’d veins, and one bright gleam 
 Of setting life shone on her evening-hours : 
 
 ISot less enraptur’d than the happy pair ; 
 
 Who flourish’d long in tender bliss, and rear’d 
 A numerous offspring, lovely like themselves ; 
 
 And good, the grace of all the country round. 
 
 Defeating oft the labours of the year, 
 
 The sultry south collects a potent blast. 
 
 At first the groves are scarcely seen to stir 
 Their trembling tops ; and a still murmur runs 
 Along the soft inclining fields of corn. 
 
 But as th’ aerial tempest fuller swells. 
 
 And in one mighty stream, invisible. 
 
 Immense, the whole excited atmosphere. 
 
 Impetuous rushes, o’er the sounding world ; 
 
 Strain’d to the root, the stooping forest pours 
 A rustling shower of yet untimely leaves. 
 
 High-beat, the circling mountains eddy in, 
 
 From the hare wild, the dissipated storm. 
 
 And send it in a torrent down the vale. 
 
 Expos’d, and naked, to its utmost rage, 
 
 Through all the sea of harvest rolling round, 
 
 The billowy plain floats wide ; nor can evade, 
 Though pl'ant to the blast, its seizing force ; 
 
 Or whirl’d m air, or in.to vacant chaff 
 Shook waste. And sometinu>s too a burst of rain. 
 Swept from the black horizon, broad, descends 
 In one continuous flood. Still over head 
 
144 
 
 AUTUMN, 
 
 The mingling tempest weaves its gloom, and still 
 The deluge deepens ; till the fields around 
 Lie sunk, and flatted, in the sordid wave. 
 
 Sudden, the ditches swell ; the meadows swim. 
 Ked, from the hills, innumerable streams 
 Tumultuous roar ; and high above its banks 
 The river lift ; before whose rushing tide. 
 
 Herds, flocks, and harvests, cottages, and swams, 
 Roll mingled down ; all that the winds had spared 
 In one wild moment ruin’d ; the big hopes, 
 
 And well-earn’d treasures of the painful year. 
 
 Fled to some eminence, the husbandman. 
 Helpless, beholds the miserable wreck 
 Driving along ; his drowning ox at once 
 Descending, with his labours scatter’d round, 
 
 He sees ; and instant o’er his shivering thought 
 Comes Winter unprovided, and a train 
 Of claimant children dear. Ye masters, then, 
 
 Be mindful of the rough laborious hand 
 That sinks you soft in elegance and ease ; 
 
 Be mindful of those limbs in russet clad. 
 
 Whose toil to yours is warmth and graceful pride ; 
 f^nd, oh ! be mindful of that sparing board, 
 fV'hich covers yours with luxury profuse ; 
 
 Makes your glass sparkle, and your sense rejoice •, 
 Nor cruelly demand what the deep rains. 
 
 And all-involving winds, have swept away. 
 
 Here the rude clamour of the sportsman’s joy, 
 The gun fast thundering, and the winded horn, 
 Would tempt the Mus-e to sing the rural game : 
 How in his mid-career, the spaniel struck, 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 4d. 
 
 Stiff, by the tainted gale, with open nose, 
 Outstretch’d, and finely sensible, draws full, 
 
 Fearful, and cautious, on the latent prey 
 As in the sun the circling covey bask 
 Their varied plumes, and watchful every way, 
 Through the rough stubble turn the secret eye. 
 
 Caught in the meshy snare, in vain they beat 
 Their idle wings, entangled more and more : 
 
 Nor on the surges of the boundless air, 
 
 Though borne triumphant, are they safe ; the gun, 
 Glanc’d just, and sudden, from the fowler’s eye 
 O’ertakcs their sounding pinions : and again, 
 Immediate brings them from the towering wing. 
 
 Dead to the ground ; or drives them wide-dispers’d 
 Wounded, and wheeling various, down the w ind. 
 
 These are not subjects for the peaceful Muse, 
 
 Nor will she stain with such her spotless song : 
 
 Then most delighted, when she social sees 
 The whole mix’d animal-creation round 
 Alive, and happy. ’Tis not joy to her. 
 
 This falsely-cheerful barbarous game of death, 
 
 This rage of pleasure, which the restless youiii 
 Awakes, impatient with the gleaming morn ; 
 
 When beasts of prey retire, that all night long, 
 
 Urg’d by necessity, had rang’d the dark. 
 
 As if their conscious ravage shunn'd the light, 
 Asham'd. Not so the steady tyrant Man, 
 
 Who with the thoughtless innocence of powder 
 Inflamed, beyond the most infuriate wrath 
 Of the woist monster that e’er roamed the waste, 
 
 For sport alone pursues the cruel chase, 
 id H 
 
146 
 
 A\.TUMN. 
 
 Amid the beaming’s of the gentle days. 
 
 Upbraid, ye ravening tribes, our wanton rage. 
 For hunger kindles you, and law less want ; 
 
 But lavish fed, in Nature’s bounty rolled, 
 
 To joy at anguish, and delight in blood, 
 
 Is what your liorrid bosoms never knew. 
 
 Poor is the triumph o’er the timid hare ! 
 
 Scar’d from the corn, and now to some lone seat 
 Retir'd: the rushy fen; the ragged furze. 
 Stretch’d o’er the stony heath; the stubble cliapt 
 The thistly lawn ; the thick entangled broom ; 
 
 Of the same friendly hue, the wither’d fern ; 
 
 The tallow ground laid open to the sun, 
 Concoctive; and the nodding sandy bank. 
 
 Hung o’er the mazes of the mountain brook. 
 
 Vain is her best precaution ; though she sits 
 Conceal’d with folded ears ; unsleeping eyes, 
 
 By nature rais’d to take th’ horizon in ; 
 
 And head couch’d close betwixt her hairy feet, 
 in act to spring away. The scented dew 
 Betrays her early labyrinth ; and deep, 
 in scatter’d sullen openings, far behind, 
 
 With every breeze she hears the coming storm* 
 But nearer, and more frequent, as it loads 
 The sighing gale, she springs amaz’d, and all 
 The savage soul of game is up at once* 
 
 The pack full-opening, various; the shrill horn, 
 Resounded from the hills ; the neighing steed, 
 Wild for the chase; and the loud hunter’s shout; 
 O’er a weak, harmless, flying creature, all 
 Mix’d in mad tumult, and discordantjoy. 
 
AUTUMN, 
 
 \4 
 
 The stag’, too, singled from the hei'd, where long 
 He rang’d the branching monarch of the shades, 
 Before the tempest drives. At first in speed 
 He, sprightly, puts his faith . and rous’d by fear, 
 Gives all his swift aerial soul to flight ; 
 
 Against the breeze he darts, that way the more 
 To leave the lessening murderous cry behind : 
 Deception short! though fleeter than the winds 
 Blown o’er the keen-air’d mountain by the north, 
 He bursts the thickets, glances through the glades, 
 And plunges deep into the wildest wood ; 
 
 H slow, yet sure, adhesive to the track, 
 
 Hot steaming, up behind him come again 
 Th’ inhuman rout, and from the shady depth 
 Expel him, circling through his every shift. 
 
 He sweeps the forest oft; and sobbing sees 
 The glades, mild opening to the golden day ; 
 Where, in kind contest, with his butting friends 
 He wont to struggle, or his loves enjoy. 
 
 Oft in the full-descending flood he tries 
 To lose the scent, and lave his burning sides. 
 
 Oft seeks the herd ; the watchful herd, alarm’d, 
 With selfish care avoid a brother’s wo. 
 
 What shall he do.^ His once so vivid nerves, 
 
 So full of buoyant spirit, now no more 
 Inspire the course ; but fainting breathless toil, 
 Sick, seizes on his heart: he stands at bay; 
 
 And puts his last weak refuge in despair. 
 
 The big round tears run down his dappled face ; 
 He groans in anguish ; while the growling pack, 
 Blood-happy, hang at his fair jutting chest, 
 
148 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 And mark his beauteous chequer’d sides svitii gore. 
 Of this enough. But if the sylvan youth, 
 
 Whose fervent blood boils into violence, 
 
 Must have the chase; behold, despising fbght, 
 
 The rous’d-up lion, resolute, and slow. 
 
 Advancing full on the protended spear. 
 
 And coward-band, that circling wheel aloof 
 Slunk from the cavern, and the troubled wood, 
 
 See the grim wolf; on him his shaggy foe 
 Vindictive fix, and let the ruffitin die; 
 
 Or, grow ling horrid, as the brindled boar 
 Grins fell destruction, to the monster’s heart 
 Let the dart lighten from the nervous arm. 
 
 These Britain knows not; give, ye Britons, ther 
 Your sportive fury, pityless, to pour 
 Loose on the nightly robber of the fold ; 
 
 Him, from his craggy winding haunts unearth’d. 
 Let all the thunder of the chase pursue. 
 
 Throw the broad ditch behind you; o’er the hedge 
 High-bound, resistless ; nor tlie deep morass 
 Refuse, but through the shaking wilderness 
 Pick your nice way; into the perilous flood 
 Bear fearless, of the raging instinct full; 
 
 And as you ride the torrent, to the banks 
 Your triumph sound sonorous, running round, 
 
 Prom rock to rock, in circling echoes tost; 
 
 Then scale the mountains to their woody tops; 
 
 Rush dow n the dangerotis steep ; and o’er the lawn, 
 In fancy swallowing up the space between. 
 
 Pour all your speed into the rapid game. 
 
 Ft r happy he ! who tops the wheeling chase ; 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 149 
 
 Has every maze evolv’d, aifid every glide 
 Disclos’d; who knows the merits of the pack; 
 
 Who saw the villain seiz'd and dying hard, 
 
 Without complaint, though by a hundred mouths 
 Relentless torn : O glorious he, beyond 
 His daring peers ! when the retreating horn 
 Calls them to ghostly halls of gr^ renown, 
 
 With woodland honours grac’d; the fox’s fur, 
 Depending decent from the roof ; and spread 
 Round the drear walls, with antic figures fierce. 
 The stag’s large front : he then is loudest heard, 
 Whtm the night staggers with severer toils ; 
 
 With feats Thessalian Centaurs never knew. 
 
 And their repeated wonders shake the dome. 
 
 But first the fuell’d chimney blazes wide; 
 
 The tankards foam : and the strong table groans 
 Beneath the smoking sirloin, stretch’d immense 
 From side to side; in which, with desperate knife, 
 They deep incision make, and talk the while 
 Of England’s glory, ne’er to be defac’d, 
 
 While hence they borrow vigour, or amain 
 Into the pasty plung’d, at intervals. 
 
 If stomach keen can intervals allow. 
 
 Relating all the glories of the chase. 
 
 Then sated Hunger bids his brother Thirst 
 Produce the mighty bowl; the mighty bowl, 
 Swell’d high with fiery juice, steams liberal round 
 A potent gale; delicious, as the breath 
 Of Maia to the love-sick shepherdess. 
 
 On violets diffus’d ; while soft she hears 
 Her panting shepherd stealing to her arms. 
 
 N 2' 
 
150 
 
 AUTUMN, 
 
 Nor wanting is the brown October, drawn, 
 
 Mature and perfect, from his dark retreat 
 Of thirty years ; and now his honest front 
 Flames in the light refulgent, not afraid 
 E’en with the vineyard’s best produce to vie. 
 
 To cheat the thirsty moments. Whist awhile 
 Walks his dull round, beneath a cloud of smoke, 
 Wreath’d, fragrant, from the pipe ; or the quick dice, 
 In thunder leaping from the box, awake 
 The sounding gammon ; while romp-loving miss 
 Is haul’d about, in gallantry robust. 
 
 At last these puling idlenesses laid 
 Aside, frequent and full, the dry divan 
 Close in firm circle; and set, ardent, in 
 For serious drinking. Nor evasion sly, 
 
 Nor sober shift, is to the puking wretch 
 Indulg’d apart; but earnest, brimming bowls 
 Lave every soul, the table floating round. 
 
 And pavement, faithless to the fuddled foot. 
 
 Thus as they swim in mutual swill, the talk, 
 Vociferous at once from twenty tongues. 
 
 Reels fast from theme to theme; from horses, hounds, 
 To church or mistress, politics or ghost. 
 
 In endless mazes, intricate, perplex’d. 
 
 Meantime, with sudden interruption, loud, 
 
 Th’ impatient catch bursts from the joyous heart ; 
 That moment touch’d is every kindred soul; 
 
 And, opening in a full-mouth’d cry of joy. 
 
 The laugh, the slap, the jocund curse go round ; 
 While, from their slumbers shook, the kennerd hounds 
 Mix in the music of the day again. 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 15 ^. 
 
 As when the tempest, that has vex’d the deep 
 The dark night long, with fainter murmurs falls ; 
 
 So gradual sinks their mirth. Their feeble tongues, 
 Unable to take up the cumbrous word. 
 
 Lie quite dissolv’d. Before their maudlin eyes 
 Seem dim, and blue, the double tapers dance, 
 
 Like the sun wading through the misty sky. 
 
 Then, sliding soft, they drop. Confus’d above. 
 Glasses and bottles, pipes and gazetteers. 
 
 As if the table e’en itself was drunk, 
 
 Lie a wet broken scene ; and wide, below, 
 
 Is heap’d the social slaughter : where astride 
 'J'he lubber Powder in filthy triumph sits, 
 
 Slumbrous, inclining still from side to side. 
 
 And steeps them drench’d in potent sleep till morn. 
 Perhaps some doctor of tremendous paunch. 
 
 Awful and deep, a black abyss of drink. 
 
 Outlives them all ; and from his buried flock 
 Retiring, full of rumination sad, 
 
 Laments the weakness of these latter times. 
 
 But if the rougher sex by this fierce spoil 
 Is hurried wild, let not such horrid joy 
 E’er stain the bosom of the British fair. 
 
 Far be the spirit of the chase from them! 
 
 Uncomely courage, unbeseeming skill; 
 
 To spring the fence, to rein the prancing steert ; 
 
 The cap, the whip, the masculine attire. 
 
 In which they roughen to the sense, and all 
 The winning softness of their sex is lost. 
 
 In them his graceful to dissolve at wo; 
 
 With every motion, every word, to wave 
 
152 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 Quick o’er the kindling- cheek the ready blush; 
 And from the smallest violence to shrink 
 Unequal, then the loveliest in their fears, 
 
 And by this silent adulation, soft, 
 
 To their protection more eng^aging- Man. 
 
 0 may their eyes no miserable sight, 
 
 Save weeping lovers, see ; a nobler game, 
 
 Through love’s enchanting wiles pursued, yet fled. 
 In chase ambiguous. May their tender limbs 
 Float in the loose simplicity of dress ; 
 
 And, fashion’d all to harmony, alone 
 Know they to seize the captivated soul. 
 
 In rapture warbled from love-breathing lips ; 
 
 To leach the lute to languish; with smooth step, 
 Disclosing motion in its every charm. 
 
