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THE TRAVELLER'S RETURN.
SWEET to the morning traveller
The song amid the sky,

Where twinkling in the dewy light
The skylark soars on high.

And cheering to the traveller

The gales that round him play, When faint and heavily he drags Along his noon-tide way.

And when beneath the unclouded sun
Full wearily toils he,

The flowing water makes to him
A soothing melody.

And when the evening light decays,
And all is calm around,

There is sweet music to his ear
In the distant sheep-bell's sound.

But oh! of all delightful sounds

1798.

Of evening or of morn

The sweetest is the voice of Love, That welcomes his return.

1798

THE OLD MAN'S COMFORTS,

AND HOW HE GAINED THEM.

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,
The few locks which are left you are grey;
You are hale, Father William, a hearty old man,
Now tell me the reason, I pray.

In the days of my youth, Father William replied,
I remember'd that youth would fly fast,
And abused not my health and my vigour at first,
That I never might need them at last.

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,
And pleasures with youth pass away,
And yet you lament not the days that are gone,
Now tell me the reason, I pray.

TRANSLATION OF A GREEK ODE ON

ASTRONOMY,

WRITTEN BY S. T. COLERIDGE, FOR THE PRIZE AT

CAMBRIDGE, 1793.

HAIL, venerable NIGHT!

O first-created, hail!

Thou who art doom'd in thy dark breast to veil
The dying beam of light.

The eldest and the latest thou,
Hail, venerable NIGHT!
Around thine ebon brow,

Glittering plays with lightning rays

A wreath of flowers of fire.

The varying clouds with many a hue attire Thy many-tinted veil.

Holy are the blue graces of thy zone! But who is he whose tongue can tell The dewy lustres which thine eyes adorn? Lovely to some the blushes of the Morn; To some the glory of the Day, When, blazing with meridian ray, The gorgeous Sun ascends his highest throne; But I with solemn and severe delight Still watch thy constant car, immortal NIGHT!

For then to the celestial Palaces
Urania leads, Urania, she

The Goddess who alone
Stands by the blazing throne,
Effulgent with the light of Deity.
Whom Wisdom, the Creatrix, by her side
Placed on the heights of yonder sky,
And smiling with ambrosial love, unlock'd
The depths of Nature to her piercing eye.
Angelic myriads struck their harps around,
And with triumphant song
The host of Stars, a beauteous throng,
Around the ever-living Mind
In Jubilee their mystic dauce begun;
When at thy leaping-forth, O Sun!
The Morning started in affright,
Astonish'd at thy birth, her Child of Light!

Hail, O Urania, hail!

Queen of the Muses! Mistress of the Song! For thou didst deign to leave the heavenly throng. As earthward thou thy steps wert bending, A ray went forth and harbinger'd thy way:

All Ether laugh'd with thy descending. Thou hadst wreath'd thy hair with roses, The flower that in the immortal bower

Its deathless bloom discloses.
Before thine awful mien, compelled to shrink,
Fled Ignorance abash'd with all her brood;
Dragons, and Hags of baleful breath,
Fierce Dreams, that wont to drink
The Sepulchre's black blood;

Or on the wings of storms
Riding in fury forms,

Shriek'd to the mariner the shriek of Death.

I boast, O Goddess, to thy name That I have raised the pile of fame!

Therefore to me be given

To roam the starry path of Heaven, To charioteer with wings on high, And to rein in the Tempests of the sky.

Chariots of happy Gods! Fountains of Light! Ye Angel-Temples bright!

May I unblamed your flamy thresholds tread?
I leave Earth's lowly scene;

I leave the Moon serene,
The lovely Queen of Night;

I leave the wide domains,

Beyond where Mars his fiercer light can fling,
And Jupiter's vast plaius,
(The many-belted King;)

Even to the solitude where Saturn reigns,
Like some stern tyrant to just exile driven;
Dim-seen the sullen power appears
In that cold solitude of Heaven,
And slow he drags along

The mighty circle of long-lingering years.

Nor shalt thou escape my sight,

Who at the threshold of the sun-trod domes Art trembling,-youngest Daughter of the Night! And you, ye fiery-tressed strangers! you, Comets who wander wide,

Will I along your pathless way pursue,
Whence bending I may view

The Worlds whom elder Suns have vivified.

