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Invocation, &c. Seed-time. Harrowing. Morning walks. Milking. The dairy. Suffolk cheese. Spring coming forth. Sheep fond of changing. Lambs at play. The butcher. Sympathy yields to Necessity and Hope.

INVOCATION. THE AUTHOR'S INSPIRATION, THE WARMTH OF A HEART FIRED BY SIMPLE, RURAL OBJECTS.-FANCY, TRUTH, AND MEMORY.

O COME, blest Spirit! whatsoe'er thou art,
Thou rushing warmth that hover'st round my heart,
Sweet inmate, hail! thou source of sterling joy,
That poverty itself cannot destroy,

Be thou my Muse; and, faithful still to me,
Retrace the paths of wild obscurity.
No deeds of arms my humble lines rehearse,
No Alpine wonders thunder through my verse,
The roaring cataract, the snow-topt hill,
Inspiring awe, till breath itself stands still :
Nature's sublimer scenes ne'er charmed mine eyes,
Nor science led me through the boundless skies;
From meaner objects far my raptures flow :
O, point these raptures! bid my bosom glow!

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And lead my soul to ecstasies of praise
For all the blessings of my infant days!
Bear me through regions where gay fancy dwells;
But mould to truth's fair form what memory tells.

GILES, THE FARMER'S BOY, HIS JOYS, SORROWS, AND IDEAS;
HIS CONDITION; EDUCATED BY NATURE.

Live, trifling incidents, and grace my song,
That to the humblest menial belong :
To him whose drudgery unheeded goes,
His joys unreckoned as his cares or woes;
Though joys and cares in every path are sown,
And youthful minds have feelings of their own,
Quick springing sorrows, transient as the dew,
Delights from trifles, trifles ever new.

"T was thus with GILES: meek, fatherless, and poor :
Labor his portion, but he felt no more;
No stripes, no tyranny, his steps pursued ;
His life was constant, cheerful servitude:
Strange to the world, he wore a bashful look,
The fields his study, nature was his book;
And, as revolving Seasons changed the scene
From heat to cold, tempestuous to serene,
Though every change still varied his employ,
Yet each new duty brought its share of joy.

GILES'S HOME AND MASTER. GRAFTON.EUSTON, IN SUFFOLK; SCENES OF GILES'S BOYHOOD.

Where noble Grafton spreads his rich domains,
Round Euston's watered vale, and sloping plains,
Where woods and groves in solemn grandeur rise,
Where the kite brooding unmolested flies;
The woodcock and the painted pheasant race,
And skulking foxes, destined for the chase;
There Giles, untaught and unrepining, strayed
Through every copse, and grove, and winding glade;
There his first thoughts to Nature's charms inclined,
That stamp devotion on the inquiring mind.

GILES'S MASTER; HIS HOUSEHOLD; ESTATE; HABITS.
A little farm his generous master tilled,
Who with peculiar grace his station filled;
By deeds of hospitality endeared,
Served from affection, for his worth revered;
A happy offspring blest his plenteous board,
His fields were fruitful, and his barns well stored,
And four-score ewes he fed, a sturdy team,
And lowing kine that grazed beside the stream:
Unceasing industry he kept in view;
And never lacked a job for Giles to do.

THE COMING OF SPRING; verdure.
Fled now the sullen murmurs of the north,
The splendid raiment of the Spring peeps forth;
Her universal green, and the clear sky,
Delight still more and more the gazing eye.
Wide o'er the fields, in rising moisture strong,
Shoots up the simple flower, or creeps along
The mellowed soil; imbibing fairer hues,

Or sweets from frequent showers and evening dews;
That summon from its shed the slumbering ploughs,
While health impregnates every breeze that blows.

HORSE-PLOUGHING; THE PLOUGHED FIELD BIRDS THAT FOLLOW THE PLOUGH.

No wheels support the diving pointed share; No groaning ox is doomed to labor there; No helpmates teach the docile steed his road (Alike unknown the plough-boy and the goad); But, unassisted through each toilsome day, With smiling brow the ploughman cleaves his way, Draws his fresh parallels, and, widening still, Treads slow the heavy dale, or climbs the hill: Strong on the wing his busy followers play, [day; Where writhing earth-worms meet the unwelcome Till all is changed, and hill and level down Assume a livery of sober brown :

GILES ENGAGED IN HARROWING AND SOWING.

