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I WANDER'D in a lonely glade,
Where, issuing from the forest shade,
A little mountain stream
Along the winding valley play'd,
Beneath the morning beam,

Light o'er the woods of dark brown oak,
The west-wind wreath'd the hovering smoke,
From cottage-roofs conceal'd,

Below a rock abruptly broke,
In rosy light reveal'd;

'Twas in the infancy of May,

The uplands glow'd in green array,
While from the ranging eye,
The lessening landscape stretch'd away,
To meet the bending sky.

'Tis sweet in solitude to hear
The earliest music of the year,

The blackbird's loud wild note, Or, from the wintry thickét drear, The thrush's stammering throat.

In rustic solitude 'tis sweet

The earliest flowers of spring to greet,
The violet from its tomb,

The strawberry, creeping at our feet,
The sorrel's simple bloom.

Therefore I love the walks of spring,-
While still I hear new warblers sing,
Fresh-opening bells 1 see;

Joy flits on every roving wing,
Hope buds on every tree.

That morn I look'd and listen'd long,
Some cheering sight, some woodland song,
As yet unheard, unseen,

To welcome, with remembrance strong,
Of days that once had been ;-

When gathering flowers, an eager child,.
I ran abroad with rapture wild;

Or, on more curious quest,

Peep'd breathless through the copse, and smil'd To see the linnet's nest.

Already had I watch'd the flight
Of swallows darting through the light,.
And mock'd the cuckoo's call;.
Already view'd, o'er meadows bright,
The evening rainbow fall.

Now in my walk, with sweet surprise,
I saw the first spring cowslip rise,
The plant whose pensile flowers
Bend to the earth their beauteous eyes,
In sunshine as in showers.

Lone on a mossy bank it grew,
Where lichens, purple, white, and blue,
Among the verdure crept ;

Its yellow ringlets, dropping dew,

The breezes lightly swept..

A bee had nestled on its blooms,
He shook abroad their rich perfumes,
Then fled in airy rings;
His place a butterfly assumes,
Glancing his glorious wings.

O, welcome, as a friend! I cried;
A friend through many a season tried,
Nor ever sought in vain;
When May, with Flora at her side,
Is dancing on the plain.

Sure as the Pleiades adorn
The glittering coronet of morn,
In calm delicious hours,
Beneath their beams thy buds are borne,
'Midst love-awakening showers.

Scatter'd by nature's graceful hand
In briery glens, o'er pasture land,
Thy fairy tribes we meet;

Gay in the milk-maid's path they stand,
They kiss her tripping feet.

From winter's farm-yard bondage freed,
The cattle, bounding o'er the mead,
Where green the herbage grows,
Among thy fragrant blossoms feed,
Upon thy tufts repose.

Tossing his forelock o'er his mane,
The foal, at rest upon the plain,
Sports with thy flexile stalk,
But stoops his little neck in vain
To crop it in his walk.

Where thick thy primrose blossoms play,
Lovely and innocent as they,

O'er coppice, lawns and dells,

In bands the rural children stray,
To pluck thy nectar'd bells;-

Whose simple sweets, with curious skill,
The frugal cottage dames distil,
Nor envy France the vine,

While many a festal cup they fill
With Britain's homely wine.

Unchanging still from year to year,
Like stars returning in their sphere,
With undiminish'd rays,

Thy vernal constellations cheer
The dawn of lengthening days.

Perhaps from Nature's earliest May,
Imperishable 'midst decay,
Thy self-renewing race

Have breath'd their balmy lives away
In this neglected place.

And O, till Nature's final doom,
Here unmolested may they bloom,

From scythe and plough secure;
This bank their cradle and their tomb,
While earth and skies endure!

Yet, lowly cowslip, while in thee
An old, unalter'd friend I see,
Fresh in perennial prime;

From Spring to Spring, behold in me
The woes and waste of time.

This fading eye and withering mien,
Tell what a sufferer I have been,

Since more and more estrang'd,

From hope to hope, from scene to scene,
Through Folly's wilds I rang'd.

Then fields and woods I proudly spurn'd;
From Nature's maiden love I turn'd,
And woo'd the enchantress, Art;
Yet while for her my fancy burn'd,
Cold was my wretched heart ;-

Till, distanc'd in ambition's race,
Weary of pleasure's joyless chace,
My peace untimely slain;

Sick of the world,-I turn'd my face
To fields and woods again.

'Twas Spring-my former haunts I found;
My fav'rite flowers adorn'd the ground;
My darling minstrels play'd;

The mountains were with sunset crown'd, The vallies dun with shade.

With lorn delight the scene I view'd,
Past joys and sorrows were renew'd;
My infant hopes and fears
Look'd lovely, through the solitude
Of retrospective years.

And still in Memory's twilight bowers,
The spirit of departed hours,

With mellowing tints, pourtray
The blossoms of life's vernal flowers,
For ever fall'n away.

Till youth's delirious dream is o'er,
Sanguine with hope we look before,
The future good to find;
age when error charms no more,
For bliss we look behind.

In

MORNING LANDSCAPE.

BLACKET.

NOW the rosy orb of day,

O'er the waves begins to rise,

Tinging with his glowing ray,

June's unclouded morning skies.

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