'TIS now the hour the Wanderer strays Through covert paths, and woodland ways; It is the starry-mantled hour,

When slumber lulls each choral bower;
Alone Minerva's wakeful Bird
From some sepulchral Yew is heard.

Wild Hermit! from his sylvan shroud,

He lifts his whooping voice aloud;

To every mute attesting star
He sends his shrill appeal afar,
Sounding like Traveller's cry affrighted,
In some waste solitude benighted.

And now, the startled Plover's wail
Arises on the plaintive gale.
Poor trembler, in her simple dread,
She hears the wily Fowler's tread;
And from her lowly dwelling springs,
To lure him far, on wheeling wings.

But hush, poor Bird, thy clamorous suit;
And Thou, whom day offends, be mute!
For hark, the vernal notes awake
From yonder lone neglected brake.
Dear musical Enthusiast, hail,
Unmatch'd, poetic Nightingale!

Sweet Bird, calumnious minstrels say
That thine is a complaining lay;
They say thy voice will only flow
Obedient to the call of woe.

O who could thus thy warblings wrong,
That ever heard the' ectstatic song!

No: 'tis pure joy's unmingled vein
That prompts that rich and vivid strain:
If sadness touch those breathings sweet,
It is because extremes will meet;
And thus thy rapture's last excess
Will melt in murmuring tenderness.