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Rhymed Lessons for August.

BEATTIE'S "HERMIT."

Ar the close of the day, when the hamlet is still, And mortals the sweets of forgetfulness prove, When naught but the torrent is heard on the hill, And naught but the nightingale's song in the grove :

"T was thus by the cave of the mountain afar, While his harp rung symphonious, a hermit began:

No more with himself or with nature at war,

He thought as a sage, though he felt as a man.

Ah! why, all abandoned to darkness and woe, Why, lone Philomela, that languishing fall? For Spring shall return, and a lover bestow,

And sorrow no longer thy bosom inthrall: But if pity inspire thee, renew the sad lay, Mourn, sweetest complainer, man calls thee to

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'Now gliding remote on the verge of the sky, The moon half-extinguished her crescent displays : But lately I marked, when majestic on high

She shone, and the planets were lost in her blaze. Roll on, thou fair orb, and with gladness pursue

The path that conducts thee to splendor again; But man's faded glory what change shall renew? Ah, fool! to exult in a glory so vain!

"Tis night, and the landscape is lovely no more;
I mourn, but, ye woodlands, I mourn not for you;
For morn is approaching, your charms to restore,
Perfumed with fresh fragrance and glittering with
Nor yet for the ravage of Winter I mourn; [dew:
Kind Nature the embryo blossom will save.
But when shall Spring visit the mouldering urn!
O, when shall it dawn on the night of the grave!'
'T was thus, by the glare of false science betrayed,
That leads, to bewilder; and dazzles, to blind;
My thoughts wont to roam, from shade onward to

Destruction before me, and sorrow behind. [shade, O pity, great Father of Light,' then I cried, "Thy creature, who fain would not wander from Lo, humbled in dust I relinquish my pride: [Thee; From doubt and from darkness Thou only canst free!'

And darkness and doubt are now flying away;
No longer I roam in conjecture forlorn :
So breaks on the traveller, faint, and astray,

The bright and the balmy effulgence of morn. See Truth, Love, and Mercy, in triumph descending, And Nature all glowing in Eden's first bloom! On the cold cheek of death smiles and roses are blending,

And beauty immortal awakes from the tomb.

POPE'S "UNIVERSAL ORDER."

ALL are but parts of one stupendous whole, Whose body nature is, and God the soul; That changed through all, and yet in all the same, Great in the earth, as in the ethereal frame; Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze, Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees; Lives through all life, extends through all extent; Spreads undivided, operates unspent ; Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part, As full, as perfect, in an hair as heart; As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns, As the rapt seraph that adores and burns : To Him no high, no low, no great, no small ; He fills, He bounds, connects, and equals all,

Cease, then, nor order imperfection name : Our proper bliss depends on what we blame. Know thy own point: this kind, this due degree Of blindness, weakness, Heaven bestows on thee. Submit. In this, or any other sphere,

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AUTUMN-SEPTEMBER.

The Third of the Seasons.

THOMSON'S "AUTUMN."

ARGUMENT.

The subject proposed. Addressed to Mr. Onslow. A prospect of the fields ready for harvest. Reflections in praise of industry raised by that view. Reaping. A tale relative to it. A harvest storm. Shooting and hunting; their barbarity. A ludicrous account of fox-hunting. A view of an orchard. Wall-fruit. A vineyard. A description of fogs, frequent in the latter part of autumn; whence a digression, inquiring into the rise of fountains and rivers. Birds of season considered, that now shift their habitation. The prodigious number of them that cover the northern and western isles of Scotland. Hence a view of the country. A prospect of the discolored, fading woods. After a gentle, dusky day, moonlight. Autumnal meteors. Morning; to which succeeds a calm, pure, sunshiny day, such as usually shuts up the season. The harvest being gathered in, the country dissolved in joy. The whole concludes with a panegyric on a philosophical country life.

THE AUTUMN OF THE YEAR.

