ADMIRING Nature in her wildest grace, | |
| These northern scenes with weary feet I trace; | |
| O’er many a winding dale and painful steep, | |
| The abodes of covied grouse and timid sheep, | |
| My savage journey, curious, I pursue, | 5 |
| Till famed Breadálbane opens to my view. | |
| The meeting cliffs each deep-sunk glen divides; | |
| The woods, wild scattered, clothe their ample sides; | |
| The outstretching lake, imbosomed ’mong the hills, | |
| The eye with wonder and amazement fills; | 10 |
| The Tay, meandering sweet in infant pride; | |
| The palace, rising on its verdant side; | |
| The lawns, wood-fringed in Nature’s native taste; | |
| The hillocks, dropt in Nature’s careless haste; | |
| The arches, striding o’er the new-born stream; | 15 |
| The village, glittering in the noontide beam— * * * * * | |
| Poetic ardors in my bosom swell, | |
| Lone wandering by the hermit’s mossy cell: | |
| The sweeping theatre of hanging woods; | |
| The incessant roar of headlong tumbling floods— * * * * * | 20 |
| Here Poesy might wake her Heaven-taught lyre, | |
| And look through nature with creative fire; | |
| Here to the wrongs of Fate half reconciled, | |
| Misfortune’s lightened steps might wander wild; | |
| And Disappointment, in these lonely bounds, | 25 |
| Find balm to soothe her bitter, rankling wounds: | |
| Here heart-struck Grief might heavenward stretch her scan, | |
| And injured Worth forget and pardon man. * * * * * | |
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