ODE to NIGHT.

TH

HE bufy cares of day are done;
In yonder western cloud the fun
Now fets, in other worlds to rise,

And glad with light the nether skies.

With ling'ring pace the parting day retires, And flowly leaves the mountain tops, and gilded fpires.

Yon azure cloud, enrob'd with white,
Still fhoots a gleam of fainter light:
At length defcends a browner fhade;
At length the glimm'ring objects fade

'Till all fubmit to NIGHT's impartial reign,

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And undistinguish'd darkness covers all the plain.

淡菜

No more the ivy-crowned oak

Refounds beneath the wood-man's ftroke.

Now Silence holds her folemn fway;

Mute is each bush, and every spray : Nought but the found of murm'ring rills is heard, Or from the mould'ring tow'r, NIGHT's solitary bird.

3

Hail facred hour of peaceful reft!

Of pow'r to charm the troubled breast!
By thee the captive slave obtains
Short refpite from his galling pains;
Nor fighs for liberty, nor native foil;
But for a while forgets his chains, and fultry toil.

No horrors haft thou in thy train,

No scorpion lash, no clanking chain.
When the pale murd'rer round him spies
A thousand grifly forms arise,

When shrieks and groans arouse his palfy'd fear,
'Tis guilt alarms his foul, and confcience wounds his ear.

The village swain whom Phillis charms,
Whose breast the tender paffion warms,
Wishes for thy all-fhadowing veil,

To tell the fair his love-fick tale:

Nor lefs impatient of the tedious day,
She longs to hear his tale, and figh her soul away.

Oft by the covert of thy shade

LEANDER WOo'd the THRACIAN maid;
Through foaming feas his paffion bore,
Nor fear'd the ocean's thund'ring roar.

The

The conscious virgin from the fea-girt tow'r Hung out the faithful torch to guide him to her bow'r.

Oft at thy filent hour the fage
Pores on the fair instructive page;
Or rapt in musings deep, his foul
Mounts active to the starry pole :

There pleas'd to range the realms of endless night, Numbers the stars, or marks the comet's devious light.

Thine is the hour of converse sweet,
When fprightly wit and reafon meet:
Wit, the fair bloffom of the mind,

But fairer ftill with reafon join'd. Such is the feaft thy focial hours afford,

When eloquence and GRANVILLE join the friendly board.

GRANVILLE, whofe polifh'd mind is fraught
With all that RoME OF GREECE e'er taught;
Who pleases and inftructs the ear,

When he affumes the critic's chair,

Or from the STAGYRITE or PLATO draws The arts of civil life, the fpirit of the laws.

O let

O let me often thus employ

The hour of mirth and focial joy!

And glean from GRANVILLE's learned store
Fair science and true wisdom's lore.

Then will I ftill implore thy longer stay,

Nor change thy feftive hours for funshine and the day.

Written upon leaving a FRIEND'S House in

WALES.

By the Rev. Dr. M.

THE

HE winds were loud, the clouds deep-hung;
And dragg'd their sweepy trains along
The dreary mountain's fide;

When, from the hill, one look to throw
On Towy's rambling flood below,

I turn'd my horfe- and figh'd.

But foon the gufts of fleet and hail
Flew thick across the darken'd vale,
And blurr'd the face of day:

Forlorn and fad, I jogg'd along;

And though Tom cry'd, "You're going wrong,'
Still wander'd from my way.

The scenes, which once my fancy took,
And my
aw'd mind with wonder ftruck,

Pafs'd unregarded, all!

Nor black Trecarris' fteepy height,
Nor wafte Trecastle gave delight;
Nor clamorous Hondy's fall.

Did the bleak day then give me pain?
The driving fnow, or pelting rain,

Or fky with tempefts fraught?
No! these unheeded rag'd around:
Nought in them so much Mine I found,
As claim'd one wandering thought.

Far other cares engrofs'd my mind,
Cares for the joys I left behind,

In Newton's happy groves!
Yet not because its woods difclofe
Or grots or lawns more fweet than those
Which Pan at noon-day loves;

But that, befide its focial hearth

Dwells every joy, which youthful mirth

Or ferious age can claim:

Newton is the name of a feat belonging to Sir John Price.

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