Thus gives her gather'd streams again
In showers on hill, and dale, and plain.
O may the virtues which adorn With modest beams his rising morn, Unclouded grow to perfect day! May He with bounty's brightest ray The natives chear, enrich the soil, With arts improve, reward their toil, Glad with kind warmth, our northern sky, And generous Lonsdale's loss supply.
(WRITTEN IN THE CLOSE OF WINTER)
JUST LEAVING A FAVORITE RETIREMENT,
Previous to settling abroad.
THE REV. SAMUEL HENLEY,
F. S. A.
ERE yet your footsteps quit the place
Your presence long hath deign'd to grace,
With softening eye and heart deplore
The conscious scenes your own no more.
When vernal clouds their influence shower, Expand the bud, and rear the flower,
Who to yon leafing grove will come
Where the rath primrose loves to bloom,
And fondly seek with heedful tread
The forward floret's downy head?
Or, when the violet leaves the ground,
Scent the pure perfume breathing round?
EPISTLES DESCRIPTIVE, &c.
The garden tribes that gladlier grew
While cherish'd by your fostering view,
No more resume their wonted hues,
No more their wonted sweets diffuse.
Who first will spy the swallow's wing,
Or hear the cuckoo greet the Spring?*
Unmark'd shall then th' assiduous dove
With ruffling plumage urge his love;
Unnoted, though in lengthen'd strain,
The bashful nightingale complain!
O'er the broad down who then delight,
Led by the lapwing's devious flight,
To see her run and hear her cry,
Most clamorous when least danger's nigh?
Who listless now will sauntering stay
Where rustics spread th' unwither'd hay,
And o'er the field survey askance
The wavy vapor quivering dance?
Or sunk supine with musing eye
Listen the hum of noon-day fly?
Or watch the bee from bell to bell
Where shelter'd lilies edge the dell?
Or mid the sultry heat reclin'd
Beneath the poplar woo the wind,
While to the lightest air that strays
Each leaf its hoary side displays?
Who, drawn by Nature's varying face, O'er heaven the gathering tempest trace ? Or, in the rear of sunny rain,
Admire the wide bow's gorgeous train ;
Till blending all its tints decay,
And the dim'd vision fleets away
In misty streams of ruddy glow
That cast an amber shine below,
And melting into ether blue
The freshen'd verdure gild anew?
Who now ascend the upland lawn When Morning tines the kindling dawn, To view the goss'mer pearl'd with dew That tremulous shoots each glistering hue? Or mark the clouds in liveries gay Surround the radiant orb of day? Who, when his amplest course is run, Wistful pursue the sinking sun? · To common eyes he vainly shines, Unheeded rises, or declines!
In vain, with saffron light o'erspread,
Yon summit lifts its verdant head,
Discovering ev'ry whiten'd cote
And coppice, clear to eye remote;
While down the steep each loftier oak,"
Outbraving still the woodman's stroke,
Detains, athwart th' impurpling haze,
The golden glance of westering rays.
The rook-lov'd groves and grange between,
Dark hedge-row elms with meadows green,
The grey church peeping half through trees,
Slopes waving corn as list the breeze,
The podding bean-field striped with balks,
The hurdled sheep-fold, hoof-trod walks,
The road that winds aslant the down,
The skirting furze-brake, fallow brown,
The wind-mill's scarcely circling vane,
The villager's returning wain,
The orient window's crimson blaze
That flares obtrusive on the gaze,
The eager
heifer's echoing low
Far from her calf compell'd to go,
From the tall ash the throstle's lay
That bids farewell to lingering day,
The dale's blue smokes that curling rise,
The plodding hind that homeward hies,
The stilly hum from glimmering woods,
The lulling lapse of distant floods,
The whitening mist that winding spreads
As winds the brook adown the meads,
The plank and rail that bridge the stream,
The rising full-moon's umber'd gleam,
Twixt severing clouds that richly dight
Let gradual forth her brightening light,
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