CROWNED with the sickle and the wheaten sheaf, While Autumn, nodding o'er the yellow plain, Comes jovial on; the Doric reed once more, Well-pleased, I tune. Whate'er the wintry frost Nitrous prepared; the various-blossomed Spring Put in white promise forth; and summer-suns Concocted strong, rush boundless now to view, Full, perfect all, and swell my glorious theme.

DEDICATION TO MR. ONSLOW.PATRIOTISM.

Onslow the Muse, ambitious of thy name, To grace, inspire, and dignify her song, Would from the public voice thy gentle ear A while engage. Thy noble cares she knows, The patriot virtues that distend thy thought, Spread on thy front, and in thy bosom glow; While listening senates hang upon thy tongue, Devolving through the maze of eloquence A roll of periods, sweeter than her song. But she too pants for public virtue; she, Though weak of power, yet strong in ardent will, Whene'er her country rushes on her heart, Assumes a bolder note, and fondly tries To mix the patriot's with the poet's flame.

THE SKY OF AUTUMN, BLUE, COOL, AND GOLDEN. — THE RIPE CROP.

When the bright Virgin gives the beauteous days, And Libra weighs in equal scales the year; From Heaven's high cope the fierce effulgence shook Of parting Summer, a serener blue, With golden light enlivened, wide invests The happy world. Attempered suns arise, Sweet-beamed, and shedding oft through lucid clouds

A pleasing.calm; while broad, and brown, below
Extensive harvests hang the heavy head.
Rich, silent, deep, they stand; for not a gale
Rolls its light billows o'er the bending plain :
A calm of plenty! till the ruffled air

Falls from its poise, and gives the breeze to blow.
Rent is the fleecy mantle of the sky;

The clouds fly different; and the sudden sun
By fits effulgent gilds the illumined field,
And black by fits the shadows sweep along.
A gayly-checkered, heart-expanding view,
Far as the circling eye can shoot around,
Unbounded tossing in a flood of corn.

THE PRAISE OF INDUSTRY, THE CIVILIZER.

These are thy blessings, Industry! rough power! Whom labor still attends, and sweat, and pain; Yet the kind source of every gentle art, And all the soft civility of life : Raiser of humankind! by nature cast, Naked, and helpless, out amid the woods And wilds, to rude inclement elements; With various seeds of art deep in the mind Implanted, and profusely poured around Materials infinite, but idle all.

THE SAVAGE; EXPOSED; COMFORTLESS; HOMELESS. Still unexerted, in the unconscious breast, Slept the lethargic powers; corruption still, Voracious, swallowed what the liberal hand Of bounty scattered o'er the savage year: And still the sad barbarian, roving, mixed With beasts of prey; or for his acorn-meal Fought the fierce tusky boar; a shivering wretch ! Aghast, and comfortless, when the bleak north, With Winter charged, let the mixed tempest fly, Hail, rain, and snow, and bitter breathing frost : Then to the shelter of the hut he fled; And the wild seasons, sordid, pined away.

THE SWEETS OF HOME; PROGRESS OF THE SAVAGE, AIDED BY INDUSTRY, TO ART; AND THROUGH ART TO MODERN CIVILIZATION.

For home he had not; home is the resort Of love, of joy, of peace and plenty, where, Supporting and supported, polished friends, And dear relations, mingle into bliss. But this the rugged savage never felt, E'en desolate in crowds; and thus his days Rolled heavy, dark, and unenjoyed along, A waste of time! till Industry approached, And roused him from his miserable sloth; His faculties unfolded; pointed out, Where lavish Nature the directing hand Of Art demanded; showed him how to raise His feeble force by the mechanic powers; To dig the mineral from the vaulted earth; On what to turn the piercing rage of fire, On what the torrent, and the gathered blast; Gave the tall ancient forest to his axe; Taught him to chip the wood, and hew the stone,

Till by degrees the finished fabric rose;
Tore from his limbs the blood-polluted fur,
And wrapt them in the woolly vestment warm,
Or bright in glossy silk, and flowing lawn;
With wholesome viands filled his table, poured
The generous glass around, inspired to wake
The life-refining soul of decent wit:
Nor stopped at barren, bare necessity;
But still advancing bolder, led him on
To pomp, to pleasure, elegance, and grace;
And, breathing high ambition through his soul,
Set science, wisdom, glory, in his view,
And bade him be the Lord of all below.

