Thus pass the temperate hours: but when the sun Shakes from his noonday throne the scattering clouds,

Even shooting listless languor through the deeps,
Then seek the bank where flowering elders crowd,
Where scatter'd wild the lily of the vale

Its balmy essence breathes, where cowslips hang

The dewy head, where purple violets lurk,

With all the lowly children of the shade;

Or lie reclin'd beneath yon spreading ash

Hung o'er the steep, whence borne on liquid wing
The sounding culver shoots; or where the hawk

High in the beetling cliff his eyry builds.

There let the classic page thy fancy lead

Through rural scenes, such as the Mantuan swain
Paints in the matchless harmony of song;

Or catch thyself the landscape, gliding swift
Athwart imagination's vivid eye;

Or, by the vocal woods and waters lull'd,
And lost in lonely musing, in a dream,
Confus'd, of careless solitude, where mix
Ten thousand wandering images of things,
Soothe every gust of passion into peace-

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460

All but the swellings of the soften'd heart,
That waken, not disturb, the tranquil mind.

Behold, yon breathing prospect bids the muse
Throw all her beauty forth. But who can paint
Like Nature? Can imagination boast,

Amid its gay creation, hues like hers?

Or can it mix them with that matchless skill,

And lose them in each other, as appears

In every bud that blows? If fancy, then,
Unequal fails beneath the pleasing task,

Ah, what shall language do? ah, where find words
Ting'd with so many colors; and whose power,

To life approaching, may perfume my lays

With that fine oil, those aromatic gales,

That inexhaustive flow continual round?

Yet, though successless, will the toil delight.

Come then, ye virgins and ye youths whose hearts

Have felt the raptures of refining love;

And thou, Amanda, come, pride of my song!

Form'd by the graces, loveliness itself!

Come with those downcast eyes, sedate and sweet,

Those looks demure, that deeply pierce the soul

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480

See, where the winding vale its lavish stores, Irriguous, spreads. See, how the lily drinks The latent rill, scarce oozing through the grass.

Of growth luxuriant; or the humid bank,

In fair profusion, decks. Long let us walk,

Where the breeze blows from yon extended field

Of blossom'd beans. Arabia can not boast

A fuller gale of joy than, liberal, thence

Breathes through the sense, and takes the ravish'd soul.

Nor is the mead unworthy of thy foot,

Full of fresh verdure, and unnumber'd flowers,

The negligence of Nature, wide and wild;
Where, undisguis'd by mimic art, she spreads
Unbounded beauty to the roving eye.

Here their delicious task the fervent bees,

In swarming millions, tend': around, athwart,

Through the soft air the busy nations fly,

Cling to the bud, and with inserted tube

Suck its pure essence, its ethereal soul;

And oft, with bolder wing, they soaring dare
The purple heath, or where the wild-thyme grows,

And yellow load them with the luscious spoil.

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510

L

At length the finish'd garden to the view
Its vistas opens, and its alleys green.

Snatch'd through the verdant maze, the hurried eye
Distracted wanders: now the bowery walk

Of covert close, where scarce a speck of day
Falls on the lengthen'd gloom, protracted sweeps;
Now meets the bending sky; the river now
Dimpling along, the breezy-ruffled lake,
The forest darkening round, the glittering spire,
The ethereal mountain, and the distant main.
But why so far excursive? when at hand,

Along these blushing borders, bright with dew,

520