Far to the north grim Winter draws his train,

To his own clime, to Zembla's frozen shore; Where, throned on ice, he holds eternal reign;

Where whirlwinds madden, and where tempests roar.

Loosed from the bands of frost, the verdant ground
Again puts on her robe of cheerful green,
Again puts forth her flowers; and all around
Smiling, the cheerful face of spring is seen.

Behold! the trees new deck their withered boughs;
The ample leaves, the hospitable plane,

Their taper elm, and lofty ash disclose;
The blooming hawthorn variegates the scene.

The lily of the vale, of flowers the queen,
Puts on the robe she neither sewed nor spun;
The birds on ground, or on the branches green,
Hop to and fro, and glitter in the sun,

Soon as o'er eastern hills the morning peers,
From her low nest the tufted lark upsprings;

And, cheerful singing, up the air she steers;

Still high she mounts, still loud and sweet she sings.

On the green furze, clothed o'er with golden blooms
That fill the air with fragrance all around,

The linnet sits, and tricks his glossy plumes,
While o'er the wild his broken notes resound.

While the sun journeys down the western sky,

Along the green sward, marked with Roman mound, Beneath the blithesome shepherd's watchful eye,

The cheerful lambkins dance and frisk around.

Now is the time for those who wisdom love,
Who love to walk in Virtue's flowery road,
Along the lovely paths of spring to rove,
And follow Nature up to Nature's God.

Thus Zoroaster studied Nature's laws;

Thus Socrates, the wisest of mankind;

Thus heaven-taught Plato traced the Almighty cause, And left the wondering multitude behind.

Thus Ashley gathered academic bays;

Thus gentle Thomson, as the seasons roll, Taught them to sing the great Creator's praise,

And bear their poet's name from pole to pole.

Thus have I walked along the dewy lawn;

My frequent foot the blooming wild hath worn; Before the lark I've sung the beauteous dawn,

And gathered health from all the gales of morn.

And, even when winter chilled the aged year,
I wandered lonely o'er the hoary plain:
Though frosty Boreas warned me to forbear,
Boreas, with all his tempests, warned in vain.

Then, sleep my nights, and quiet blessed my days;
I feared no loss, my mind was all my store;
No anxious wishes e'er disturbed my ease;

Heaven gave content and health-I asked no more.

Now, Spring returns; but not to me returns.
The vernal joy my better years have known,
Dim in my breast life's dying taper burns,

And all the joys of life with health are flown.

Starting and shivering in the inconstant wind,
Meager and pale, the ghost of what I was,
Beneath some blasted tree I lie reclined,

And count the silent moments as they pass:

The winged moments, whose unstaying speed
No art can stop, or in their course arrest;
Whose flight shall shortly count me with the dead,

And lay me down in peace with them at rest.

Oft morning dreams presage approaching fate;
And morning dreams, as poets tell, are true;
Led by pale ghosts, I enter Death's dark gate,
And bid the realms of life and light adieu.

I hear the helpless wail, the shriek of woe;
I see the muddy wave, the dreary shore,
The sluggish streams that slowly sleep below,
Which mortals visit, and return no more.

Farewell, ye blooming fields! ye cheerful plains!
Enough for me the church-yard's lonely mound,
Where melancholy with still silence reigns,

And the rank grass waves o'er the cheerless ground.

There let me wander at the shut of eve,

When sleep sits dewy on the laborer's eyes;

The world and all its busy follies leave,

And talk with Wisdom where my Daphne lies.

There let me sleep, forgotten in the clay,

When death shall shut these weary, aching eyes; Rest in the hopes of an eternal day,

Till the long night is gone, and the last morn aris

THE HUS BAUD MAU.

(FROM A LONG POEM ENTITLED "LOCHLEVEN.")

"How blest the man, who, in these peaceful plains,
Ploughs his paternal field; far from the noise,
The care and bustle of a busy world!
All in the sacred, sweet, sequestered vale

Of solitude, the secret primrose path

Of rural life he dwells; and with him dwells
Peace and content, twins of the sylvan shade,
And all the graces of the golden age.
Such is Agricola, the wise, the good,

By nature formed for the calm retreat,

The silent path of life. Learned, but not fraught
With self-importance, as the starched fool
Who challenges respect by solemn face,
By studied accent, and high-sounding phrase,
Enamored of the shade, but not morose,
Politeness raised in courts by frigid rules
With him spontaneous grows. Not books alone,
But man his study, and the better part;
To tread the ways of virtue, and to act

The various scenes of life with God's applause.