THE FORMATION OF SOCIETY AND GOVERNMENT; CIVIL LIBERTY; JUSTICE. — REFINEMENT. CITIES NURSES OF ART.

Then gathering men their natural powers comAnd formed a public; to the general good [bined, Submitting, aiming, and conducting all. For this the Patriot-Council met, the full, The free, and fairly represented Whole; For this they planned the holy guardian laws, Distinguished orders, animated arts, And, with joint force Oppression chaining, set Imperial Justice at the helm, yet still To them accountable: nor slavish dreamed That toiling millions must resign their weal, And all the honey of their search, to such As for themselves alone themselves have raised. Hence every form of cultivated life In order set, protected, and inspired, Into perfection wrought. Uniting all, Society grew numerous, high, polite, And happy. Nurse of art! the city reared In beauteous pride her tower-encircled head; And, stretching street on street, by thousands drew, From twining woody haunts, or the tough yew To bows strong-straining, her aspiring sons.

COMMERCE; STORES; SHIPS; THE BRITISH NAVY.

Then Commerce brought into the public walk
The busy merchant; the big warehouse built;
Raised the strong crane; choked up the loaded street
With foreign plenty; and thy stream, O Thames,
Large, gentle, deep, majestic, king of floods!
Chose for his grand resort. On either hand,
Like a long wintry forest, groves of masts
Shot up their spires; the bellying sheet between
Possessed the breezy void; the sooty hulk
Steered sluggish on; the splendid barge along
Rowed, regular, to harmony; around,

The boat, light-skimming, stretched its oary wings;
While deep the various voice of fervent toil [oak,
From bank to bank increased; whence ribbed with
To bear the British thunder, black, and bold,
The roaring vessel rushed into the main.

LUXURY; THE FINE ARTS.

Then too the pillared dome, magnific, heaved Its ample roof; and Luxury within Poured out her glittering stores: the canvas smooth,

With glowing life protuberant, to the view
Embodied rose; the statue seemed to breathe,
And soften into flesh, beneath the touch
Of forming art, imagination-flushed.

GIFTS OF INDUSTRY TO WINTER, SPRING, SUMMER, AND
AUTUMN.

All is the gift of industry; whate'er Exalts, embellishes, and renders life Delightful. Pensive Winter, cheered by him, Sits at the social fire, and happy hears The excluded tempest idly rave along; His hardened fingers deck the gaudy Spring; Without him Summer were an arid waste; Nor to the autumnal months could thus transmit Those full, mature, immeasurable stores, That, waving round, recall my wandering song.

THE REAPERS, YOUTHS AND MAIDENS; THE HARVEST.
Soon as the morning trembles o'er the sky,
And, unperceived, unfolds the spreading day;
Before the ripened field the reapers stand,
In fair array, each by the lass he loves,
To bear the rougher part, and mitigate
By nameless gentle offices her toil.

At once they stoop, and swell the lusty sheaves;
While through their cheerful band the rural talk,
The rural scandal, and the rural jest,
Fly harmless, to deceive the tedious time,
And steal unfelt the sultry hours away.
Behind the master walks, builds up the shocks;
And, conscious, glancing oft on every side
His sated eye, feels his heart heave with joy.

THE CLEANERS. — CHARITY TO THE POOR ENFORCED.

The gleaners spread around, and here and there, Spike after spike, their scanty harvest pick. Be not too narrow, husbandmen! but fling From the full sheaf, with charitable stealth, The liberal handful. Think, O grateful think! How good the God of Harvest is to you; Who pours abundance o'er your flowing fields; While these unhappy partners of your kind Wide-hover round you, like the fowls of heaven, And ask their humble dole. The various turns Of fortune ponder; that your sons may want What now, with hard reluctance, faint, ye give.

