The plumage, rising full, to form the bed
Of luxury. And here a while the Muse,
High-hovering o'er the broad coerulean scene,
Sees CALEDONIA, in romantic view:
Her airy mountains, from the waving main,
Invested with a keen diffusive sky,

Breathing the foul acute; her forefts huge,
Incult, robuft, and tall, by Nature's hand
Planted of old; her azure lakes between,
Pour'd out extenfive, and of watery wealth

875

880

Full; winding deep, and green, her fertile vales; 885 With many a cool translucent brimming flood

890

895

Wash'd lovely, from the Tweed (pure parent fiream,
Whose pastoral banks first heard my Doric reed,
With, filvan Jed, thy tributary brook),
To where the north-inflated tempeft foams
O'er Orca's or Betubium's highest peak:
Nurse of a people, in misfortune's school
Train'd up to hardy deeds; foon visited
By Learning, when before the Gothic rage.
She took her western flight. A manly race,
Of unsubmitting spirit, wife and brave;
Who ftill thro' bleeding ages ftruggled hard,
(As well unhappy WALLACE can attest,
Great patriot-hero! ill requited chief!),
To hold a generous undiminish'd state;
Too much in vain! Hence of unequal bounds
Impatient, and by tempting glory borne
O'er every land, for every land their life

900

Has flow'd profufe, their piercing genius plann❜d,
And fwell'd the pomp of peace their faithful toil. 905
As from their own clear north, in radiant ftreams,

Bright over Europe bursts the Boreal Moru.

Oh is there not fome patriot, in whose

N 3

power

That

That beft, that godlike Luxury is plac'd,
Of bleffing thousands, thousands yet unborn,
Thro' late pofterity? fome, large of foul,
To chear dejected industry? to give

A double harvest to the pining fwain?

919

And teach the labouring hand the sweets of toil?
How, by the finest árt, the native robe

915

To weave; how, white as hyperborean Snow,
To form the lucid lawn; with venturous oar
How to dash wide the billow; nor look on,
Shamefully paffive, while Batavian fleets
Defraud us of the glittering finny fwarms,

That heave our friths, and croud upon our fhores;
How all-enlivening trade to roufe, and wing
The profperous fail, from every growing port,
Uninjur'd, round the fea-incircled globe;
And thus, in foul united as in name,

Bid BRITAIN reign the mistress of the deep?

920

925

930

Yes, there are fuch. And full on thee, ARGYLE, Her hope, her stay, her darling, and her boast, From her first patriots and her heroes sprung, Thy fond imploring Country turns her eye; In thee, with all a mother's triumph, fees Her every virtue, every grace combin'd, Her genius, wisdom, her engaging turn, J. Her pride of honour, and her courage try'd, Calm, and intrepid, in the very throat

935

Of fulphurous war, on Tenier's dreadful field,

Nor less the palm of peace inwreathes thy brow:
For, powerful as thy fword, from thy rich tongue
Perfuafion flows, and wins the high debate;

While mix'd in thee combine the charm of youth, 940
The force of manhood, and the depth of age.
Thee, FORBES, too, whom every worth attends,

As

945

As truth fincere, as weeping friendship kind,
Thee, truly generous, and in filence.great,
Thy country feels thro' her reviving arts,
Plann'd by thy wisdom, by thy foul inform'd;
And feldom has fhe known a friend like, thee.
But fee the fading many-colour'd woods,
Shade deepening over fhade, the country round
Imbrown; a crowded umbrage, dusk, and dun, 950
Of every hue, from wan declining green

To footy dark. Thefe, now the lonesome Muse,
Low-whispering, lead into their leaf-ftrown walks,
And give the seafon in its lateft view.

