Which loves their grassy sides to lave, Now meet excursive Fancy's eye, And with a sweet diversity Break the wide level of the rippling wave. Ah! as thy varying scene I mark, What cloud-clad rocks, what mountains huge appear: Here WALLOW frowns, with SKIDDAW in its rear, A vast stupendous mass! and, hark! Methinks I seem in Fancy's dream to hear A deep majestic sound Where wild woods ever wave 'mid fragments drear. On breezes borne, that fan the day, The hollow sound on KESWIC's shores, Till led by Fancy to the impending shade, LODORE is seen to thunder thro' the glade, And from the appalling steep with fearful shocks To urge the fragment thro' the opening air, near. Tremendous flood! Which flingst thy foam on many a fragment rude; And bid'st the forest quake And listening nature shake, As down thou tumblest 'mid the humid wood. Her wildest storms may winter bring! May many a mountain torrent mix with thine, And seek thy favourite haunt, sublimity divine! What are the graces of the polish'd scene Where the wild form of Nature's sought in vain, Where artificial elegance is seen A supplement to Beauty's beamy train ! What, when compar'd to LODORE's shade! Here wanton Nature's boundless grace, Fancy, sweet visionary maid, Is often fondly seen to trace. Here all the viewless forms that still Here fairy phantoms that dispense Impart their highest influence There, Dulness leaning on some statue near (Her emblem meet) wears out the insipid year, And talks of Nature with an ideot joy While Nature, absent maid, ne'er blest her vacant eye. ELEGY ON LEAVING EXMOUTH. August, 1794. FAREWEL, Sweet scenes familiar to mine eyes, Oft have I mark'd you with a transport blest; Tho' now no more for me your charms shall rise, Or give my soul a transitory rest. Farewel, thou blue and ever restless main, On whose clear breast yon bright orb sheds While from the vault above with boundless reign, He proudly flames, the exulting LORD of day. Farewel, ye little skiffs that calmly scud And you, ye proud majestic ships, that glide With swelling canvas, and with pennants gay, Stately and slow along the obedient tide, No more for me ye plow your wat'ry way! Farewel, the glowing sigh, the swelling thought, The throb mysterious, and the tear so sweet; Farewel, the joys that inspiration brought, And Nature wild, in Solitude's retreat. I haste, alas! from this unruffled main, wave, To scenes of moral misery and pain, The billowy storms of busy life to brave. Feelings of peace, ye melting thoughts, I go, |