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For plenty there a residence has found,
And grandeur a magnificent abode.

Hard is the fate of the infirm and poor!
Here, as I crav'd a morsel of their bread,
A pamper❜d menial drove me from the door,
To seek a shelter in an humbler shed.

Oh! take me to your hospitable dome!
Keen blows the wind, and piercing is the cold!
Short is my passage to the friendly tomb,
For I am poor and miserably old.

Should I reveal the sources of my grief,

If soft humanity e'er touch'd your breast, Your hands would not with-hold the kind relief, And tears of pity would not be represt.

Heaven sends misfortunes-why should we repine?
'Tis Heav'n has brought me to the state you see;
And your condition may be soon like mine-
The child of sorrow-and of misery.

A little farm was my paternal lot;

Then, like the lark, I sprightly hail'd the morn; But ah! oppression forc'd me from my cot, My cattle died, and blighted was my corn.

My daughter-once the comfort of my age!
Lur'd by a villain from her native home,
Is cast abandon'd on the world's wide stage,
And doom'd in scanty poverty to roam.

My tender wife-sweet soother of my care!
Struck with sad anguish at the stern decree,
Fell-ling'ring fell, a victim to despair,

And left the world to wretchedness and me.

Pity the sorrows of a poor old man,

Whose trembling limbs have borne him to your door, Whose days are dwindled to the shortest span, Oh! give relief-and Heaven will bless your store.

ODE TO SPRING.

[MRS. BARBAULD.]

SWEET daughter of a rough and stormy sire,
Hoar Winter's blooming child; delightful Spring!
Whose unshorn locks with leaves

And swelling buds are crown'd;

From the

green islands of eternal youth,

(Crown'd with fresh blooms, and ever-springing shade)

Turn, hither turn thy step,

O thou, whose powerful voice

More sweet than softest touch of Doric reed,

Or Lydian flute, can sooth the madding winds,
And thro' the stormy deep

Breathe thy own tender calm.

Thee, best belov'd! the virgin train await,

With

songs

and festal rites, and joy to rove

Thy blooming wilds among,

And vales and dewy lawns,

With untir'd feet; and cull thy earliest sweets
To weave fresh garlands for the glowing brow
Of him the favour'd youth

That prompts their whisper'd sigh.

Unlock thy copious stores; those tender showers,
That drop their sweetness on the infant buds,

And silent dews that swell

The milky ear's green stem,

And feed the flowering osier's early shoots;
And call those winds which thro' the whisp'ring boughs

With warm and pleasant breath

Salute the blowing flowers.

Now let me sit beneath the whitening thorn, And mark thy spreading tints steal o'er the dale; And watch with patient eye

Thy fair unfolding charms.

O Nymph approach! while yet the temperate sun With bashful forehead, thro' the cool moist air Throws his young maiden beams,

And with chaste kisses wooes

The earth's fair bosom; while the streaming veil Of lucid clouds with kind and frequent shade Protects thy modest blooms

From his severer blaze.

Sweet is thy reign, but short; the red dog-star
Shall scorch thy tresses, and the mower's scythe
Thy greens, thy flow'rets all,
Remorseless shall destroy.

Reluctant shall I bid thee then farewell;

For O, not all that Autumn's lap contains,
Nor Summer's ruddiest fruits,

Can aught for thee atone,

Fair Spring! whose simplest promise more delights
Than all their largest wealth, and thro' the heart
Each joy and new born hope
With softest influence breathes.

ODE TO CONTENT.

[IBID.]

THOU, the Nymph with placid eye!
O seldom found, yet ever nigh!

Receive my temperate vow:

Not all the storms that shake the pole
Can e'er disturb thy halcyon soul,
And smooth unalter'd brow.

O come, in simplest vest array'd,
With all thy sober cheer display'd
To bless my longing sight;
Thy mien compos'd, thy even pace,
Thy meek regard, thy matron grace,

And chaste subdued delight.

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