She blest _that_ day, which he remembers too, When he could gaze on heav'n's ethereal blue, See the green Spring, and Summer's countless dies, And all the colours of the morning rise.-- 'When was this work of bitterness begun? How came the blindness of your only son?' Thus pity prompts full many a tongue to say, But never, till she slowly wipes away Th' obtruding tear that trembles in her eye. This dagger of a question meets reply:-- "My boy was healthy, and my rest was sound, When last year's corn was green upon the ground From yonder town infection found its way; Around me putrid dead and dying lay, I trembled for his fate: but all my care Avail'd not, for he breath'd the tainted air; Sickness ensu'd--in terror and dismay I nurs'd him in my arms both night and day, When his soft skin from head to foot became One swelling purple sore, unfit to name: Hour after hour, when all was still beside, When the pale night-light in its socket died, Alone I sat; the thought still sooths my heart, That surely I perform'd a mother's part, Watching with such anxiety and pain Till he might smile and look on me again; But that was not to be--ask me no more: GOD keep small-pox and blindness from your door!" Now, ye who think, whose souls abroad take wing, And trace out human troubles to their spring, Say, should Heav'n grant us, in some hallow'd hour, Means to divest this demon of his power, To loose his horrid grasp from early worth, To spread a saving conquest round the earth, Till ev'ry land shall bow the grateful knee, Would it not be a glorious day to see?-- That day is come! my soul, in strength arise, Invoke no muse, no power below the skies; To Heav'n the energies of verse belong, Truth is the theme, and truth shall be the song; Arm with conviction ev'ry joyful line, Source of all mercies, for the praise is thine! Sweet beam'd the star of peace upon those days When Virtue watch'd my childhood's quiet ways, Whence a warm spark of Nature's holy flame Gave the farm-yard an honourable name, But left one theme unsung: then, who had seen In herds that feast upon the vernal green, Or dreamt that in the blood of kine there ran Blessings beyond the sustenance of man? We tread the meadow, and we scent the thorn, We hail the day-spring of a summer's morn Nor mead at dawning day, nor thymy heath, Transcends the fragrance of the heifer's breath: May that dear fragrance, as it floats along O'er ev'ry flow'r that lives in rustic song; May all the sweets of meadows and of kine Embalm, O Health! this offering at thy shrine.