 To swim along, and swell the mazy dance , 
 
 To train the foliage o’er the snowy lawn ; 
 
 To guide the pencil, turn the tuneful page , 
 
 To lend new flavour to the fruitful year. 
 
 And heighten Nature’s dainties; in their race 
 'Fo rear their graces into second life; , 
 
 To give society its highest taste; 
 
 Well-order’d home, man’s best delight to make. 
 And by submissive wisdom, modest skill, 
 
 With every gentle care-eluding art. 
 
 To raise the virtues, animate the bliss. 
 
 And sweeten all the toils of human life : 
 
 This be the female dignity, and praise. 
 
 Ye swains, now hasten to the hazel-bank; 
 Where, down yon dale, the wildly-winding brook 
 Falls hoarse from steep to strep. In close array- 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 J53 
 
 Fit for the thickets and the tangling- shrub, 
 
 Ye virgins come. For you their latest song 
 The woodlands raise ; the clustering nuts for you 
 The lover finds amid the secret shade ; 
 
 And, where they burnish on the topmost bough, 
 With active vigour crushes down the tiee ; 
 
 Or shakes them ripe from the resigning husk, 
 
 A glossy shower, and of an ardent brown, 
 
 As are the ringlets of Melinda’s hair : 
 
 Melinda ! form’d with every grace complete 
 Yet these neglecting, above beauty wise. 
 
 And far transcending such a vulgar praise 
 Hence from the busy joy -resounding fields, 
 
 In cheerful error, let us tread the maze 
 Of Autumn, unconfin’d ; and taste, reviv’d. 
 
 The breath of orchard big with bending fruit. 
 Obedient to the breeze and beating ray, 
 
 F rom the deep-loaded bough a mellow shower 
 Incessant melts away. The juicy pear 
 Lies, in a soft profusion, scatter’d round. 
 
 A various sweetness swells the gentle race ; 
 
 By Nature’s all-refining hand prepar’d; 
 
 Of temper’d sun, and water, earth, aiK^ air, 
 
 In ever-changing composition mix’d. 
 
 Such, falling frequent through the chiller night, 
 The fragrant stores, the wide projected heaps 
 Of apples, which the lusty handed Year, 
 Innumerous, o’er the blushing orchard shakes 
 A various spirit, fresh, delicious, keen. 
 
 Dwells in their gelid pores; and, active, points 
 The piercing cider for the thirsty tongue : 
 
154 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 Thy native theme, and boon inspirer too, 
 
 Phillips, Pomona’s bard! the second thou 
 Who nobly durst, in rhyme-unfetter’d verse. 
 
 With British freedom sing the British song : 
 
 How, from Silurian vats, high-sparkling wines 
 Foam in transparent floods; some strong, to cheer 
 The wintry revels of the labouring hind ; 
 
 And tasteful some, to cool the summer hours. 
 
 In this glad season, while his sweetest beams 
 The sun sheds equal o’er the meeken’d day; 
 
 Oh lose me in the green delightful walks 
 Of, Dodington, thy seat, serene and plain ; 
 
 W^here simple Nature reigns; and every view, 
 Diffusive, spreads the pure Dor^etian downs, 
 
 In boundless prospect; yonder shagg’d with wood, 
 Here rich with harvest, and there white witli flocks ! 
 Meantime the grandeur of thy lofty dome. 
 Far-splendid, seizes on the ravish’d eye. 
 
 New beauties rise with each revolving day ; 
 
 New columns swell ; and still the fresh Spring finds 
 New plants to quicken, and new groves to green. 
 
 Full of thy genius all ! the Muse’s seat: 
 
 Where in the secret bower, and winding walk, 
 
 For virtuous Young and thee they twine the bay. 
 Here wandering oTt, fir’d with the restless thirst 
 Of thy applause, I solitary court 
 Th’ inspiring breeze; and meditate the book 
 Of Nature ever open ; aiming thence. 
 
 Warm from the heart, to learn the moral song. 
 
 Here, as I steal along the sunny wall. 
 
 Where Autumn basks, with fruit empurpled deep. 
 
AUTUMN 
 
 155 
 
 My pleasing theme continual prompts my thought 
 Presents the downy peach ; the shining plum; 
 
 The ruddy, fragrant nectarine ; and dark, 
 
 Beneath his ample leaf, the luscious fig. 
 
 The vine too here her curling tendrils shoots ; 
 
 Hangs out her clusters, glowing to the south ; 
 
 And scarcely wishes for a warmer sky. 
 
 Turn we a moment Fancy’s rapid flight 
 To vigorous soils, and climes of fair extent; 
 
 Where, by the potent sun elated high, 
 
 The vineyard swells refulgent on the day ; 
 
 Spreads o’er the vale ; or up the mountain climbs, 
 Profuse ; and drinks amid the sunny rocks. 
 
 From cliff to clifl* increas’d the heighten’d blaze. 
 
 Low bend the weighty boughs. The clusters clear, 
 Half through the foliage seen, or ardent flame. 
 
 Or shine transparent ; while perfection breathes 
 White o’er the turgent film the living dew. 
 
 As thus they brighten with exalted juice, 
 
 Touch'd into flavour by the mingling ray ; 
 
 The rural youth and virgins o’er the field. 
 
 Each fond for each to cull th’ autumnal prime. 
 Exulting rove and speak the vintage nigh. 
 
 Then comes the crushing swain ; the country floats, 
 And foams unbounded with the mashy flood ; 
 
 That by degrees fermented, and refin’d. 
 
 Round the rais’d nations pours the cup of joy : 
 
 The claret smooth^ red as the lip we press 
 In sparkling fancy, while we drain the bowl; 
 
 The mellow-tastcd burgundy; and quick. 
 
 As is the wit it gives, the gay champaign. 
 
156 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 Now, by the cool declining^ year condens’d, 
 Descend the copious exhalations; check'd 
 As up the middle sky unseen they stole; 
 
 And roll the doubling- fog-s around the hill. 
 
 No more the mountain, horrid, vast, sublime, 
 Who pours a sweep cf rivers from his sides, 
 
 And high between contending kingdoms rears 
 The rocky long division, fills the view 
 “With great variety; but in a night 
 Of gathering vapour, from the bafiled sense 
 Sinks dark and dreary. Thence expanding far, 
 The huge dusk^ gradual, swallows up the plain ; 
 Vanish the woods; the dim-seen river seems 
 Sullen, and slow, to roll the misty wave. 
 
 E’en in the height of noon oppress’d, the sun 
 Sheds weak, and blunt his wide refracted ray; 
 W’^hence glaring oft, with many a broaden’d orb, 
 He frights the nations. Indistinct on earth, 
 
 Seen through the turbid air, beyond the life 
 Objects appear ; and, wildered o’er the waste 
 The shepherd stalks gigantic. Till at last 
 Wreath’d dun around, in deeper circles still 
 Successive closing, sits the general fog 
 Unbounded o’er the world ; and, mingling thick, 
 A formless gray confusion covers all. 
 
 As when of old (so sung the Hebrew bard) 
 
 Light, uncollected, through the chaos urged 
 Its infant way; nor Order yet had drawn 
 His lovely train from out the dubious gloom. 
 
 These roving mists, that constant now begin 
 To smoke along the hilly country, these, 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 157 
 
 With weighty rains, and melted Alpine snows, 
 
 The mountain-cisterns fill, those ample stores 
 Of water, scoop’d among the hollow rocks ; 
 
 Whence gush the streams, the ceaseless fountains 
 And their unfailing wealth the rivers draw. [play, 
 Some sages say, that where the numerous wave 
 For ever lashes the resounding shore. 
 
 Drill’d through the sandy stratum, every vvaj'. 
 
 The waters with the sandy stratum rise; 
 
 Amid whose angles infinitely strain’d. 
 
 They joyful leave their jaggy salts behind. 
 
 And clear and sweeten, as they soak along. 
 
 Nor stops the restless fluid, mounting still. 
 
 Though oft amidst th’ irriguous vale it springs; 
 
 But to the mountain courted by the sand, 
 
 Thcit leads it darkling on in faithful maze. 
 
 Far from the parent-main, it boils again 
 Fresh into day; and all the glittering hill 
 Is bright with spouting rills. But hence this vain 
 Amusing dream ! why should the waters love 
 To take so far a journey to the hills, 
 
 W'^hen the sweet valleys offer to their toil 
 Inviting quiet, and a nearer bed.? 
 
 Or if, by blind ambition led astray. 
 
 They must aspire ; why should they sudden stop 
 Among the broken mountain’s rushy dells. 
 
 And, ere they gain its highest peak, desert 
 
 Th’ attractive sand that charm’d their course so long? 
 
 Besides, the hard agglomerating salts. 
 
 The spoil of ages, would impervious choke 
 Their secret channels; or, by slow degrees, 
 o 
 
153 
 
 AUTUMN, 
 
 High as the hills protrude the swelling vales: 
 
 Old Ocean too, suck’d through the porous globe. 
 
 Had long ere now forsook his horrid bed, 
 
 And brought Deucalion’s watery times again. 
 
 Say then, where lurk the vast eternal springs, 
 That, like creating Nature, lie conceal’d 
 From mortal eye, yet with their lavish stores 
 Refresh the globe, and all its joyous tribes ? 
 
 O thou pervading Genius, given to man, 
 
 To trace the secrets of the dark abyss I 
 O lay the mountains bare : and wide display 
 Their hidden structure to th’ astonish’d view; 
 
 Strip from the branching Alps their piny load ; 
 
 The huge encumbrance of horrific woods 
 From Asian Taurus, from Imaus stretch’d 
 Athwart the roving Tartar’s sullen bounds; 
 
 Give opening Hemus to my searching eye, 
 
 And high Olympus pouring many a stream. 
 
 0 from the sounding summits of the north. 
 
 The Dofrine hills, through Scandinavia roll’d 
 To furthest Lapland and the frozen main; 
 
 From lofty Caucasus, far seen by those 
 Who in the Caspian and black Euxine toil; 
 
 From cold Riphean rocks, which the wild Russ 
 Believes the stony girdle* of the world : 
 
 And all the dreadful mountains, wrap’d in storm, 
 Whence wide Siberia draws her lonely floods ; 
 
 * The Muscovites call the Riphean Mount ains Weliki 
 Camonypoys ; that is, the great stony girdle : because 
 they suppose them to encompass the whole earth. 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 159 
 
 0 sweep th’ eternal snows, hung o’er the deep, 
 
 That ever works beneath his sounding base, 
 
 Bid Atlas, propping heaven, as poets feign, 
 
 His subterranean wonders spread ; unveil 
 The niiny caverns, blazing on the day. 
 
 Of Abyssinia’s cloud-compelling cliffs. 
 
 And of the bending Mountains of the Moon !* 
 O’crtopping all these giant sons of earth. 
 
 Let the dire Andes, from the radiant line 
 Stretch d to the stormy seas that thunder round 
 The southern pole, their hideous deeps unfold. 
 Amazing scene ! behold, the glooms disclose, 
 
 1 see the rivers in their infant beds; 
 
 Deep, deep, I hear them labouring to get free. 
 
 1 see the leaning strata artful rang’d; 
 
 The gaping fissures to receive the rains. 
 
 The melting SHOW'S, and ever-dripping fogs. 
 
 Strew’d bibulous above I sec the sands. 
 
 The pebbly gravel next, the layers then 
 Of mingled moulds, of more retentive earths, 
 
 The gutter’d rocks and mazy running clefts ; 
 
 That while the stealing moisture they transmit, 
 Retard its motion, and forbid its waste. 
 
 Beneath th’ incessant weeping of these drains, 
 
 I see the rocky siphons stretch’d immense ; 
 
 The mighty reservoirs, of harden’d chalk, 
 
 Or stiff compacted clay, capacious form’d. 
 O’erflowing thence, the congregated stores, 
 
 * range of mountains in Afr ica^ that surround al- 
 most all Monomotapa. 
 
160 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 The crystal treasures of the liquid world, 
 
 Through the stirr’d sands a bubbling passage burst. 
 And welling out, around the middle steep, 
 
 Or from the bottoms of the bosom’d hills, 
 
 In pure effusion flow. United, thus, 
 
 Th’ exhaling sun, the vapour- burden’d air. 
 
 The gelid mountains, that to rain condens’d 
 These vapours in continual current draw, 
 
 And send them, o’er the fair-divided earth, 
 
 In bounteous rivers to the deep again; 
 
 A social commerce hold, and firm support 
 The full-adjusted harmony of things. 
 
 When Autumn scatters his departing gleams, 
 Warn’d of approaching Winter, gather’d, play 
 The swallow-people ; and toss’d wide around, 
 
 O’er the calm sky, in convolution swift. 
 
 The feather’d eddy floats : rejoicing once. 
 
 Ere to their wintry slumbers they retire ; 
 
 In clusters clung beneath the mouldering bank. 
 
 And where, unpierc’d by frost, the cavern sweats 
 Or rather into warmer climes conveyed, 
 
 With other kindred birds of season, there 
 I'hey twitter cheerful, till the vernal months 
 Invite them welcome back : for, thronging, now 
 Innumerous wings are in commotion all. 
 
 Where the Rhine loses his majestic force 
 In Belgian plains, won from the raging deep, 
 
 By diligence amazing, and the strong 
 Unconquerable hand of Liberty, 
 
 The stork-assembly meets ; for many a day. 
 Consulting deep, and various, ere they take 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 icii 
 
 Tiieir arduous voyag^e through the ii(juid sky. 
 
 And now tlieir route design’d, their leaders chose, 
 Their tribes adjusted, clean’d their vigorous wings; 
 And many a circle, many a short essay. 
 
 Wheel’d round and round, in congregation full 
 The figur’d flight ascends ; and riding high 
 Th’ aerial billows, mixes with the clouds. 
 
 Or where the Northern ocean, in vast whirls, 
 
 Boils round the naked melancholy isles 
 Of furthest Thul6, and th’ Atlantic surge 
 Pours in among the stormy Hebrides ; 
 
 Who can recount what transmigrations there 
 Are annual made? what nations come and go? 
 
 And how the living clouds on clouds arise ? 
 
 Infinite w ings ! till all the plume dark air, 
 
 And rude resounding shore, are one wild cry. 
 
 Here (he plain harmless native, his small flock, 
 And herd diminutive of many hues, 
 
 Tends on the little island’s verdant swell. 
 
 The shepherd’s sea-girt reign ; or, to the rocks 
 Dire-clinging, gathers his ovarious food! 
 
 Or sweeps the fishy shore 1 or treasures up 
 The plumage, rising full, to form the bed 
 Of luxury. And here awhile the Muse, 
 
 High hovering o’er the broad cerulean scene, 
 
 Sees Caledonia, in romantic view: 
 
 Her airy mountains, from the waving main, 
 
 Invested with a keen difi’usive sky. 
 
