AROUND th' adjoining brook, that purls along
The vocal grove, now fretting o'er a rock,
Now scarcely moving through a reedy pool,
Now starting to a sudden stream, and now
Gently diffused into a limpid plain,

A various group the herds and flocks compose,
Rural confusion! On the grassy bank
Some ruminating lie; while others stand.

Half in the flood, and often bending sip

The circling surface. In the middle droops

The strong laborious ox, of honest front,

Which incomposed he shakes; and from his sides
The troublous insects lashes with his tail,

Returning still. Amid his subjects safe,

Slumbers the monarch-swain, his careless arm

Thrown round his head, on downy moss sustain'd:
Here laid his scrip, with wholesome viands fill'd;
There, listening every noise, his watchful dog.

Thomson.

THE SHEPHERD.

H! gentle Shepherd! thine the lot to tend,
Of all that feels distress, the most assail'd,
Feeble, defenceless: lenient be thy care:
But spread around thy tenderest diligence

In flowery spring-time, when the new-dropp'd lamb,
Tottering with weakness by his mother's side,
Feels the fresh world about him; and each thorn,
Hillock, or furrow, trips his feeble feet:

Oh, guard his meek sweet innocence from all
Th' innumerous ills that rush around his life;
Mark the quick kite, with beak and talons prone,
Circling the skies to snatch him from the plain;
Observe the lurking crows; beware the brake,-
There the sly fox the careless minute waits;
Nor trust thy neighbour's dog, nor earth, nor sky:
Thy bosom to a thousand cares divide:
Eurus oft flings his hail; the tardy fields
Pay not their promis'd food; and oft the dam
O'er her weak twins with empty udder mourns,
Or fails to guard, when the bold bird of prey
Alights, and hops in many turns around,
And tires her also turning: to her aid
Be nimble, and the weakest in thine arms.
Gently convey to the warm cot, and oft,
Between the lark's note and the nightingale's,
His hungry bleating still with tepid milk ;-
In this soft office may thy children join,
And charitable actions learn in sport.
Nor yield him to himself, ere vernal airs
Sprinkle the little croft with daisy flowers :
Nor yet forget him: life has rising ills.

Dyer.