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The Life and Poetical Works of James Woodhouse

(1735-1820): Edited by the Rev. R. I. Woodhouse

expand sectionI, II. 

SHROPSHIRE.

Still stretching farther, West, let raptur'd sight,
Behold, 'mid objects of supreme delight,
On the broad bosom of surrounding dells,
With sov'reign pride, the conic Wrekin swells;
And, o'er the prostrate plains, with crest elate,
Lifts its huge throne in solitary state—
Of arbitrary pow'r, proud emblem, clear,
Which suffers no aspiring rival near.
Remoter still, Cambria's high craggs emerge,
Frowning defiance o'er the swelling surge;
While, like Titanian twins, the Clees aspire,
'Mid Juno's tempests and Jove's forky fire!
Here Alverley its brawney shoulders rears,
To pillar, with its pile, the bending spheres!
There spouting pure its Esculapian rills,
Malvern erects its many-headed hills;—
Pleas'd, to its breasts, bids pale Disease repair,
To taste their streams, and breathe their balmy air;
And, while they purge off sicknesses, and pains,
Send patients bounding back o'er smiling plains!
Scoop'd concaves vast connect their sloping sides,
Stretch out their borders to the billowy tides,
While sight, unintercepted, pushing through,
Labours to realize the distant view;
And bears Imagination's flights between,
To sketch out elfin Lands, and Seas unseen!