Are annual made? what nations come and go? And how the living clouds on clouds arise? Infinite wings! till all the plume-dark air And rude resounding shore are one wild cry. Here the plain harmless native his small flock, And herd diminutive of many hues, Tends on the little island's verdant swell, The shepherd's sea-girt reign; or, to the rocks Dire-clinging, gathers his ovarious food; Or sweeps the fishy shore; or treasures up The plumage, rising full, to form the bed Of luxury. And here awhile the Muse, High hovering o'er the broad cerulean scene, Sees Caledonia, in romantic view: Her airy mountains, from the waving main, Invested with a keen diffusive sky, Breathing the soul acute; her forests huge, Incult, robust, and tall, by Nature's hand Planted of old; her azure lakes between, Pour'd out extensive, and of watery wealth Full; winding deep, and green, her fertile vales; With many a cool translucent brimming flood Wash'd lovely from the Tweed (pure parent stream, Whose pastoral banks first heard my Doric reed, With sylvan Jed, thy tributary brook) To where the north-inflated tempest foams O'er Orca's or Betubium's highest peak: Nurse of a people, in misfortune's school Train'd up to hardy deeds; soon visited By Learning, when before the Gothic rage She took her western flight. A manly race, Of unsubmitting spirit, wise, and brave; Who still through bleeding ages struggled 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 Has flow'd profuse, their piercing genius plann'd And swell'd the pomp of peace their faithful toil, As from their own clear north, in radiant streams, Bright over Europe bursts the Boreal morn.
Oh, is there not some patriot, in whose power That best, that godlike luxury is plac'd, Of blessing thousands, thousands yet unborn, Through late posterity? some, large of soul, To cheer dejected industry? to give A double harvest to the pining swain? And teach the laboring hind the sweets of toil? How, by the finest art, the native robe 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 passive, while Batavian fleets Defraud us of the glittering finny swarms, That heave our friths, and crowd upon our shores; How all-enlivening trade to rouse, and wing The prosperous sail, from every growing port, Uninjur'd, round the sea-encircled globe; And thus, in soul united as in name, Bid Britain reign the mistress of the deep? Yes, there are such. And full on thee, Argyll, 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, sees Her every virtue, every grace combin'd, Her genius, wisdom, her engaging turn, Her pride of honor, and her courage tried,
Calm, and intrepid, in the very throat
Of sulphurous war, on Tenier's dreadful field. Nor less the palm of peace inwreathes thy brow: For, powerful as thy sword, from thy rich tongue Persuasion flows, and wins the high debate; While mix'd in thee combine the charm of youth, The force of manhood, and the depth of age. Thee, Forbes, too, whom every worth attends, As truth sincere, as weeping friendship kind, Thee, truly generous, and in silence great, Thy country feels through her reviving arts, Plann'd by thy wisdom, by thy soul inform'd; And seldom has she known a friend like thee. But see the fading many-color'd woods, Shade deepening over shade, the country round Imbrown; a crowded umbrage, dusk, and dun, Of every hue, from wan-declining green To sooty dark. These now the lonesome Muse, Low-whispering, lead into their leaf-strown walks, And give the season in its latest view.
Meantime, light shadowing all, a sober calm Fleeces unbounded ether; whose least wave Stands tremulous, uncertain where to turn The gentle current: while illumin'd wide, The dewy-skirted clouds imbibe the Sun, And through their lucid vale his soften'd 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 crowd, And soar above this little scene of things; To tread low-thoughted Vice beneath their feet; To soothe the throbbing passions into peace; And woo lone Quiet in her silent walks. Thus solitary, and in pensive guise, Oft let me wander o'er the russet mead, And through the sadden'd grove, where scarce is heard One dying strain, to cheer the woodman's toil. Haply some widow'd songster pours his plaint, Far, in faint warblings, through the tawny copse; While congregated thrushes, linnets, larks, And each wild throat, whose artless strains so late Swell'd all the music of the swarming shades, Robb'd of their tuneful souls, now shivering sit On the dead tree, a dull despondent flock; With not a brightness waving o'er their plumes, And nought save chattering discord in their note. 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 miserable prey, In mingled murder, fluttering on the ground!
