64

AUTUMN-SPRING-WINTER, &c.

18. The dead leaves strew the forest walk,
And wither'd are the pale wild flowers;
The frost hangs black'ning on the stalk,
The dew-drops fall in frozen showers.

19. The world leads round the seasons in a choir,
For ever changing, and for ever new,
Blending the grand, the beautiful, the gay,
The mournful and the tender, in one strain.

20. The gentle gales of Spring went by,

And fruits and flowers of summer die;
The autumn winds swept o'er the hill,
And winter's breath came cold and chill.

J. BRAINARD.

J. G. PERCIVAL.

GOODRICH.

21. What scenes of delight, what sweet visions she brings
Of freshness, of gladness and mirth-

Of fair sunny glades where the buttercup springs,
Of cool, gushing fountains, of rose-tinted wings,
Of birds, bees and blossoms, all beautiful things,
Whose brightness rejoices the earth!

MRS. A. B. WELBY.

22. The bleak wind whistles-snow-showers, far and near,
Drift without echo to the whitening ground;
Autumn hath past away, and, cold and drear,
Winter stalks in, with frozen mantle bound.

23. Hark! through the dim woods dying

With a moan,

Faintly the winds are sighing;

Summer's gone!

MRS. NORTON.

MRS. NORTON.

24. First budding Spring appears, next Summer's heat, Then Autumn's fruits, then Winter's cold and sleet.

J. T. WATSON.

25. Then rugged Winter his appearance makes, Cloth'd in his cheerless robes of snow and frost, And vegetation all the land forsakes,

And flowers decay, and all Spring's fruits are lost.

J. T. WATSON.

1.

AVARICE-BRIBERY-MISER.

Shall we now

Contaminate our fingers with base bribes?
And sell the mighty space of our large honours,
For so much trash as may be grasped thus?
I'd rather be a dog, and bay the moon,
Than such a Roman.

2. The miser lives alone, abhorr'd by all, Like a disease, yet cannot so be 'scaped,

SHAKSPEARE.

But, canker-like, eats through the poor men's hearts
That live about him; never has commerce
With any, but to ruin them.

3. Of Age's avarice I cannot see

What colour, ground, or reason there can be;
Is it not folly, when the way we ride
Is short, for a long voyage to provide?
To avarice some title Youth may own,
To
reap in autumn what a spring had sown;
And, with the providence of bees or ants,
Prevent with summer's plenty winter's wants.

But Age scarce sows, ere death stands by to reap,
And to a stranger's hand transfer the heap.

4. Who thinketh to buy villany with gold,

Shall ever find such faith so bought-so sold.

MAY.

DENHAM.

6*

MARSTON.

5. But the base miser starves amidst his store, Broods o'er his gold, and griping still at more, Sits sadly pining, and believes he's poor.

6. The lust of gold, unfeeling and remorselessThe last corruption of degenerate man.

DRYDEN

DR. JOHNSON's Irene,

7. 'Tis strange the miser should his care employ To gain those riches he can ne'er enjoy.

POPE'S Moral Essays.

8. Their crimes on gold shall misers lay
Who've pawn'd their sordid souls away?
Let bravoes, then, whose blood is spilt,
Upbraid the passive sword with guilt.

GAY's Fables.

9. Oh cursed lust of gold! when for thy sake
The fool throws up his interest in both worlds;
First starv'd in this, then damn'd in that to come.

BLAIR'S Grave.

10. Who, lord of millions, trembles for his store,
And fears to give a farthing to the poor;
Proclaims that penury will be his fate,
-And, scowling, looks on charity with hate.

11.

DR. WOLCOT's Peter Pindar.

The love of gold, that meanest rage,
And latest folly of man's sinking age,
Which, rarely venturing in the van of life,
While nobler passions wage their heated strife,
Comes skulking last, with selfishness and fear,
And dies collecting lumber in the rear.

12. Oh gold! why call we misers miserable?

Theirs is the pleasure that can never pall;
Theirs is the best bower-anchor, the chain cable,
Which holds fast other pleasures great and small.

MOORE.

BYRON'S Don Juan.

13.

14.

Sound him with gold;

"T will sink into his venal soul like lead
Into the deep, and bring up slime, and mud,
And ooze too, from the bottom, as the lead doth
With its greased understratum.

A thirst for gold,

The beggar's vice, which can but overwhelm
The meanest soul.

BYRON.

BYRON'S Vision of Judgment.

15. Who loves no music but the dollar's clink.

SPRAGUE'S Curiosity.

16. The kindly throbs that other men control,
Ne'er melt the iron of the miser's soul;
Thro' life's dark road his sordid way he wends,
An incarnation of fat dividends.

SPRAGUE'S Curiosity.

SPRAGUE'S Curiosity.

17. And he, across whose brain scarce dares to creep Aught but thrift's parent pair-to get-to keep.

18. Mammon's close-link'd bonds have bound him,
Self-imposed, and seldom burst;

Though heaven's waters gush'd around him,
He would pine with earth's poor thirst.

BALL-DANCING, &c.

1. Come and trip it as you you go

2.

MRS. S. J. HALE.

On the light fantastic toe.

Methought it was the sound.

Of riot and ill-managed merriment,
Such as the jocund flute or gamesome pipe

Stirs

up among the loose unletter'd hinds.

MILTON.

MILTON'S Comus.

68

BALL-DANCING, &c.

3. Yet is there one, the most delightful kind,
A lofty jumping and a leaping round,
When arm in arm the dancers are entwined,

And whirl themselves with strict embracements round.

4. Alike all ages; dames of ancient days

Have led their children through the mirthful maze;
And the gay grandsire, skill'd in gestic lore,
Has frisk'd beneath the burden of threescore.

DAVIES.

GOLDSMITH'S Traveller.

5. A thousand hearts beat happily; and when
Music arose with its voluptuous swell,
Soft eyes look'd love to eyes that spoke again,
And all went merry as a marriage bell.

BYRON'S Childe Harold.

6. On with the dance! let joy be unconfined!
No sleep till morn, when youth and pleasure meet,
To chase the glowing hours with flying feet.

BYRON'S Childe Harold.

7. The long carousal shakes th' illumined hall;
Well speeds alike the banquet and the ball:
And the gay dance of bounding beauty's train
Links grace and harmony in happiest chain.
Blest are the early hearts and gentle hands,
That mingle theirs in well-according bands;
It is a sight the careful brow might smooth,
And make age smile, and dream itself to youth,
And youth forget such hours were past on earth,—
So springs th' exulting bosom to that mirth.

BYRON'S Lara.

8. The music, and the banquet, and the wine,—
The garlands, the rose-odours, and the flowers,—
The sparkling eyes, and flashing ornaments—
The white arms, and the raven hair-the braids
And bracelets-swan-like bosoms—the thin robes,