Ye vigorous swains! while youth ferments your blood,
And purer spirits swell the sprightly flood, Now range the hills, the gameful woods beset, Wind the shrill horn, or spread the waving net. When milder autumn summer's heat succeeds, And in the new-shorn field the partridge feeds, Before his lord the ready spaniel bounds; Panting with hope, he tries the furrow'd grounds; But when the tainted gales the game betray, Couch'd close he lies, and meditates the prey; Secure they trust the unfaithful field beset, Till hovering o'er them sweeps the swelling net. Thus (if small things we may with great compare) When Albion sends her eager sons to war, Some thoughtless town, with ease and plenty bless'd, Near, and more near, the closing lines invest; Sudden they seize the amazed, defenceless prize, And in high air Britannia's standard flies.
See! from the brake the whirring pheasant springs, And mounts exulting on triumphant wings. Short is his joy: he feels the fiery wound, Flutters in blood, and panting beats the ground. Ah! what avail his glossy, varying dyes, His purple crest, and scarlet-circled eyes, The vivid green his shining plumes unfold, His painted wings, and breast that flames with gold?
Nor yet, when moist Arcturus clouds the sky, The woods and fields their pleasing toils deny. To plains with well-breathed beagles we repair, And trace the mazes of the circling hare : (Beasts, urged by us, their fellow-beasts pursue, And learn of man each other to undo.)
With slaughtering guns the unwearied fowler roves, When frosts have whiten'd all the naked groves, Where doves in flocks the leafless trees o'ershade, And lonely woodcocks haunt the watery glade. He lifts the tube, and levels with his eye; Straight a short thunder breaks the frozen sky: Oft, as in airy rings they skim the heath, The clamorous lapwings feel the leaden death: Oft, as the mounting larks their notes prepare, They fall, and leave their little lives in air.
In genial spring, beneath the quivering shade, Where cooling vapours breathe along the mead, The patient fisher takes his silent stand, Intent, his angle trembling in his hand : With looks unmoved, he hopes the scaly breed, And eyes the dancing cork and bending reed. Our plenteous.streams a various race supply; The bright-eyed perch with fins of Tyrian dye; The silver eel, in shining volumes roll❜d; The yellow carp, in scales bedropp'd with gold; Swift trouts, diversified with crimson stains; And pikes, the tyrants of the watery plains.
Now Cancer glows with Phoebus' fiery car : The youth rush eager to the sylvan war,
Swarm o'er the lawns, the forest walks surround, Rouse the fleet hart, and cheer the opening hound.` The impatient courser pants in every vein, And, pawing, seems to beat the distant plain : Hills, vales, and floods appear already cross'd, And ere he starts a thousand steps are lost. See the bold youth strain up the threatening steep, Rush through the thickets, down the valleys sweep, Hang o'er their coursers' heads with eager speed, And Earth rolls back beneath the flying steed.
Let old Arcadia boast her ample plain, The immortal huntress, and her virgin train : Nor envy, Windsor! since thy shades have seen As bright a goddess, and as chaste a queen; Whose care, like her's, protects the sylvan reign, The earth's fair light, and empress of the main. Here too, 'tis sung, of old Diana stray'd, And Cynthus' top forsook for Windsor's shade; Here was she seen o'er airy wastes to rove, Seek the clear spring, or haunt the pathless grove; Here, arm'd with silver bows, in early dawn, Her buskin'd virgins traced the dewy lawn. Above the rest a rural nymph was famed, Thy offspring, Thames! the fair Lodona named; (Lodona's fate, in long oblivion cast,
The Muse shall sing, and what she sings shall last.) Scarce could the goddess from her nymph be known,
But by the crescent and the golden zone. She scorn'd the praise of beauty, and the care; A belt her waist, a fillet binds her hair; A painted quiver on her shoulder sounds, And with her dart the flying deer she wounds. It chanced as, eager of the chase, the maid Beyond the forest's verdant limits stray'd, Pan saw and loved, and, burning with desire, Pursued her flight; her flight increased his fire. Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly When the fierce eagle cleaves the liquid sky; Not half so swiftly the fierce eagle moves, When through the clouds he drives the trembling doves;
As from the god she flew with furious pace, Or as the god, more furious, urged the chase;
Now fainting, sinking, pale, the nymph appears Now close behind, his sounding steps she hears; And now his shadow reach'd her as she run, His shadow lengthen'd by the setting sun; And now his shorter breath, with sultry air, Pants on her neck, and fans her parting hair. In vain on father Thames she calls for aid, Nor could Diana help her injured maid.
Faint, breathless, thus she pray'd, nor pray'din vain. 'Ah, Cynthia ! ah !-though banish'd from thy train, Let me, O let me, to the shades repair,
My native shades-there weep, and murmur there.' She said, and melting as in tears she lay, In a soft silver stream dissolved away. The silver stream her virgin coldness keeps, For ever murmurs, and for ever weeps; Still bears the name the hapless virgin bore, And bathes the forest where she ranged before. In her chaste current oft the goddess laves, And with celestial tears augments the waves. Oft in her glass the musing shepherd spies The headlong mountains and the downward skies, The watery landscape of the pendent woods, And absent trees that tremble in the floods; In the clear azure gleam the flocks are seen, And floating forests paint the waves with green; Through the fair scene roll slow the lingering
Then foaming pour along, and rush into the Thames.
Thou too, great father of the British floods! With joyful pride survey'st our lofty woods; Where towering oaks their growing honours rear, And future navies on thy shores appear.
Not Neptune's self from all his streams receives A wealthier tribute than to thine he gives. No seas so rich, so gay no banks appear, No lake so gentle, and no spring so clear. Nor Po so swells the fabling poet's lays, While led along the skies his current strays, As thine, which visits Windsor's famed abodes, To grace the mansion of our earthly gods: Nor all his stars above a lustre show, Like the bright beauties on thy banks below; Where Jove, subdued by mortal passions still, Might change Olympus for a nobler hill.
Happy the man whom this bright court approves, His sovereign favours, and his country loves: Happy next him, who to the shades retires,
Whom Nature charms, and whom the Muse inspires :
Whom humbler joys of home-felt quiet please, Successive study, exercise, and ease.
He gathers health from herbs the forest yields, And of their fragrant physic spoils the fields, With chemic art exalts the mineral powers, And draws the aromatic souls of flowers; Now marks the course of rolling orbs on high; O'er figured worlds now travels with his eye; Of ancient writ unlocks the learned store, Consults the dead, and lives past ages o'er: Or wandering thoughtful in the silent wood, Attends the duties of the wise and good, To observe a mean, be to himself a friend,
To follow nature, and regard his end;
Or looks on Heaven with more than mortal
Bids his free soul expatiate in the skies,
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