STORY OF PALEMON AND LAVINIA. HER PARENTAGE AND
CHILDHOOD.

The lovely young Lavinia once had friends;
And fortune smiled, deceitful, on her birth.
For, in her helpless years deprived of all,
Of every stay, save Innocence and Heaven,
She with her widowed mother, feeble, old,
And poor, lived in a cottage, far retired
Among the windings of a woody vale ;
By solitude and deep surrounding shades,
But more by bashful modesty, concealed.
Together thus they shunned the cruel scorn
Which virtue, sunk to poverty, would meet
From giddy passion and low-minded pride;

Almost on nature's common bounty fed;
Like the gay birds that sung them to repose,
Content, and careless of to-morrow's fare.

HER BEAUTY DESCRIBED. LOVELINESS UNADORNED.

Her form was fresher than the morning rose, When the dew wets its leaves; unstained and pure As is the lily, or the mountain snow. The modest Virtues mingled in her eyes, Still on the ground dejected, darting all Their humid beams into the blooming flowers: Or when the mournful tale her mother told, Of what her faithless fortune promised once, Thrilled in her thought, they, like the dewy star Of evening, shone in tears. A native grace Sat fair-proportioned on her polished limbs, Veiled in a simple robe, their best attire, Beyond the pomp of dress; for loveliness Needs not the foreign aid of ornament, But is, when unadorned, adorned the most. Thoughtless of beauty, she was Beauty's self, Recluse amid the close-embowering woods.

LAVINIA GLEANS IN THE FIELDS OF PALEMON. PALEMON DESCRIBED. ARCADIAN LIFE.

As in the hollow breast of Apennine,
Beneath the shelter of encircling hills,
A myrtle rises, far from human eye,

And breathes its balmy fragrance o'er the wild;
So flourished blooming, and unseen by all,
The sweet Lavinia; till, at length, compelled
By strong Necessity's supreme command,
With smiling patience in her looks, she went
To glean Palemon's fields. The pride of swains
Palemon was, the generous and the rich;
Who led the rural life in all its joy
And elegance, such as Arcadian song
Transmits from ancient uncorrupted times;
When tyrant custom had not shackled man,
But free to follow nature was the mode.
He then, his fancy with autumnal scenes
Amusing, chanced beside his reaper-train
To walk, when poor Lavinia drew his eye;
Unconscious of her power, and turning quick
With unaffected blushes from his gaze :
He saw her charming, but he saw not half
The charms her downcast modesty concealed.

SOLILOQUY OF PALEMON. ACASTO.

That very moment love and chaste desire Sprung in his bosom, to himself unknown ; For still the world prevailed and its dread laugh, Which scarce the firm philosopher can scorn, — Should his heart own a gleaner in the field; And thus in secret to his soul he sighed :

What pity that so delicate a form, By beauty kindled, where enlivening sense And more than vulgar goodness seem to dwell, Should be devoted to the rude embrace Of some indecent clown! she looks, methinks, Of old Acasto's line; and to my mind

Recalls that patron of my happy life,
From whom my liberal fortune took its rise;
Now to the dust gone down; his houses, lands,
And once fair-spreading family, dissolved.
"T is said that in some lone, obscure retreat,
Urged by remembrance sad, and decent pride,
Far from those scenes which knew their better days,
His aged widow and his daughter live,
Whom yet my fruitless search could never find.
Romantic wish! would this the daughter were!'

LAVINIA IS ACASTO'S DAughter.

When, strict inquiring, from herself he found She was the same, the daughter of his friend, Of bountiful Acasto-who can speak The mingled passions that surprised his heart, And through his nerves in shivering transport ran? Then blazed his smothered flame, avowed, and bold; And as he viewed her, ardent, o'er and o'er, Love, gratitude, and pity, wept at once. Confused, and frightened at his sudden tears, Her rising beauties flushed a higher bloom, As thus Palemon, passionate and just, Poured out the pious rapture of his soul:

PALEMON'S WOOING.