The pale descending year, yet pleasing still, A gentler mood inspires; for now the leaf Incessant rustles from the mournful grove, Oft startling such as, studious, walk below, And slowly circles through the waving air. But should a quicker breeze amid the boughs Sob, o'er the sky the leafy deluge streams; Till, chok'd and matted with the dreary shower, The forest-walks, at every rising gale, Roll wide the wither'd waste, and whistle bleak Fled is the blasted verdure of the fields; And, shrunk into their beds, the flowery race Their sunny robes resign. Ev'n what remain'd Of stronger fruits falls from the naked tree; And woods, fields, gardens, orchards, all around The desolated prospect 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 soften'd feature, and the beating heart, Pierc'd deep with many a virtuous pang, declare. O'er all the soul his sacred influence breathes! Inflames imagination; through the breast Infuses every tenderness; and far Beyond dim Earth exalts the swelling thought. Ten thousand thousand fleet ideas, such As never mingled with the vulgar dream, Crowd fast into the mind's creative eye. As fast the correspondent passions rise, 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,
To make them blest; the sigh for suffering worth Lost in obscurity; the noble scorn
Of tyrant-pride; the fearless great resolve; The wonder which the dying patriot draws, Inspiring glory through remotest time; Th' awaken'd throb for virtue, and for fame; The sympathies of love, and friendship dear; With all the social offspring of the heart.
Oh, bear me then to vast embowering shades, To twilight groves, and visionary vales; To weeping grottoes, and prophetic glooms; Where angel forms athwart the solemn dusk Tremendous sweep, or seem to sweep along; And voices more than human, through the void Deep-sounding, seize the enthusiastic ear!
Instead of squadrons flaming o'er the field, And long-embattled hosts! when the proud foe, The faithless vain disturber of mankind, Insulting Gaul, has rous'd the world to war; When keen, once more, within their bounds to press Those polish'd robbers, those ambitious slaves, The British youth would hail thy wise command, Thy temper'd ardor, and thy veteran skill.
The western Sun withdraws the shorten'd day; And humid Evening, gliding o'er the sky, In her chill progress, to the ground condens'd The vapor throws. Where creeping waters ooze, Where marshes stagnate, and where rivers wind, Cluster the rolling fogs, and swim along
The dusky-mantled lawn. Meanwhile the Moon, Full-orb'd, and breaking through the scatter'd clouds, Shows her broad visage in the crimson'd east. Turn'd to the Sun direct, her spotted disk, Where mountains rise, umbrageous dales descend, And caverns deep, as optic tube descries, A smaller Earth, gives us his blaze again, Void of its flame, and sheds a softer day. Now through the passing cloud she seems to stoop, Now up the pure cerulean rides sublime. Wide the pale deluge floats, and streaming mild O'er the sky'd mountain to the shadowy vale, While rocks and floods reflect the quivering gleam, The whole air whitens with a boundless tide Of silver radiance, trembling round the world. But when half-blotted from the sky, her light,
Or is this gloom too much? Then lead, ye powers, Fainting, permits the starry fires to burn That o'er the garden and the rural seat
Preside, which shining through the cheerful land In countless numbers blest Britannia sees; O, lead me to the wide-extended walks, The fair majestic paradise of Stowe!* Not Persian Cyrus on Ionia's shore
E'er saw such sylvan scenes; such various art By genius fir'd, such ardent genius tam'd By cool judicious art; that, in the strife, All-beauteous Nature fears to be outdone. And there, O Pitt, thy country's early boast, There let me sit beneath the shelter'd slopes, Or in that templet where, in future times, Thou well shalt merit a distinguish'd name; And, with thy converse blest, catch the last smiles Of Autumn beaming o'er the yellow woods. While there with thee th' enchanted round I walk The regulated wild, gay Fancy then
Will tread in thought the groves of Attic land; Will from thy standard taste refine her own, Correct her pencil to the purest truth Of Nature, or, the unimpassion'd shades Forsaking, raise it to the human mind. Or if hereafter she, with juster hand,
Shall draw the tragic scene, instruct her thou, To mark the varied movements of the heart, What every decent character requires, And every passion speaks: O, through her strain Breathe thy pathetic eloquence! that moulds Th' attentive senate, charms, persuades, exalts, Of honest zeal the indignant lightning throws, And shakes Corruption on her venal throne. While thus we talk, and through Elysian vales Delighted rove, perhaps a sigh escapes; What pity, Cobham, thou thy verdant files Of order'd trees shouldst here inglorious range,
* The seat of the Lord Viscount Cobham. The temple of Virtue in Stowe.gardens.
With keener lustre through the depth of Heaven; Or near extinct her deaden'd orb appears, And scarce appears, of sickly beamless white; Oft in this season, silent from the north A blaze of meteors shoots; ensweeping first The lower skies, they all at once converge High to the crown of Heaven, and all at once Relapsing quick, as quickly reascend, And mix, and thwart, extinguish, and renew, All ether coursing in a maze of light.
