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. Even what remain'd
Of stronger fruit 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 sufferingworth
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 th' enthusiastic ear!

Or, is this gloom too much? Then lead, ye powers, 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 th' indignant lightning throws,
And shakes Corruption on her venal throne.
While thus we talk, and through Elysian vales

*The seat of the Lord Viscount Cobham.
+ The temple of Virtue in Stowe Gardens.

Delighted rove, perhaps a sigh escapes:
What pity, Cobham, thou thy verdant files
Of order'd trees shouldst here inglorious range,
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 ardour, and thy veteran skill.

The western sun withdraws the shorten'd day;
And humid evening, gilding o'er the sky,
In her chill progress, to the ground condens'd
The vapours 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,
Shews 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 his 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,
Fainting, permits the starry fires to burn
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 commixt, 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: even 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 decoyed 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 time,
Sent by the better genius of the night,
Innoxious, gleaming on the horse's main,
The meteor sits; and shews 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 mountain 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,
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, used 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?