Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch A broader, browner shade, Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech O'er-canopies the glade, Beside some water's rushy brink With me the Muse shall sit, and think (At ease reclined in rustic state) How vain the ardour of the crowd, How low, how little are the proud, How indigent the great! Still is the toiling hand of Care; The panting herds repose: Yet hark, how thro' the peopled air The busy murmur glows! The insect-youth are on the wing, Eager to taste the honied spring And float amid the liquid noon: Some lightly o'er the current skim, Some show their gaily-gilded trim Quick-glancing to the sun. To Contemplation's sober eye Such is the race of Man: And they that creep, and they that Shall end where they began. Alike the Busy and the Gay But flutter thro' life's little day, In Fortune's varying colours drest: Brush'd by the hand of rough Mischance, Or chill'd by Age, their airy dance They leave, in dust to rest. Methinks I hear in accents low The sportive kind reply: Poor moralist! and what art thou? A solitary fly! Thy joys no glittering female meets, No hive hast thou of hoarded sweets, No painted plumage to display: On hasty wings thy youth is flown; Thy sun is set, thy spring is gone-- We frolic while 'tis May. _T. Gray_ CLXXXIII _THE POPLAR FIELD_ The poplars are fell'd; 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 first 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 charm'd 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. _W. Cowper_ CLXXXIV _TO A MOUSE_ _On turning her up in her nest, with the plough, November, 1785_ Wee, sleekit, cow'rin', tim'rous beastie, O what a panic's in thy breastie! Thou need na start awa sae hasty, Wi' bickering brattle! I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee Wi' murd'ring pattle!