Attract his slender feet. The foodless wilds
Pour forth their brown inhabitants. The hare,
Though timorous of heart, and hard beset

By death in various forms, dark snares, and dogs,
And more unpitying men, the garden seeks,
Urged on by fearless want. The bleating kine
Eye the bleak heaven, and next the glistening earth,
With looks of dumb despair: then, sad dispersed,
Dig for the withered herb through heaps of snow.—
'Tis done! dread Winter spreads his latest glooms,
And reigns tremendous o'er the conquered year.
How dead the vegetable kingdom lies!

How dumb the tuneful! Horror wide extends
His desolate domain. Behold, fond Man!
See here thy pictured life; pass some few years,
Thy flowery Spring, thy Summer's ardent strength,
Thy sober Autumn, fading into age,

And pale concluding Winter comes at last,
And shuts the scene. Ah! whither now are fled
Those dreams of greatness, those unsolid hopes
Of happiness, those longings after fame,

Those restless cares, those busy bustling days,
Those gay-spent festive nights, those veering thoughts,
Lost between good and ill, that shared thy life?
All now are vanished! Virtue sole-survives,
Immortal, never-failing friend of Man!

His guide to happiness on high.

THOMSON.

WINTER.

HOUGH now no more the musing ear
Delights to listen to the breeze,

That lingers o'er the greenwood shade,
I love thee, Winter! well.

Sweet are the harmonies of Spring,
Sweet is the Summer's evening gale,
Pleasant the Autumnal winds that shake
The many-coloured grove.

And pleasant to the sobered soul
The silence of the wintry scene,
When Nature shrouds her in a trance
In deep tranquillity.

Not undelightful now to roam

The wild heath sparkling on the sight; Not undelightful now to pace

The forest's ample rounds;

And see the spangled branches shine,
And mark the moss of many a hue
That varies the old tree's brown bark,
Or o'er the gray stone spreads.

The clustered berries claim the eye
O'er the bright holly's gay green leaves:
The ivy round the leafless oak

Clasps its full foliage close.

So Virtue, diffident of strength,
Clings to Religion's firmer aid,
And, by Religion's aid upheld,
Endures calamity.

Nor void of beauties now the spring,
Whose waters, hid from Summer sun,
Have soothed the thirsty pilgrim's ear
With more than melody.

The green moss shines with icy glare; The long grass bends in spear-like form; And lovely is the silvery scene

When faint the sunbeams smile.

Reflection, too, may love the hour
When Nature, hid in Winter's grave,
No more expands the bursting bud,
Or bids the floweret bloom.

For Nature, soon in Spring's best charms,
Shall rise revived from Winter's grave,
Again expand the bursting bud,

And bid the floweret bloom.

SOUTHEY.

WINTER.

ARK! 'twas dark Winter's sullen voice, That told the gloom that reigned; That bade the plains no more rejoice, And all the waves be chained.

And see! brown Autumn dies away!

The pallid sire is come!

The plains his shivering rules obey,

And every wave is dumb!

Yet still with cheerful heart I pace
The whitened vale below;
And smile at every printed trace
I leave upon the snow.

Thus, (soft I whisper to my breast,)

Man treads life's weary waste; Each step that leads to better rest Forgot as soon as past!

For what is life and all its bliss?
The splendour of a fly;

The breathings of a morning's kiss;
A summer's flushing sky.

Dismantled lies the gaudy fly;

Morn droops at evening's frown;
And Summer, though so gay her eye,
Tempestuous terrors crown!

Yes, Lord, but shoots no gladdening day
Through this nocturnal scene?

Decks not one gem of lively ray

Grief's darksome wave unseen?

How sweet the evergreen beguiles
The gloom of yonder snow!
Thus Virtue cheers, with endless smiles,
Life's wintry waste of woe.

Howl then, ye storms! ye tempests, beat

Round this unshrinking head !

I know a sweet, a soft retreat,

In Virtue's peaceful shed!

Drive down, ye hails! pour, snows and winds,
Pale terror where I stray!

My foot a path yet verdant finds,
Where Virtue smooths the way!

O Thou! by whose all-gracious hand
The cherub Mercy stands,
Smiling at each divine command,
With fondness o'er the lands;

O let me ne'er, with marble eye,

Pale shivering Want reject;

Where mourns the long, the deep-drawn sigh,

The anguish of neglect !

While lordly pride and cushioned ease

Petition's tear despise,

O let this hand the mourner raise,

And wipe her streaming eyes!

When Death shall call me to my Lord,

To bow beneath his throne;
His praise be the divine reward

That charity has won.

There, where no wintry storms affright,
No tempests shake the pole;
No gloomy shades of dreary night
Appal the waking soul;

There, let me ever hymn, adore,
And love the immortal King;

Love, while dread Winter breaks no more

The eternity of Spring!

HUNT.

HYMN ON THE SEASONS.

(HESE, as they change, Almighty Father, these Are but the varied God. The rolling year

Is full of Thee. Forth in the pleasing Spring

Thy beauty walks, Thy tenderness and love.
Wide flush the fields; the softening air is balm;
Echo the mountains round; the forest smiles;
And every sense, and every heart is joy.

Then comes Thy glory in the Summer months,
With light and heat refulgent. Then Thy sun
Shoots full perfection through the swelling year :
And oft Thy voice in dreadful thunder speaks;
And oft at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve,
By brooks and groves, in hollow-whispering gales.
Thy bounty shines in Autumn unconfined,
And spreads a common feast for all that lives.
In Winter, awful Thou! with clouds and storms
Around Thee thrown, tempest o'er tempest rolled,
Majestic darkness! on the whirlwind's wing,
Riding sublime, Thou bidd'st the world adore,