Her every virtue, every grace combin'd;
Her genius, wisdom, her engaging turn;'
Her pride of honour, and her courage try'd,
Calm, and intrepid, in the very throat
Of sulph'rous war, on Tenier's dreadful field.
Nor less the palm of peace inwreaths thy brow:
For, powerful as thy sword, from thy rich tongue
Persuasion flows, and wins the high debate;
While mix'd in thee combine the charm of youth, 940
The force of manhood, and the depth of age.
Thee, FORBES, too, whom every worth attends,
As truth sincere, as weeping friendship kind;
Thee, truly generous, and in silence great,
Thy country feels through her reviving arts,
Plann'd by thy wisdom, by thy soul inform'd;
And seldom has she known a friend like thee.
But see the fading many-colour'd woods,
Shade deepening over shade, the country round
Imbrown; a crowded umbrage, dusk, and dun,
Of every hue, from wan declining green
To sooty dark. These now the lonesome Muse,
Low-whispering, lead into their leaf-strown walks,
And give the season in its latest view.
Meantime, light-shadowing all, a sober calm
Fleeces unbounded ether; whose least wave
Stands tremulous, uncertain where to turn
The gentle current: while illumin'd wide,
The dewy-skirted clouds imbibe the sun,
And through their lucid veil his softened force
Shed o'er the peaceful world. Then is the time,
For those whom wisdom and whom Nature charm,
To steal themselves from the degenerate crowd,
And soar above this little scene of things;
To tread low-thoughted vice beneath their feet;
To sooth the throbbing passions into peace;
And woo lone Quiet in her silent walks.
Thus solitary, and in pensive guise,
Oft let me wander o'er the russet mead,
And thro' the sadden'd grove, where scarce is heard 970
One dying strain, to cheer the woodman's toil.
Haply some widowed songster pours his plaint,
Far, in faint warblings, through the tawny copse.
While congregated thrushes, linnets, larks,
And each wild throat, whose artless strains so late 975
Swell'd all the music of the swarming shades,
Robb'd of their tuneful souls, now shivering sit
On the dead tree, a dull despondent flock;
With not a brightness waving o'er their plumes,
And nought save chattering discord in their note. 980
O let not, aim'd from some inhuman eye,
The gun, the music of the coming year
Destroy; and harmless, unsuspecting harm,
Lay the weak tribes, a miserable prey,
In mingled murder, fluttering on the ground.
The pale descending year, yet pleasing still,
A gentler mood inspires; for now the leaf
Incessant rustles from the mournful grove;
Oft startling such as, studious, walk below,
And slowly circles through the waving air.
But should a quicker breeze amid the boughs
Sob, o'er the sky the leafy deluge streams;
Till choak'd and matted with the dreary shower,
The forest-walks, at every rising gale,
Roll wide the wither'd waste, and whistle bleak.
Fled is the blasted verdure of the fields;
And, shrunk into their beds, the flowery race
Their sunny robes resign. Ev'n what remain'd
Of stronger fruits, falls from the naked tree;
And woods, fields, gardens, orchards, all around 1000 The desolated prospect thrills the soul.
He comes! he comes! in every breeze the Power Of PHILOSOPHIC MELANCHOLY comes!
His near approach the sudden-starting tear,
The glowing cheek, the mild dejected air,
The soften'd feature, and the beating heart,
Pierc'd deep with many a virtuous pang, declare.
O'er all the soul his sacred influence breathes!
Inflames imagination; through the breast
Infuses every tenderness; and far
Beyond dim earth exalts the swelling thought.
Ten thousand thousand fleet ideas, such
As never mingled with the vulgar dream,
Crowd fast into the Mind's creative eye.
As fast the correspondent passions rise,
As varied, and as high: devotion rais'd
To rapture, and divine astonishment;
The love of Nature unconfin'd, and, chief,
Of human race; the large ambitious wish,
To make them blest; the sigh for suffering worth
Lost in obscurity; the noble scorn
Of tyrant pride; the fearless great resolve;
The wonder which the dying patriot draws,
Inspiring glory through remotest time;
Th' awakened throb for virtue, and for fame;
The sympathies of love, and friendship dear;
With all the social Offspring of the heart.
Oh bear me then to vast embowering shades,
To twilight groves, and visionary vales;
To weeping grottoes, and prophetic glooms;
Where angel-forms athwart the solemn dusk
Tremendous sweep, or seem to sweep along;
And voices more than human, through the void
Deep-sounding, seize th' enthusiastic ear.
Or is this gloom too much? Then lead, ye powers, That o'er the garden and the rural seat
Preside, which shining through the cheerful land
In countless numbers blest BRITANNIA sees;
O lead me to the wide-extended walks,
The fair majestic paradise of STOWE!
Not Persian Cyrus on Ionia's shore
E'er saw such silvan scenes; such various art
By genius fir'd, such ardent genius tam'd
By cool judicious art; that, in the strife,
|