From look to look, contagious through the crowd The panic runs, and into wondrous shapes Th' appearance throws: armies in meet array, Throng'd with aërial spears and steeds of fire Till the long lines of full-extended war In bleeding fight commix'd, the sanguine flood Rolls a broad slaughter o'er the plains of Heaven. As thus they scan the visionary scene, On all sides swells the superstitious din, Incontinent; and busy Frenzy talks Of blood and battle; cities overturn'd, And late at night in swallowing earthquake sunk, Or hideous wrapt in fierce ascending flame; Of sallow famine, inundation, storm;
Of pestilence, and every great distress ; Empires subvers'd, when ruling Fate has struck Th' unalterable hour: ev'n Nature's self Is deem'd to totter on the brink of time. Not so the man of philosophic eye, And inspect sage; the waving brightness he Curious surveys, inquisitive to know The causes, and materials, yet unfix'd, Of this appearance beautiful and new.
Now black, and deep, the night begins to fall, A shade immense. Sunk in the quenching gloom, Magnificent and vast, are Heaven and Earth. Order confounded lies; all beauty void; Distinction lost; and gay variety
One universal blot: such the fair power Of light, to kindle and create the whole. Drear is the state of the benighted wretch, Who then, bewilder'd, wanders through the dark, Full of pale fancies, and chimeras huge; Nor visited by one directive ray, From cottage streaming, or from airy hall. Perhaps, impatient as he stumbles on, Struck from the root of slimy rushes, blue, The wild-fire scatters round, or gather'd trails A length of flame deceitful o'er the moss: Whither decoy'd by the fantastic blaze, Now lost, and now renew'd, he sinks absorpt, Rider and horse, amid the miry gulf: While still, from day to day, his pining wife And plaintive children his return await, In wild conjecture lost. At other times, Sent by the better genius of the night, Innoxious, gleaming on the horse's mane, The meteor sits; and shows the narrow path, That winding leads through pits of death, or else Instructs him how to take the dangerous ford.
The lengthen'd night elaps'd, the Morning shines Serene, in all her dewy beauty bright, Unfolding fair the last autumnal day. And now the mounting Sun dispels the fog; The rigid hoar-frost melts before his beam; And hung on every spray, on every blade Of grass, the myriad dew-drops twinkle round.
Ah, see, where robb'd, and murder'd, in that pit Lies the still heaving hive! at evening snatch'd, Beneath the cloud of guilt-concealing night, And fix'd o'er sulphur: while, not dreaming ill, The happy people, in their waxen cells, Sat tending public cares, and planning schemes Of temperance, for Winter poor; rejoic'd To mark, full-flowing round, their copious stores. Sudden the dark oppressive steam ascends; And, us'd to milder scents, the tender race, By thousands, tumble from their honied domes, Convolv'd, and agonizing in the dust. And was it then for this you roam'd the Spring, Intent from flower to flower? for this you toil'd Ceaseless the burning Summer-heats away? For this in Autumn search'd the blooming waste, Nor lost one sunny gleam? for this sad fate? O, man! tyrannic lord! how long, how long, Shall prostrate Nature groan beneath your rage, Awaiting renovation? When oblig'd, Must you destroy? Of their ambrosial food Can you not borrow; and, in just return, Afford them shelter from the wintry winds? Or, as the sharp year pinches, with their own Again regale them on some smiling day? See where the stony bottom of their town Looks desolate, and wild; with here and there A helpless number, who the ruin'd state Survive, lamenting weak, cast out to death. Thus a proud city, populous and rich, Full of the works of peace, and high in joy, At theatre or feast, or sunk in sleep, (As late, Palermo, was thy fate!) is seiz'd By some dread earthquake, and convulsive hurl'd Sheer from the black foundation, stench-involv'd, Into a gulf of blue sulphureous flame.
Hence every harsher sight! for now the day, O'er Heaven and Earth diffus'd, grows warm, and high,
Infinite splendor! wide investing all.
