While the cock, with lively din, Scatters the rear of darkness thin, And to the stack, or the barn-door, Stoutly struts his dames before:
Sometime walking, not unseen, By hedgerow elms, on hillocks green, Right against the eastern gate Where the great sun begins his state, Robed in flames, and amber light, The clouds in thousand liveries dight; While the ploughman, near at hand, Whistles o'er the furrow'd land, And the milkmaid singeth blithe, And the mower whets his scythe, And every shepherd tells his tale, Under the hawthorn in the dale.
Straight mine eye hath caught new pleasures, Whilst the landscape round it measures;
Russet lawns, and fallows gray,
Where the nibbling flocks do stray; Mountains, on whose barren breast The laboring clouds do often rest; Meadows trim, with daisies pied, Shallow brooks, and rivers wide; Towers and battlements it sees Bosom'd high in tufted trees, Where, perhaps, some beauty lies, The cynosure of neighboring eyes. Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes From betwixt two aged oaks, Where Corydon and Thyrsis met, Are at their savory dinner set
Of herbs, and other country messes, Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses; And then in haste her bower she leaves, With Thestylis to bind the sheaves; Or, if the earlier season lead, To the tann'd haycock in the mead. Sometimes, with secure delight, The upland hamlets will invite, When the merry bells ring round, And the jocund rebecks sound To many a youth and many a maid Dancing in the checker'd shade;
And young and old come forth to play On a sunshine holiday,
Till the live-long daylight fail:
Tower'd cities please us then,
And the busy hum of men,
Where throngs of knights and barons bold, In weeds of peace, high triumphs hold, With store of ladies, whose bright eyes Rain influence, and judge the prize Of wit or arms, while both contend To win her grace whom all commend. There let Hymen oft appear
In saffron robe, with taper clear, And pomp, and feast, and revelry, With mask and antique pageantry; Such sights as youthful poets dream On summer eves by haunted stream. Then to the well-trod stage anon, If Jonson's learned sock be on,
Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy's child,
Warble his native wood-notes wild.
And ever, against eating cares, Lap me in soft Lydian airs, Married to immortal verse,
Such as the meeting soul may pierce, In notes, with many a winding bout Of linked sweetness long drawn out, With wanton heed and giddy cunning, The melting voice through mazes running, Untwisting all the chains that tie
The hidden soul of harmony;
That Orpheus' self may heave his head, From golden slumber on a bed
Of heap'd Elysian flowers, and hear Such strains as would have won the ear
Of Pluto, to have quite set free His half-regain'd Eurydice. These delights if thou canst give,
Mirth, with thee I mean to live.
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