Again disturbed, when Giles with wearying strides From ridge to ridge the ponderous harrow guides; His heels deep sinking every step he goes, Till dirt usurp the empire of his shoes. Welcome, green headland firm beneath his feet; Welcome the friendly bank's refreshing seat; There, warm with toil, his panting horses browse Their sheltering canopy of pendent boughs; Till rest, delicious, chase each transient pain, And new-born vigor swell in every vein.

Hour after hour and day to day succeeds;
Till every clod and deep-drawn furrow spreads
To crumbling mould; a level surface clear,
And strewed with corn to crown the rising year;
And o'er the whole Giles once transverse again,
In earth's moist bosom buries up
the grain.

THE FARMER'S TRUST AND HOPES; THE EARLY BLADE.
The work is done; no more to Man is given ;
The grateful farmer trusts the rest to Heaven.
Yet oft with anxious heart he looks around,
And marks the first green blade that breaks the
In fancy sees his trembling oats uprun, [ground;
His tufted barley yellow with the sun;
Sees clouds propitious shed their timely store,
And all his harvest gathered round his door.

HOW BEST TO GUARD AGAINST THIEVES, ROOKS, AND CROWS; THE BEST SCARECROWS.

But still unsafe the big swoln grain below, A favorite morsel with the rook and crow; From field to field the flock increasing goes; To level crops most formidable foes: Their danger well the wary plunderers know, And place a watch on some conspicuous bough; Yet oft the skulking gunner by surprise Will scatter death amongst them as they rise. These, hung in triumph round the spacious field, At best will but a short-lived terror yield: Nor guards of property (not penal law, But harmless riflemen of rags and straw); Familiarized to these, they boldly rove, Nor heed such sentinels that never move. Let, then, your birds lie prostrate on the earth, In dying posture, and with wings stretched forth; Shift them at eve or morn from place to place, And death shall terrify the pilfering race; In the mid air, while circling round and round, They call their lifeless comrades from the ground; With quickening wing, and notes of loud alarm, Warn the whole flock to shun the impending harm. GILES'S WALK AT DAWN; HIS MATINS, AND THOSE Of the MORNING BIRDS; THE BLACKBIRD, WHITE-THROAT, THRUSH. This task had Giles, in fields remote from home; Oft has he wished the rosy morn to come.

Yet never famed was he nor foremost found
To break the seal of sleep; his sleep was sound:
But when at daybreak summoned from his bed,
Light as the lark that carolled o'er his head,
His sandy way deep-worn by hasty showers,
O'er-arched with oaks that formed fantastic bowers,
Waving aloft their towering branches proud,
In borrowed tinges from the eastern cloud
(Whence inspiration, pure as ever flowed,
And genuine transport in his bosom glowed) -
His own shrill matin joined the various notes
Of nature's music, from a thousand throats :
The blackbird strove with emulation sweet,
And echo answered from her close retreat;
The sporting white-throat, on some twig's end borne,
Poured hymns to freedom and the rising morn ;

Stopped in her song, perchance, the starting thrush
Shook a white shower from the black-thorn bush,
Where dew-drops thick as early blossoms hung,
And trembled as the minstrel sweetly sung.

COMPANIONS OF GILES'S MORNING WALK; THE RABBIT, COCK-
PHEASANT.THE HEATH; WOOD; FOX AND HIS VICTIMS.
Across his path, in either grove to hide,
The timid rabbit scouted by his side;

Or bold cock-pheasant stalked along the road,
Whose gold and purple tints alternate glowed.
But groves no further fenced the devious way;
A wide-extended heath before him lay,
Where on the grass the stagnant shower had run,
And shone a mirror to the rising sun
(Thus doubly seen), lighting a distant wood,
Giving new life to each expanding bud ;
Effacing quick the dewy foot-marks found,
Where prowling Reynard trod his nightly round;
To shun whose thefts 't was Giles's evening care
His feathered victims to suspend in air,
High on the bough that nodded o'er his head;
And thus each morn to strew the field with dead.

GILES SENT TO THE MEADOW FOR THE COWS; THEIR LOITERING RETURN. THE MASTER-COW.'

His simple errand done, he homeward hies;
Another instantly its place supplies.