How still the breeze! save what the filmy threads
Of dew evaporate brushes from the plain. How clear the cloudless sky! how deeply ting'd With a peculiar blue! th' ethereal arch How swell'd immense! amid whose azure thron'd The radiant Sun how gay! how calm below The gilded Earth! the harvest-treasures all Now gather'd in, beyond the rage of storms, Sure to the swain; the circling fence shut up; And instant Winter's utmost rage defied. While, loose to festive joy, the country round Laughs with the loud sincerity of mirth,
Shook to the wind their cares. The toil-strung youth, By the quick sense of music taught alone, Leaps wildly graceful in the lively dance. Her every charm abroad, the village toast, Young, buxom, warm, in native beauty rich, Darts not unmeaning looks; and, where her eye Points an approving smile, with double force The cudgel rattles, and the wrestler twines. Age, too, shines out; and, garrulous, recounts The feats of youth. Thus they rejoice; nor think That, with to-morrow's Sun, their annual toil Begins again the never-ceasing round.
Oh, knew he but his happiness, of men The happiest he! who, far from public rage, Deep in the vale, with a choice few retir'd, Drinks the pure pleasures of the rural life. What though the dome be wanting, whose proud gate, Each morning, vomits out the sneaking crowd
Of flatterers false, and in their turn abus'd? Vile intercourse! What though the glittering robe, Of every hue reflected light can give,
Or floating loose, or stiff with massy gold, The pride and gaze of fools! oppress him not? What though, from utmost land and sea purvey'd, For him each rarer tributary life
Bleeds not, and his insatiate table heaps With luxury and death? What though his bowl Flames not with costly juice: nor sunk in beds, Oft of gay care, he tosses out the night, Or melts the thoughtless hours in idle state? What though he knows not those fantastic joys, That still amuse the wanton, still deceive; A face of pleasure, but a heart of pain; Their hollow moments undelighted all? Sure peace is his; a solid life, estrang'd To disappointment, and fallacious hope: Rich in content, in Nature's bounty rich, In herbs and fruits; whatever greens the Spring, When Heaven descends in showers; or bends the
When Summer reddens, and when Autumn beams; Or in the wintry glebe whatever lies
Conceal'd, and fattens with the richest sap: These are not wanting; nor the milky drove, Luxuriant, spread o'er all the lowing vale; Nor bleating mountains; nor the chide of streams. And hum of bees, inviting sleep sincere Into the guiltless breast, beneath the shade, Or thrown at large amid the fragrant hay; Nor aught besides of prospect, grove, or song, Dim grottoes, gleaming lakes, and fountains clear. Here, too, dwells simple truth; plain innocence; Unsullied beauty; sound unbroken youth, Patient of labor, with a little pleas'd; Health ever blooming; unambitious toil; Calm contemplation, and poetic ease.
Let others brave the flood in quest of gain, And beat, for joyless months, the gloomy wave: Let such as deem it glory to destroy,
Rush into blood, the sack of cities seek; Unpierc'd, exulting in the widow's wail, The virgin's shriek, and infant's trembling cry. Let some, far distant from their native soil, Urg'd or by want or harden'd avarice, Find other lands beneath another Sun. Let this through cities work his eager way, By regal outrage and establish'd guile, The social sense extinct; and that ferment Mad into tumult the seditious herd,
Or melt them down to slavery. Let these Insnare the wretched in the toils of law, Fomenting discord, and perplexing right, An iron race! and those of fairer front, But equal inhumanity, in courts, Delusive pomp, and dark cabals delight; Wreathe the deep bow, diffuse the lying smile, And tread the weary labyrinth of state. While he, from all the stormy passions free That restless men involve, hears, and but hears, At distance safe, the human tempest roar, Wrapt close in conscious peace. The fall of kings, The rage of nations, and the crush of states, Move not the man, who, from the world escap'd, In still retreats, and flowery solitudes,
To Nature's voice attends, from month to month, And day to day, through the revolving year; Admiring sees her in her every shape; Feels all her sweet emotions at his heart; Takes what she liberal gives, nor thinks of more. He, when young Spring protrudes the bursting
Marks the first bud, and sucks the healthful gale Into his freshen'd soul; her genial hours He full enjoys; and not a beauty blows, And not an opening blossom breathes in vain. In Summer he, beneath the living shade, Such as o'er frigid Tempé wont to wave, Or Hemus cool, reads what the Muse, of these, Perhaps, has in immortal numbers sung;
Or what she dictates writes: and oft, an eye Shot round, rejoices in the vigorous year. When Autumn's yellow lustre gilds the world, And tempts the sickled swain into the field, Seiz'd by the general joy, his heart distends With gentle throes; and through the tepid gleams Deep musing, then he best exerts his song. E'en Winter, mild to him, is full of bliss. The mighty tempest, and the hoary waste, Abrupt, and deep, stretch'd o'er the buried earth, Awake to solemn thought. At night the skies, Disclos'd, and kindled, by refining frost,
Pour every lustre on th' exalted eye.
