Ο THOU, whose wisdom, solid yet refin'd, Whose patriot-virtues, and confummate skill To touch the finer springs that move the world, Join'd to whate'er the Graces can bestow,
And all Apollo's animating fire,
Give thee, with pleasing dignity, to shine At once the guardian, ornament, and joy, Of polish'd life; permit the Rural Muse, O CHESTERFIELD, to grace with thee her fong!
Ere to the shades again she humbly flies,
Indulge her fond ambition, in thy train, (For every Muse has in thy train a place)
To mark thy various full-accomplish'd mind: To mark that spirit, which, with British Scorn,
Rejects th' allurements of corrupted power; That elegant politeness, which excels, Even in the judgment of presumptuous France, The boafted manners of her shining court;
That wit, the vivid energy of sense,
The truth of Nature, which, with Attic point, 675 And kind well-temper'd fatire, smoothly keen, Steals through the foul, and without pain corrects. Or, rifing thence with yet a brighter flame, O let me hail thee on fome glorious day, When to the liftening senate, ardent, croud BRITANNIA's sons to hear her pleaded cause. Then dreft by thee, more amiably fair,
Truth the foft robe of mild perfuafion wears : Thou to affenting reason giv'st again
Her own enlightened thoughts; call'd from the heart,
Th' obedient passions on thy voice attend;
And even reluctant party feels a while
Thy gracious power: as thro' the varied maze
Of eloquence, now smooth, now quick, now strong, Profound and clear, you roll the copious flood. 690
To thy lov'd haunt return, my happy Muse : For now, behold, the joyous winter-days, Frosty, fucceed; and thro' the blue serene, For fight too fine, th' ethereal nitre flies; Killing infectious damps, and the spent air Storing afresh with elemental life. Close crouds the shining atmosphere; and binds Our strengthened bodies in its cold embrace, Conftringent; feeds, and animates our blood; Refines our spirits, thro' the new-strung nerves, 700 In swifter fallies darting to the brain; Where fits the foul, intense, collected, cool, Bright as the skies, and as the season keen. All Nature feels the renovating force Of Winter, only to the thoughtless eye In ruin seen. The frost-concocted glebe Draws in abundant vegetable soul,
And gathers vigour for the coming year. A stronger glow fits on the lively cheek
Of ruddy fire: and luculent along The purer rivers flow; their fullen deeps, Transparent, open to the shepherd's gaze, And murmur hoarfer at the fixing froft.
WHAT art thou, frost? and whence are thy keen
Deriv'd, thou secret all-invading power, Whom even th' illusive fluid cannot fly ? Is not thy potent energy, unfeen,
Myriads of little salts, or hook'd, or shap'd Like double wedges, and diffus'd immenfe Thro' water, earth, and ether? Hence at eve, Steam'd eager from the red horizon round, With the fierce rage of Winter deep fuffus'd, An icy gale, oft shifting, o'er the pool Breathes a blue film, and in its mid career
Arrests the bickering stream. The loosened ice, 725 Let down the flood, and half diffolv'd by day, Rustles no more; but to the sedgy bank Fast grows, or gathers round the pointed stone, A crystal pavement, by the breath of heaven Cemented firm; till, seiz'd from shore to fhore, 730 The whole imprison'd river growls below, Loud rings the frozen earth, and hard reflects A double noise; while, at his evening watch, The village dog deters the nightly thief; The heifer lows; the distant water-fall Swells in the breeze; and, with the hafty tread
Of traveller, the hollow-founding plain
Shakes from afar. The full ethereal round,
Infinite worlds disclosing to the view,
Shines out intensely keen; and, all one cope
Of starry glitter, glows from pole to pole.
From pole to pole the rigid influence falls, Thro' the still night, incessant, heavy, strong, And seizes Nature fast. It freezes on;
Till morn, late-rising o'er the drooping world, 745 Lifts her pale eye unjoyous. Then appears The various labour of the filent night : Prone from the dripping eave, and dumb cascade,
Whose idle torrents only seem to roar, The pendant icicle; the froft-work fair, Where tranfient hues, and fancy'd figures rise; Wide-spouted o'er the hill, the frozen-brook, A livid tract, cold-gleaming on the morn; The foreft bent beneath the plumy wave;
And by the frost refin'd the whiter snow, Incrusted hard, and founding to the tread Of early shepherd, as he pensive seeks His pining flock, or from the mountain top, Pleas'd with the flippery surface, swift descends.
ON blithsome frolicks bent, the youthful swains,
While every work of Man is laid at rest, Fond o'er the river croud, in various sport And revelry diffolv'd; where mixing glad,
Happiest of all the train! the raptur'd boy Lashes the whirling top. Or, where the Rhine 765
Branch'd out in many a long canal extends,
From every province fwarming, void of care, Batavia rushes forth; and as they sweep,
On founding skates, a thousand different ways,
In circling poise, swift as the winds, along,
The then gay land is maddened all to joy. Nor less the northern courts, wide o'er the snow, Pour a new pomp. Eager, on rapid fleds, Their vigorous youth in bold contention wheel 774 The long-refounding course. Mean-time, to raise The manly strife, with highly blooming charms, Flush'd by the season, Scandinavia's dames,
Or Ruffia's buxom daughters glow around.
PURE, quick, and sportful, is the wholesome day; But foon elaps'd. The horizontal sun, Broad o'er the fouth, hangs at his utmost noon: And, ineffectual, strikes the gelid cliff: His azure gloss the mountain still maintains, Nor feels the feeble touch. Perhaps the vale Relents a while to the reflected ray; Or from the foreft falls the cluster'd snow, Myriads of gems, that in the waving gleam Gay-twinkle as they scatter. Thick around Thunders the sport of those, who with the gun, And dog impatient bounding at the shot,
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