O'er hill and dale; till, waken'd by the wasp,
They fstarting snap. Nor shall the Muse disdain
To let the little noisy summer-race
Live in her lay, and flutter through her song:
Not mean, though simple; to the fun ally'd,
From him they draw their animating fire.
Wak'd by his warmer ray, the reptile young Come wing'd abroad; by the light air upborn, Lighter, and full of foul. From every chink, And fecret corner, where they slept away
The wintery storms; or rising from their tombs, 245
To higher life; by myriads, forth at once,
Swarming they pour; of all the vary'd hues
Their beauty-beaming parent can disclose.
Ten thousand forms! ten thousand different tribes!
People the blaze. To funny waters some
By fatal instinct fly; where on the pool
They, sportive, wheel; or, failing down the stream,
Are snatch'd immediate by the quick-ey'd trout,
Or darting salmon. Through the green-wood glade
Some love to stray; there lodg'd, amus'd and fed, 255
In the fresh leaf. Luxurious, others make
The meads their choice, and visit every flower,
And every latent herb: for the sweet task,
To propagate their kinds, and where to wrap,
In what soft beds, their young yet undisclos'd,
Employs their tender care. Some to the house,
The fold, and dairy, hungry, bend their flight;
Sip round the pail, or taste the curdling cheese:
Oft, inadvertent, from the milky stream
They
They meet their fate; or, weltering in the bowl, 265 With powerless wings around them wrapt, expire,
But chief to heedless flies the window proves
A constant death; where, gloomily retir'd,
The villain spider lives, cunning, and fierce,
Mixture abhorr'd! Amid a mangled heap
Of carcafes, in eager watch he fits,
O'erlooking all his waving snares around.
Near the dire cell the dreadless wanderer oft
Passes, as oft the ruffian shows his front;
The prey at last enfnar'd, he dreadful darts,
With rapid glide, along the leaning line;
And, fixing in the wretch his cruel fangs,
Strikes backward grimly pleas'd: the fluttering wing
And fhriller found declare extreme diftress,
And ask the helping hospitable hand.
Resounds the living furface of the ground:
Nor undelightful is the ceaseless hum,
To him who muses through the woods at noon:
Or drowsy shepherd, as he lies reclin'd,
With half-shut eyes, beneath the floating shade
Of willows grey, close-crowding o'er the book,
Gradual, from these what numerous kinds descend,
Evading ev'n the microscopic eye!
Full Nature swarms with life; one wondrous mass
Of animals, or atoms organiz'd,
Waiting the vital Breath, when Parent-Heaven
Shall bid his fpirit blow. The hoary fen,
In putrid steams, emits the living cloud
Of pestilence. Through fubterranean cells,
Where searching fun-beams scarce can find a way, 295
Earth animated heaves. The flowery leaf
Wants not its soft inhabitants. Secure,
Within its winding citadel, the stone
Holds multitudes. But chief the foreft-boughs,
That dance unnumber'd to the playful breeze,
The downy orchard, and the melting pulp
Of mellow fruit, the nameless nations feed
Of evanefcent insects. Where the pool
Stands mantled o'er with green, invisible,
Amid the floating verdure millions stray.
Each liquid too, whether it pierces, sooths,
Inflames, refreshes, or exalts the taste,
With various forms abounds. Nor is the stream
Of pureft crystal, nor the lucid air,
Though one transparent vacancy it seems,
Void of their unseen people, These, conceal'd
By the kind art of forming Heaven, escape
The grosser eye of Man: for, if the worlds
In worlds inclos'd should on his senses burit,
From cates ambrofial, and the nectar'd bowl,
He would abhorrent turn; and in dead night,
When filence fleeps o'er all, be stunn'd with noise.
Let no prefuming impious railer tax
Creative Wisdom, as if aught was form'd
In vain, or not for admirable ends.
Shall little haughty ignorance pronounce
His works unwise, of which the smallest part
Exceeds the narrow vision of her mind?
As if upon a full-proportion'd dome,
On fwelling columns heav'd, the pride of art!
A critic-fly, whose feeble ray scarce spreads
An inch around, with blind presumption bold,
Should dare to tax the structure of the whole.
And lives the man, whose universal eye
Has swept at once th' unbounded scheme of things;
Mark'd their dependence so, and firm accord,
And hymns of holy wonder, to that Power
Whose wifdom shines as lovely on our minds,
As on our smiling eyes his servant fon.
Thick in yon ftream of light, a thousand ways, Upward, and downward, thwarting, and convolv'd, The quivering nations sport; till, tempeft-wing'd, Fierce Winter sweeps them from the face of day. 345 Ev'n so luxurious men, unheeding, pass An idle summer life in fortune's shine, A season's glitter! Thus they flutter on From toy to toy, from vanity to vice; Till, blown away by death, oblivion comes Behind, and strikes them from the book of life. Now swarms the village o'er the jovial mead: The ruftic youth, brown with meridian toil, Healthful and ftrong; full as the fummer rose
Blown by prevailing funs, the ruddy maid,
Half naked, swelling on the fight, and all
* Her kindled graces, burning o'er her cheek.
Ev'n ftooping age is here: and infant-hands
Trail the long rake, or, with the fragrant load
O'ercharg'd, amid the kind oppreffion roll.
Wide flies the tedded grain; all in a row
Advancing broad, or wheeling round the field,
They spread their breathing harvest to the fun,
That throws refreshful round a rural smell:
Or, as they rake the green-appearing ground, 365
And drive the dusky wave along the mead,
The ruffet hay-cock rises thick behind,
In order gay. While, heard from dale to dale,
Waking the breeze, resounds the blended voice
Of happy labour, love, and social glee.
Or rushing thence, in one diffusive band, They drive the troubled flocks, by many a dog Compell'd, to where the mazy-running brook Forms a deep pool; this bank abrupt and high,
And that fair spreading in a pebbled shore.
Urg'd to the giddy brink, much is the toil,
The clamour much, of men, and boys, and dogs,
Ere the foft fearful people to the flood
Commit their woolly fides. And oft the swain,
On fome impatient seizing, hurls them in:
Embolden'd then, nor hesitating more,
Faft, faft, they plunge amid the flashing wave,
And panting labour to the farthest shore.
Repeated this, till deep the well-wan'd fleece
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