University of Virginia Library


83

EXTRACT.

Hail! beauteous lands that crown the Southern Seas;
Dear happy seats of Liberty and Ease!
Hail! whose green coasts the peaceful ocean laves,
Incessant washing with its watery waves!
Delicious islands! to whose envied shore
Thee, gallant Cook! the ship Endeavour bore.
There laughs the sky, there zephyr's frolic train,
And light-wing'd loves, and blameless pleasures reign:
There, when two souls congenial ties unite,
No hireling Bonzes chant the mystic rite;
Free every thought, each action unconfined,
And light those fetters which no rivets bind.
There in each grove, each sloping bank along,
And flow'rs and shrubs and odorous herbs among,
Each shepherd clasp'd, with undisguised delight,
His yielding fair one,—in the Captain's sight;
Each yielding fair, as chance or fancy led,
Preferr'd new lovers to her sylvan bed.
Learn hence, each nymph, whose free aspiring mind
Europe's cold laws, and colder customs bind—
O! learn, what Nature's genial laws decree—
What Otaheite is, let Britain be!