A friend, a book, the stealing hours secure,
Led by primeval ages, uncorrupt,
When angels dwelt, and God himself, with man! Oh, Nature! all-sufficient! over all! Enrich me with the knowledge of thy works! Snatch me to Heaven; thy rolling wonder there, World beyond world, in infinite extent, Profusely scatter'd o'er the blue immense, Show me; their motions, periods, and their laws, Give me to scan; through the disclosing deep Light my blind way; the mineral strata there; Thrust, blooming, thence the vegetable world; O'er that the rising system, more complex, Of animals; and higher still, the mind, The varied scene of quick-compounded thought, And where the mixing passions endless shift; These ever open to my ravish'd eye;
A search, the flight of time can ne'er exhaust! But if to that unequal; if the blood, In sluggish streams about my heart, forbid That best ambition; under closing shades, Inglorious, lay me by the lowly brook, And whisper to my dreams. From thee begin, Dwell all on thee, with thee conclude my song; And let me never, never stray from thee!
The subject proposed. Address to the Earl of Wil
mington. First approach of Winter. According to the natural course of the Season, various storms described. Rain. Wind. Snow. The driving of the snows: a man perishing among them; whence reflections on the wants and miseries of human life. The wolves descending from the Alps and Apennines. A winter evening described as spent by philosophers; by the country people; in the city. Frost. A view of Winter within the polar circle. A thaw. The whole concluding with moral reflections on a future state.
SEE, Winter comes, to rule the varied year, Sullen and sad, with all his rising train, Vapors, and clouds, and storms. Be these my theme! These! that exalt the soul to solemn thought, And heavenly musing. Welcome, kindred glooms! Congenial horrors, hail! with frequent foot, Pleas'd have I, in my cheerful morn of life When nurs'd by careless solitude I liv'd, And sung of Nature with unceasing joy, Pleas'd have I wander'd through your rough domain;
And mark them down for wisdom. With swift wing, Trod the pure virgin-snows, myself as pure;
O'er land and sea imagination roams; Or truth, divinely breaking on his mind, Elates his being, and unfolds his powers; Or in his breast heroic virtue burns. The touch of kindred too and love he feels; The modest eye, whose beams on his alone Ecstatic shine; the little strong embrace Of prattling children, twin'd around his neck, And emulous to please him, calling forth The fond paternal soul. Nor purpose gay, Amusement, dance, or song, he sternly scorns; For happiness and true philosophy Are of the social still, and smiling kind. This is the life which those who fret in guilt, And guilty cities, never knew; the life,
Heard the winds roar, and the big torrent burst; Or seen the deep fermenting tempest brew'd In the grim evening sky. Thus pass'd the time, Till through the lucid chambers of the south Look'd out the joyous Spring, look'd out, and smil'd. To thee, the patron of her first essay, The Muse, O Wilmington! renews her song. Since has she rounded the revolving year: Skimm'd the gay Spring; on eagle-pinions borne, Attempted through the Summer-blaze to rise; Then swept o'er Autumn with the shadowy gale, And now among the Wintry clouds again, Roll'd in the doubling storm, she tries to soar; To swell her note with all the rushing winds, To suit her sounding cadence to the floods;
As is her theme, her numbers wildly great: Thrice-happy! could she fill thy judging ear With bold description, and with manly thought. Nor art thou skill'd in awful schemes alone, And how to make a mighty people thrive: But equal goodness, sound integrity, A firm, unshaken, uncorrupted soul Amid a sliding age, and burning strong, Not vainly blazing for thy country's weal, A steady spirit regularly free;
These, each exalting each, the statesman light Into the patriot; these, the public hope And eye to thee converting, bid the Muse Record what envy dares not flattery call.
Now when the cheerless empire of the sky To Capricorn the Centaur Archer yields, And fierce Aquarius stains th' inverted year; Hung o'er the farthest verge of Heaven, the Sun Scarce spreads through ether the dejected day. Faint are his gleams, and ineffectual shoot His struggling rays, in horizontal lines,
Through the thick air; as, cloth'd in cloudy storm, Weak, wan, and broad, he skirts the southern sky; And, soon descending, to the long dark night, Wide-shading all, the prostrate world resigns. Nor is the night unwish'd; while vital heat, Light, life, and joy, the dubious day forsake. Meantime, in sable cincture, shadows vast, Deep-ting'd and damp, and congregated clouds, And all the vapory turbulence of Heaven, Involve the face of things. Thus Winter falls A heavy gloom oppressive o'er the world, Through Nature shedding influence malign, And rouses up the seeds of dark disease. The soul of man dies in him, lothing life, And black with inore than melancholy views. The cattle droop; and o'er the furrow'd land, Fresh from the plow, the dun discolor'd flocks, Untended spreading, crop the wholesome root. Along the woods, along the moorish fens, Sighs the sad Genius of the coming storm; And up among the loose disjointed cliffs, And fractur'd mountains wild, the brawling brook And cave, presageful, send a hollow moan, Resounding long in listening Fancy's ear.
