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Wherever driven by wind or tide,
Exempt from every ill beside.

And as for you, my Lady Squeamish,
Who reckon every touch a blemish,
If all the plants, that can be found
Embellishing the scene around,

Should droop and wither where they grow,
You would not feel at all-not you.
The noblest minds their virtue prove
By pity, sympathy, and love:
These, these are feelings truly fine,
And prove their owner half divine."

His censure reached them as he dealt it, And each, by shrinking, showed he felt it.

Cowper.

THE NIGHTINGALE AND GLOW-WORM.

A Nightingale, that all day long
Had cheered the village with his song,
Nor yet at eve his note suspended,
Nor yet when eventide was ended,
Began to feel, as well he might,
The keen demands of appetite;
When, looking eagerly around,
He spied far off, upon the ground,
A something shining in the dark,
And knew the glow-worm by his spark ;

So, stooping down from hawthorn top,
He thought to put him in his crop.
The worm, aware of his intent,

Harangued him thus, right eloquent-
"Did you admire my lamp," quoth he,
"As much as I your minstrelsy,
You would abhor to do me wrong,
As much as I to spoil your song;
For 'twas the self-same power divine
Taught you to sing, and me to shine;
That you with music, I with light,
Might beautify and cheer the night."
The songster heard his short oration,
And warbling out his approbation,
Released him, as my story tells,
And found a supper somewhere else.
Hence jarring sectaries may learn
Their real interest to discern;

That brother should not war with brother,
And worry and devour each other;
But sing and shine by sweet consent,
Till life's poor transient night is spent,
Respecting in each other's case,
The gifts of nature and of grace.

Those Christians best deserve the name,
Who studiously make peace their aim;
Peace both the duty and the prize
Of him that creeps and him that flies.

Cowper.

ON A GOLDFINCH STARVED TO DEATH IN HIS CAGE.

Time was when I was free as air,
The thistle's downy seed my fare,
My drink the morning dew;
I perched at will on every spray,
My form genteel, my plumage gay,
My strains for ever new.

But gaudy plumage, sprightly strain,
And form genteel, were all in vain,
And of a transient date;

For caught and caged, and starved to death,

In dying sighs my little breath

Soon passed the wiry grate.

Thanks, gentle swain, for all my woes,

And thanks for this effectual close,

And cure of every

ill!

More cruelty could none express;
And I, if you had shown me less,

Had been your prisoner still.

Cowper.

THE POPLAR FIELD.

The poplars are felled, farewell to the shade, And the whispering sound of the cool colonnade;

The winds play no longer and sing in the leaves, Nor Ouse on his bosom their image receives.

Twelve years have elapsed, since I last took a view

Of my favourite field, and the bank where they grew;

And now in the grass behold they are laid,

And the tree is my seat, that once lent me a shade.

The blackbird has fled to another retreat,

Where the hazels afford him a screen from the

heat;

And the scene, where his melody charmed me before,

Resounds with his sweet-flowing ditty no more.

My fugitive years are all hasting away,
And I must ere long lie as lowly as they ;

With a turf on my breast, and a stone at my head,

Ere another such grove shall arise in its stead.

The change both my heart and my fancy employs,

I reflect on the frailty of man, and his joys; Short-lived as we are, yet our pleasures, we see, Have a still shorter date, and die sooner than

we.

Cowper.

THE ROSE.

The rose had been washed, just washed in a shower,

Which Mary to Anna conveyed,

The plentiful moisture encumbered the flower, And weighed down its beautiful head.

The cup was all filled, and the leaves were all wet,
And it seemed to a fanciful view,

To weep for the buds it had left with regret,
On the flourishing bush where it grew.

I hastily seized it, unfit as it was,

For a nosegay, so dripping and drown'd,
And swinging it rudely, too rudely, alas !
I snapped it-it fell to the ground.

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