[From The Seasons.] PURE AND HAPPY LOVE. BUT happy they! the happiest of their kind! Whom gentler stars unite, and in one fate Their hearts, their fortunes, and their beings blend. 'Tis not the coarser tie of human laws, Unnatural oft, and foreign to the mind, That binds their peace, but harmony itself, Attuning all their passions into love; Where Friendship full-exerts her softest power, Perfect esteem enlivened by desire Ineffable, and sympathy of soul; Thought meeting thought, and will preventing will, With boundless confidence: nought but love [From The Seasons.] THE TEMPEST. UNUSUAL darkness broods; and growing, gains The full possession of the sky, surcharged With wrathful vapor, from the secret beds, Where sleep the mineral generations, drawn. Thence nitre, sulphur, and the fiery spume Of fat bitumen, steaming on the day, With various-tinctured trains of latent flame, Pollute the sky, and in yon baleful cloud, A reddening gloom, a magazine of fate, Ferment; till, by the touch ethereal roused, for Can answer love, and render bliss Of fighting winds, while all is calm They furious spring. A boding silence reigns, Dread through the dun expanse; save the dull sound That from the mountain, previous to the storm, Rolls o'er the muttering earth, disturbs the flood, And shakes the forest-leaf without a breath. Prone, to the lowest vale, the aërial tribes Descend: the tempest-loving raven scarce Dares wing the dubious dusk. In rueful gaze The cattle stand, and on the scowling heavens Cast a deploring eye; by man forsook, Who to the crowded cottage hies him fast, Or seeks the shelter of the downward cave. 'Tis listening fear, and dumb amazement all: When to the startled eye the sudden glance Appears far south, eruptive through the cloud; And following slower, in explosion vast, The thunder raises his tremendous voice. At first, heard solemn o'er the verge of heaven, The tempest growls; but as it nearer comes, And rolls its awful burden on the wind, The lightnings flash a larger curve, and more The noise astounds: till overhead a sheet Of livid flame discloses wide, then shuts, And opens wider; shuts and opens still Expansive, wrapping ether in a blaze. Follows the loosened aggravated roar, Enlarging, deepening, mingling, peal on peal Crushed horrible, convulsing heaven and earth. A calm of plenty! till the ruffled air Falls from its poise, and gives the breeze to blow. Rent is the fleecy mantle of the sky; The clouds fly different; and the sudden sun By fits effulgent gilds the illumined field, And black by fits the shadows sweep along. A gaily-chequered heart-expanding view, Far as the circling eye can shoot around, Unbounded tossing in a flood of corn. These are thy blessings, industry! rough power! Whom labor still attends, and sweat, and pain; Yet the kind source of every gentle art, And all the soft civility of life. [From The Seasons.] BIRDS, AND THEIR LOVES. WHEN first the soul of love is sent abroad Warm through the vital air, and on the heart Harmonious seizes, the gay troops begin, In gallant thought, to plume the painted wing; And try again the long-forgotten strain, At first faint-warbled. But no sooner grows The soft infusion prevalent, and wide, Than, all alive, at once their joy o'erflows In music unconfined. Upsprings the| lark, Shrill-voiced, and loud, the messenger of morn; Ere yet the shadows fly, he mounted sings Amid the dawning clouds, and from their haunts Calls up the tuneful nations. Every copse Deep-tangled, tree irregular, and bush Of the coy quiristers that lodgewithin, thrush thorny brake; Of new-sprung leaves their modula tions mix Mellifluous. The jay, the rook, the daw, And each harsh pipe, discordant heard alone, Aid the full concert: while the stockdove breathes A melancholy murmur through the whole. 'Tis love creates their melody, and all That even to birds, and beasts, the Hence, the Of mates Pour forth their little souls. First, wide around, With distant awe, in airy rings they rove, Endeavoring by a thousand tricks to catch The cunning, conscious, half-averted glance Of their regardless charmer. Should she seem Softening the least approvance to be stow, Their colors burnish, and by hope inspired, They brisk advance; then, on a sudden struck, Retire disordered; then again approach; In fond rotation spread the spotted wing, And shiver every feather with desire. [From The Seasons.] DEATH AMID THE SNOWS. The mellow bullfinch answers from ALL winter drives along the dark the grove: ened air: Nor are the linnets, o'er the flower-In his own loose revolving fields, the ing furze Poured out profusely, silent. Joined to these Innumerous songsters, in the freshening shade swain Disastered stands; sees other hills ascend. Of unknown joyless brow; and other scenes Of horrid prospect, shag the trackless plain; Nor finds the river, nor the forest, hid Beneath the formless wild; but wanders on From hill to dale, still more and more astray; Impatient flouncing through the drifted heaps, Stung with the thoughts of home; the thoughts of home Rush on his nerves, and call their vigor forth In many a vain attempt. How sinks his soul! What black despair, what horror fills his heart! When for the dusky spot, which fancy feigned His tufted cottage rising through the snow, He meets the roughness of the middle waste, Far from the track and blest abode his mind, Of covered pits, unfathomably deep, A dire descent! beyond the power of frost; Of faithless bogs; of precipices huge, Smoothed up with snow; and, what is land, unknown, What water, of the still unfrozen spring, In the loose marsh or solitary lake, Where the fresh fountain from the bottom boils. These check his fearful steps; and down he sinks, Beneath the shelter of the shapeless drift, Thinking o'er all the bitterness of death; Mixed with the tender anguish na ture shoots Through the wrung bosom of the dying man, displays A manly softened form. The bloom of gods Seems youthful o'er the beardless cheek to wave: His features yet, heroic ardor warms; And sweet subsiding to a native smile, Mixed with the joy elating conquest gives, A scattered frown exalts his matchless air. The Queen of Love arose, as from the deep She sprung in all the melting pomp of charms. Bashful she bends, her well-taught look aside Turns in enchanting guise, where dubious mix |