 Breathing the soul acute : her forests husre, 
 
 Incuit, robust, and tall, by Nature’s hand 
 Planted of old; her azure lakes between, 
 
 11 o 2 
 
1^2 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 Pour’d out extensive, and of watery wealth 
 Full ; winding' deep, and green, her fertile vales ; 
 ^Vith many a cool translucent brimming flood 
 
 ash’d lovely, from the Tweed (pure parent stream, 
 AVhose pastoral banks first heard my Doric creed, 
 With, sylvan Jed, thy tributary brook) 
 
 To where the north-inflated tempest foams 
 O’er Orca’s or Betubium’s highest peak : 
 
 Nurse of a people, in Misfortune’s school 
 Train’d up to hardy deeds j soon visited 
 By Learning, when before the Gothic rage, 
 
 She took her western flight. A manly race. 
 
 Of unsubmitting spirit, wise and brave j 
 Who still through bleeding ages struggled hard, 
 
 (As well unhappy Wallace can attest. 
 
 Great patriot-hero ! ill-requited chief!) 
 
 To hold a generous undiminish’d state; 
 
 Too much in vain ! Hence of unequal bounds 
 Impatient, and by tempting glory borne 
 O’er every land ; for every land their life 
 Has flow’d profuse, their piercing genius plann’d, 
 And swell’d the pomp of peace their faithful toil. 
 
 As from their own clear north in radiant streams 
 Bright over Europe bursts the boreal morn. 
 
 Oh I is there not some patriot, in whose power 
 That best, that godlike luxury is plac’d, 
 
 Of blessing thousands, thousands yet unborn, 
 Through late posterity ? some, large of sole, 
 
 To cheer dejected industry ? to give 
 A double harvest to the pining swain 
 And teach the labouring hand the sweets of toil ? 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 163 
 
 Uow, by the finest art, the native robe 
 To weave; how, white as hyperborean snow. 
 
 To form the lucid lawn ; with ventVous oar 
 Mow to dash wide the billow ; nor look on, 
 Shamefully passive, while Batavian fleets 
 Defraud us of the glittering- finny swarms, 
 
 That heave our friths, and crowd upon our shores? 
 How all enlivening trade to rouse, and wing 
 The prosperous sail, from every growing port. 
 Uninjur’d, round, the sea-encircled globe; 
 
 And thus, in soul united as in name, 
 
 Bid Britain reign the mistress of the deep? 
 
 Yes, there are such. And full on thee, Argyle, 
 Her hope, her stay, her darling, and her boast, 
 From her first patriots and her heroes sprung, 
 
 Thy fond imploring country turns her eye ; 
 
 In thee, with all a mother’s triumph, sees 
 Her every virtue, every grace combin’d ; 
 
 Her genius, wisdom, her engagingturn; 
 
 Her pride of honour, and her courage tried, 
 
 Calm, and intrepid, in the very throat 
 Of sulphurous -war, on Tenier’s dreadful field. 
 
 Nor less the palm of peace inwreaths thy brow. 
 For, powerful as thy sword, from thy rich tongue 
 Persuasion flows, and wins the high debate ; 
 
 While mix’d in thee combine the charm of youth, 
 The force of manhood, and the depth of age. 
 
 Thee, Forbes, too, whom every worth attends, 
 
 As truth sincere, as weeping friendship kin<i ; 
 
 Thee, truly generous, and in silence great, 
 
 Thy country feels through her reviving arts, 
 
164 
 
 ACTUMN. 
 
 Plann’d by thy wisdom, by thy soul inform'd ; 
 
 And seldom has she known a friend like thee. 
 
 But see the fading many-colour'd woods, 
 
 Shade deepening over shade, the country round 
 fmbrown ; a crowded umbrage, dusk, and dun, 
 
 Of every hue, from wan declining green 
 
 I'o sooty dark. These now the lonesome rdtise. 
 
 Low-whispering, lead into their leaf-strowii wail s, 
 
 And give the Season in its latest view. 
 
 Meantime, light-shadowing all, a sober calm 
 Fleecejs unbounded ether ; whose least wave 
 Stands tremulous, uncertain where to turn 
 The gentle current : while illumin’d wide, 
 
 The dewy-skirted clouds imbibe the sun. 
 
 And through their lucid veil his soften’d force 
 Shed o’er the peaceful world. Then is the time, 
 
 For those whom Wisdom and w hom Nature cliarm, i 
 To steal themselves from the degenerate crowd, ^ 
 
 And soar above this little scene of things ; ! 
 
 To tread low-thoughted Vice beneath their feet ; 
 
 To sooth the throbbing passions into peace ; 
 
 And w'oo lone Quiet in her silent walks. 
 
 Thus solitary, and in pensive guise, t 
 
 Oft let me wander o’er the russet mead, < 
 
 And through the sadden’d grove,»w here scarce is heard 1 
 One dying strain to cheer theVoodman’s toll. I 
 
 Haply some widow’d songster pours his plaint, i 
 
 Far, in faint warblings, through the tawny copse: 1 
 
 While congregated thrushes, linnets, larks, ‘ 
 
 And each wild throat, whose artless strains so late 
 Swell'd all the music of the swarming shades, 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 165 
 
 Robb’d of their tuneful souls, now shivering sit 
 On the dead tree, a dull despondent flock; 
 
 With not a brightness waving o’er their plumes. 
 And nought save chattering discord in their note. 
 
 O let not, aim’d from some inhuman eye, 
 
 The gun, the music of the coming year. 
 
 Destroy; and harmless, unsuspecting harm, 
 l-t^y the weak tribes, a miserable prey. 
 
 In mingled murder, fluttering on the ground. 
 
 The pale descending year, yet pleasing still, 
 
 A gentler mood inspires; for now the leaf 
 Incessant rustles from the mournful grove ; 
 
 Oft startling such as, studious, walk below. 
 
 And slowly circles through the waving air. 
 
 But should a quicker breeze amid the boughs 
 Sob, o’er the sky the leafy deluge streams; 
 
 Till chok’d, and matted with the dreary shower, 
 The forest -walks, at every rising gale. 
 
 Roll wide the wither’d waste, and whistle bleak. 
 Fled is the blasted verdure of the fields; 
 
 And, shrunk into their beds, the flowery race 
 Their sunny robes resign. E’en wdiat remain’d 
 Of stronger fruits, falls from the naked tree ; 
 
 And woods, fields, gardens, orchards, all aro'.md 
 The desolated prospect thrills the soul. 
 
 He comes! he comes! in every breeze the Power 
 Of Philosophic Melancholy comes ! 
 
 His near approach the sudden-starting tear. 
 
 The glowing cheek, the mild dejected air. 
 
 The soften’d feature^ and the beating heart, 
 
 Pierc’d deep with many a virtuous pang, declare. 
 
166 
 
 AUTUMN^ 
 
 O’er all the soul his sacred influence breathes! 
 Inflames imagination; through the breast 
 Infuses every tenderness; and far 
 Beyond him earth exalts the swelling thought. 
 Ten thousand thousand fleet ideas, such 
 As never mingled with the vulgar dream, 
 
 Crowd fast into the mind’s creative eye. 
 
 As fast the correspondent passions rise, 
 
 As varied, and as high. Devotion rais’d 
 To rapture, and divine astonishment; 
 
 The love of Nature unconfin’d, and, chief. 
 
 Of human race; the large ambitious wish, 
 
 To make them blest; the sigh for suffering worth 
 Lost in obscurity; the noble scorn 
 Of tyrant-pride ; the fearless great resolve ; 
 
 The wonder which the dying patriot draws, 
 Inspiring glory through remotest time; 
 
 Th’ awaken’d throb for virtue, and for fame; 
 
 The sympathies of love, and friendship dear; 
 
 With all the social offspring of the heart. 
 
 Oh ! bear me then to vast embowering shades; 
 To twilight groves, and visionary vales ; 
 
 To weeping grottos, and prophetic glooms; 
 
 Where angel forms athwart the solemn dusk. 
 Tremendous sweep, or seem to sweep along; 
 
 And voices more than human, through the void 
 Deep-sounding, seize th’ enthusiastic ear. 
 
 Or is this gioom too much ? Then lead, ye pow'ers, 
 That o’er the garden and the rural seat 
 Preside, which shining through the cheerful land 
 In countless numbers blest Britannia sees ; 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 IG 
 
 O ! lead me to the wide-extended w alks. 
 
 The fair majestic paradise of Stowe!* 
 
 INot Persian Cyrus on Ionia’s shore 
 E’er saw such sylvan scenes; such various art 
 By genius fir’d, such ardent genius tam’d 
 By cool judicious art ; that, in the strife, 
 All-bounteous Nature fears to be outdone. 
 
 And there, O Pitt! thy country’s early boast. 
 There let me sit beneath the shelter’d slopes, 
 
 Or in that Templet where, in future times, 
 
 Thou well shalt merit a distinguish’d name ; 
 
 And with thy converse blest, catch the last smiles 
 Of Autumn beaming o’er the yellow woods. 
 
 While there with thee th’ enchanted round I walk, 
 The regulated wild ; gay Fancy then 
 Will tread in thought the groves of attic land; 
 Will from thy standard taste refine her own, 
 Correct her pencil to the purest truth 
 Of Nature, or, the unimpassion’d shades 
 Forsaking, raise it to the human mind. 
 
 Or if hereafter she, with juster hand. 
 
 Shall draw the tragic scene, instruct her, thou. 
 
 To mark the varied movements of the heart. 
 
 What every decent character requires, 
 
 And every passion speaks: O! through her strain 
 Breathe thy pathetic eloquence ! that moulds 
 Th’ attentive senate, charms, persuades, exalts, 
 
 * TJie seat of Lord Viscount Cobham, 
 
 I The Temple of Virtue in Stowe Gardens. 
 
168 
 
 AUTUxMN. 
 
 Of honest Zeal th’ indignant lightning throws, 
 
 And shakes Corruption on her venal throne. 
 
 While thus we talk, and through Elysian vales 
 Delighted rove, perhaps a sigh escapes ; 
 
 What pity, Cobham, thou thy verdant files 
 Of order’d trees shouldst here inglorious range, 
 Instead of squadrons flaming o’er the field, 
 
 And long embattled hosts ; when the proud foe, 
 
 The faithless vain disturber of mankind, 
 
 Insulting Gaul, has rous’d the world to war ; 
 
 When keen, once more, within their bounds to press 
 Those polish’d robbers, those ambitious slaves. 
 
 The British youth would hail thy wise command, 
 
 Thy temper’d ardour and thy vetVan skill. 
 
 The western sun withdraws the shorten’d day • 
 
 And humi^d Evening, gliding o’er the sky, 
 
 In her chill progress, to the ground condens’d 
 The vapour throws. Where creeping waters 007 :e, 
 Where marshes stagnate, and where rivers wind. 
 Cluster the rolling fogs, and swim along 
 The dusky-mantled lawn. Meanwhile the Moon 
 Full-orb’d, and breaking through the scatter’d cloudr, 
 Shows her broad visage in the crimson’d east; 
 Turn'd to the sun direct, her spotted disk. 
 
 Where mountains rise, umbrageous dales descend, 
 And caverns deep, as optic tube descries, 
 
 A smaller earth gives us his blaze again. 
 
 Void of its flame, and sheds a softer day. 
 
 Now through the passing cloud she seems to stoop. 
 Now up the pure cerulean rides sublime. 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 169 
 
 Wide the pale deluge floats ; and streaming mild 
 O’er the sky’d mountain to the shadowy vale, 
 
 While rocks and floods reflect the quivering gleam, 
 The whole air whitens with a boundless tide 
 Of silver radiance, trembling round the world. 
 
 But when half blotted from the sky her light, 
 Fainting, [)ermits the starry nres to burn 
 With keener lustre through the depth of heaven ; 
 
 Or near extinct her deaden’d orb appears, 
 
 And scarce appears, of sickly beamless white ; 
 
 Oft in this season, silent from the north 
 A blaze of meteors shoots : ensweeping first 
 The lower skies, they all at once converge 
 High to the crown of heaven, and all at once 
 Relapsing quick, as quickly reascend. 
 
 And mix, and thwart, extinguish, and renew', 
 
 All ether coursing in a maze of light. 
 
 Frcvtn look to look, contagious through the crowd, 
 The panic runs, and into w'ondrous shapes 
 Th’ appearance throws : armies in meet array, 
 Throng’d with aerial spears, and steeds of fire ; 
 
 Till the long lines of full-extended war 
 In bleeding fight commixt, the sanguine fiood 
 Rolls a broad slaughter o’er the plains of heaven. 
 
 As thus they scan the visionary scene. 
 
 On all sides swells the superstitious din, 
 
 Incontinent ; and busy frenzy talks 
 Of blood and battle ; cities overturn’d ; 
 
 And late at night in swallowing earthquake sunk, 
 
 Or hideous wrapt in fierce ascending flame , 
 
 Of sallow famine, inundation, storm ; 
 
 p 
 
110 
 
 AUTUMN, 
 
 Of pestilence, and every great distress ; 
 
 Empires subvers'd, v/hen ruling fate has struck 
 Th’ unalterable hour : e’en Nature’s self 
 Is deem’d to totter on the brink of time. 
 
 Not so the man of philosophic eye, 
 
 And inspect sage; the waving brightness he 
 Curious surveys, inquisitive to know 
 The causes, and materials, yet unfix’d, 
 
 Of this appearance beautiful and new. 
 
 Now black, and deep, the night begins to fall, 
 
 A shade immense! Sunk in the quenching gtoom, 
 Magnificent and vast, are heaven and earth. 
 Order confounded lies ; all beauty void ; 
 Distinction lost; and gay variety 
 One universal blot: such the fair power 
 Of light, to kindle and create the whole. 
 
 Drear is the state of the benighted wretch, 
 
 Who then, bewilder’d, wanders through the dark. 
 Full of pale fancies, and chimeras huge; 
 
 Nor visited by one directive ray. 
 
 From cottage streaming, or from airy hall. 
 Perhaps impatient as he stumbles on. 
 
 Struck from the root of slimy rushes, blue, 
 
 The wild-fire scatters round ; or gather’d trails 
 A length of flame deceitful o'er the moss; 
 Whither decoy’d by the fantastic blaze, 
 
 Now lost and now renew’d, he sinks absorpt, 
 Rider and horse, amid the miry gulf; 
 
 While still, from day to day, his pining wife, 
 
 And plaintive children, his return await, 
 
 In wild conjecture lost. At other times, 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 Hi 
 
 Sent by the better Genius of the night, 
 
 Innoxious, gleaming on the horse’s mane, 
 
 The meteor sits; and shows the narrow path. 
 
 That winding leads through pits of death, or else 
 Instructs him how to take the dangerous ford. 
 
 The lengthen’d night elapsed, the Morning shines 
 Serene, in all her dewy beauty bright; 
 
 Unfolding fair the last autumnal day. 
 