The clattering dairy-maid immersed in steam,
Singing and scrubbing midst her milk and cream,
Bawls out, Go fetch the cows!'- he hears no more;
For pigs, and ducks, and turkeys, throng the door,
And sitting hens, for constant war prepared;
A concert strange to that which late he heard.
Straight to the meadow then he whistling goes;
With well-known halloo calls his lazy cows :
Down the rich pasture heedlessly they graze,
Or hear the summons with an idle gaze;
For well they know the cow-yard yields no more
Its tempting fragrance, nor its wintry store.
Reluctance marks their steps, sedate and slow;
The right of conquest all the law they know :
Subordinate they one by one succeed;
And one among them always takes the lead,
Is ever foremost, wheresoe'er they stray;
Allowed precedence, undisputed sway;
With jealous pride her station is maintained,
For many a broil that post of honor gained.

THE COW-YARD IN SPRING. THE MANURE-HEAP.- THE MILK-
MAID AND HER MISTRESS.

At home, the yard affords a grateful scene: For Spring makes e'en a miry cow-yard clean. Thence from its chalky bed behold conveyed The rich manure that drenching Winter made, Which, piled near home, grows green with many a A promised nutriment for Autumn's seed. Forth comes the maid, and like the morning smiles; The mistress too, and followed close by Giles.

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THE MILKING; THE MILK-MAID'S SEAT, PAILS; SONG. A friendly tripod forms their humble seat, With pails bright scoured, and delicately sweet.

Where shadowing elms obstruct the morning ray,
Begins their work, begins the simple lay;
The full-charged udder yields its willing streams,
While Mary sings some lover's amorous dreams;
And crouching Giles beneath a neighboring tree
Tugs o'er his pail, and chants with equal glee;
Whose hat with tattered brim, of nap so bare,
From the cow's side purloins a coat of hair,
A mottled ensign of his harmless trade,
An unambitious, peaceable cockade.

THE DAIRY, CHURNING, BUTTER, WHEY, CURDS. As unambitious, too, that cheerful aid The mistress yields beside her rosy maid: With joy she views her plenteous reeking store, And bears a brimmer to the dairy door; Her cows dismissed, the luscious mead to roam, Till eve again recall them loaded home. And now the dairy claims her choicest care, And half her household find employment there: Slow rolls the churn, its load of clogging cream At once foregoes its quality and name; From knotty particles first floating wide Congealing butter's dashed from side to side; Streams of new milk through flowing coolers stray, And snow-white curd abounds, and wholesome whey. Due north the unglazed windows, cold and clear, For warming sunbeams are unwelcome here.

GILES, A SERVANT OF ALL WORK; HOGS; CHICKENS.

Brisk goes the work beneath each busy hand, And Giles must trudge, whoever gives command; A Gibeonite, that serves them all by turns: He drains the pump, from him the fagot burns; From him the noisy hogs demand their food; While at his heels run many a chirping brood, Or down his path in expectation stand, With equal claims upon his strewing hand. Thus wastes the morn, till each with pleasure sees The bustle o'er, and pressed the new-made cheese.

SUFFOLK SKIM-MILK CHEESE, LONDON THE GRAVE OF PROVISIONS; ITS MARKET AND SUPPLIES.

Unrivalled stands thy country cheese, O Giles! Whose very name alone engenders smiles; Whose fame abroad by every tongue is spoke, The well-known butt of many a flinty joke, That pass like current coin the nation through ; And, ah! experience proves the satire true. Provision's grave, thou ever-craving mart, Dependent, huge Metropolis! where Art Her pouring thousands stows in breathless rooms, Midst pois'nous smokes and steams, and rattling Where grandeur revels in unbounded stores; [looms; Restraint, a slighted stranger at their doors! Thou, like a whirlpool, drain'st the countries round, Till London market, London price, resound Through every town, round every passing load, And dairy produce throngs the eastern road : Delicious veal, and butter, every hour, From Essex lowlands, and the banks of Stour; And further far, where numerous herds repose, From Orwell's brink, from Weveny, or Ouse.

DESCRIPTION OF THE MANUFACTURE AND QUALITIES OF SKIMMILK CHEESE.

Hence Suffolk dairy-wives run mad for cream, And leave their milk with nothing but its name; Its name derision and reproach pursue,

And strangers tell of three times skimmed sky-blue.'
To cheese converted, what can be its boast?
What, but the common virtues of a post!
If drought o'ertake it faster than the knife,
Most fair it bids for stubborn length of life,
And, like the oaken shelf whereon 't is laid,
Mocks the weak efforts of the bending blade;
Or in the hog-trough rests in perfect spite,
Too big to swallow, and too hard to bite.
Inglorious victory! Ye Cheshire meads,
Or Severn's flowery dales, where plenty treads,
Was your rich milk to suffer wrongs like these,
Farewell your pride! farewell renowned cheese!
The skimmer dread, whose ravages alone
Thus turn the mead's sweet nectar into stone.
SPRING-FLOWERS. LOVE AND HOPE; VERDURE; SHEEP AND
SHEPHERDS.

