ON RURAL SOLITUDE. WHEN wandering, thoughtful, my stray steps at eve Half wearied with the long and lonesome walk, And felt strange sadness steal upon the heart, And unaccountable. And sounds spake all of peacefulness and home; The lazy mastiff, who my coming eyed, Half balancing 'twixt fondness and distrust, Recall'd some images, now half forgot, Of the warın hearth at eve, when flocks are penn'd And as the twilight's peaceful hour clos'd in, Have brought a busy train of hov'ring thoughts In younger days, and happier times perform❜d. And that old mulberry that shades the court, Has been my joy from very childhood up. In hollow music, sighing through the glade, As with lone tread along the whisp❜ring grove When by the huddling brooklet's secret brim When by the poet's sacred urns I kneel, And rapture springs exultant to my reed, The pæan dies, and sadder measures steal, And grief and Montague demand the meed. THOU mongrel, who dost show thy teeth, and yelp, I, a Laconian dog, can bite again : Much more a bragging, foul-mouthed whelp like thee. Beware Lycambes,' or Bupalus' fate The wicked still shall meet my deadly hate; And know, when once I seize upon my prey, I do not languidly my wrongs bemoan; I do not whine and cant the time away, But, with revengeful gripe, I bite him to the bone. ODE TO THE MORNING STAR. MANY invoke pale Hesper's pensive sway, From the safe folded flock. But me, bright harbinger of coming day, Let the poor silken sons of slothful pride Press now their downy couch in languid ease, Flit o'er their troubled brain. Be mine to view; awake to nature's charms, Thy paly flame evanish from the sky, As gradual day usurps The welkin's glowing bounds. |