 And now the mounting sun dispels the fog; 
 
 The rigid hoar-frost melts before his beam; 
 
 And hung on every spray, on every blade 
 Of grass, the myriad dew-drops twinkle round. 
 
 Ah, see where robb’d, and murder’d, in that pit 
 Lies the still heaving hive ! at evening snatch'd, 
 Beneath the cloud of guilt-concealing night. 
 
 And fix’d o’er sulphur; while, not dreaming ill. 
 
 The happy people, in their waxen cells. 
 
 Sat tending public cares, and planning schemes 
 Of temperance, for Winter poor; rejoiced 
 To mark, full flowing round, their copious stores. 
 Sudden the dark oppressive steam ascends; 
 
 And, us’d to milder scents, the tender race. 
 
 By thousands, tumble from their honey’d domes, 
 Contolv’d, and agonizing in the dust. 
 
 Anjl was it then for this you roam’d the Spring, 
 Intent from flower to flower.^ for this you toil’d 
 Ceaseless the burning Summer-heats away? 
 
 For this in Autumn search’d the blooming waste. 
 Nor lost one sunny gleam, for this sad fate? 
 
 OMan! tyrannic lord! how long, how long, 
 
 Shall prostrate Nature groan beneath your rage, 
 
172 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 Awaiting renovation ? When oblig’d, 
 
 Must you destroy ? Of their ambrosial food 
 Can you not borrow; and, in just return, 
 
 Afford them shelter from the wintry winds ? 
 
 Or, as the sharp year pinches, with their own 
 Again regale them on some smiling day ? 
 
 See where the stony bottom of their town 
 Looks desolate, and wild; with here and there 
 A helpless number, who the ruin’d state 
 Survive, lamenting weak, cast out to death. 
 
 Thus a proud city, populous and rich. 
 
 Full of the works of peace, and high in joy ; 
 
 At theatre or feast, or sunk in sleep, 
 
 (As late, Palermo, was thy fate,) is seiz’d 
 By some dread earthquake; and convulsive hurl’d 
 Sheer from the black foundation, stench-involvM, 
 Into a gulf of blue sulphureous flame. 
 
 Hence every harsher sight! for now the day. 
 
 O’er heaven and earth diffus’d, grows warm and high 
 Infinite splendour! wide investing all. 
 
 How still the breeze! save what the filmy threads 
 Of dew evaporate brushes from the plain. 
 
 How clear the cloudless sky ! how deeply ting d 
 With a peculiar blue! th’ ethereal arch 
 How swell’d immense! amid whose azure thron’d 
 The radiant sun how gay ! how calm below 
 The gilded earth ! the harvest-trejasures all 
 Now gather’d in, beyond the rage of storms, 
 
 Sure to the swain; the circling fence shut up; 
 
 And instant Winter’s utmost rage defied 
 While, loose, to festive joy, the country round 
 
autumn- 
 
 173 
 
 Laughs with the loud sincerity of mirth, 
 
 Shook to the wind their cares. The toil-strung youth, 
 By the quick sense of music taught alone, 
 
 Leaps wildly graceful in the lively dance. 
 
 Her every charm abroad, the village-toast. 
 
 Young, buxom, warm, in native beauty ricli. 
 
 Darts not unmeaning looks; and, where her eye 
 Points an approving smile, with double force, 
 
 The cudgel rattles, and the wrestler twines. 
 
 Age too shines out; and, garrulous, recounts 
 The feats of youth. Thus they rejoice; nor think 
 That, with to-morrow’s sun, their annual toil 
 Begins again the never-ceasing round. 
 
 Oh, knew he but his happiness, of men 
 The happiest he! who far from public rage, 
 
 Deep in the vale, with a choice few retir’d. 
 
 Drinks the pure pleasures of the Rural Life. 
 
 What though the dome be wanting, whose proud gate, 
 Each morning vomits out the sneaking crowd 
 Of flatterers false, and, in their turn abus’d ^ 
 
 Vile intercourse I what though the glittering robe* 
 
 Of every hue reflected light can give. 
 
 Or floating loose, or stiff with mazy gold, 
 
 The pride and gaze of fools I oppress him not? 
 
 What though, from utmost land and sea purvey’d, 
 For him each rarer tributary life 
 Bleeds not, and his insatiate table heaps 
 With luxury, and death? What though his bowl 
 Flames not with costly juice; nor sunk in beds, 
 
 Oft of gay care, he tosses out the night. 
 
 Or melts the thoughtless hours in idle state * 
 
 p 2 
 
174 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 What thoug^h he knows not those fantastic joys, 
 That still amuse the wanton, still deceive; 
 
 A face of pleasure, but a heart of pain; 
 
 Their hollow moments undelighted all? 
 
 Sure peace is his; a solid life, estrang’d 
 To disappointment, and fallacious hope : 
 
 Rich in content, in Nature^s bounty rich, 
 
 In herbs and fruits ; whatever greens the Spring, 
 When heav’ii descendsdn showers ; or bends the bough 
 When Summer reddens, and when Autumn beams ; 
 Or in the wintry glebe whatever lies 
 Conceal’d, and fattens with the richest sap : 
 
 These are not wanting; nor the milky drove, 
 Luxuriant, spread o’er all the lowing vale; 
 
 Nor bleating mountains; nor the chide of streams, 
 And hum of bees, inviting sleep sincere 
 Into the guiltless breast, beneath the shade, 
 
 Or thrown at large amid the fragrant hay; 
 
 Nor aught besides of prospect, grove, or song, 
 
 Dim grottos, gleaming lakes, and fountain clear. 
 Here too dwells simple Truth ; plain Innocence ; 
 Unsullied Beauty ; sound unbroken Youth, 
 
 Patient of labour, with a little pleas’d; 
 
 Health ever blooming; unambitious toil; 
 
 Calm Contemplation, and poetic Ease. 
 
 Let others brave the flood in quest of gain. 
 
 And beat, for joyless months, the gloomy wave. 
 
 Let such as deem it glory to destroy, 
 
 Rush into blood, the sack of cities seek; 
 
 Unpierc’d, exulting in the widow’s wail, 
 
 The virgin’s shriek, and infant’s trembling cry. 
 
A.UTUMN, 
 
 175 
 
 Let some, far distant from their native soil, 
 
 Urg’d or by want or harden’d avarice. 
 
 Find other lands beneath another sun. 
 
 Let this through cities work his eager v/ay, 
 
 By legal outrage and establish’d guile. 
 
 The social sense extinct ; and that ferment 
 Mad into tumult the seditious herd. 
 
 Or melt them down to slavery. Let these 
 Ensnare the wretched in the toils of law. 
 
 Fomenting discord, and perplexing right, 
 
 An iron race ! and those of fairer front. 
 
 But equal inhumanity, in courts. 
 
 Delusive pomp and dark cabals, delight; 
 
 Wreathe the deep bow, diffuse the lying smile, 
 
 And tread the weary labyrinth of state. 
 
 While he, from all the stormy passions free 
 That restless men involve, hears, and but hears, 
 
 At distance safe, the human tempest roar, 
 
 Wrapt close in conscious peace. The fall of kiihgs, 
 The rage of nations, and the crush of states. 
 
 Move not the man, who, from the world escap’d, 
 
 In still retreats, and flowery solitudes. 
 
 To Nature’s voice attends, from month to month. 
 And day to day, through the revolving year; 
 Admiring, sees her in her every shape ; 
 
 Feels all her sweet emotions at his heart; 
 
 Takes what she liberal gives, nor thinks of more. 
 
 He, when young Spring protrudes the burstinggems, 
 Marks the flrst bud, and sucks the healthful gale 
 Into his freshen’d soul ; her genial hours 
 He full enjoys ; and not a beauty blows. 
 
176 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 And not an opening blossom breathes in vain. 
 
 In Summer he, beneath the living shade, 
 
 Such as o’er frigid Terape wont to wave, 
 
 Or Hemus cool, reads what the Muse, of these, 
 Perhaps, has in immortal numbers sung; 
 
 Or what she dictates writes : and, oft an eye 
 Shot round, rejoices in the vigorous year. 
 
 When Autumn’s yellow lustre gilds the world, 
 
 And tempts the sickled swain into the field. 
 
 Seiz’d by the general joy, his heart distends 
 With gentle throes ; and, through the tepid gleams 
 Deep musing, then he best exerts his song. 
 
 E’en Winter wild to him is full of bliss. 
 
 The mighty tempest, and the hoary waste, 
 
 Abrupt, and deep, stretch'd o’er the buried earth, 
 Awake to solemn thought. At night the skies, 
 Disclos’d and kindled by refining frost 
 Pour every lustre on th’ exalted eye. 
 
 A friend, a book, the stealing hours secure, 
 
 And mark them down for wisdom. With swift .ving 
 O’er land and sea imagination roams ; 
 
 Or truth, divinely breaking on his mind. 
 
 Elates his being, and unfolds his powers ; 
 
 Or in his breast heroic virtue burns. 
 
 The touch of kindred too and love he feels 
 The modest eye, whose beams on his alone 
 Ecstatic shine ; the little strong embrace 
 Of prattling children, twin’d around his neck, 
 
 And emulous to please him, calling forth 
 The fond parental soul. JNor purpose gay. 
 Amusement, dance, or song, he sternly scorns ; 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 177 
 
 For liappmess and true philosophy 
 Are of the social still, and smiling' kind. 
 
 This is the life which those who fret in guilt, 
 
 And guilty cities, never knew ; the life, 
 
 Led by primeval ages, uncorrupt, 
 
 When Angels dwelt, and God himself, with Man. 
 
 Oh Nature ! all sufficient I over all ! 
 
 Enrich me with the knowledge of thy works ! 
 Snatch me to heaven ; thy rolling wonders there, 
 World beyond world, in infinite extent, 
 
 Profusely scatter’d o’er the blue immense, 
 
 Show me ; their motions, periods, and their laws. 
 Give me to scan ; through Ciie disclosing deep 
 Light my blind way : the mineral strata there ; 
 Thrust, blooming, thence the vegetable world 5 
 O’er that the rising system, more complex, 
 
 Of animals ; and higher still, the mind. 
 
 The varied scene of quick-compounded thought, 
 And where the mixing passions endless shift } 
 These ever open to my ravish’d eye ; 
 
 A search, the flight of time can ne’er exhaust. 
 
 But if to that unequal ; if the blood, 
 
 In sluggish streams about my heart, forbid 
 That best ambition ; under closing shades, 
 Inglorious, lay me by the lowly brook, 
 
 And whisper to my dreams. From Thee begin. 
 Dwell all on Thee, w ith Thee conclude my song ; 
 And let me never, never stray from Thee ! 
 
 12 
 

WINTER 
 
TOE ARGUMENT. 
 
 Pie mhject proposed. Address to the Earl of Wil- 
 mington. First approach of Winter. According 
 to the natural course of the season^ various storms de- 
 scribed. Rain. Wind. Snow. The driving of the 
 snows : a man perishing among them ; whence re- 
 flections on the wants and miseries of human life. 
 The wolves descending from the Alps and Appe- 
 nines. A winter evening described; as spent by 
 philosophers; by the country people; in the city. 
 Frost. A view of Winter within the polar circle. A 
 thaw. The whole concluding loith moral reflections 
 on a future state. 
 
WINTER 
 
 OEE, Winter comes, to rule the varied year, 
 Sullen and sad, with all his rising train; [theme* 
 Vapours, and Clouds, and Storms. Be these my 
 that exalt the soul to solemn thought. 
 
 And heavenly musing. Welcome, kindred glooms! 
 Congenial horrors, hail ! with frequent foot. 
 
 Pleas’d have I, in my cheerful morn of life, 
 
 When nurs’d by careless Solitude I liv’d. 
 
 And snng of Nature with unceasing joy. 
 
 Pleas’d have I wander’d through your rough domain; 
 Trod the pure virgin-snows, myself as pure; 
 
 Heard the winds roar, and the big torrent burst; 
 
 Or seen the deep-fermenting tempest brew’d. 
 
 In the grim evening sky. Thus pass’d the time, 
 
 Till through the lucid chambers of the south 
 Look’d out the joyous Spring, look’d out, and smil’d. 
 
 To thee, the patron of her first essay, 
 
 The Muse, 0 Wilmington! renews her song. 
 
 Since has she rounded the revolving year : 
 
 Skimm’d the gay Spring; on eagle-pinions borne, 
 Attempted through the Summer-blaze to rise; 
 
 Then swept o’er Autumn with the shadowy gale ; 
 
 And now among the wintry clouds again, 
 
WINTER. 
 
 iS2 
 
 Roll’d in the doubling- storm, she tries to soar; 
 
 To swell her note with all the rushing winds; 
 
 To suit her spunding cadence to the floods; 
 
 As is her theme, her numbers wildly great: 
 
 Thrice happy ! could she fill thy judging ear 
 With bold description, and with manly thoughts. 
 
 Nor art thou skill’d in awful schemes alone, 
 
 And how to make a mighty people thrive ; 
 
 But equal goodness, sound integrity, 
 
 A firm unshaken uncorrupted soul 
 Amid a sliding age, and burning strong, 
 
 Not vainly blazing, for thy country’s weal, 
 
 A steady spirit regularly free; 
 
 These each exalting each, the statesman light 
 Into the patriot; these the public hope 
 And eye to thee converting, bid the Muse 
 Record what envy dares not flattery call. 
 
 Now when the cheerless empire of the sky 
 To Capricorn the Centaur Archer yields. 
 
 And fierce Aquarius stains th’ inverted year; 
 
 Hung o’er the furthest verge of heaven, the sun 
 Scarce spreads through ether the dejected day 
 Faint are his gleams, and inefiectual shoot 
 His struggling rays, in horizontal lines, 
 
 Through the thick air; as cloth’d in cloudy storm. 
 Weak, wan, and broad, he skirts the southern sky 
 And, soon-descending, to the long dark night. 
 Wide-shading all, the prostrate world resigns. 
 
 Nor is the night tinwish’d ; while vital heat,' 
 
 Light, life, and joy, the dubious day forsake. 
 Meantime, in sable cincture, shadows vast, 
 
WINTER. 
 
 183 
 
 Deep-ting’d and damp, and congregated clouds, 
 
 ^nd all the vapoury turbulence of heaven. 
 
 Involve the face of things. Thus Winter falls, 
 
 A. heavy gloom oppressive o’er the world, 
 
 Through Nature shedding influence malign, 
 
 And rouses up the seeds of dark disease. 
 
 The soul of man dies in him, loathing life. 
 
 And black with more than melancholy views. 
 
 The cattle droop; and o’er the furrow’d land. 
 
 Fresh from the plough, the dun discolour’d flocks. 
 Untended spreading, crop the wholesome root. 
 Along the woods, along the moorish fens,. 
 
 Sighs the sad Genius of the coming storm ; 
 
 And up among the loose disjointed cliffs. 
 
