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,
Borrowed 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,
The treasures of the sun without his rage:
Hence, fervent all, with culture, toil, and arts,
Wide glows her land : her dreadful thunder hence
Rides o'er the waves sublime, and now, even now
Impending hangs o'er Gallia's humbled coast;
Hence rules the circling deep, and awes the world.
'Tis raging Noon; and, vertical, the sun
Darts on the head direct his forceful rays.
O'er heaven and earth, far as the ranging eye
Can sweep, a dazling deluge reigns; and all
From pole to pole is undistinguish'd blaze.
In 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
And slippery lawn an arid hue disclose,
Blast Fancy's bloom, and wither even the Soul.
Echo no more returns the chearful sound
Of sharpening scythe: the mower sinking heaps
O'er him the humid hay, with flowers perfum'd;

And scarce a chirping grass-hopper is heard
Thro' the dumb mead. Distressful Nature pants.
The very streams look languid from afar;
Or, thro' th' unshelter'd glade, impatient, seem
To hurl into the covert of the grove.

All-conquering Heat, oh intermit thy wrath!
And on my throbbing temples potent thus
Beam not so fierce! Incessant still you flow,
And still another fervent flood succeeds,
Pour'd on the head profuse. In vain I sigh,
And restless turn, and look around for Night;
Night is far off; and hotter hours approach.
Thrice happy he! who on the sunless side
Of a romantic mountain, forest-crown'd,
Beneath the whole collected shade reclines :

Or in the gelid caverns, woodbine-wrought,
And fresh bedew'd with ever-spouting streams,
Sits cooly 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! 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 comfort glides ;

The heart beats glad ; the fresh-expanded eye
And ear resume their watch; the sinews knit ;
And life shoots swift thro' all the lightened limbs.
Around th' adjoining brook, that purls along
The vocal grove, now fretting o'er a rock,
Now scarcely moving thro' 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
The circling surface. In the middle droops
The strong laborious ox, of honest front,
Which incompos'd he shakes; and from his sides
The 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 their keeper's voice, and scour the plain,
Thro' 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 spirit swell,

Trembling with vigour, in the heat of blood,
Springs the high fence; and o'er the field effus'd
Darts on the gloomy flood, with stedfast eye,
And heart estranged 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 quire,
Nods o'er the mount beneath. At every step,
Solemn, and slow, the shadows blacker fall,
And all is awful listening gloom around.

These are the haunts of Meditation, these
The scenes where ancient bards th' inspiring breath,
Extatic, 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 soul
For future trials fated to prepare;

To

prompt the poet, who devoted gives

His muse to better themes; to soothe 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,

Daily, 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 thro' 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 laws, and great pursuit.
» Once some of us, like thee, thro' stormy life,
» Toil'd, tempest-beaten, ere we could attain
» This holy calm, this harmony of mind,
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 heard,

» And voices chaunting from the wood-crown'd hill, > The deepening dale, or immost 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, (1) STANLEY, of that sacred band?

Alas, for us too soon! Tho' rais'd above

The reach of human pain, above the flight

Of human joy; yet, with a mingled ray

1) A young lady, who died at the age of eighteen.