Neglected now the early daisy lies:

Nor thou, pale primrose, bloom'st the only prize :
Advancing Spring profusely spreads abroad
Flowers of all hues, with sweetest fragrance stored;
Where'er she treads, Love gladdens every plain,
Delight on tiptoe bears her lucid train;
Sweet Hope with conscious brow before her flies,
Anticipating wealth from summer skies;
All nature feels her renovating sway;
The sheep-fed pasture, and the meadow gay,
And trees, and shrubs, no longer budding seen,
Display the new-grown branch of lighter green;
On airy downs the shepherd idling lies,
And sees to-morrow in the marbled skies.
Here, then, my soul, thy darling theme pursue,
For every day was Giles a shepherd too.

GILES A SHEPHERD; HIS SHEEP FEEDING. A VARIETY OF
FOOD NECESSARY; FENCES, WOODBINE, ASH, HAWTHORN.
Small was his charge: no wilds had they to roam;
But bright enclosures circling round their home.
Nor yellow-blossomed furze, nor stubborn thorn,
The heath's rough produce, had their fleeces torn :
Yet ever roving, ever seeking thee,
Enchanting spirit, dear Variety!
O happy tenants, prisoners of a day!
Released to ease, to pleasure, and to play ;
Indulged through every field by turns to range,
And taste them all in one continual change.
For though luxuriant their grassy food,
Sheep long confined but loathe the present good;
Bleating around the homeward gate they meet,
And starve, and pine, with plenty at their feet.
Loosed from the winding lane, a joyful throng,
See, o'er yon pasture how they pour along!
Giles round their boundaries takes his usual stroll;
Sees every pass secured, and fences whole;

1 Suffolk, a county in the eastern part of England, with the North Sea east, Norfolk north, Essex south, and Cambridgeshire west; population in 1851, 337,000.

High fences, proud to charm the gazing eye,
Where many a nestling first essays to fly;
Where blows the woodbine, faintly streaked with red,
And rests on every bough its tender head;
Round the young ash its twining branches meet,
Or crown the hawthorn with its odors sweet.

SYMPATHY WITH INNOCENCE; PLEASURE IN THE GAMBOLS
OF ANIMALS; LAMBKINS; KITTENS.

Say, ye that know, ye who have felt and seen Spring's morning smiles, and soul-enlivening green, Say, did you give the thrilling transport way? Did your eye brighten, when young lambs at play Leaped o'er your path with animated pride, Or gazed in merry clusters by your side? Ye who can smile, to wisdom no disgrace, At the arch meaning of a kitten's face; If spotless innocence, and infant mirth, Excites to praise, or gives reflection birth; In shades like these pursue your favorite joy, Midst Nature's revels, sports that never cloy.

LAMBKINS AT PLAY.

A few begin a short but vigorous race,
And indolence abashed soon flies the place;
Thus challenged forth, see thither, one by one,
From every side assembling playmates run:
A thousand wily antics mark their stay,
A starting crowd, impatient of delay.
Like the fond dove from fearful prison freed,
Each seems to say, 'Come, let us try our speed ;'
Away they scour, impetuous, ardent, strong,
The green turf trembling as they bound along;
Adown the slope, then up the hillock climb,
Where every molehill is a bed of thyme;
There panting stop; yet scarcely can refrain;
A bird, a leaf, will set them off again :
Or, if a gale with strength unusual blow,
Scattering the wild-brier roses into snow,
Their little limbs increasing efforts try;
Like the torn flower the fair assemblage fly.