 And fractur’d mountains wild, the brawling brook 
 And cave, presageful, send a hollow moan, 
 Eesounding long in listening Fancy’s ear. 
 
 Then comes the father of the tempest forth. 
 Wrapt in black glooms. First joyless rains obscure 
 Drive through the mingling skies with vapour foul; 
 Dash on the mountain’s brow, and shake the woods. 
 That grumbling wave below. Th’ unsightly plain 
 Lies a brown deluge; as the low-bent clouds 
 Pour flood on flood, yet unexhausted still 
 Combine, and deepening into night, shut up 
 The day’s fair face. The wanderers of heaven, 
 Each to his home, retire ; save those that love 
 To take their pastime in the troubled air, 
 
 Or skimming flutter round the dimply pool 
 The cattle from th’ untasted fields return, 
 
184 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 And ask, with meaning low, theirwonted stalls, 
 
 Or ruminate in the contiguous shade. 
 
 Thither the household feathery people crowd, 
 
 The crested cock, with all his female train, 
 
 Pensive, and dripping; while the cottage hind 
 Hangs o’er th’ enlivening blaze, and taleful there 
 Recounts his simple frolic : much he talks, 
 
 And much he laughs, nor recks the storm mat blows 
 Without, and rattles on his humble roof. 
 
 Wide o’er the brim, with many a torrent swell’d, 
 And the mix’d ruin of its banks o’erspread. 
 
 At last the rous’d-up river pours along : 
 
 Resistless, roaring, dreadful, down it comes, 
 
 F rom the rude mountain, and the mossy wild, 
 Tumoling through rooks abrupt, and sounding far; 
 Then o’er the sanded valley floating spreads, 
 
 Calm, sluggish, silent ; till again, constrain’d 
 Between two meeting hills it bursts away. 
 
 Where rocks and woods o’erhang the turbid stream • 
 There gathering triple force, rapid, and deep. 
 
 It boils, and wheels, and foams, and thunders through 
 Nature! great parent! whose unceasing hand 
 Rolls round the Season-s of the changeful year, 
 
 How mighty, how majestic, are jthy works! 
 
 With what a pleasing dread they swell the soul ! 
 
 That sees astonish’d ! and astonish’d sings ! 
 
 Ve too, ye winds! that now begin to blow. 
 
 With boisterous sweep, I raise my voice to you. 
 Where are your stores, ye powerful beings ! say* 
 Where your aerial magazines reserv’d, 
 
WINTEK 
 
 1S5 
 
 To swell the brooding terrors of the storm? 
 
 In what far-distant region of the sky, 
 
 Hush’d in deep silence, sleep ye when ’tis calm? 
 
 When from the pallid 'sky the sun descends. 
 With many a spot, that o'er his glaring orb 
 Uncertain wanders, stain’d; red fiery streaks 
 Begin to flush around. The reeling clouds 
 Stagger with dizzy poise, as doubting yet 
 Which master to obey : while rising slow. 
 
 Blank, in the leaden-colour’d east, the moon 
 Wears a wan circle round her blunted horns. 
 
 Seen through the turbid fluctuating air. 
 
 The stars obtuse emit a shiver’d ray; 
 
 Or frequent seem to shoot athwart the gloom. 
 
 And long behind them trail the whitening blaze. 
 Snatch’d in short eddies, plays the wither'd leaf, 
 And on the flood the dancing feather floats. 
 
 With broaden’d nostrils to the sky up-turn’d, 
 
 The conscious heifer snuffs the stormy gale. 
 
 E’en as the matron, at her nightly task. 
 
 With pensive labour draws the flaxen thread, 
 i’he wasted taper and the crackling flame 
 Foretell the blast. But chief the plumy race, 
 
 The tenants of the sky, its changes speak. 
 
 Retiring from the downs, where all day long 
 They pick’d their scanty fare a blackening train 
 Of clamorous rooks thick urge their w eary flight, 
 And seek the closing shelter of the grove. 
 
 Assiduo jp ra his bower, the wailing owl 
 Plies his saa sons*. The cormorant on high 
 Wheels from the deep, and screams along the land. 
 
186 
 
 WlNTEl? 
 
 Loud shrieks the soaring’ hern ; and with wild wing 
 The circling sea-fowl cleave the flaky clouds. 
 
 Ocean, unequal press’d, with broken tide 
 
 And blind commotion heaves ; while from the shore 
 
 Eat into caverns by the restless wave, 
 
 And forest-rustling mountain, comes a voice, 
 
 .rhat solemn sounding bids the world prepare. 
 
 Then issues forth the storm with sudden burst. 
 
 And hurls the whole precipitated air, 
 
 Down in a torrent. On the passive main 
 Descends the ethereal force, and with strong gust 
 Turns from its bottom the discolour’d deep. 
 
 Through the black night that sits immense around, 
 Lash’d into foam, the fierce conflicting brine 
 Seems o’er a thousand raging waves to burn : 
 Meantime the mountain-billows, to the clouds 
 fn dreadful tumult swell’d, surge above surge, 
 
 Burst into chaos with tremendous roar, 
 
 And anchor’d navies from their stations drive, 
 
 Wild as the winds across the howling waste 
 Of mighty waters : now th’ inflated wave 
 Straining they scale, and now impetuous shoot 
 Into the secret chambers of the deep. 
 
 The wintry Baltic thundering o’er their head. 
 Emerging thence again, before the breath 
 Of full-exerted heaven they wing their course, 
 
 And dart on distant coasts ; if some sharp rock, 
 
 Or shoal insiduous, break not their career. 
 
 And in loose fragments fling them floating round 
 Nor less at land the loosen’d tempest reigns. 
 
 The mountain thunders ; and its sturdy sons 
 
WINTER. 
 
 387 
 
 Stoop to the bottom of the rocks they shade. 
 
 Lone on the midnigtit steep, and all aghast, 
 
 The dark wayfaring stranger breathless toils, 
 
 And, often falling, climbs against the blast. 
 
 Low waves the rooted forest, vex’d, and sheds 
 What of its tarnish’d honours yet remain ; 
 
 Dash’d down, and scatter’d, by the tearing wind’s 
 Assiduous fury, its gigantic limbs. 
 
 Thus struggling through the dissipated grove. 
 
 The whirling tempest raves along the plain; 
 
 And on the cottage thatch’d, or lordly roof. 
 Keen-fastening, shakes them to the solid base. 
 
 Sleep frighted flies; and round the rocking dome, 
 For entrance eager, howls the savage blast. 
 
 Then too, they say, through all the burden’d air, 
 Long groans are heard, shrill sounds, and distant 
 That, utter’d by the demon of the night, [sighs, 
 Warn the devoted wretch of wo and death. 
 
 Huge uproar lords it wide. The clouds commix'd 
 With stars swift gliding sweep along the sky. 
 
 All Nature reels. Till Nature’s King, who oft 
 Amid tempestuous darkness dwells alone. 
 
 And on the wings of the careering wind 
 Walks dreadfully serene, commands a calm ; 
 
 Then straight, air, sea, and earth, are hush’d at once. 
 
 As yet ’tis midnight deep. The weary clouds, 
 Slow-meeting, mingle into solid gloom. 
 
 Now, while the drowsy world lies lost in sleep, 
 
 Let me associate with the serious Night, 
 
 And Contemplation, her sedate compeer ; 
 
188 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 Let me shake off the intrusive cares of day> 
 
 And lay the meddling- senses all aside 
 Where now, ye lying vanities of life! 
 
 Ye ever-tempting, ever-cheating train! 
 
 Where are you now? and what is your amount? 
 Vexation, disappointment, and remorse. 
 
 Sad, sickening thought! and yet, deluded man, 
 
 A scene of crude disjointed visions past, 
 
 And broken slumbers, rises still resolv’d; 
 
 With new-flush ’d hopes, to run the giddy round. 
 
 Father of light and life, thou Good Supreme 
 O teach me what is good ! teach me Thyself ! 
 
 Save me from folly, vanity, and vice, 
 
 From every low pursuit ; and feed ray soul 
 With knowledge, conscious peace, and virtue pure ; 
 Sacred, substantial, never-fading bliss! 
 
 The keener tempests rise : and fuming dun 
 From all the livid east, or piercing north. 
 
 Thick clouds ascend ; in whose capacious womb 
 A vapoury deluge lies, to snow congeal’d. 
 
 Heavy they roll their fleecy world along ; 
 
 And the sky saddens with the gather’d storm. 
 
 Thro’ the hush’d air the whitening shower descends, 
 At first thin wavering ; till at last the flakes 
 Fall broad, and wide, and fast, dimming the day 
 With a continual flow. The cherish’d fields 
 Fut on their winter-robe of purest white. 
 
 1 is brightness all ; save where the new snow melts 
 AtuosT the mazy current. I^ow. the woods 
 
 their hoar nead; and, ere the languid sun 
 
WINTER. 
 
 189 
 
 Faint from the west emits his evening ray, 
 
 Earth’s universal face, deep hid, and chill, 
 
 Is one wild dazzling waste, that buries wide 
 The works of man. Drooping, the labour er-ox 
 Stands cover’d o’er with snow, and then demands 
 The fruit of all his toil. The fowls of heaven, 
 Tam’d by the cruel season, crowd around 
 The winnowing store, and claim the little boon 
 Which Providence assigns them. One alone. 
 
 The red-breast, sacred to the household gods, 
 
 Wisely regardful of th’ embroiling sky, 
 
 [n joyless fields, and thorny thickets leaves 
 His shivering mates, and pays to trusted man 
 His annual visit. Half-afraid, he first 
 Against the window beats; then, brisk, alights 
 On the warm hearth ; then, hopping o’er the floor, 
 Eyes all the smiling family askance. 
 
 And pecks, and starts, and wonders where he is: 
 
 Till more familiar grown, the table-crumbs 
 Attract his slender feet. The foodless wilds 
 Pour forth their brown inhabitants. The hare, 
 Though timorous of heart, and hard beset 
 By death in various forms, dark snares, and dogs. 
 And more unpitying men, the garden seeks. 
 
 Urg’d on by fearless want. The bleating kind 
 Eye the bleak heaven, and next the glistening earth, 
 W’^ith looks of dumb despair ; then sad dispers’d, 
 Dig for the wither’d herb through heaps of snow. 
 
 Now, shepherds, to your helpless charge be kind; 
 Baffle the raging year, and fill their pens 
 With food at will; lodge them below the storm, 
 
190 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 And watch them strict: for from the belloi^ing east" 
 In this dire season, oft the whirlwind’s w ing 
 Sweeps up the burden of whole wintry plains 
 At one wide waft; and o’er the hapless flocks, 
 
 Hid in the hollow of two neighbouring hills, 
 
 The billowy tempest whelms; till, upward urged, 
 
 The valley to a shining mountain swells, 
 
 Tipt with a wreath high-curling in the sky. 
 
 As thus the snows arise ; and foul, and fierce, 
 
 All Winter drives along the darken’d air; 
 
 In his own loose-revolving fields, the swain 
 Disaster’d stands ; sees other hills ascend. 
 
 Of unknov/n joyless brow ; and other scenes, 
 
 Of horrid prospect, shag the trackless plain; 
 
 Nor finds the river, nor the forest hid 
 Beneath the formless vvild; but wanders on 
 From hill to dale, still more and more astray; 
 Impatient flouncing through the drifted heaps, 
 
 Stung with the thoughts of home; the thoughts of 
 Rush on his nerves, and call their vigour forth [home 
 In many a vain attempt. How sinks his soul! 
 
 What black despair, what horror fills his heart. 
 When for the dusky spot, which fancy feign’d 
 His tufted cottage rising through the snow. 
 
 He meets the roughness of the middle waste. 
 
 Far from the track, and bless’d abode of man; 
 
 While round him night resistless closes fast. 
 
 And every tempest, howling o’er his head, 
 
 Renders the savage w ilderness more wild. 
 
 Then throng the busy shapes into his mind. 
 
 Of cover’d pits, unfathomably deep, 
 
WINTER, 
 
 m 
 
 K dire descent ! beyond the power of frost ; 
 
 Of faithless bogs ; of precipices huge, 
 
 Smooth’d up with snow; and, what is land, unknown, 
 What water, of the still unfrozen spring, 
 
 In the loose marsh or solitary lake, 
 
 Where the fresh fountain from the bottom boils. 
 These check his fearful steps; and down he sinks 
 Beneath the shelter of the shapeless drift, 
 
 Thinking o’er ail the bitterness of death ; 
 
 Mix’d with the tender anguish Nature shoots 
 Through the wrung bosom of the dying man. 
 
 His wife, his children, and his friends unseen. 
 
 In vain for him tlT officious wife prepares 
 The fire fair-blazing, and the vestment warm * 
 
 In vain his little children, peeping out 
 Into the mingling storm, demand their sire, 
 
 With tears of artless innocence. Alas' 
 
 Nor wife, nor children, more shall he behold; 
 
 Nor friends, nor sacred home. On every nerve 
 The deadly Winter seizes; shuts up sense; 
 
 And, o’er his inmost vitals creeping cold, 
 
 Lays him along the snows, a stiffen’d corse; 
 
 Stretch’d out, and bleaching in the northern blast. 
 
 Ah! little think the gay licentious proud, 
 
 Whom pleasure, power, and affluence surround ; 
 They, who their thoughtless hours in giddy mirth, 
 And wanton, often cruel, riot waste; 
 
 Ah! little think they, while they dance along, 
 
 How many feel, this very moment, death, 
 
 And all the sad variety of pain. 
 
193 
 
 WINTEK. 
 
 How many sink in the devouring* flood, 
 
 Or more devouring flame. How many bleed. 
 
 By shameful variance betwixt man and man. 
 
 How many pine in want, and dunffeon glooms; 
 Shut from the com.j jn air, and uO.A,non use 
 Of their own limbs. How many drink the cup 
 Of baleful grief, or eat the bitter bread 
 Of misery. Sore pierc’d by wintry winds, 
 
 Kow many shrink into the sordid hut 
 Of cheerless poverty. How many shake 
 With all the fiercer tortures of the mind. 
 Unbounded passion, madness, guilt, remorse; 
 Whence tumbled headlong from the height of Iile, 
 They furnish matter for the tragic Muse. 
 
 E’en in the vale, where Wisdom loves to dwell, 
 With friendship, peace, and contemplation join’d. 
 How many, rack’d with honest passions, droop 
 In deep retir’d distress. How many stand 
 Around the death-bed of their dearest friends, 
 
 And point the parting anguish. Thought fond Man 
 Of these, and all the thousand nameless ills 
 That one incessant struggle render life 
 One scene of toil, of suflering, and of fate ; 
 
 Vice in his high career would stand appall’d, 
 
 And heedless rambling Impulse learn to think; 
 
 The conscious heart of Charity would warm, 
 
 And her wide wish Benevolence dilate ; 
 
 The social tear would rise, the social sigh ; 
 
 And into clear perfection., gradual bliss, 
 
 Refining still, the social passions work. 
 
