This, one of those small builders proved In a green covert, where, from out The forehead of a pollard oak, 35 The leafy antlers sprout; For She who planned the mossy lodge, Mistrusting her evasive skill, Had to a Primrose looked for aid Her wishes to fulfil. 40 High on the trunk's projecting brow And fixed an infant's span above The budding flowers, peeped forth the nest, The prettiest of the grove! The treasure proudly did I show 45 To some whose minds without disdain Can turn to little things; but once Looked up for it in vain: 'Tis gone--a ruthless spoiler's prey, Who heeds not beauty, love, or song, 50 'Tis gone! (so seemed it) and we grieved Indignant at the wrong. Just three days after, passing by In clearer light the moss-built cell I saw, espied its shaded mouth; 55 And felt that all was well. The Primrose for a veil had spread The largest of her upright leaves; And thus, for purposes benign, A simple flower deceives. 60 Concealed from friends who might disturb Thy quiet with no ill intent, Secure from evil eyes and hands On barbarous plunder bent, Rest, Mother-bird! and when thy young 65 Take flight, and thou art free to roam, When withered is the guardian Flower, And empty thy late home, Think how ye prospered, thou and thine, Amid the unviolated grove 70 Housed near the growing Primrose-tuft In foresight, or in love. FOOTNOTES: [767] Wrens still build (1896) in the same pollard oak tree, which survives in "Dora's Field"; and primroses grow beneath it.--ED. TO ---- UPON THE BIRTH OF HER FIRST-BORN CHILD, MARCH, 1833 "Tum porro puer, ut sævis projectus ab undis Navita, nudus humi jacet," etc.--LUCRETIUS.[768] Composed March 1833.--Published 1835 [Written at Moresby near Whitehaven, when I was on a visit to my son, then incumbent of that small living. While I am dictating these notes to my friend, Miss Fenwick, January 24, 1843, the child upon whose birth these verses were written is under my roof, and is of a disposition so promising that the wishes and prayers and prophecies which I then breathed forth in verse are, through God's mercy, likely to be realised.--I. F.] One of the "Poems of Sentiment and Reflection."--ED.