And art thou, then, Acasto's dear remains?
She whom my restless gratitude has sought
So long in vain? O heavens! the very same,
The softened image of my noble friend;
Alive his every look, his every feature,
More elegantly touched. Sweeter than Spring!
Thou sole surviving blossom from the root
That nourished up my fortune! Say, ah where,
In what sequestered desert hast thou drawn
The kindest aspect of delighted Heaven?
Into such beauty spread, and blown so fair;
Though poverty's cold wind, and crushing rain,
Beat keen and heavy on thy tender years?
O let me now into a richer soil

Transplant thee safe! where vernal suns and showers
Diffuse their warmest, largest influence;
And of my garden be the pride and joy !
Ill it befits thee, O, it ill befits
Acasto's daughter, his, whose open stores,
Though vast, were little to his ampler heart,
The father of a country- thus to pick
The very refuse of those harvest-fields
Which from his bounteous friendship I enjoy.
Then throw that shameful pittance from thy hand,
But ill applied to such a rugged task;
The fields, the master, all, my fair, are thine:
If to the various blessings which thy house
Has on me lavished thou wilt add that bliss,
That dearest bliss, the power of blessing thee!'

LAVINIA WON; DOMESTIC HAPPINESS.

Here ceased the youth: yet still his speaking eye Expressed the sacred triumph of his soul, With conscious virtue, gratitude, and love, Above the vulgar joy divinely raised.

Nor waited he reply. Won by the charm
of goodness irresistible, and all

In sweet disorder lost, she blushed consent.
The news immediate to her mother brought,
While, pierced with anxious thought, she pined away
The lonely moments for Lavinia's fate;
Amazed, and scarce believing what she heard,
Joy seized her withered veins, and one bright gleam
Of setting life shone on her evening hours:
Not less enraptured than the happy pair,
Who flourished long in tender bliss, and reared
A numerous offspring, lovely like themselves,
And good, the grace of all the country round.

THE SUMMER HURRICANE.

Defeating oft the labors of the year,
The sultry south collects a potent blast.
At first the groves are scarcely seen to stir
Their trembling tops, and a still murmur runs
Along the soft-inclining fields of corn.
But as the aerial tempest fuller swells,
And in one mighty stream, invisible,
Immense, the whole excited atmosphere
Impetuous rushes o'er the sounding world:
Strained to the root, the stooping forest pours
A rustling shower of yet untimely leaves.
High-beat, the circling mountains eddy in
From the bare wild the dissipated storm,
And send it in a torrent down the vale.
Exposed, and naked, to its utmost rage,
Through all the sea of harvest rolling round,
The billowy plain floats wide, nor can evade,
Though pliant to the blast, its seizing force;
Or whirled in air, or into vacant chaff
Shook waste.

THE SUMMER TEMPEST. DELUGE OF RAIN. INUNDATION.
-DAMAGE.

And sometimes too a burst of rain,

Swept from the black horizon, broad, descends
In one continuous flood. Still over head
The mingling tempest waves its gloom, and still
The deluge deepens, till the fields around
Lie sunk, and flatted, in the sordid wave.
Sudden the ditches swell, the meadows swim;
Red, from the hills, innumerable streams
Tumultuous roar, and high above its banks
The river lift, before whose rushing tide
Herds, flocks, and harvests, cottages, and swains,
Roll mingled down; all that the winds had spared
In one wild moment ruined; the big hopes
And well-earned treasures of the painful year.

THE DISAPPOINTED FARMER AND HIS LANDLORD.

Fled to some eminence, the husbandman
Helpless beholds the miserable wreck
Driving along; his drowning ox at once
Descending, with his labors scattered round,
He sees; and instant o'er his shivering thought
Comes Winter unprovided, and a train
Of clamant children dear. Ye masters, then,
Be mindful of the rough laborious hand

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