955

960

Meantime, light-fhadowing all, a fober calm Fleeces unbounded ether; whose least wave Stands tremulous, uncertain where to turn The gentle current: while illumin'd wide, The dewy-fkirted clouds imbibe the fun, And thro' their lucid veil his foftened force Shed o'er the peaceful world. Then is the time, For those whom, wisdom and whom Nature charm, To steal themselves from the degenerate croud, And foar above this little scene, of things;.. To tread low-thoughted vice beneath their feet; 965 To foothe the throbbing paffions into peace; And wooe lone Quiet in her filent walks. Thus folitary, and in penfive guife, tam

Oft let me wander o'er the ruffet mead,

And thro' the fadden'd grove, where foarce is heard 970.
One dying ftrain, to chear the woodman's toil. ›i
Haply fome widow'd fongfter pours his plaint,
Far, in faint warblings, thro' the tawny cople.
While congregated thrushes, linnets, larks,

And each wild throat, whose artless strains so late. 975
Swell'd all the mufic of the fwarming fhades,

Robb'd

985

Robb'd of their tuneful fouls, now fhivering fit
On the dead tree, a full defpondent flock;
With not a brightness waving o'er their plumes,
And nought fave chattering difcord in their note. 980
O let not, aim'd from some inhuman eye,
The gun, the music of the coming year
Destroy; and harmless, unsuspecting harm,
Lay the weak tribes, a miferable prey,
In mingled murder, fluttering on the ground!
The pale defcending year, yet pleasing still,
A gentler mood infpires; for now the leaf
Inceffant ruftles from the mournful grove;
Oft startling fuch as, ftudious, walk below,
And flowly circles thro' the waving air.
But should a quicker breeze amid the boughs
Sob, o'er the sky the leafy deluge streams;
Till choak'd, and matted with the dreary shower,
The forest-walks, at every rifing gale,

990

Roll wide the wither'd waste, and whistle bleak. 995
Fled is the blafted verdure of the fields;

And, fhrunk into their beds, the flowery race
Their funny robes refign. Even what reinain'd
Of stronger fruits falls from the naked tree;

And woods, fields, gardens, orchards, all around 1000
The defolated profpect thrills the soul.

He comes! he comes! in every breeze the POWER Of PHILOSOPHIC MELANCHOLY Comes!

His near approach the sudden starting tear, │:
The glowing cheek, the mild dejected air,
The foftened feature, and the beating heart,
Pierc❜d deep with many a virtuous pang, declare.
O'er all the foul his facred influence breathes!
Inflames imagination; thro' the breast
Infufes every tenderness; and far

1005

1. 1010 Beyond

Beyond dim earth exalts the fwelling thought.
Ten thousand thousand fleet ideas, such
As never mingled with the vulgar dream,
Croud faft into the Mind's creative eye.
As faft the correspondent paffions rife,
As varied, and as high: Devotion rais'd
To rapture, and divine astonishment;

The love of Nature unconfin'd, and, chief,
Of human race; the large ambitious wish,

1015

To make them bleft; the figh for fuffering worth, 1020 Loft in obfcurity; the noble fcorn

Of tyrant-pride; the fearlefs great refolve;

The wonder which the dying patriot draws,
Infpiring glory thro' remotest time;

Th' awaken'd throb for virtue, and for fame; 1025
The sympathies of love, and friendship dear;
With all the focial offspring of the heart.

Oh bear me, then, to vaft embowering fhades,
To twilight-groves, and visionary vales;
To weeping grottoes, and prophetic glooms;
Where angel-forms athwart the folemn dusk,
Tremendous sweep, or feem to fweep along;
And voices more than human, thro' the void
Deep-founding, feized th' enthufiaftic ear!

1030

Or is this gloom too much? Then lead, ye powers,

That o'er the garden and the rural feat

1036

Prefide, which shining thro' the chearful land

In countless numbers, blefs'd BRITANNIA fees;

O lead me to the wide-extended walks,

The fair majestic paradife of * STOWE !

1040

Not Perfian Gyrus on Ionia's fhore
E'er faw fuch Gilvan scenes; fuch various art

The feat of Lord Viscount Cobham.

By