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Ye cliffs, in hoary grandeur pil'd High o'er the glimmering dale! Ye groves,, along whofe windings.wild Soft fighs the fadd'ning gale! • Where oft lone Melancholy ftrays, • By wilder'd Fancy fway'd,

• What time the wan moon's yellow rays • Gleam thro' the chequer'd fhade!

To you, ye waftes, whofe artlefs charms
• Ne'er drew Ambition's eye,
'Scap'd a tumultuous world's alarms,
To your retreats I fly :

Deep in your moft fequefter'd bower,
• Let me my woes refign;

• Where Solitude, mild modeft power, Leans on her ivy'd fhrine.

• How fhall I woo thee, matchless fair, Thy heavenly fmile how win!

B Thy fmile, that smoothes the brow of Care • And stills each ftorm within!

• O wilt thou to thy favourite grove

• Thine ardent votary bring,

And bless his hours, and bid them move

• Serene on filent wing!

Oft let Remembrance foothe his mind

• With dreams of former days,

• When soft on Leifure's lap reclin'd, He caroll'd fprightly lays :

Blefs'd days! when Fancy fmil'd at Care,

• When Pleasure toy'd with Truth,

Nor Envy, with malignant glare,

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• "Twas then, O Solitude! to thee

• His early vows were paid,

• From heart fincere, and warm, and free,

• Devoted to the fhade.

Ah! why did Fate his fteps decoy

In thorny paths to roam, • Remote from all congenial joy! O take thy wanderer home!

• Henceforth thy awful haunts be mine! The long abandon'd hill;

The hollow cliff, whose waving pine

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O'erhangs the darksome rill;

• Whence the scar'd owl, on pinions grey,
• Breaks from the ruftling boughs,
⚫ And down the lone vale fails away-
To fhades of deep repose.

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For me no more the path invites

Ambition loves to tread ;

⚫ No more I climb those toilfome heights,

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THOU faithful partner of a heart thy own,

Whose pain or pleasure springs from thine alone;

Thou, true as honour, as compaffion kind,
That in sweet union harmonize thy mind;
Here, while thy eyes for fad Amyntor's woe,
And Theodora's wreck, with tears o'erflow,
O may thy friend's warm wish, to Heav'n preferr'd
For thee, for him by gracious Heav'n be heard!
So her fair hour of fortune shall be thine
Unmix'd, and all Amyntor's fondness mine:
So thro' long vernal life, with blended ray,
Shall Love light up, and Friendship close our day;
Till fummon'd late this lower heav'n to leave,
One figh fhall end us, and one earth receive!

CANTO I.

AR in the watʼry waste, where his broad wave

On from the piny fhores of Labrador

To frozen Thulé eaft, her airy height

Aloft

Aloft to heav'n remotest Kilda lifts,
Laft of the fea-girt Hebrides, that guard,
In filial train, Britannia's parent coast.
Thrice happy land! tho' freezing on the verge
Of Arctick skies, yet blameless still of arts
That polish to deprave each fofter clime,
With fimple nature, fimple virtue, blefs'd!
Beyond Ambition's walk, where never War
Uprear'd his fanguine standard, nor unsheath'd,
For wealth or pow'r, the defolating sword;
Where Luxury, foft Syren, who around
To thousand nations deals her nectar'd cup
Of pleafing bane, that foothes at once and kills,
Is yet a name unknown; but calm content,
That lives to reason, ancient faith, that binds
The plain community of guileless hearts
In love and union, innocence of ill,

Their guardian genius; these the pow'rs that rule
This little world, to all it's fons fecure,

Man's happiest life; the foul ferene and found
From paffion's rage, the body from disease,
Red on each cheek behold the rose of health,
Firm in each finew Vigour's pliant spring,
By temp'rance brac'd to peril and to pain,
Amid the floods they ftem, or on the steep

Of upright rocks their ftraining steps furmount,
For food or paftime; these light up their morn,
And close their eve in flumber sweetly deep,
Beneath the north, within the circling fwell
Of ocean's raging found; but last and best,
What Av'rice, what Ambition, fhall not know,
True Liberty is theirs, the heav'n-fent gueft,
Who in the cave, or on th' uncultur'd wild,
With Independence dwells and peace of mind,
In youth, in age, their fun that never fets.
Daughter of Heav'n and Nature, deign thy aid,

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Spontaneous Mufe! O, whether from the depth
Of ev'ning foreft, brown with broadeft fhade,
Or from the brow fublime of vernal Alp
As morning dawns, or from the vale at noon,

By some soft stream that slides with liquid foot

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Thro' bow'ry groves, where Infpiration fits
And liftens to thy lore, aufpicious come!

O'er these wild waves, o'er this unharbour'd shore,

Thy wing high-hovering spread, and to the gale,

The Boreal spirit breathing lib'ral round
From echoing hill to hill, the lyre attune
With anfw'ring cadence free, as beft befeems

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The tragick theme my plaintive verfe unfolds.

Here good Aurelius-and a scene more wild The world around, or deeper folitude,

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Affliction could not find-Aurelius here,

(By fate unequal and the crime of war

Expell'd his native home, the facred vale

That faw him blefs'd, now wretched and unknown!)
Wore out the flow remains of fetting life

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In bitterness of thought; and with the furge,

And with the founding ftorm, his murmur'd moan
Would often mix-Oft as remembrance fad
Th' unhappy past recall'd, a faithful wife,

Whom love first chofe, whom reafon long endear'd,

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His foul's companion and his fofter friend,
With one fair daughter, in her rofy prime,

Her dawn of op'ning charms, defenceless left
Within a tyrant's grafp! his foe profefs'd,
By civil madness, by intemp'rate zeal
For diff'ring rites, imbitter'd into hate
And cruelty remorfelefs!-Thus he liv'd,

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If this was life! to load the blast with fighs,

Hung o'er it's edge, to fwell the flood with tears,
At midnight hour; for midnight frequent heard
The lonely mourner, defolate of heart,

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