The loaded wain; while, lightened of its charge,
The wain that meets it passes swiftly by;

The boorish driver leaning over his team
Vociferous, and impatient of delay. L

Nor less attractive is the woodland scene,
Diversified with trees of every growth,

Alike, yet various. Here the gray smooth trunks
Of ash, or lime, or beech, distinctly shine,
Within the twilight of their distant shades;
There, lost behind a rising ground, the wood
Seems sunk, and shortened to its topmost boughs,
No tree in all the grove but has its charms,
Though each its hue peculiar; paler some,
And of a wannish gray; the willow such,
And poplar, that with silver lines his leaf,
And ash far-stretching his umbrageous arm;
Of deeper green the elm; and deeper still,
Lord of the wood, the long-surviving oak.
Some glossy-leaved, and shining in the sun,
The maple, and the beech of oily nuts
Prolific, and the lime at dewy eve
Diffusing odours: nor unnoted pass
The sycamore, capacious in attire,

Now green, now tawny, and, ere autumn yet
Have changed the woods, in scarlet honours bright.
Over these, but far beyond (a spacious map
Of hill and valley interposed between),

The Ouse, dividing the well-watered land,
Now glitters in the sun, and now retires,
As bashful, yet impatient to be seen.

Hence the declivity is sharp and short,
And such the re-ascent: between them weeps
A little naiad her impoverished urn

All summer long, which winter fills again,
The folded gates would bar my progress now,
But that the lord of this enclosed demesne,
Communicative of the good he owns,

*

Admits me to a share; the guiltless eye
Commits no wrong, nor wastes what it enjoys.
Refreshing change! where now the blazing sun?

By short transition we have lost his glare,
And stepped at once into a cooler clime.
Ye fallen avenues! once more I mourn
Your fate unmerited, once more rejoice
That yet a remnant of your race survives.
How airy and how light the graceful arch,
Yet awful as the consecrated roof
Re-echoing pious anthems! while beneath
The chequered earth seems restless as a flood
Brushed by the wind. So sportive is the light
Shot through the boughs, it dances as they dance,
Shadow and sunshine intermingling quick,

* See the foregoing note.

And darkening and enlightening, as the leaves
Play wanton, every moment, every spot.

And now, with nerves new-braced and spirits cheered,

We tread the wilderness, whose well-rolled walks, With curvature of slow and easy sweep

Deception innocent-give ample space

To narrow bounds. The grove receives us next;
Between the upright shafts of whose tall elms
We may discern the thresher at his task.
Thump after thump resounds the constant flail,
That seems to swing uncertain, and yet falls
Full on the destined ear. Wide flies the chaff,
The rustling straw sends up a frequent mist
Of atoms, sparkling in the noon day beam.
Come hither, ye that press your beds of down,
And sleep not; see him sweating over his bread
Before he eats it-'Tis the primal curse,
But softened into mercy; made the pledge
Of cheerful days, and nights without a groan.
By ceaseless action all that is subsists.
Constant rotation of the unwearied wheel
That nature rides upon maintains her health,
Her beauty, her fertility. She dreads

An instant pause, and lives but while she moves.
Its own revolvency upholds the world.

Winds from all quarters agitate the air,

And fit the limped element for use,

Else noxious: oceans, rivers, lakes, and streams,
All feel the freshening impulse, and are cleansed
By restless undulation: even the oak

Thrives by the rude concussion of the storm
He seems indeed indignant, and to feel
The impression of the blast with proud disdain,
Frowning, as if in his unconscious arm

He held the thunder: but the monarch owes
His firm stability to what he scorns,

More fixt below, the more disturbed above.
The law, by which all creatures else are bound,
Binds man the lord of all. Himself derives
No mean advantage from a kindred cause,
From strenuous toil his hours of sweetest ease.
The sedentary stretch their lazy length
When custom bids, but no refreshment find,
For none they need: the languid eye, the cheek
Deserted of its bloom, the flaccid, shrunk,
And withered muscle, and the vapid soul,
Reproach their owner with that love of rest,
To which he forfeits even the rest he loves.
Not such the alert and active. Measure life
By its true worth, the comforts it affords,
And their's alone seems worthy of the name.
Good health, and, its associate in the most,
Good temper; spirits prompt to undertake,

And not soon spent, though in an arduous task;

The powers of fancy and strong thought are their's
Even age itself seems privileged in them,
With clear exemption from its own defects.
A sparkling eye beneath a wrinkled front
The veteran shows, and, gracing a gray beard
With youthful smiles, descends toward the grave,
Sprightly, and old almost without decay.

Like a coy maiden, ease, when courted most,
Farthest retires-an idol, at whose shrine
Who oftenest sacrifice are favoured least.

The love of Nature, and the scenes she draws,
Is Nature's dictate. Strange! there should be found,
Who, self-imprisoned in their proud saloons,
Renounce the odours of the open field

For the unscented fictions of the loom;
Who, satisfied with only penciled scenes,
Prefer to the performance of a God

The inferior wonders of an artist's hand!
Lovely indeed the mimic works of art;
But Nature's works far lovelier. I admire,
None more admires the painter's magic skill,
Who shows me that which I shall never see,
Conveys a distant country into mine,

And throws Italian light on English walls:
But imitative strokes can do no more

Than please the eye-sweet Nature's every sense.