WINTER. 
 
 193 
 
 And here can I forget the generous band,* 
 
 Who, touch’d with human wo, redressive search’d 
 Into the horrors of the gloomy jail? 
 
 Unpitied, and unheard, where misery moans; 
 
 Where sickness pines ; where thirst and hunger burii; 
 And poor misfortune feels the lash of vice. 
 
 While in the land of Liberty, the land 
 Whose every street and public meeting glow 
 With open freedom, little tyrants rag’d; 
 
 Snatch’d the lean morsel from the starving mouth; 
 Tore from cold wintry limbs the tatter’d weed; 
 
 E’en robb’d them of the last of comforts, sleep ; 
 
 The freeborn Briton to the dungeon chain’d. 
 
 Or, as the lust of cruelty prevail’d. 
 
 At pleasure mark’d him with inglorious stripes; 
 
 And crush’d out lives, by secret barbarous ways, 
 That for their country would have toil’d, or bled. 
 
 O great design ! if executed well, 
 
 With patient care, and wisdom-temper’d zeal, 
 
 Te sons of Mercy! yet resume the search; 
 
 Drag forth the legal monsters into light, 
 
 Wrench from their hands oppression’s iron rod, 
 
 And bid the cruel feel the pains they give. 
 
 Much still untouch’d remains ; in this rank age, 
 Much is the patriot’s weeding hand requir’d. 
 
 The toils of law, (what dark insidious men 
 Have cumbrous added to perplex the truth, 
 
 And lengthen simple justice into trade,) 
 
 * The Jail Committee ^ in the year 1729. 
 
 13 R 
 
VJA 
 
 WIxVTER. 
 
 How glorious were the day that saw these broke, 
 And every man within the reach of right! 
 
 By wintry famine rous’d, from all the tract 
 Of horrid modntains which the shining' Alps, 
 
 And wavy Appenine, and Pyrenees, 
 
 Branch out stupendous into distant lands ; 
 
 Cruel as death, and hungry as the grave ! 
 
 Burning for blood I bony, and gaunt, and grim! 
 Assembling wolves in raging troops descend; 
 
 And, pouring o’er the country, bear along, 
 
 Keen as the north-wind sw eeps the gloSvSy snow 
 All is their prize. They fasten on the steed, 
 
 Pi css him to earth, and pierce his mighty heart. 
 
 Nor can the bull his awful front defend, 
 
 Or shake the murdering savages away. 
 
 Bapacious, at the mother’s throat they fly. 
 
 And tear the screaming infant from her breast. 
 
 The godlike face of man avails him nought. 
 
 E'en beauty, force divine! at whose bright glan.:e 
 The generous lion stands in soften’d gaze. 
 
 Here bleeds, a hapless undistinguish’d prey. 
 
 But if, appriz’d of the severe attack. 
 
 The country be shut up; lur’d by the scent, 
 ihi churchyards drear (inhuman to relate!) 
 
 The disappointed prowlers fall, and dig 
 The shrouded body from the grave; o’er w hich, 
 Ivlix’d with foul shades, and frighted ghosts, they 
 Among those hilly regions, where, embrac’d ['howl. 
 In peaceful vales, the happy Orisons dwell; 
 
 Oft, rusliing", Sudden from the loaded cliffs. 
 
 Mountains of snow their gathering terrors roll 
 
WlNTKPc. 
 
 105 
 
 From steep to steep, loud thundering down they come, 
 A wintry waste in dire commotion all : 
 
 And herds and flocks, and travellers and swains, 
 And sometimes whole brigades of marching troops, 
 Or hamlets sleeping in the dead of night. 
 
 Are deep beneath the smothering ruin whelm’d. 
 
 Now, ail amid the rigours of the year, 
 
 In the wild depth of Winter, while without 
 The ceaseless winds blow ice, be my retreat, 
 Setween the groaning forest and the shore 
 Beat by the boundless multitude of waves ; 
 
 A rural, shelter’d, solitary, scene ; 
 
 Where ruddy Are and beaming tapers join 
 To cheer the gloom. There studious let me sit, 
 
 And hold high converse with the mighty Dead * 
 
 Sages of ancient time, as gods rever’d; 
 
 As gods beneficent, who bless’d mankind 
 AVlth arts, with arms, and humaniz’d a world. 
 Rous’d at th’ inspiring thought, I throw aside 
 The long-liv'd volume; and, deep-musing, hail 
 The sacred shades, that slowly rising pass 
 Before my wondering eyes. First Socrates, 
 
 Wlio, firmly good in a corrupted state. 
 
 Against the rage of tyrants single stood, 
 
 Invincible! calm Reason’s holy law, 
 
 Tiiat Voice of God within th’ attentive mind, 
 Obeying, fearless, or in life, or death. 
 
 Great moral teacher ! Wisest of mankind ! 
 
 Solon the next; who built his common-weal 
 On equity’s wide base; by tender laws 
 A lively people curbing, yet undarap’d ; 
 
196 
 
 WINTER 
 
 Preserving still that quick peculiar fire, 
 
 Whence in the laurel’d field of finer arts. 
 
 And of bold freedom, they unequall’d shone ; 
 
 The pride of smiling Greece, and human kind 
 Lycurgus then, who bow’d beneath the force. 
 
 Of strictest discipline, severely wise, 
 
 All human passions. Following him, I see, 
 
 As at Thermopylaj he glorious fell. 
 
 The firm devoted Chief,* who prov’d by deeds 
 The hardest lesson which the other taught. 
 
 Then Aristides lifts his honest front ; 
 
 Spotless of heart, to whom th’ unflattering voice 
 Of freedom gave the noblest name of Just; 
 
 In pure majestic poverty rever’d ; 
 
 Who, e’en his glory to his country's weal 
 Submitting, swell’ d a haughty rival’st fame. 
 Rear’d by his care, of softer ray appears 
 Cimon sweet-soul’d ; whose genius, rising strong, 
 Shook ofi* the load of young debauch; abroad 
 The scourge of Persian pride, at home the friena 
 Of every worth and every splendid art; 
 
 Modest, and simple, in the pomp of wealth. 
 
 Then tne last worthies of declining Greece, 
 
 Late call’d to glory, in unequal times. 
 
 Pensive, appear. The fair Corinthian boast, 
 Timoleon, happy temper! mild, and firm, 
 
 Who wept the brother while the tyrant bled. 
 
 And equal to the best, the Theban Pair,! 
 
 * Leonidas. t Thtmktocle* 
 
 t i^dopidas and Epaminondas 
 
WINTER. 
 
 197 
 
 Whose virtues, in heroic concord join’d, 
 
 Their country' rais’d to freedom, empire, fame. 
 
 He too, with whom Athenian honour sunk, 
 
 And left a mass of sordid lees behind, 
 
 Phocion the Good; in public life severe, 
 
 To virtue still inexorably firm ; 
 
 But when, beneath his low illustrious roof, 
 
 Sweet peace and happy wisdom smooth’d his biow, 
 Not friendship softer was, nor love more kind. 
 
 And he, the last of old Lycurgus’ sons. 
 
 The generous victim to that vain attempt. 
 
 To save a rotten state, Agis, who saw 
 E’en Sparta’s self to servile avarice sunk. 
 
 The two Achaian heroes close the train ; 
 
 Aratiis, who awhile relum’d the said 
 Of fondly-lingering liberty in Greece, 
 
 And he her darling as her latest hope, 
 
 The gallant Philopoemen; who to arms 
 Turn’d the luxurious pomp he could not cure ; 
 
 Or toiling in his farm, a simple swain ; 
 
 Or, bold and skilful, thundering in the field. 
 
 Of wugher front, a mi<rhty people come. 
 
 A race of heroes ! in thch^-' virtuous times 
 Which knew no stain, save that with partial fiam 
 Their dearest country they too fondly lov’d : 
 
 Her better founder first, the light of Rome, 
 
 Numa, who soften’d her rapacious sons: 
 
 Servius the king, who laid the solid base 
 On which o’er earth the vast republic sprea 
 Then the great consuls venerabie rise. 
 
 R -2 
 
198 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 The public Father* who the private quell’d, 
 
 As o-n the dread tribunal sternly sad. 
 
 He, whom his thankless country could not lose, 
 Camillus, only vengeful to her foes. 
 
 Fabricius, scorner of all-conquering gold ; 
 
 And Cincinnatus, awful from the plough. 
 
 Thy willing victim,! Carthage, bursting loose 
 From all that pleading Nature could oppose, 
 
 From a whole city’s tears, by rigid faith 
 Imperious call’d, and honour’s dire command. 
 Scipio, the gentle chief, humanely brave ; 
 
 Who soon the race of spotless glory ran. 
 
 And, warm in youth, to the poetic shade 
 With Friendship and Philosophy retir’d. 
 
 Tully, whose powerful eloquence awhile 
 Restrain’d the rapid fate of rushing Rome. 
 Unconquer’d Cato, virtuous in extreme : 
 
 And thou, unhappy Brutus, kind of heart ; 
 
 Whose steady arm, by awful virtue urg’d. 
 
 Lifted the Roman steel against thy friend. 
 Thousands, besides, the tribute of a verse 
 Demand; but who can count the stars of heaven ? 
 Who sing their influence on this lower world ? 
 
 Behold, who yonder comes ! in sober state, 
 
 Fair, mild, and strong, as is a vernal sun : 
 
 ’Tis Pheebus’ self, or else the Mantuan swain ! 
 Gr<>at Homer too appears, of daring wing. 
 
 Parent of song! and equal by his side, 
 
 * Mai’cus Junius Brutus. f Re^uius. 
 
WINTER. 
 
 199 
 
 The British Muse: join’d hand in hand they walk, 
 Darkling, full up the middle steep to fame. 
 
 Nor absent arc those shades, whose skilful touch 
 Pathetic drew th’ impassion’d heart, and charm’d 
 Transported Athens with the moral scene : 
 
 Nor those who, tuneful, wak’d the enchanting lyre. 
 
 First of your kind, society divine ! 
 
 Still visit thus my nights, for you reserv’d. 
 
 And mount my soaring soul to thoughts like yours. 
 Silence, thou lonely power I the door be thine ; 
 
 See on the hallow’d hour that none intrude, 
 
 Save a few chosen friends, who sometimes deign 
 To bless my humble roof, with sense reiin’d, 
 Learning digested well, exalted faith, 
 
 Unstudied wit, and humour ever gay. 
 
 Or from the IMiises’ hill will Pope descend. 
 
 To raise the sacred hour, to bid it smile. 
 
 And with the social spirit warm the heart: 
 
 For though not sweeter his own Ilomer sings, 
 
 Yet is his life the more endearing song. 
 
 Where art thou, Hammond ? thou, the darling pride, 
 The friend and lover of the tuneful throng ! 
 
 Ah ! why, dear youth, in all the blooming prime 
 Of vernal genius, where disclosing fast 
 Each active worth, each manly virtue lay, 
 
 Why wert thou ravish’d from our hope so soon ? 
 What now avails that noble thirst of fame, 
 
 Which stung thy fervent breast ? that treasur’d store 
 Of knowledge, early gain’d.^ that eager zeal 
 To serve thy country, glowing in the band 
 Of youthful patriots, who sustain her name.^ 
 
1200 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 What now, alas! that life-diffusing charnu 
 Of sprightly wit? that rapture for the MusOi 
 That heart of friendship, and that soul of joy, 
 
 Which bade with softest light thy virtues smile. 
 
 Ah 1 only show’d, to check our fond pursuits, 
 
 And teach our humbled hopes that life is vain ! 
 
 Thus in some deep retirement would I pass 
 The Winter glooms, with friends of pliant soul. 
 
 Or blithe, or solemn, as the theme inspir’d : 
 
 With them would search, if Nature’s boundless frame 
 Was call’d, late-rising from the void of night, 
 
 Or sprung eternal from th’ Eternal Mind ; 
 
 Its life, its laws, its progress, and its end. 
 
 Hence larger prospects of the beauteaus whole 
 W ould, gradual, open on our opening minds j 
 And each diffusive harmony unite 
 In full perfection to th’ astonished eye. 
 
 Then would we try to scan the moral world, 
 
 Which, though to us it seems embroil’d, moves on 
 In higher order; fitted, and impell’d. 
 
 By Wisdom’s finest hand, and issuing all 
 In general good. The sage historic Muse 
 Should next conduct us through the deeps of time : 
 Show us how empire grew, declin’d, and fell. 
 
 In scatter’d states; what makes the nations smile j 
 Improves their soil, and gives them double suns; 
 
 And why they pine beneath the brightest skies, 
 
 In Nature’s richest lap. As thus we talk’d, 
 
 Our hearts would burn within us, would inhale 
 
 That portion of divinity, that ray 
 
 Of purest heaven, which lights the public soul 
 
WINTEH, 
 
 201 
 
 Of patriots, and of heroes. But if doom’d, 
 
 In powerless humble fortune, to repress 
 These ardent risings of the kindling soul ; 
 
 Then, e’en superior to ambition, we 
 Would learn the private virtues ; how to glide 
 Thro’ shades and plains, along the smoothest stream 
 Of rural life : or snatch’d away by hope. 
 
 Through the dim spaces of futurity, 
 
 With earnest eye anticipate those scenes 
 Of happiness and wonder, where the mind. 
 
 In endless growth and infinite ascent. 
 
 Rises from state to state, and world to world. 
 
 But when with these the serious thought is foil’d, 
 We, shifting for relief, would play the shapes 
 Of frolic fancy j and incessaiit form 
 Those rapid pictures, that assembled train 
 Of fleet ideas, never join’d before; 
 
 Whence lively Wit excites to gay surprise, 
 
 Or folly-painting Humour, grave himself. 
 
 Calls Laughter forth, deep-shaking every nerve. 
 
 Meantime the village rouses up the fire ; 
 
 While, well attested, and as well believ’d. 
 
 Heard solemn, goes the goblin story round; 
 
 Till superstitious horror creeps o’er all. 
 
 Or, frequent in the sounding hall, they wake 
 The rural gambol. Rustic mirth goes round ; 
 
 The simple joke that takes the shepherd’s heart, 
 Easily pleas’d; the long loud laugh, sincere ; 
 
 The kiss, snatch’d hasty from the side-long maid. 
 
 On purpose guardless, or pretending sleep. 
 
 The leap, the slap, the haul; and, shook to notes 
 
9M 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 Of native music, the respondent dance. 
 
 Thus jocund fletis with them the winter-night. 
 
 The city swarms intense. The public haunt, 
 
 Full of each theme, and warm with mix’d discourse- 
 Hums indistinct. The sons of riot flow 
 Down the loose stream of false enchanted joy 
 To swift destruction. On the rankled soul 
 The gaming fury fails ; and in one gulf, 
 
 Of total ruin, honour, virtue, peace. 
 
 Friends, families, and fortune, headlong sink. 
 
