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(From Windsor Forest)
THE GROVES of Eden, vanished now so long, | |
| Live in description, and look green in song: | |
| These, were my breast inspired with equal flame, | |
| Like them in beauty, should be like in fame. | |
| Here hills and vales, the woodland and the plain, | 5 |
| Here earth and water, seem to strive again; | |
| Not chaos-like together crushed and bruised, | |
| But, as the world, harmoniously confused: | |
| Where order in variety we see, | |
| And where, though all things differ, all agree. | 10 |
| Here waving groves a checkered scene display, | |
| And part admit and part exclude the day; | |
| As some coy nymph her lover’s warm address | |
| Nor quite indulges, nor can quite repress. | |
| There, interspersed in lawns and opening glades, | 15 |
| Thin trees arise that shun each other’s shades. | |
| Here in full light the russet plains extend; | |
| There, wrapt in clouds, the bluish hills ascend. | |
| Even the wild heath displays her purple dyes, | |
| And, midst the desert, fruitful fields arise, | 20 |
| That, crowned with tufted trees and springing corn, | |
| Like verdant isles the sable waste adorn. | |
| Let India boast her plants, nor envy we | |
| The weeping amber or the balmy tree, | |
| While by our oaks the precious loads are born, | 25 |
| And realms commanded which those trees adorn. | |
| Nor proud Olympus yields a nobler sight, | |
| Though gods assembled grace his towering height, | |
| Than what more humble mountains offer here, | |
| Where, in their blessings, all those gods appear. | 30 |
| See Pan with flocks, with fruits Pomona crowned; | |
| Here blushing Flora paints the enamelled ground; | |
| Here Ceres’ gifts in waving prospect stand, | |
| And, nodding, tempt the joyful reaper’s hand; | |
| Rich Industry sits smiling on the plains, | 35 |
| And peace and plenty tell, a Stuart reigns. * * * * * | |
| See! from the brake the whirring pheasant springs, | |
| And mounts exulting on triumphant wings: | |
| Short is his joy; he feels the fiery wound, | |
| Flutters in blood, and, panting, beats the ground. | 40 |
| Ah! what avail his glossy, varying dyes, | |
| His purple crest, and scarlet-circled eyes, | |
| The vivid green his shining plumes unfold, | |
| His painted wings, and breast that flames with gold? | |
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| Nor yet, when moist Arcturus clouds the sky, | 45 |
| The woods and fields their pleasing toils deny. | |
| To plains with well-breathed beagles we repair, | |
| And trace the mazes of the circling hare | |
| (Beasts, urged by us, their fellow-beasts pursue, | |
| And learn of man each other to undo). | 50 |
| With slaughtering guns the unwearied fowler roves, | |
| When frosts have whitened all the naked groves; | |
| Where doves in flocks the leafless trees o’ershade, | |
| And lonely woodcocks haunt the watery glade. | |
| He lifts the tube, and levels with his eye; | 55 |
| Strait a short thunder breaks the frozen sky: | |
| Oft, as in airy rings they skim the heath, | |
| The clamorous lapwings feel the leaden death; | |
| Oft, as the mounting larks their notes prepare, | |
| They fall, and leave their little lives in air. | 60 |
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| In genial spring, beneath the quivering shade, | |
| Where cooling vapors breathe along the mead, | |
| The patient fisher takes his silent stand, | |
| Intent, his angle trembling in his hand; | |
| With looks unmoved, he hopes the scaly breed, | 65 |
| And eyes the dancing cork and bending reed. | |
| Our plenteous streams a various race supply,— | |
| The bright-eyed perch with fins of Tyrian dye; | |
| The silver eel, in shining volumes rolled; | |
| The yellow carp, in scales bedropped with gold; | 70 |
| Swift trouts, diversified with crimson stains; | |
| And pikes, the tyrants of the watery plains. * * * * * | |
| Thy trees, fair Windsor! now shall leave their woods, | |
| And half thy forests rush into thy floods, | |
| Bear Britain’s thunder, and her cross display, | 75 |
| To the bright regions of the rising day; | |
| Tempt icy seas, where scarce the waters roll, | |
| Where clearer flames glow round the frozen pole; | |
| Or under southern skies exalt their sails, | |
| Led by new stars, and borne by spicy gales! | 80 |
| For me the balm shall bleed, and amber flow, | |
| The coral redden, and the ruby glow, | |
| The pearly shell its lucid globe infold, | |
| And Phœbus warm the ripening ore to gold. | |
| The time shall come, when free as seas or wind | 85 |
| Unbounded Thames shall flow for all mankind, | |
| Whole nations enter with each swelling tide, | |
| And seas but join the regions they divide; | |
| Earth’s distant ends our glory shall behold, | |
| And the new world launch forth to seek the old. | 90 |
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