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 grey, 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 neighbouring 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 chequer'd shade; And young and old come forth to play On a sun-shine holy-day,
Till the live-long day-light fail : Then to the spicy nut-brown ale, With stories told of many a feat, How faery Mab the junkets eat. She was pinch'd, and pull'd, she said; And he, by friar's lantern led,
Tells how the drudging goblin sweat, To earn his cream-bowl duly set,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn, His shadowy flail hath thresh'd the corn, That ten day-laborers could not end; Then lies him down the lubbar-fiend, And, stretch'd out all the chimney's length, Basks at the fire his hairy strength; And crop-full out of doors he flings, Ere the first cock his matin rings. Thus done the tales, to bed they creep, By whispering winds soon lull'd asleep. 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 Shakspeare, 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.
HENCE, vain deluding Joys
The brood of Folly without father bred! How little you bested,
Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys! Dwell in some idle brain,
And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess, As thick and numberless
As the gay motes that people the sun-beams; Or likest hovering dreams,
The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train. But hail, thou Goddess! sage and holy, Hail, divinest Melancholy!
Whose saintly visage is too bright To hit the sense of human sight, And therefore to our weaker view
O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue: Black, but such as in esteem
Prince Memnon's sister might beseem; Or that starr'd Ethiop queen that strove To set her beauty's praise above
The sea-nymphs, and their powers offended: Yet thou art higher far descended :
Thee, bright-hair'd Vesta, long of yore,
To solitary Saturn bore;
His daughter she; in Saturn's reign,
Such mixture was not held a stain:
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