Whose numbers, stealing through thy darkening vale, May not unseemly with its stillness suit· As, musing slow, I hail Thy genial loved return! For when thy folding-star arising shows And many a Nymph who wreathes her brows with sedge, The pensive Pleasures sweet, Prepare thy shadowy car. Then let me rove some wild and heathy scene; By thy religious gleams. Or, if chill blustering winds, or driving rain, Views wilds, and swelling floods, And hamlets brown, and dim-discovered spires; Thy dewy fingers draw The gradual dusky veil. While Spring shall pour his showers, as oft he wont, While sallow Autumn fills thy lap with leaves; Or Winter, yelling through the troublous air, Affrights thy shrinking train, And rudely rends thy robes; So long, regardful of thy quiet rule, And love thy favorite name! ODE TO PEACE. O THOU, who badest thy turtles bear And bade his storms arise! Tired of his rude tyrannic sway, His sullen shrines to burn : But thou who hear'st the turning spheres, O Peace, thy injured robes up-bind! The British Lion, goddess sweet, Lies stretched on earth to kiss thy feet, Let others court thy transient smile, And, while around her ports rejoice, THE MANNERS. AN ODE. FAREWELL, for clearer ken designed, Farewell the porch whose roof is seen Youth of the quick uncheated sight, Thy walks, Observance, more invite! O thou who lovest that ampler range, Where life's wide prospects round thee change, And, with her mingling sons allied, Throwest the prattling page aside, To me, in converse sweet, impart To dream in her enchanted school: Retiring hence to thoughtful cell, As Fancy breathes her potent spell, Not vain she finds the charmful task, In pageant quaint, in motley mask; Behold, before her musing eyes, The countless Manners round her rise; While, ever varying as they pass, To some Contempt applies her glass: With these the white-robed maids combine; And those the laughing Satyrs join! But who is he whom now she views, In robe of wild contending hues? Thou by the Passions nursed, I greet The comic sock that binds thy feet! O Humor, thou whose name is known There where the young-eyed healthful Wit (Whose jewels in his crispéd hair Are placed each other's beams to share; By old Miletus, who so long Whose tales e'en now, with echo sweet, Or him whom Seine's blue nymphs deplore, In watchet weeds on Gallia's shore; Who drew the sad Sicilian maid, By virtues in her sire betrayed. O Nature boon, from whom proceed Each forceful thought, each prompted deed; If but from thee I hope to feel, On all my heart imprint thy seal! Let some retreating cynic find Those oft-turned scrolls I leave behind: The Sports and I this hour agree, To rove thy scene-full world with thee! |