LAMBS, LIKE SPRING FLORETS, DESTINED TO EARLY DEATH.
Ah, fallen rose! sad emblem of their doom;
Frail as thyself, they perish while they bloom!
Though unoffending innocence may plead,
Though frantic ewes may mourn the savage deed,
Their shepherd comes, a messenger of blood,
And drives them bleating from their sports and food:
Care loads his brow, and pity wrings his heart,
For, lo, the murdering butcher with his cart
Demands the firstlings of his flock to die,
And makes a sport of life and liberty!
His gay companions Giles beholds no more;
Closed are their eyes, their fleeces drenched in gore;
Nor can compassion, with her softest notes,
Withhold the knife that plunges through their
Down, indignation! hence, ideas foul! [throats.
Away the shocking image from my soul !
Let kindlier visitants attend my way,
Beneath approaching Summer's fervid ray;
Nor thankless glooms obtrude, nor cares annoy,
Whilst the sweet theme is Universal Joy.

Pastorals for April.

VIRGIL'S "TITYRUS AND MELIBUS."

A BUCOLIC.

TRANSLATED FROM THE LATIN BY DRYDEN.

ARGUMENT.

The occasion of this first pastoral was this: When Augustus had settled himself in the Roman empire, that he might reward his veteran troops for their past service, he distributed among them all the lands that lay about Cremona and Mantua,- turning out the right owners for having sided with his enemies. Virgil was a sufferer among the rest, who afterwards recovered his estate by Mecanas's intercession, and, as an instance of his gratitude, composed the following pastoral, where he sets out his own good fortune in the person of Tityrus, and the calamities of his Mantuan neighbors in the character of Melibus.

MELIBUS.

BENEATH the shade which beechen boughs diffuse, You, Tityrus, entertain your sylvan muse; Round the wide world in banishment we roam, Forced from our pleasing fields and native home; While, stretched at ease, you sing your happy loves; And Amaryllis fills the shady groves.

TITYRUS.

These blessings, friend, a deity bestowed ; For never can I deem him less than god. The tender firstlings of my woolly breed Shall on his holy altar often bleed.

He gave my kine to graze the flow'ry plain, And to my pipe renewed the rural strain.

MELIBEUS.

I envy not your fortune, but admire, That while the raging sword and wasteful fire Destroy the wretched neighborhood around, No hostile arms approach your happy ground. Far different is my fate; my feeble goats With pains I drive from their forsaken cots; And this you see I scarcely drag along, Who yeaning on the rocks has left her young (The hope and promise of my failing fold). My loss, by dire portents, the gods foretold ; For, had I not been blind, I might have seen Yon riven oak, the fairest of the green, And the hoarse raven, on the blasted bough, By croaking from the left presaged the coming blow. But tell me, Tityrus, what heavenly power Preserved your fortunes in that fatal hour?

TITYRUS.

Fool that I was! I thought imperial Rome Like Mantua, where on market-days we come, And thither drive our tender lambs from home. So kids and whelps their sires and dams express;

And so the great I measured by the less.
But country-towns, compared with her, appear
Like shrubs, when lofty cypresses are near.

MELIBUS.

What great occasion called you hence to Rome?

TITY RUS.

Freedom, which came at length, though slow to Nor did my search of liberty begin, [come. Till my black hairs were changed upon my chin: Nor Amaryllis would vouchsafe a look, Till Galatea's meaner bonds I broke. Till then a helpless, hopeless, homely swain, I sought not freedom, nor aspired to gain ; Though many a victim from my folds was bought, And many a cheese to country markets brought, Yet all the little that I got I spent, And still returned as empty as I went.

MELIBUS.

We stood amazed to see your mistress mourn; Unknowing that she pined for your return: We wondered why she kept her fruit so long, For whom so late the ungathered apples hung. But now the wonder ceases, since I see She kept them only, Tityrus, for thee. For thee the bubbling springs appeared to mourn, And whispering pines made vows for thy return.

TITYRUS.

What should I do? while here I was enchained; No glimpse of godlike liberty remained; Nor could I hope in any place but there To find a god so present to my prayer. There first the youth of heavenly birth I viewed, For whom our monthly victims are renewed. He heard my vows, and graciously decreed My grounds to be restored, my former flocks to feed.

MELIBUS.

[fields,

O, fortunate old man! whose farm remains For you sufficient, and requites your pains, Though rushes overspread the neighboring plains. Though here the marshy grounds approach your And there the soil a stony harvest yields. Your teeming ewes shall no strange meadows try, Nor fear a rot from tainted company. Behold, yon bordering fence of sallow trees [bees; Is fraught with flowers, the flowers are fraught with The busy bees, with a soft, murmuring strain, Invite to gentle sleep the laboring swain ; While from the neighboring rock, with rural songs, The pruner's voice the pleasing dream prolongs;

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