ALONG these blushing borders, bright with dew,

And in yon mingled wilderness of flowers, Fair-handed Spring unbosoms every grace; Throws out the snowdrop and the crocus first;

The daisy, primrose, violet darkly blue, And polyanthus of unnumbered dyes; The yellow wallflower, stained with ironbrown,

And lavish stock that scents the garden round;

From the soft wing of vernal breezes shed Anemones; auriculas, enriched

With shining meal o'er all their velvet leaves;

And full ranunculas of glowing red.
Then comes the tulip race, where Beauty
plays

Her idle freaks; from family diffused
To family, as flies the father-dust,

The varied colours run; and, while they break

[marks On the charmed eye, th' exulting florist With secret pride the wonders of his hand. No gradual bloom is wanting; from the bud, [tribes;

Firstborn of Spring, to Summer's musky Nor hyacinths, of purest virgin white, Low bent, and blushing inward; nor jonquils

pinks;

Of potent fragrance; nor Narcissus fair,
As o'er the fabled fountain hanging still;
Nor broad carnations, nor gay-spotted
[damask rose.
Nor, showered from every bush, the
Infinite numbers, delicacies, smells,
With hues on hues expression cannot paint,
The breath of Nature, and her endless
bloom.

SPRING SHOWERS.

[shut up

THE north-east spends his rage; he now
Within his iron cave, the effusive south
Warms the wide air, and o'er the void of
heaven
[distent.
Breathes the big clouds with vernal showers
At first a dusky wreath they seem to rise,
Scarce staining ether; but, by swift degrees,
In heaps on heaps the doubling vapour
sails

Along the loaded sky, and mingling deep,
Sits on the horizon round, a settled gloom:
Not such as wintry storms on mortals shed,
Oppressing life; but lovely, gentle, kind,
And full of every hope and every joy,
The wish of Nature. Gradual sinks the
breeze

Into a perfect calm, that not a breath
Is heard to quiver through the closing
woods,

Or rustling turn the many-twinkling leaves Of aspen tall. The uncurling floods,

diffused

[lapse

In glassy breadth, seem through delusive Forgetful of their course. 'Tis silence all, And pleasing expectation. Herds and flocks

[eye

Drop the dry sprig, and mute-imploring The falling verdure. Hushed in short [oil,

suspense,

The plumy people streak their wings with To throw the lucid moisture trickling off; And wait the approaching sign to strike,

at once,

[vales,

Into the general choir. Even mountains, And forests seem, impatient, to demand The promised sweetness. Man superior

walks

Thus all day long the full-distended clouds [showered earth Indulge their genial stores, and wellIs deep enriched with vegetable life; Till, in the western sky, the downward sun Looks out, effulgent, from amid the flush Of broken clouds, gay shifting to his beam. The rapid radiance instantaneous strikes The illumined mountain, through the forest streams,

Shakes on the floods, and in a yellow mist, Far smoking o'er the interminable plain, In twinkling myriads lights the dewy gems. Moist, bright, and green, the landscape laughs around. [wakes,

Full swell the woods; their every music Mixed in wild concert with the warbling brooks.

springs.

Increased, the distant bleatings of the hills,
And hollow lows responsive from the vales,
Whence, blending all, the sweetened zephyr
[cloud,
Meantime, refracted from yon eastern
Bestriding earth, the grand ethereal bow
Shoots up immense, and every hue unfolds,
In fair proportion running from the red
To where the violet fades into the sky.
Here, awful Newton, the dissolving clouds
Form, fronting on the sun, thy showery
prism;

And to the sage-instructed eye unfold
The various twine of light, by thee disclosed
From the white mingling maze.
Not so
[ment bend,

the boy;
He wondering views the bright enchant-
Delightful, o'er the radiant fields, and runs
To catch the falling glory; but amazed
Beholds the amusive arch before him fly,
Then vanish quite away. Still night

succeeds,

A softened shade, and saturated earth Awaits the morning beam, to give to light, Raised through ten thousand different plastic tubes,

The balmy treasures of the former day.

A WINTER PICTURE.

[gods, THE Redbreast, sacred to the household Wisely regardful of th' embroiling sky, In joyless fields and thorny thickets leaves His shivering mates, and pays to trusted

man

His annual visit. Half afraid, he first Against the window beats; then brisk alights

Joined to the prattle of the purling rills Were heard the lowing herds along the vale, And flocks loud bleating from the distant hills,

And vacant shepherds piping in the dale; And now and then sweet Philomel would wail,

Or stockdoves 'plain amid the forest deep,
That drowsy rustled to the sighing gale;
And still a coil the grasshopper did keep,
Yet all these sounds yblent inclined all
to sleep.

Full in the passage of the vale above,
A sable, silent, solemn forest stood,
Where nought but shadowy forms was
seen to move,

As Idless fancied in her dreaming mood;
And tip the hills, on either side, a wood
Of blackening pines, aye waving to and fro,
Sent forth a sleepy horror through the
blood.

Should reason guide thee with her brightest

ray,

And pour on misty doubt resistless day; Should no false kindness lure to loose delight,

Nor praise relax, nor difficulty fright; Should tempting novelty thy cell refrain, And sloth effuse her opiate fumes in vain; Should beauty blunt on fops her fatal dart, Nor claim the triumph of a lettered heart; Should no disease thy torpid veins invade, Nor melancholy's phantom haunt thy shade;

Yet hope not life from grief or danger free,
Nor think the doom of man reversed for
thee:
[eyes,

Deign on the passing world to turn thine
And pause a while from learning, to be wise:
There mark what ills the scholar's life assail,
Toil, envy, want, the patron, and the jail.
See nations slowly wise, and, meanly just,
To buried merit raise the tardy bust.
If dreams yet flatter, once again attend,
Hear Lydiat's life, and Galileo's end.

Nor deem, when Learning her last prize bestows,

The glittering eminence exempt from foes; See when the vulgar 'scapes, despised or awed,

Rebellion's vengeful talons seize on Laud; From meaner minds though smaller fines

content,

The plundered palace or sequestered rent, Marked out by dangerous parts he meets the shock,

And fatal learning leads him to the block: Around his tomb let art and genius weep, But hear his death, ye blockheads, hear and sleep.

SHAKESPEARE AND BEN JONSON.

WHEN Learning's triumph o'er her barbarous foes, [speare rose.

First reared the stage, immortal ShakeEach change of many-coloured life he drew, Exhausted worlds, and then imagined new; Existence saw him spurn her bounded reign, And panting Time toiled after him in vain ; His powerful strokes presiding Truth impressed,

And unresisted Passion stormed the breast. Then Jonson came, instructed from the school

To please in method, and invent by rule,

THE MELODIES OF MORNING. BUT who the melodies of morn can tell? The wild brook babbling down the mountain side; [bell;

The lowing herd; the sheepfold's simple The pipe of early shepherd dim descried In the lone valley; echoing far and wide The clamorous horn along the cliffs above; The hollow murmur of the ocean tide; The hum of becs, the linnet's lay of love, And the full choir that wakes the universal grove.

The cottage curs at early pilgrim bark; Crowned with her pail the tripping milk

maid sings;