 Up springs the dance along the lighted dome, 
 
 Mix’d, and evolv’d, a thousand sprightly ways. 
 
 The glittering court effuses every pomp ; 
 
 The circle deepens: beam’d from gaudy robes, 
 Tapers, and sparkling gems, and radiant eyes, 
 
 A soft effulgence o’er the palace waves: 
 
 While, a gay insect in his summer shine, 
 
 The fop, light-fluttering, spreads his mealy wings. 
 
 Dread o’er the scene the ghost of Hamlet stalks * 
 Othello rages; poor Monimia mourns^ 
 
 And Belvidera pours her soul in love. 
 
 Terror alarms the breast; the comely tear 
 Steals o’er the cheek: or else the Comic Muse 
 Holds to the world a picture of itself. 
 
 And raises sly the fair impartial laugh. 
 
 Sometimes she lifts her strain, and paints the scenes 
 Of beauteous life; whate’er can deck mankind, 
 
 Or charm the heart, in generous Bevil* show’d. 
 
 * A character in The Conscious Loversj written by 
 Sir R. Steele. 
 
WINTER. 
 
 203 
 
 0 Iliou, whose wisdom, solid, yet refin’d, 
 
 Whose patriot-virtues, and consummate skill 
 To touch the finer springs that move the w^orld, 
 Join’d to whate’er the Graces can bestow, 
 
 And all Apollo’s animating fire, 
 
 Give thee, with pleasing dignity, to shine 
 At once the guardian, ornament, and joy, 
 
 Of polish’d life; permit the rural Muse, 
 
 O Chesterfield ! to grace with thee her song. 
 
 Ere to the shades again she humbly flies, 
 
 Indulge her fond ambition, m iny train, 
 
 (For every Muse has in thy train a place,) 
 
 To mark thy various full-accomplish’d mind: 
 
 To mark that spirit, which, with British scoro. 
 Rejects th’ allurements of corrupted power; 
 
 That elegant politeness, which excels. 
 
 E’en in the judgment of presumptuous France, 
 
 The boasted manners of her shining court; 
 
 That wit, the vivid energy of sense, 
 
 The truth of Nature, which, with Attic point. 
 
 And kind well-temper’d satire, smoothly keer.i 
 Steals through the soul, and without pain correi'ts, 
 Or, rising thence with yet a brighter flame. 
 
 O let me hail thee on some glorious day. 
 
 When to the listening senate, ardent, crowd 
 Britannia’s sons to hear her pleaded cause. 
 
 Then dress’d by thee, more amiably fair. 
 
 Truth the soft robe of mild persuasion wears : 
 
 Thou to assenting reason giv’st asrain 
 
 Her own enlighten’d thoughts ; call’d from the ht^n, 
 
 I'll’ obedient passions on thy voice attend ; 
 
204 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 And e’en reluctant party feels awhile 
 Thy gracious power : as through the varied maze 
 Of eloquence, now smooth, now quick, now strong, 
 Profound, and clear, you roll the copious flood. 
 
 To thy lov’d haunt return, my happy Muse : 
 
 For now, behold, the joyous winter days, 
 
 Frosty, succeed; and through the blue serene, 
 
 For sight too fine, th’ ethereal nitre flies; 
 
 Killing infectious damps, and the spent air 
 Storing afresh with elemental life. 
 
 Close crowds the shining atmosphere; and binds 
 Our strengthen’d bodies in its cold embrace, 
 Constringent; feeds, and animates our blood ; 
 Refines our spirits, through the new-strung nerves, 
 
 In swifter sallies darting to the brain; 
 
 Where sits the soul, intense, collected, cool, 
 
 Bright as the skies, and as the season keen. 
 
 All Nature feels the renovating force 
 Of Winter, only to the thoughtless eye 
 In ruin seen. The frost-concocted glebe 
 Draws in abundant vegetable soul. 
 
 And gathers vigour for the coming year. 
 
 A stronger glow sits on the lively cheek 
 Of ruddy fire : and luculent along 
 The purer rivers flow ; their sullen deeps, 
 Transparent, open to the shepherd’s gaze, 
 
 And murmur hoarser at the fixing frost. 
 
 What art thou, frost and whence are thy keen 
 Deriv’d, thou secret all-invading power ! [stores 
 Whom e’en th’ illusive fluid cannot fly ? 
 
 Is not thy potent energy, unseen, 
 
WINTER, 
 
 ^05 
 
 Myriads of little salts, or hook’d, or shap’d 
 Like double wedges, and diffus’d immense 
 Through water, earth, and ether ? hence at eve. 
 Steam’d eager from the red horizon round, 
 
 With the fierce rage of Winter deep isuffiis’d, 
 
 An icy gale, oft shifting, o’er the pool 
 Breathes a blue film, and in its mid career 
 Arrests the bickering stream. The loosen’d ice, 
 Let down the flood, and half dissolv’d by day. 
 Rustles no more; but to the sedgy bank 
 Fast grows; or gathers round the pointed stone, 
 
 A crystal pavement, by the breath of heaven 
 Cemented firm; till, seiz’d from shore to shore, 
 The whole imprison’d river growls below. 
 
 Loud rings the frozen earth, and hard reflects 
 A double noise; while, at his evening watch, 
 
 The village dog deters the nightly thief; 
 
 The heifer lows ; the distant, waterfall 
 Swells in the breeze; and, with the hasty tread 
 Of traveller, the hollow sounding plain 
 Shakes from afar. The full ethereal rounds 
 Infinite worlds disclosing to the view, 
 
 Shines out intensely keen; and, all one cope 
 Of starry glitter, glows from pole to pole. 
 
 From pole to pole the rigid influence falls, 
 Through the still night, incessant, heavy, strong. 
 And seizes Nature fast. It freezes on; 
 
 Till morn, late rising o’er the drooping world, 
 Lifts her pale eye unjoyous. Then appears 
 The various labour of the silent night: 
 
 Prone from the dripping eave, and dumb cascade, 
 
206 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 Whose idle torrents onlj seem to roar 
 The pendent icicle ; the frost-work fair, 
 
 Where transient hues, and fancied fig^iires rise; 
 Wide spouted o’er the hill, the frozen brook, 
 
 A livid tract, told gleaming on the morn ; 
 
 The forest bent beneath the plumy wave; 
 
 And by the frost refin’d the whiter snow, 
 
 Incrusted hard, and sounding to the tread 
 Of early shepherd, as he pensive seeks 
 His pining flock; or from the mountain-top, 
 
 Pleas’d with the slippery surface, swift descends 
 
 On blithsome frolics bent, the youthful swains, 
 While every work of man is laid at rest, 
 
 Fond o’er the river crowd, in various sport 
 And revelry dissolv’d; where mixing glad, 
 Happiest of all the train! the raptur’d boy 
 Lashes the whirling top. Or, where the Rhine, 
 Branch’d out, in many a long canal extends. 
 
 From every province swarming, void of care, 
 Batavia rushes forth ; and as they sweep, 
 
 On sounding skates, a thousand difierent ways, 
 
 In circling poise, swift as the winds, alongf 
 The then gay land is madden’d all to joy. 
 
 Nor less the northern courts, wide o’er the snow, 
 Pour a new pomp. Eager, on rapid sleds, 
 
 Their vigorous youth in bold contention wheel 
 The long-resounding course. Meantime, to raise 
 The manly strife, with highly-blooming charms, 
 Flush’d by the season, Scandinavia’s dames, 
 
 Or Russia’s buxom daughters, glow around. 
 
 Pure, quick, and sportful, is the wholesome day 
 
WINTER. 
 
 207 
 
 vrjort f ians’d. Ttie Iiorizontal suu, 
 bfoml o er the south, han^s at his utmost noon ; 
 Ana, ineffectual, strikes the gelid cliff* 
 
 His azure gloss the mountain still maintains, 
 
 Nor feels the feeble touch. Perhaps the vale 
 Relents a while to the reflected ray ; 
 
 Or from the forest falls the cluster’d snow, 
 Myriads of gems, that in the waving gleam 
 Gay twinkle as they scatter. Thick around 
 Thunders the sport of those, who with the gun, 
 And dog impatient bounding at the shot. 
 
 Worse than the Season, desolate the fields; 
 
 And, adding to the ruins of the year. 
 
 Distress the footed or the feather’d game. 
 
 But what 19 this.^ Our infant Winter siv.ks, 
 Divested of his grandeur, should our eye 
 Astonish’d shoot into the frigid zone; 
 
 Where, for relentless months, continual Night 
 Holds o’er the glittering waste her starry reign. 
 
 There, through the prison of unbounded wilds, 
 Barr’d by the hand of Nature from escape. 
 
 Wide roams the Russian exile. Nought around 
 Strikes his sad eye but deserts lost in snow*; 
 
 And heavy-loaded groves; and solid floo is, 
 
 That stretch, athwart the solitary vast, 
 
 Their icy horrors to the frozen main ; 
 
 And cheerless towms far-distant, never blcss’d^ 
 Save when its annual course the caravan 
 Bends to the golden coast of rich Cathay/ 
 
 The old name for China, 
 
208 
 
 WINTER, 
 
 With news of human-kind. Yet there life glows ; 
 
 Ifet cherished there, beneath the shining waste, 
 
 The furry nations harbour: tipp’d with jet, 
 
 F air ermines, spotless as the snows they press ; 
 Sables, of glossy black; and dark-embrovvn’a, 
 
 Or beauteous freak’d with many a mingled hue, 
 Thousands besides, the costly pride of courts. 
 
 There warm together press’d, the trooping deer 
 Sleep on the new-fall’n snows; and, scarce his head 
 Rais’d o’er the heapy wreath, the branching elk 
 Lies slumbering sullen in the white abyss. 
 
 The ruthless hunter wants nor dogs nor toils ; 
 
 Nor with the dread of sounding bows he drives 
 The fearful flying race ; with pond’rous clubs, 
 
 As weak against the mountain heaps they push 
 Their beating breast in vain, and piteous bray, 
 
 He lays them quivering on th’ ensanguin’d snows; 
 And with loud shouts, rejoicing, bears them home 
 There through the piny forest half absorpt. 
 
 Rough tenant of these shades, the shapeless bear, 
 With dangling ice all horrid, stalks forlorn ; 
 Slow-pac’d, and sourer as the storms increase, 
 
 He makes his bed beneath th’ inclement drift, 
 
 And, with stern patience, scorning weak complaint, 
 Hardens his heart against assailing want. 
 
 Wide o’er the spacious regions of the north, 
 
 That see Bootes urge his tardy wain, 
 
 A boisterous race, by frosty Caurus* pierc’d, 
 
 Who little pleasure know, and fear no pain, 
 
 T/ie Korlh-west wind. 
 
WINTER. 
 
 209 
 
 Prolific swarm. They once relum’d the flame 
 Of lost mankind in polish’d slavery sunk; 
 
 Drove martial horde on horde,* with dreadful sweep 
 Resistless rushing" o’er th’ enfeebled south, 
 
 And gave the vanquish’d world another form. 
 
 Not such the sons of Lapland : wisely they 
 Despise th’ insensate barbarous trade of war ; 
 
 They ask no more than simple Nature gives. 
 
 They love their mountains, and enjoy their storms. 
 No false desires, no pride-created wants. 
 
 Disturb the peaceful current of their time ; 
 
 And through the restless ever-tortur’d maze 
 Of pleasure, or ambition, bid it rage. 
 
 Their rein-deer form their riches. These, their tents, 
 Their robes, their beds, and all their homely wealth 
 Supply, their wholesome fare, and cheerful c^ips 
 Obsequious at their call, the docile tribe 
 Yield to the sled their necks, and whirl them swift 
 O’er hill and dale, heap’d into one expanse 
 Of marbled snow, as far as eye can sweep. 
 
 With a blue crust of ice unbounded glaz’d. 
 
 By dancing meteors then, that ceaseless shake 
 A waving blaze refracted o’er the heavens. 
 
 And vivid moons, and stars that keener play 
 With double lustre from the glossy waste ; 
 
 E’en in the depth of polar night, they find 
 A w'ondrous day : enough to light the chase. 
 
 Or guide their daring steps to Finland fairs. 
 
 Wish’d Spring returns ; and from the hazy south. 
 While dim Aurora slowly moves before, 
 
 14 * The wandering Scythian cla^u. 
 
210 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 The welcome sun, just verging up at first, 
 
 By small degrees extends the swelling cui ve ; 
 
 Till seen at last for gay rejoicing months, 
 
 Still round and round, his spiral course he winds ; 
 
 And as he nearly dips his flaming orb, 
 
 Wheels up again, and re-ascends the sky. 
 
 In that glad season, from the lakes and floods, 
 
 Where pure Niemi’s^ fairy mountains rise, 
 
 And, fring’d with roses, Tengliof rolls his stream, 
 They draw the copious fry. With these, at eve, 
 They, cheerful loaded, to their tents repair ; 
 
 Where, all day long in useful cares .:^pioy’d, 
 
 Their kind unblemish’d wives the fire prepare 
 Thrice happy race ! by poverty secur’d 
 F rom legal plunder and rapacious pow er : 
 
 In whom fell interest never yet has sown 
 
 The seeds of vice : whose spotless swains ne’er knew 
 
 Injurious deed ; nor, blasted by the breath 
 
 * M. de Maupertuis, in his book on the Figure of 
 the Earth j after having described the beautiful lake 
 and mountain of Niemiy in Lapland, says, From this 
 height we had opportunity several times to see those ta- 
 pours rise from the lake which the people of the coun- 
 try call Haltios, and which they deem to be the guar- 
 dian spirits of the mo\intains. We had been frighted 
 with stories of bears that haunted this place, but saw 
 none. It seemed rather a place of resort for fairies and 
 genii, than bears."' 
 
 ^ The same author observes, I was surprised to see 
 upon the banks of this river (the Tengiio) roses of as 
 lively a red as any that are in our gardens.'* 
 
WINTER. 
 
 211 
 
 Of faithless love, their blooming- daughters wo. 
 
 Still pressing on beyond Tornea’s lake, 
 
 And Hecla flaming through a waste of snow, 
 
 And furthest Greenland, to the pole itself. 
 
 Where, failing gradual, life at length goes out, 
 
 The Muse expands her solitary flight; 
 
 And, hovering o’er the wild stupendous scene, 
 Beholds new seas beneath another sky * 
 
 Thron’d in his palace of cerulean ice. 
 
 Here Winter holds his unrejoicing court: 
 
 And through his airy hall the loud misrule 
 Of driving tempest is for ever heard : 
 
 Here the grim tyrant meditates his wrath ; 
 
 Here arms his winds with all-subduing frost; 
 Moulds his fierce hail, and treasures up his snows, 
 With which he now oppresses half the globe. 
 
 Thence, winding eastward to the Tartar’s coast 
 She sweeps the howling margin of the main; 
 Where undissolving, from the first of time. 
 
