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 hues
Their beauty-beaming parent can disclose.
Ten thousand forms, ten thousand 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 eyed trout
Or darting salmon. Through the green wood 'glade
Some love to stray; there lodged, amused, 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 undisclosed,
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 wrapp'd, expire.
But chief to heedless flies the window proves

A constant death; where, gloomily retired,
The villain spider lives, cunning and fierce,
Mixture abhorr'd! amid a mangled heap
Of carcasses, in eager watch, he sits,

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 ensnared, he dreadful darts,
With rapid glide, along the leaning line;
And, fixing in the wretch his cruel fangs,
Strikes backward grimly pleased; 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 reclined,
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,...,

Trail the long rake, or with the fragrant load
O'ercharged, amid the kind oppression roll.
Wide flies the tedded grain all in a row
Advancing broad, or wheeling round the field,
They spread the breathing harvest to the sun,
That throws refreshful round a rural smell:
Or, as they rake the green-appearing ground,
And drive the dusky wave along the mead,
The russet haycock 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 Compell'd, to where the mazy running brook Forms a deep pool; this bank abrupt and high, And that fair spreading in a pebbled shore. Urged 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, On some impatient seizing, hurls them in 90 Embolden'd then, nor hesitating more, Ero 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 got. Heavy, and dripping, to the breezy brow

Slow move the harmless race: where, as they spread
Their swelling treasures to the sunny ray,
Inly disturbid, and wondering what this wild
Outrageous tumult means, their loud complaints.
The country fill; and, toss'd from rock to rock,
Incessant bleatings run around the hills.
At last, of snowy white, the gather'd flocks
Are in the wattled pen innumerous press'd,
Head above head and ranged in lusty rows
The shepherds sit, and whet the sounding shears.
The housewife waits to roll her fleecy stores,
With all her gay dress'd maids attending round.
One, chief in gracious dignity enthroned,
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 the master's cipher ready stand;
Others the unwilling wether drag along;
And, glorying in his might, the sturdy boy
Holds by the twisted horns the' 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 waved;
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 The' 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, e'en 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 dazzling 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 diclose, Blast 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 perfumed;