Then comes the father of the tempest forth, Wrapt in black glooms. First joyless rains obscure Drive through the mingling skies with vapor foul; Dash on the mountain's brow, and shake the woods, That grumbling wave below. Th' unsightly plain Lies a brown deluge, as the low-bent clouds Pour flood on flood, yet unexhausted still Combine, and deepening into night, shut up The day's fair face. The wanderers of Heaven, Each to his home, retire; save those that love To take their pastime in the troubled air, Or skimming flutter round the dimply pool. The cattle from th' untasted fields return, And ask, with meaning low, their wonted stalls, Or ruminate in the contiguous shade. Thither the household feathery people crowd, The crested cock, with all his female train, Pensive, and dripping; while the cottage hind Hangs o'er th' enlivening blaze, and taleful there Recounts his simple frolic: much he talks,
Resistless, roaring, dreadful, down it comes, From the rude mountain, and the mossy wild, Tumbling through rocks abrupt, and sounding far; Then o'er the sanded valley floating spreads, Calm, sluggish, silent; till again, constrain'd Between two meeting hills, it bursts away, Where rocks and woods o'erhang the turbid stream There, gathering triple force, rapid and deep,
It boils, and wheels, and foams, and thunders through.
Nature! great parent! whose unceasing hand Rolls round the seasons of the changeful year, How mighty, how majestic, are thy works! With what a pleasing dread they swell the soul! That sees astonish'd! and astonish'd sings! Ye too, ye winds! that now begin to blow, With boisterous sweep, I raise my voice to you. Where are your stores, ye powerful beings! say, Where your aërial magazines reserv'd, To swell the brooding terrors of the storm? In what far-distant region of the sky, Hush'd in deep silence, sleep ye when 'tis calm? When from the pallid sky the Sun descends, With many a spot, that o'er his glaring orb Uncertain wanders, stain'd; red fiery streaks Begin to flush around. The reeling clouds Stagger with dizzy poise, as doubting yet Which master to obey: while rising slow, Blank, in the leaden-color'd east, the Moon Wears a wan circle round her blunted horns. Seen through the turbid fluctuating air, The stars obtuse emit a shiver'd ray; Or frequent seen to shoot athwart the gloom, And long behind them trail the whitening blaze. Snatch'd in short eddies, plays the wither'd leaf; And on the flood the dancing feather floats. With broaden'd nostrils to the sky up-turn'd, The conscious heifer snuffs the stormy gale. Ev'n as the matron, at her nightly task, With pensive labor draws the flaxen thread, The wasted taper and the crackling flame Foretell the blast. But chief the plumy race, The tenants of the sky, its changes speak. Retiring from the downs, where all day long They pick'd their scanty fare, a blackening train Of clamorous rooks thick urge their weary flight, And seek the closing shelter of the grove; Assiduous, in his bower, the wailing owl Plies his sad song. The cormorant on high Wheels from the deep, and screams along the land Loud shrieks the soaring hern; and with wild wing The circling sea-fowl cleave the flaky clouds. Ocean, unequal press'd, with broken tide And blind commotion heaves; while from the shore, Eat into caverns by the restless wave,
And forest-rustling mountains, comes a voice, That solemn sounding bids the world prepare. Then issues forth the storm with sudden burst, And hurls the whole precipitated air, Down, in a torrent. On the passive main Descends th' ethereal force, and with strong gust Turns from its bottom the discolor'd deep. Through the black night that sits immense around, Lash'd into foam, the fierce conflicting brine Seems o'er a thousand raging waves to burn.
And much he laughs, nor recks the storm that blows Meantime the mountain-billows to the clouds Without, and rattles on his humble roof.
Wide o'er the brim, with many a torrent swell'd, And the mix'd ruin of its banks o'erspread, At last the rous'd-up river pours along :
In dreadful tumult swell'd, surge above surge, Burst into chaos with tremendous roar, And anchor'd navies from their stations drive, Wild as the winds across the howling waste
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