 Snows swell on snows amazing to the sky ; 
 
 And icy mountains high on mountains pil’d. 
 
 Seem to the shivering sailor from afar, 
 
 Shapeless and white, an atmosphere of clouds 
 Projected huge, and horrid, o’er the surge, 
 
 Alps frown on Alps ; or rushing hideous down, 
 
 As if old chaos was again return’d, 
 
 Wide-rend the deep, and shake the solid pole. 
 Ocean itself no longer can resist 
 The binding fury ; but, in all its rage 
 Of tempest taken by the boundless frost. 
 
 The other hemisphtrc. 
 
212 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 Is many a fathom to the bottom chain’d. 
 
 And bid to roar no more : a bleak expaniiv 
 Shag-g’d o'er with wavy rocks, cheerless, and void 
 Of every life, that from the dreary months 
 Flies conscious southward. Miserable they ! 
 
 IVho, here entangled in the gathering ice. 
 
 Take their last look of the descending sun; 
 
 While, full of death, and fierce with tenfold frost, 
 The long, long night, incumbent o’er their heads. 
 Falls horrible. Such was the Briton’s* fate. 
 
 As with first prow, (what have not Britons dar’d f) 
 He for the passage sought, attempted since 
 So much in vain, and seeming to be shut 
 By jealous Nature with eternal bars. 
 
 Jn these fell regions, in Arzina caught. 
 
 And to the stony deep his idle ship 
 Immediate seal’d, he with his hapless crew, 
 
 Each full exerted at his several task, 
 
 F roze into statues ; to the cordage glued 
 The sailor, and the pilot to the helm. [stream 
 
 Hard by these shores, where scarce his freezing 
 Rolls the wild Oby, live the last of men; 
 
 And half enliven’d by the distant sun, 
 
 'J'hat rears and ripens man, as well as plants. 
 
 Here human Nature wears its rudest form. 
 
 Deep from the piercing season sunk in caves. 
 
 Here by dull fires, and with unjoyous cheer, 
 
 They waste the tedious gloom. Immers’d in furs, 
 Doze the gross race. Nor sprightly jest, nor song, 
 
 * Sir Hugh Willoughby, sent by Queen Elisabeth U 
 Jisroverthe north-east passage. 
 
WINTER, 
 
 213 
 
 Nor tenderness they know ; nor aught of life, 
 Beyond the kindred bears that stalk without. 
 
 Till morn at length, her roses drooping all, 
 
 Sheds a long twilight brightening o’er their fields, 
 And calls the quiver’d savage to the chase. 
 
 What cannot active government perform, [shores, 
 New-moulding man ? Wide-stretching from these 
 A people savage from remotest time, 
 
 A huge neglected empire, one vast mind. 
 
 By heaven inspir’d, from Gothic darkness call’d. 
 
 Immortal Peter' first of monarchs ! he 
 
 His stubborn country tam’d, her rocks, her fens, 
 
 Her floods, her seas, her ill-submitting sons; 
 
 And while the fierce barbarian he subdued, 
 
 To more exalted soul he rais’d the Man. 
 
 Ye shades of ancient heroes ! ye who toil’d 
 Through long successive ages to build up 
 A labouring plan of state, behold at once 
 The wonder done ! behold the matchless prince ! 
 
 Who left his native throne, where reign’d till then 
 A mighty shadow of unreal power; 
 
 Who greatly spurn’d the slothful pomp of courts; 
 And roaming every land, in every port 
 His sceptre laid aside, with glorious hand 
 Unwearied, plying the mechanic tool, 
 
 Gather’d the seeds of trade, of useful arts, 
 
 Of civil wisdom, and of martial skill. 
 
 Charg’d w ith the stores of Europe, home he goes ! 
 Then cities rise amid th’ illumin’d waste ; 
 
 O’er joyless deserts smiles the rural reign; 
 Far-distant flood to flood is social join’d; 
 
 Th’ astonish’d Euxine hears the Baltic roar ; 
 
214 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 Proud navies ride on seas that never foam’d 
 With daring keel before ; and armies stretch 
 Each way their dazzling files, repressing here 
 The frantic Alexander of the north, 
 
 And awing there stern Othman’s shrinking sons 
 Sloth flies the land, and Ignorance, and Vice, 
 
 Of old dishonour proud: it glows around. 
 
 Taught by the royal hand that rous’d the whole. 
 
 One scene of arts, of arms, of rising trade : 
 
 For what his wisdom plann’d, and power enforc’d, 
 More potent still, his great example show’d. 
 
 Muttering, the winds at eve, with blunted point, 
 31ow hollow blustering from the south. Subdued, 
 The frost resolves into a trickling thaw. 
 
 Spotted the mountains shine ; loose sleet descends, 
 \nd floods the country round. The rivers swell. 
 
 Of bonds impatient. Sudden from the hills. 
 
 O’er rocks and woods, in broad brown cataracts, 
 
 A thousand snow- fed torrents shoot at once; 
 
 And, where they rush, the wide-resounding plain 
 Is left one slimy waste. Those sulkn seas. 
 
 That wash’d th’ ungenial pole, will rest no more 
 Beneath the shackles of the mighty north ; 
 
 But, rousing all their waves, resistless heave. 
 
 And hark! the lengthening roar continuous runs 
 Athwart the rifted deep : at once it bursts. 
 
 And piles a thousand mountains to the clouds. 
 
 Ill fares the bark with trembling wretches charg’d, 
 That, tost amid the floating fragments, moors 
 Beneath the shelter of an icy isle, 
 
 While night o’erwhelms the sea, and horror looks 
 More horrible. Can human force endure 
 
WINIER. 
 
 215 
 
 Th’ assembled mischiefs that besiege^them round r 
 Heart gnawing hunger, fainting weariness, 
 
 The roar of winds and waves, the crush of ice, 
 
 Now ceasing, now renew’d with louder rage. 
 
 And^in dire echoes bellowing round the main. 
 
 More to embroil the deep. Leviathan 
 And his unwieldy train, in dreadful sport. 
 
 Tempest the loosen’d brine; while through the gloom, 
 Far, from the bleak inhospitable shore. 
 
 Loading the winds, is heard the hungry howl 
 Of famish’d monsters, there awaiting wrecks. 
 
 Yet Providence, that ever-waking eye* 
 
 Looks down with pity on the feeble toil 
 Of mortals lost to hope, and lights them safe. 
 Through all this dreary labyrinth of fate. 
 
 ’Tis done ! dread Winter spreads his latest glooms 
 And reigns tremendous o’er the conquer’d year. 
 
 How dead the vegetable kingdom lies ! 
 
 How dumb the tuneful! horror wide extends 
 His desolate domain. Behold, fond man ! 
 
 See here thy pictur’d life ; pass some few years, 
 
 Thy flowering Spring, thy Summer’s ardent strength 
 Thy sober Autumn fading into age. 
 
 And pale concluding Winter comes at last. 
 
 And shuts the scene. Ah ! whither now are fled 
 Those dreams of greatness ^ those unsolid hopes 
 Of happiness.? those longings after fame.? 
 
 Those restless cares .? those busy bustling days ? 
 Those gay-spent, festive nights.? those veering 
 thoughts. 
 
 Lost between good a ;d ill, that shar’d thy life .? 
 
 All now are vanish’d! Virtue sole survives. 
 
2*6 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 Immortal never-failing friend of Man, 
 
 His guide to happiness on high. And see ’ 
 
 ’Tis come, the glorious morn! the second birth 
 Of heaven and earth ! awakening Nature hears 
 The new-creating word, and starts to life, 
 
 In every heighten’d form ; from pain and death 
 For ever free. The great eternal scheme, 
 Involving all, and in a perfect whole 
 Uniting, as the prospect wider spreads. 
 
 To reason’s eye refin’d clears up apace. 
 
 Ye vainly wise ! ye blind presumptuous ! now, 
 Confounded in the dust, adore that Power, 
 
 And Wisdom oft arraign’d: see now the cause. 
 Why unassuming worth in secret liv’d. 
 
 And died, neglected: why the good man’s share 
 In life was gall and bitterness of soul: 
 
 Why the lone widow and her orphans pin’d 
 In starving solitude; while luxury. 
 
 In palaces, lay straining her low thought, 
 
 To form unreal wants: why heaven-born t rut, i, 
 And moderation fair, wore the red marks 
 Of superstition’s scourge: why licens’d pain, 
 That cruel spoiler, that embosom’d foe, 
 Embitter'd all our bliss. Ye good distress’d! 
 
 Ye noble few! who here unbenvling stand 
 Beneath life’s pressure, yet bear up awhile, 
 
 And what your bounded view, which only sa w 
 A little part, deem’d evil is no more: 
 
 The storms of Wintry time will quickly pass 
 And one unbounded Spring encircle all. 
 
A HYMN 
 
 These, as they chang;e, Almighty Fatheu! these . 
 Are but the varied God. The rollin|^ year 
 Is full of Thee. Forth in the pleasing Spring 
 Thy beauty walks, thy tenderness and love. 
 
 Wide flush the fields; the softening air is balno ; 
 Echoihe mountains round; the forest smiles; 
 
 And every sense, and every heart is joy. 
 
 Then comes thy glory in the Summer-months, 
 
 With light and heat refulgent. Then thy sun 
 Shoots full perfection through the swelling year: 
 
 And oft THY VOICE in dreadful thunder speaks; 
 
 And oft at dawn, deep noon, ©r falling eve, 
 
 By brooks and groves, in hollow-whispering gales. 
 Thy bounty shines in Autumn unconfin’d. 
 
 And spreads a common feast for all that lives. 
 
 In Winter, awful Thou! with clouds and stornu 
 Around Thee thrown, tempest o’er tempest roi 
 Majestic darkness ! on the whirlwind’s wing, 
 
 Riding sublime, Thou bidst the world adore, 
 
 And humblest Nature with thy northern blast. 
 
 Mysterious round! what skill, what force divine, 
 Deep felt, in these appear ! a simple train, 
 
 Yet so delightful mix’d, with such kind art 
 Such beauty and beneficence combin’d ; 
 
 Shade, unperceiv’d, so softening into shade ; 
 
 And all so forming an harmonious whole ; 
 
 That, as they still succeed, they ravish still. 
 
218 
 
 A HYMN. 
 
 But wandering oft, with brute unconscious ga>ze, 
 Man marks not Thee ; marks not the mighty hand, 
 That, ever-busy , wheels the silent spheres ; 
 
 Works in the secret deep; shoots, steaaning, thence 
 The fair profusion that o’erspreads the Spring . 
 Flings from the sun direct the fiaming d^iy ; 
 
 Feeds every creature ; hurls the tempest forth ; 
 
 And , as on earth this grateful change revolves. 
 
 With transport touches all the springs of life. 
 
 Nature, attend! join everv living soul. 
 
 Beneath the spacious temple of the sky. 
 
 In adoration join; and, ardent, raise 
 One general song! To Him, ye vocal gales, 
 
 Breathe soft; whose Spirit in your freshness breathes : 
 Oh, talk of Him in solitary glooms! 
 
 Where, o’er the rock, the scarcely waving pine 
 Fills the brown shade with a religious awe. 
 
 And ye, whose bolder note is heard afar. 
 
 Who shake th’ astonish’d world, lift high to heaven 
 Th’ impetuous song, and say from whom you rage. 
 His praise, ye brooks, attune, ye trembling rills • 
 
 And let me catch it as I muse along. 
 
 Ye headlong torrents, rapid, and profound; 
 
 Ye softer floods, that lead the humid maze 
 Along the vale ; and thou, majestic main, 
 
 A secret world of w'onders in thyself, 
 
 Sound His stupendous praise; whose greater voice 
 Or bids you roar, or bids your roarings fall. 
 
 Soft roll your incense, herbs, and fi uits, and flowers, 
 In mingled clouds to Him; whose sun exalts, 
 
 Whose breath perfumesyou, and whose pencil paints. 
 Ye forests bend, ye harvests wave, to IIiMi 
 
A HYMN. 
 
 219 
 
 Breathe your stiil song* into the reaper’s hearty 
 As home he goes beneath the joyous moon. 
 
 Ye that keep watch m heaven, as earth asleep 
 Unconscious lies, effuse your mildest beams, 
 
 Ye constellations, wliile your angels strike, 
 
 Amid the spangled sky, the silver lyre. 
 
 Great source of day i best image here below 
 Of thy Creator, ever pouring wide, 
 
 From world to world, the vital ocean round ; 
 
 On Nature write with every beam His praise. 
 
 The thunder rolls: be hush’d the prostrate world; 
 While cloud to cloud returns the solemn hymn. 
 
 Bleat out afresh, ye hills: ye mossy rocks. 
 
 Retain the sound: the broad responsive low, 
 
 Ye valleys, raise; for the Great Shepherd reigns ; 
 And his unsuffering kingdom yet will come. 
 
 Ye woodlands all, awake: a boundless song 
 Burst from the groves ! and when the restless day, 
 Expiring, lays the warbling world asleep, 
 
 Sweetest of birds! sweet Philomela, charm 
 
 The listening shades, and teach the night His praise 
 
 Ye chief, for whom the whole creation smiles, 
 
 At once the head, the heart, and tongue of all, 
 Crowmthe great hymn! in swarming cities vast. 
 Assembled men, to the deep organ join 
 The long resounding voice, oft-breaking clear, 
 
 At solemn pauses, through the swelling bass; 
 
 And, as each mingling flame increases each, 
 
 In one united ardour rise to neaven. 
 
 Or if you rather choose the rural shade, 
 
 And find a fane in every sacred grove ; 
 
 'there let the sheoherd’s flute, the virgin’s lay. 
 
220 
 
 A HYMN. 
 
 The prompting seraph, and the poet’s lyre, 
 
 Still sing the God of Seasons, as they roll! — 
 For me, when I forget the darling theme. 
 Whether the blossom blows, the summer-ray 
 Russets the plain, inspiring Autumn gleams, 
 
 Or Winter rises in the blackening east j 
 Be my tongue mute, my fancy paint no more, 
 And, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat. 
 
 Should fate command me to the furthest verg 
 Of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes, 
 Rivers unknown to song; where first the sun 
 Gilds Indian mountains, or his setting beam 
 Flames on th’ Atlantic isles; tis nought to me: 
 Since God is ever present, ever felt, 
 
 In tlie void waste as in the city full; 
 
 And where He vital breathes there must be joy. 
 When e’en at last the solemn hour shall come. 
 And wing my mystic flight to future worlds, 
 
 I cheerful will obey ; there, with new powers. 
 Will rising wonders sing: I cannot go 
 Where universal Love not smiles around, 
 Sustaining all yon orbs, and all their suns : 
 
 From seeming Evil still educing Good, 
 
 And better thence again, and better still. 
 
 In infinite progression. But I lose 
 Myself in Him, in Light inefiablei 
 Come then, xpressive Silence, muse His praise. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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