His every frolic, light as air,
Deserves the gentle Delia's care,
And tears bedew her tender eye,
To think the playful kid must die.
But knows my Delia, timely wise,
How soon this blameless æra flies?
While violence and craft succeed,
Unfair design, and ruthless deed!
Soon would the vine his wounds deplore,
And yield her purple gifts no more;
Ah! soon erased from every grove
Were Delia's name and Strephon's love.
No more those bowers might Strephon see,
Where first he fondly gazed on thee:
No more those beds of flowerets find,
Which for thy charming brows he twined.
Each wayward passion soon would tear
His bosom, now so void of care;
And when they left his ebbing vein,
What but insipid age remain?
Then mourn not the decrees of Fate,
That
gave his life so short a date;
And I will join my tenderest sighs,
To think that youth so swiftly flies!
So well our minds and tempers blend, That seasons may for ever flee,
And ne'er divide me from my But let the favour'd boy forbear To tempt with love my only fair. O Lucio! born when every Muse, When every Grace, benignant smiled, With all a parent's breast could choose To bless her loved, her only child; 'Tis thine, so richly graced, to prove More noble cares than cares of love. Together we from early youth
Have trod the flowery tracks of time, Together mused in search of truth,
O'er learned sage or bard sublime; And well thy cultured breast I know, What wondrous treasure it can show. Come, then, resume thy charming lyre,
And sing some patriot's worth sublime, Whilst I in fields of soft desire
Consume my fair and fruitless prime; Whose reed aspires but to display The flame that burns me night and day. O come! the Dryads of the woods
Shall daily sooth thy studious mind, The blue-eyed nymphs of yonder floods Shall meet and court thee to be kind; And Fame sits listening for thy lays, To swell her trump with Lucio's praise.
Like me, the plover fondly tries
To lure the sportsman from her nest,
And fluttering on with anxious cries,
Too plainly shows her tortured breast;
O let him, conscious of her care,
Pity her pains, and learn to spare.
TO THE HONOURABLE SIR RICHARD LYTTELTON.
THE morn dispensed a dubious light,
A sullen mist had stolen from sight
Each pleasing vale and hill,
When Damon left his humble bowers
To guard his flocks, to fence his flowers,
Or check his wandering rill.
Though school'd from Fortune's paths to fly,
The swain beneath each lowering sky
Would oft his fate bemoan,
That he, in silvan shades forlorn,
Must waste his cheerless even and morn,
Nor praised, nor loved, nor known.
No friend to Fame's obstreperous noise,
Yet to the whispers of her voice,
Soft murmuring, not a foe;
The pleasures he through choice declined,
When gloomy fogs depress'd his mind,
It grieved him to forego.
Grieved him to lurk the lakes beside,
Where coots in rushy dingles hide,
And moorcocks shun the day;
While caitiff bitterns, undismay'd,
Remark the swain's familiar shade,
And scorn to quit their prey.
But see the radiant Sun once more
The brightening face of Heaven restore,
And raise the doubtful dawn;
And more to gild his rural sphere,
At once the brightest train appear
That ever trod the lawn.
Amazement chill'd the shepherd's frame,
To think Bridgewater's' honour'd name
Should grace his rustic cell;
That she, on all whose motions wait
Distinction, titles, rank, and state,
Should rove where shepherds dwell.
But true it is, the generous mind,
By candour sway'd, by taste refined,
Will nought but vice disdain ;
Nor will the breast, where fancy glows,
Deem every flower a weed that blows
Amid the desert plain.
Beseems it such, with honour crown'd,
To deal its lucid beams around,
Nor equal meed receive;
At most such garlands from the field,
As cowslips, pinks, and pansies yield,
And rural hands can weave.
1 The Duchess of Bridgewater, married to Sir Richard Lyttelton.
Yet strive, ye shepherds! strive to find,
And weave the fairest of the kind,
The prime of all the spring,
If haply thus yon lovely fair
May round her temples deign to wear
The trivial wreaths you bring.
O how the peaceful halcyons play'd,
Where'er the conscious lake betray'd
Athenia's placid mien !
How did the sprightlier linnets throng,
Where Paphia's charms required the song,
Mid hazel copses green!
Lo, Dartmouth on those banks reclined,
While busy Fancy calls to mind
The glories of his line!
Methinks my cottage rears its head,
The ruin❜d walls of yonder shed,
As through enchantment, shine.
But who the nymph that guides their way?
Could ever nymph descend to stray
From Hagley's famed retreat?
Else by the blooming features fair,
The faultless make, the matchless air,
"Twere Cynthia's form complete.
So would some tuberose delight,
That struck the pilgrim's wondering sight
Mid lonely deserts drear,
All as at eve the sovereign flower
Dispenses round its balmy power,
And crowns the fragrant year.
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