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Shall scorn thy pale shrine glimm'ring near?

With him, sweet bard, may Fancy die,

And Joy desert the blooming year.

VIII.

But thou, lorn stream, whose sullen tide
No sedge-crown'd Sisters now attend,
Now waft me from the green hill's side

Whose cold turf hides the buried friend.

IX.

And see, the fairy valleys fade,

Dun Night has veil'd the solemn view;

Yet once again, dear parted shade,

Meek Nature's Child, again adieu.

X.

The genial meads assign'd to bless

Thy life, shall mourn thy early doom;

Their hinds, and shepherd-girls shall dress
With simple hands thy rural tomb.

XI.

Long, long, thy stone, and pointed clay,
Shall melt the musing Briton's eyes;

Oh! vales, and wild woods, shall He say,
In yonder grave Your Druid lies!

SPRING.

THE ARGUMENT.

THE subject proposed. Inscribed to the countess of Hertford. The Season is described as it affects the various parts of Nature, ascending from the lower to the higher; with digressions arising from the subject. Its influence on inanimate Matter, on Vegetables, on brute Animals, and last on Man; concluding with a dissuasive from the wild and irregular passion of love, opposed to that of a pure and happy kind.

SPRING.

COME, gentle Spring, ethereal mildness, come,

And from the bosom of yon dropping cloud,
While music wakes around, veil'd in a shower
Of shadowing roses, on our plains descend.

O Hertford, fitted or to shine in courts
With unaffected grace, or walk the plain
With innocence and meditation join'd
In soft assemblage, listen to my song,
Which thy own Season paints; when Nature all
Is blooming and benevolent, like thee.

And see where surly Winter passes off,
Far to the north, and calls his ruffian blasts:
His blasts obey, and quit the howling hill,
The shatter'd forest, and the ravag'd vale;
While softer gales succeed, at whose kind touch
Dissolving snows in livid torrents lost,
The mountains lift their green heads to the sky.
As yet the trembling year is unconfirm'd;
And Winter oft at eve resumes the breeze,
Chills the pale morn, and bids his driving sleets

Deform the day delightless: so that scarce
The bittern knows his time, with bill ingulpht
To shake the sounding marsh; or from the shore
The plovers when to scatter o'er the heath,
And sing their wild notes to the listening waste.

At last from Aries rolls the bounteous sun,
And the bright Bull receives him. Then no more
Th' expansive atmosphere is cramp'd with cold;
But, full of life and vivifying soul,
Lifts the light clouds sublime, and spreads them thin,
Fleecy and white, o'er all-surrounding heaven.

Forth fly the tepid airs; and unconfin'd, Unbinding earth, the moving softness strays. Joyous, th' impatient husbandman perceives Relenting Nature, and his lusty steers Drives from their stalls, to where the well-us'd plough Lies in the furrow, loosened from the frost. There, unrefusing, to the harness'd yoke They lend their shoulder, and begin their toil, Chear'd by the simple song and soaring lark. Meanwhile incumbent o'er the shining share The master leans, rentoves th' obstructing clay Winds the whole work, and sidelong lays the glebe.. White, thro' the neighbouring fields the sower stalks.

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