Here will I learn ambition to controul, To scenes of sweet retirement, thus he cried : 66 Forlorn, yet ever dear and honour'd shades. "There, though the hamlet boasts no smiling train, "Nor sportive pastime circling on the plain, "No needy villains prowl around for prey, "No slanderers, no sycophants betray;. "No gaudy foplings scornfully deride "The swain, whose humble pipe is all his pride. "There will I fly to seek that soft repose, "Which solitude contemplative bestows: "Yet, oh fond hope! perchance there still remains "One ling'ring friend behind, to bless the plains; "Some hermit of the dale, inshrin'd in ease, "Long lost companion of my youthful days, "With whose sweet converse in the social bow'r "I oft may chide away some vacant hour; "To whose pure sympathy I may impart "Each latent grief that labours at my heart; "Whate'er I felt, and what I saw, relate, "The shoals of luxury, the wrecks of state; "Those busy scenes, where science wakes in vain, "In which I shar'd,-ah! ne'er to share again. "But whence that pang? does nature now rebel? "Why faulters out my tongue the word farewel? "Ye friends! who long have witness'd to my toil, "And seen me ploughing in a thankless soil; "Whose partial tenderness hush'd ev'ry pain, Whose approbation made my bosom vain; " 'Tis you to whom my soul divided hies "With fond regret, and half unwilling flies; Sighs forth her parting wishes to the wind, "And ling'ring leaves her better half behind. "Can I forget the intercourse I shar'd, "What friendship cherish'd, and what zeal endear'd? d "Alas! remembrance still must turn to you, "The plain, or secret covert of the grove, 66 Imagination shall supply her store "Of painful bliss, and what she can restore; "Shall strew each lonely path with flow'rets gay, "And wide as is her boundless empire stray: "On eagle pinions traverse earth and skies, "And bid the lost and distant objects rise. "Here, where encircled o'er the sloping land "Woods rise on woods, shall Aristotle stand; "Lyceum round the godlike man rejoice, "And bow with reverence to wisdom's voice. "There, spreading oaks shall arch the vaulted dome, "The champion, there, of liberty, and Rome, "In attic eloquence shall thunder laws, "And uncorrupted senates shout applause. "Not more ecstatic visions rapt the soul "Of Numa, when to midnight grots he stole, "And learnt his lore, from virtue's mouth refin'd, "To fetter vice, and harmonize mankind. "Now stretch'd at ease beside some fav'rite stream, "Of beauty and enchantment will I dream; 66 Elysium, feats of art, and laurels won, "The Graces three, and * Japhet's fabled son: .* Prometheus. "Whilst Angelo shall wave the mystic rod, "And see a new creation wait his nod; "Prescribe his bounds to Time's remorseless pow'r, "And to my arms my absent friends restore; "Place me amidst the group, each well-known face, "The sons of science, lords of human race; "And, as oblivion sinks at his command, "Nature shall rise more finish'd from his hand. "Thus some magician, fraught with potent skill, "Transforms and moulds each vary'd mass at will "Calls animated forms of wond'rous birth, "Cadmean offspring, from the teeming earth, "Uncears the pond'rous tombs, the realms of night, "And calls their cold inhabitants to light; "Or, as he traverses a dreary scene, "Bids ev'ry sweet of nature there convene ; 66 Huge mountains skirted round with wavy woods, "The shrub-deck'd lawns, and silver-sprinkled floods, "Whilst flow'rets spring around the smiling land, "And follow on the traces of his wand. "Such prospects, lovely Auburn! then, be thine "And what thou canst of bliss impart be mine: "Amid thy humble shades, in tranquil ease, "Grant me to pass the remnant of my days, "Unfetter'd from the toil of wretched gain, 66 My raptur'd muse shall pour her noblest strain, "Within her native bow'rs the notes prolong, "And, grateful, meditate her latest song. 66 Thus, as adown the slope of life I bend, "And move, resign'd, to meet my latter end, "Each worldly wish, each worldly care represt, "A self-approving heart alone possest, "Content, to bounteous heav'n I'll leave the rest.” Thus spoke the bard: but not one friendly pow'r, With nod assentive, crown'd the parting hour; No eastern meteor glar'd beneath the sky, No dextral omen; Nature heav'd a sigh Prophetic of the dire impending blow, The presage of her loss, and Britain's woe. Already portion'd, unrelenting Fate Had made a pause upon the number'd date; Behind, stood Death, too horrible for sight, In darkness clad, expectant, prun'd for flight; Pleas'd at the word, the shapeless monster sped, On eager message, to the humble shed, Where, wrapt by soft poetic visions round, Sweet slumb❜ring, Fancy's darling son he found. At his approach the silken-pinion'd train, Affrighted, mount aloft, and quit the brain |