As thus they brighten with exalted juice,
Touch'd into flavour by the mingling ray;
The rural youth and virgins o'er the field,
Each fond for each to cull th' autumnal prime,
Exulting rove, and fpeak the vintage nigh.
Then comes the crufhing fwain; the country floats,
And foams unbounded with the mashy flood;
That by degrees fermented, and refin'd,
Round the rais'd nations pours the cup
of joy:
The claret fmooth, red as the lip we press
In fparkling fancy, while we drain the bowl;
The mellow-tafted burgundy; and quick,
As is the wit it gives, the gay champaign.
Now, by the cool declining year condens'd,
Defcend the copious exhalations, check'd
As up the middle sky unfeen they stole,
And roll the doubling fogs around the hill.
No more the mountain, horrid, vaft, fublime,
Who pours a sweep of rivers from his fides,
And high between contending kingdoms rears
The rocky long divifion, fills the view
With great variety; but in a night
Of gathering vapour, from the baffled fenfe
Sinks dark and dreary. Thence expanding far,
The huge dufk, gradual, fwallows up the plain:
Vanish the woods; the dim-feen river feems
Sullen, and flow, to roll the misty wave.
Even in the height of noon oppreft, the fun
Sheds weak, and blunt, his wide-refracted ray;
Whence glaring oft, with many a broadened orb,
He frights the nations. Indiftinct on earth,
Seen thro' the turbid air, beyond the life
Objects appear; and, wilder'd, o'er the wafte
The fhepherd ftalks gigantic. Till at laft
Wreath'd dun around, in deeper circles ftill
Succeffive clofing, fits the general fog
Unbounded o'er the world; and, mingling thick,
A formless grey confufion covers all.
As when of old (fo fung the HEBREW BARD)
Light, uncollected, thro' the chaos urg'd
Its infant way; nor Order yet had drawn
His lovely train from out the dubious gloom.
These roving mifts, that conftant now begin
To smoke along the hilly country, thefe,
With weighty rains, and melted Alpine fnows,
The mountain-cisterns fill, those ample stores
Of water, fcoop'd among the hollow rocks;
Whence gush the ftreams, the ceafelefs fountains play,
And their unfailing wealth the rivers draw.
Some fages fay, that, where the numerous wave
For ever lashes the refounding fhore,
Drill'd thro' the fandy ftratum, every way,
The waters with the fandy ftratum rise;
Amid whofe angles infinitely ftrain'd,
They joyful leave their jaggy falts behind,
And clear and fweeten, as they foak along,
Nor stops the restless fluid, mounting still,
Tho' oft amidst the irriguous vale it fprings;
But to the mountain courted by the fand,
That leads it darkling on in faithful maze,
Far from the parent-main it boils again
Fresh into day; and all the glittering hill
Is bright with spouting rills. But hence this vain
Amufive dream! why fhould the waters love
To take fo far a journey to the hills,
When the sweet valleys offer to their toil
Inviting quiet, and a nearer bed?
Or if, by blind ambition led aftray,
They muft afpire, why fhould they fudden ftop
Among the broken mountain's rufhy dells,
And, ere they gain its highest peak, defert
Th' attractive fand that charm'd their course so long?
Befides, the hard agglomerating falts,
The spoil of ages, would impervious choke
Their fecret channels; or, by flow degrees,
High as the hills protrude the fwelling vales:
Old Ocean too, fuck'd thro' the porous globe,
Had long ere now forfook his horrid bed,
And brought Deucalion's watry times again.
Say then, where lurk the vast eternal springs,
That, like CREATING NATURE, lie conceal'd
From mortal eye, yet with their lavish stores
Refresh the globe, and all its joyous tribes ?
O thou pervading Genius, given to Man,
To trace the secrets of the dark abyss,
O lay the mountains bare! and wide display
Their hidden ftructure to th' astonish'd view!
Strip from the branching Alps their piny load;
The huge incumbrance of horrific woods
From Afian Taurus, from Imaus ftretch'd
Athwart the roving Tartar's fullen bounds!
Give opening Hemus to my fearching eye,
And high Olympus pouring many a stream!
O from the founding fummits of the north,
The Dofrine Hills, thro' Scandinavia roll'd
To fartheft Lapland and the frozen main;
From lofty Caucafus, far-feen by thofe
Who in the Cafpian and black Euxine toil;
From cold Riphean Rocks, which the wild Russ
Believes the ftony girdle of the world;
And all the dreadful mountains, wrapt in storm,
Whence wide Siberia draws her lonely floods;
O fweep th' eternal fnows! Hung o'er the deep,
That ever works beneath his founding base,
Bid Atlas, propping heaven, as Poets feign,
His fubterranean wonders spread! unveil
The miny caverns, blazing on the day,
Of Abyffinia's cloud-compelling cliffs,
And of the bending Mountains of the Moon! +
O'ertopping all these giant-sons of earth,
Let the dire Andes, from the radiant Line
Stretch'd to the ftormy feas that thunder round
The fouthern pole, their hideous deeps unfold!
Amazing fcene! Behold! the glooms difclofe,
I fee the rivers in their infant beds!
Deep, deep I hear them, lab'ring to get free!
I fee the leaning ftrata, artful rang'd;
The gaping fiffures to receive the rains,
The melting fnows, and ever-dripping fogs.
* The Mufcovites call the Riphean Mountains Weliki Camenypoys, that is, the great flony Girdle: because they suppose them to encompass the whole earth.
† A range of Mountains in Africa, that furround almost all Monomotapa.
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