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Wish'd Spring returns; and from the hazy south,
While dim Aurora flowly moves before,

The welcome fun, juft verging up at first,

By small degrees extends the fwelling curve!

Till feen at last for gay rejoicing months,

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Still round and round, his fpiral course he winds,

And as he nearly dips his flaming orb,

Wheels up again, and reafcends the sky.

In that glad season from the lakes and floods,

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Where Niemi's fairy mountains rife,

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And fring'd with roses † Tenglio rolls his stream,
They draw the copious fry. With these, at eve,
They chearful-loaded to their tents repair;
Where, all day long in useful cares employ'd,
Their kind unblemish'd wives the fire prepare.
Thrice happy race! by poverty fecur'd
From legal plunder and rapacious power:
In whom fell intereft never yet has fown
The feeds of vice: whofe fpotlefs fwains ne'er knew

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* M. de Maupertuis, in his book on the Figure of the Earth, after having defcribed the beautiful lake and mountain of Niemi in Lapland, fays," From this height we had opportunity feveral times to fee thofe vapours rife from the lake, which the people of the country call Haltios, and which they deem to be the guardian fpirits of the mountains. We had been frighted with ftories of bears that haunted this place, "but faw none. It seemed rather a place of refort for "Fairies and Genii, than bears."

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The fame author obferves-" I was furprized to "fee upon the banks of this river (the Tenglio) roses "of as lively a red as any that are in our gardens." Injurious

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Injurious deed, nor, blasted by the breath

Of faithlefs love, their blooming daughters woe.
Still preffing on, beyond Tornea's lake,
And Hecla flaming through a waste of snow,
And fartheft Greenland, to the pole itself,
Where, failing gradual, life at length goes out,
The Mufe expands her folitary flight;

And, hovering o'er the wild ftupendous scene,
Beholds new feas beneath * another sky.
Thron'd in his palace of cerulean ice,
Here Winter holds his unrejoicing court;
And through his airy hall the loud mifrule
Of driving tempeft is for ever heard :

Here the grim tyrant meditates his wrath;

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Here arms his winds with all-fubduing froft;
Moulds his fierce hail, and treasures up his fnows, 900
With which he now oppresses half the globe.
Thence winding eastward to the Tartar's coaft,
She fweeps the howling margin of the main;
Where undiffolving, from the first of time,
Snows fwell on fnows amazing to the sky;
And icy mountains high on mountains pil❜d,
Seem to the fhivering failor from afar,
Shapclefs and white, an atmosphere of clouds.
Projected huge, and horrid, o'er the furge,
Alps frown on Alps; or rushing hideous down,
As if old Chaos was again return'd,

Wide-rend the deep, and shake the folid pole.
The other hemisphere.

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Ocean

Ocean itself no longer can refist
The binding fury; but, in all its rage
Of tempeft taken by the boundless froft,
Is many a fathom to the bottom chain'd,
And bid to roar no more: a bleak expanse,
Shagg'd o'er with wavy rocks, chearless, and void
Of every life, that from the dreary months
Flies confcious fouthward. Miferable they!
Who, here entangled in the gathering ice,
Take their last look of the defcending fun;
While, full of death, and fierce with tenfold froft,
The long long night, incumbent o'er their heads,
Falls horrible. Such was the * Briton's fate,
As with firft prow, (what have not Briton's dar'd!)
He for the paffage fought, attempted since

So much in vain, and feeming to be shut
By jealous Nature with eternal bars.

In these fell regions, in Arzina caught,
And to the ftony deep his idle ship

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Immediate feal'd, he with his hapless crew,

Each full-exerted at his feveral task,

Froze into ftatues; to the cordage glued

The failor, and the pilot to the helm.

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Hard by these shores, where scarce his freezing stream

Rolls the wild Oby, live the last of men;

And half-enliven'd by the distant fun,

That rears and ripens man, as well as plants,
Here human nature wears its rudeft form.

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Sir Hugh Willoughby, fent by Queen Elizabeth to

difcover the north-eaft paffage.

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Deep from the piercing feafon funk in caves,
Here by dull fires, and with unjoyous cheer,
They wafte the tedious gloom. Immers'd in furs,
Doze the grofs race. Nor fprightly jeft, nor fong,
Nor tenderness they know; nor aught of life,
Beyond the kindred bears that stalk without.
Till morn at length, her roses drooping all,
Sheds a long twilight brightening o'er their fields,
And calls the quiver'd favage to the chace.

What cannot active government perform,

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New-moulding man? Wide-stretching from these shores, A people favage from remotest time,

A huge neglected empire, one vaft Mind,

By Heaven infpir'd, from Gothic darkness call'd.
Immortal Peter! firft of monarchs! He

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His stubborn country tam'd, her rocks, her fens,
Her floods, her feas, her ill-fubmitting fons;
And while the fierce Barbarian he fubdued,
To more exalted foul he rais'd the man.

Ye fhades of ancient heroes, ye who toil'd
Through long fucceffive ages to build-up
A labouring plan of state, behold at once
The wonder done! behold the matchlefs prince!

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Who left his native throne, where reign'd till then
A mighty fhadow of unreal power;

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Who greatly spurn'd the flothful pomp of courts;
And, roaming every land, in every port
His fceptre laid afide, with glorious hand,
Unwearied plying the mechanic tool,
Gather'd the feeds of trade, of useful arts,

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Of

Of civil wisdom, and of martial skill.

Charg'd with the stores of Europe, home he goes;
Then cities rife amid th' illumin'd waste;

O'er joyless deserts fmiles the rural reign ;
Far-diftant flood to flood is focial join'd;
Th' aftonifh'd Euxine hears the Baltick roar ;
Proud navies ride on feas that never foam'd
With daring keel before; and armies stretch
Each way their dazzling files, repreffing here
The frantic Alexander of the north,

And awing there ftern Othman's fhrinking fons.
Sloth flies the land, and Ignorance, and Vice,
Of old difhonour proud: it glows around,
Taught by the Royal Hand that rouz'd the whole,
One fcene of arts, of arms, of rifing trade:
For what his wifdom plann'd, and power enforc❜d,
More potent ftill, his great example fhew'd.
Muttering, the winds at eve, with blunted point,
Blow hollow-bluftering from the fouth. Subdued,
The froft refolves into a trickling thaw.
Spotted the mountains fhine; loose fleet defcends,
And floods the country round. The rivers fwell,
Of bonds impatient. Sudden from the hills,
O'er rocks and woods, in broad brown cataracts,`
A thousand fnow-fed torrents fhoot at once;
And, where they rush, the wide-refounding plain
Is left one flimy wafte. Thofe fullen feas,
That wash'd th' ungenial pole, will reft no more
Beneath the fhackles of the mighty north;
But, rouzing all their waves, refiftless heave.

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