Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Volume 3
General
Specimens with Memoirs of the Less-known British Poets, Volume 3
English poetry
6 To her no more Augusta's wealthy pride
Pours the full tribute from Potosi's mine:
Nor fresh-blown garlands village maids provide,
A purer offering at her rustic shrine.
7 No more the Maypole's verdant height around
To valour's games the ambitious youth advance;
No merry bells and tabor's sprightlier sound
Wake the loud carol, and the sportive dance.
8 Sudden in pensive sadness drooped her head,
Faint on her cheeks the blushing crimson died--
'O chaste victorious triumphs! whither fled?
My maiden honours, whither gone?' she cried.
9 Ah! once to fame and bright dominion born,
The earth and smiling ocean saw me rise,
With time coeval and the star of morn,
The first, the fairest daughter of the skies.
10 Then, when at Heaven's prolific mandate sprung
The radiant beam of new-created day,
Celestial harps, to airs of triumph strung,
Hailed the glad dawn, and angels called me May.
11 Space in her empty regions heard the sound,
And hills, and dales, and rocks, and valleys rung;
The sun exulted in his glorious round,
And shouting planets in their courses sung.
12 For ever then I led the constant year;
Saw youth, and joy, and love's enchanting wiles;
Saw the mild graces in my train appear,
And infant beauty brighten in my smiles.
13 No winter frowned. In sweet embrace allied,
Three sister seasons danced the eternal green;
And Spring's retiring softness gently vied
With Autumn's blush, and Summer's lofty mien.
14 Too soon, when man profaned the blessings given,
And vengeance armed to blot a guilty age,
With bright Astrea to my native heaven
I fled, and flying saw the deluge rage;
15 Saw bursting clouds eclipse the noontide beams,
While sounding billows from the mountains rolled,
With bitter waves polluting all my streams,
My nectared streams, that flowed on sands of gold.
16 Then vanished many a sea-girt isle and grove,
Their forests floating on the watery plain:
Then, famed for arts and laws derived from Jove,
My Atalantis sunk beneath the main.
17 No longer bloomed primeval Eden's bowers,
Nor guardian dragons watched the Hesperian steep:
With all their fountains, fragrant fruits and flowers,
Torn from the continent to glut the deep.
18 No more to dwell in sylvan scenes I deigned,
Yet oft descending to the languid earth,
With quickening powers the fainting mass sustained,
And waked her slumbering atoms into birth.
19 And every echo taught my raptured name,
And every virgin breathed her amorous vows,
And precious wreaths of rich immortal fame,
Showered by the Muses, crowned my lofty brows.
20 But chief in Europe, and in Europe's pride,
My Albion's favoured realms, I rose adored;
And poured my wealth, to other climes denied;
From Amalthea's horn with plenty stored.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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