For Hope with loveliest visions soothes my mind,
That even in Man, Life's winged power,
When comes again the natal hour,
Shall on heaven-wandering feet,
In undecaying youth,
Spring to the blessed seat;
Where round the fields of Truth
The fiery Essences for ever feed;
And o'er the ambrosial mead,
The breezes of serenity
Silent and soothing glide for ever by.
There, Priest of Nature! dost thou shine,
NEWTON! a King among the Kings divine.
Whether with harmony's mild force,
He guides along its course.
The axle of some beauteous star on high;
Or gazing in the spring
Ebullient with creative energy,
Feels his pure breast with rapturous joy possest,
Inebriate in the holy ecstasy!

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Thou vegetable Porcupine!

And didst thou scratch thy tender arms, O Jane! that I should dine!

The flour, the sugar, and the fruit, Commingled well, how well they suit, And they were well bestow'd.

O Jane, with truth I praise your Pie, And will not you in just reply Praise my Pindaric Ode?

TO A BEE.

THOU wert out betimes, thou busy, busy Bee!
As abroad I took my early way,
Before the Cow from her resting-place
Had risen up and left her trace
On the meadow, with dew so grey,
Saw I thee, thou busy, busy Bee.

Thou wert working late, thou busy, busy Bee!
After the fall of the Cistus flower,

When the Primrose of evening was ready to burst,
I heard thee last, as I saw thee first;
In the silence of the evening hour,
Heard I thee, thou busy, busy Bee.

Thou art a miser, thou busy, busy Bee!
Late and early at employ;
Still on thy golden stores intent,
Thy summer in heaping and hoarding is spent
What thy winter will never enjoy;
Wise lesson this for me, thou busy, busy Bee!

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When Betty's busy eye runs round the room,
Woe to that nice geometry if seen!
But where is he whose broom
The earth shall clean?

Spider! of old thy flimsy webs were thought,
And 't was a likeness true,

To emblem laws in which the weak are caught,
But which the strong break through.

And if a victim in thy toils is ta'en,

Like some poor client is that wretched fly;
I'll warrant thee thou 'It drain
His life-blood dry.

And is not thy weak work like human schemes
And care on earth employ'd?

Such are young hopes and Love's delightful dreams
So easily destroyed!

So does the Statesman, whilst the Avengers sleep, Self-deem'd secure, his wiles in secret lay, Soon shall Destruction sweep

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THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM. THE rage

of Babylon is roused,

The King puts forth his strength;

And Judah bends the bow

And points her arrows for the coming war.

Her walls are firm, her gates are strong,
Her youth gird on the sword;

High are her chiefs in hope,

For Egypt soon will send the promised aid.

But who is he whose voice of woe

Is heard amid the streets?

Whose ominous voice proclaims

Her strength and arms and promised succours vain!

His meagre cheek is pale and sunk,
Wild is his hollow eye,

Yet fearful its strong glance;

And who could bear the anger of his frown?

PROPHET OF GOD! in vain thy lips
Proclaim the woe to come!

In vain thy warning voice

Summon'd her rulers timely to repent!

The Ethiop changes not his skin.
Impious and idiot still

The rulers spurn thy voice,

And now the measure of their crimes is full.

And now around Jerusalem

The countless foes appear;

Far as the eye can reach

Spreads the wide horror of the circling siege.

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Along the ocean's echoing verge,

Along the mountain range of rocks, The clustering multitudes behold their pomp, And raise the votive prayer.

Commingling with the ocean's roar Ceaseless and hoarse their murmurs rise, And soon they trust to see the winged bark That bears good tidings home.

The watch-tower now in distance sinks, And now Galicia's mountain rocks Faint as the far-off clouds of evening lie, And now they fade away.

Each like some moving citadel,

On through the waves they sail sublime; And now the Spaniards see the silvery cliffs, Behold the sea-girt land!

O fools! to think that ever foe Should triumph o'er the sea-girt land! O fools! to think that ever Britain's sons Should wear the stranger's yoke!

For not in vain hath Nature rear'd Around her coast those silvery cliffs; For not in vain old Ocean spreads his waves To guard his favourite isle!

On come her gallant mariners!

What now avail Rome's boasted charms? Where are the Spaniard's vaunts of eager wrath? His hopes of conquest now ?

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Till the smooth temper of my age should be Like the high leaves upon the Holly Tree.

And as when all the summer trees are seen So bright and green,

The Holly leaves their fadeless hues display Less bright than they;

But when the bare and wintry woods we see, What then so cheerful as the Holly Tree?

So serious should my youth appear among
The thoughtless throng,

So would I seem amid the young and gay
More grave than they,

That in my age as cheerful I might be
As the green winter of the Holly Tree.

THE EBB TIDE.

SLOWLY thy flowing tide

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1798.

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