University of Virginia Library

While winter's half subsiding breeze,
In mournful cadence through the trees,
Laments the slowly lengthening day,
And chides the animating ray,
That gilds, with spring-like lustre bright,
The landscape spread before our sight;
Wilt thou, my lovely friend, excuse
This trivial offering of a muse,
Which finds in friendship's partial smile
More than a meed for every toil—
A muse most willing to resign
The world's applause, if blest with thine.

The shepherd sage, whose well-earn'd fame
Once put the lore of schools to shame;
Whose head was silver'd o'er with age,
As Gay hath told us in his page;
Gather'd his hints for contemplation
From every object in creation:
Nor can we doubt th' attentive mind
In nature's open book may find
Maxims of wisdom, clearly shown,
O'erlook'd by ignorance alone.
For me, who through the livelong day,
Can scarcely steal an hour away
From graver cares, whene'er I rove
Through verdant mead, or shady grove,
In nature's ever varying face
Some moral lesson I can trace;
And see, by contemplation's aid,
Some useful truth to man convey'd.

E'en now, my daily labour done,
When faintly gleams the setting sun,
I wander forth: while, all around,
The ear can catch no livelier sound
Than gusts of wind, which, hurrying by
Through yon bare branches seem to sigh;
Unless on evening's gale should float,
In fitful swell the casual note
Of martial music; faintly caught,
With pleasing melancholy fraught:
And though the lengthen'd day would fair
Assert fair Spring's returning reign,
The leafless boughs, the sighing gale,
The gathering clouds, the misty veil,
Which shrouds the sun's declining ray,
Confess stern Winter's further sway.
Yet still to me this dreary hour,
This shadowy landscape, has the power
To soothe my pensive troubl'd heart
And sober tranquil bliss impart.
I love to see bleak Winter yield
Reluctantly to Spring the field;
I love to mark the watery gleam
Of Sol's bright rays on Deben's stream;
To see it gild the sapless tree,
And gem with mimic pageantry
The dewy thorn, whose straggling bough
Can boast no other beauty now.
Perchance in some sequester'd lane,
Screen'd from the blast that sweeps the plain,
Smiling amidst its chrystal tears
Some little flower its head uprears;
Spring's earliest trophy, fairest gem
To deck her graceful diadem.
Maria! canst thou tell me why
Objects like these delight the eye,
And touch the heart? to me it seems
They point to loftier, nobler themes
To me this elemental strife
An emblem shews of human life;
And when dark winter's clouds recede,
And Spring with verdure clothes the mead,
Even before her power is seen,
In the parterre, or on the green,
Thus, I exclaim, shall sorrow's night
Give way to joy's returning light?
As shine the dew-drops bright and clear,
So shall the half unconscious tear,
Brighter than smiles of pleasure seem
Glittering in rapture's rising beam.
That beauteous flowret too shall be
To fancy's eye, a type of thee;
Like thee it shuns the gazing eye,
Lovely in native modesty;
Like thine its opening charms display
The promise of a brighter day;
And though the chilly dews may gem
Its humid cup, and bend its stem;
Soon shall those pearly drops be dried,
And Flora claim her garland's pride.
Oh! may the emblem faithful be,
That flowret prove a type of thee.