Young inveigler, fond in wiles,
Prone to mirth, profuse in smiles,
Yet a novice in disdain,
Pleasure giving without pain,
Still caressing, still caressed,
Thou and all thy lovers blessed,
Never teased, and never teasing,
Oh for ever pleased and pleasing!
Hither, British Muse of mine,
Hither, all the Grecian Nine,
With the lovely Graces Three,
And your promised nursling see:
Figure on her waxen mind
Images of life refined;
Make it as a garden gay,
Every bud of thought display,
Till, improving year by year,
The whole culture shall appear,
Voice, and speech, and action, rising,
All to human sense surprising.
Is the silken web so thin
As the texture of her skin?
Can the lily and the rose
Such unsullied hue disclose?
Are the violets so blue
As her veins exposed to view?
Do the stars in wintry sky
Twinkle brighter than her eye?
Has the morning lark a throat
Sounding sweeter than her note ?
Who e'er knew the like before thee?
They who knew the nymph that bore thee.
From thy pastime and thy toys,
From thy harmless cares and joys,
Give me now a moment's time:
When thou shalt attain thy prime,
And thy bosom feel desire,
Love the likeness of thy sire,
One ordained through life to prove
Still thy glory, still thy love.
Like thy sister, and like thee,
Let thy nurtured daughters be:
Semblance of the fair who bore thee.
Trace the pattern set before thee,
Where the Liffy meets the main,
Has thy sister heard my strain;
From the Liffy to the Thames,
Minstrel echoes, sing their names,
Wafting to the willing ear
Many a cadence sweet to hear,
Smooth as gently breathing gales
O'er the ocean and the vales,
While the vessel calmly glides
O'er the level glassy tides,
While the summer flowers are springing,
And the new-fledged birds are singing.
N Leven's banks, while free to rove
And tune the rural pipe to love,
I envied not the happiest swain
That ever trod the Arcadian plain.
Pure stream, in whose transparent wave
My youthful limbs I wont to lave,
No torrents stain thy limpid source,
No rocks impede thy dimpling course,
That warbles sweetly o'er its bed,
With white, round, polished pebbles spread,
While, lightly poised, the scaly brood
In myriads cleave thy crystal flood-
The springing trout in speckled pride,
The salmon, monarch of the tide,
The ruthless pike intent on war,
The silver eel, and mottled par,
Devolving from thy parent lake,
A charming maze thy waters make,
By bowers of birch and groves of pine,
And edges flowered with eglantine.
Still on thy banks, so gaily green,
May numerous herds and flocks be seen,
And lasses, chanting o'er the pail,
And shepherds, piping in the dale,
And ancient faith, that knows no guile,
And Industry, embrowned with toil,
And hearts resolved and hands prepared
The blessings they enjoy to guard.
IN myriad swarms, each summer sun
An insect nation shows;
Whose being, since he rose begun,
And e'er he sets will close.
Brief is their date, confin'd their powers,
The fluttering of a day;-
Yet life's worth living, e'en for hours,
When all those hours are play.
PERHAPS it is not love, said I,
That melts my soul when Flavia's nigh:
Where wit and sense like hers agree,
One may be pleased, and yet be free.
The beauties of her polish'd mind
It needs no lover's eye to find;
The hermit freezing in his cell
Might wish the gentle Flavia well.
averse to bear
The servile chain that lovers wear;
Let, let me all my fears remove,
My doubts dispel it is not love -
O! when did wit so brightly shine
In any form less fair than thine?
It is it is love's subtile fire,
And under friendship lurks desire.
EE those cheeks of beauteous dye,
Lovely as the dawning sky,
Innocence that ne'er beguiles,
Lips that wear eternal smiles:
Beauties to the rest unknown,
Shine in her and her alone.
Now the rivers smoother flow,
Now the op'ning roses glow,
The woodbine twines her odorous charms
Round the oak's supporting arms:
Lilies paint the dewy ground
And ambrosia breathes around.
Come, ye gales that fan the spring,
Zephyr, with thy downy wing,
Gently waft to Mira's breast
Health, Content, and balmy Rest.
Far, O far from hence remain
Sorrow, Care, and sickly Pain.
Thus sung Mira to her lyre,
Till the idle numbers tire:
'Ah! Sappho sweeter sings,' I cry,
And the spiteful rocks reply,
(Responsive to the jarring strings)
Sweeter Sappho sweeter sings.'
MY Peggy is a young thing
Just entered in her teens,
Fair as the day, and sweet as May
Fair as the day, and always gay.
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