145 Embodied rose. The statue seem'd to breathe,
And soften into flesh, beneath the touch
Of forming art, imagination-flush'd.

All is the gift of Industry; whate'er
Exalts, embellishes, and renders life
150 Delightful. Pensive Winter chear'd by him.
Sits at the social fire, and happy hears
Th'excluded tempest idly rave along.

His harden'd fingers deck the gaudy Spring.
Without him Summer were an arid waste;
155 Nor to th'autumnal months could thus transmit
These full, mature, immeasurable stores,
That, waving round, recal my wandering song.

Soon as the morning trembles o'er the sky,
And, unperceiv'd, unfolds the spreading day;
160 Before the ripen'd field the reapers stand,
In fair array; each by the lass he loves,
To bear the rougher part, and mitigate
By nameless gentle offices her toil.

At once they stoop, and swell the lusty sheaves; 165 While, bandied round and round, the rural talk, The rural scandal, and the rural jest

Fly hearty, to deceive the tedious time,
And chearly steal the sultry hours away.

B 156 These ] Those 165 While thro' their chearful Band the

rural Talk

MS 156 BP

167 Fly harmless,

165-168 P writes:

168 And steal unfelt the etc.

While through (the) their chearfull Band the Rural Talk
With hearty Mirth deceive the tedious Task

And rural Jests smooth all the Sense of Pain

(follows something illegible)

And steal unfelt the sultry Hours away

T retains the first and the fourth lines. For the two middle verses
he restores text A with harmless for hearty, and Gambol for
scandal. In the first line he corrects P's through into thro', and
cancels the second 1 in chearfull: in the second verse he puts an
s to deceive.

Behind the master walks, builds up the shocks;
170 And, conscious, glancing oft this way and that
His sated eye, feels his heart heave with joy.
The gleaners spread around, and here and there,
Spike after spike, their sparing harvest pick.
Be not too narrow, husband-men! but fling
175 From the full sheaf, with charitable stealth,
The liberal handful. Think, oh grateful think!
How good the God of harvest is to you;
Who pours abundance o'er your flowing fields;
While these unhappy partners of your kind
180 Wide-hover round you, like the fowls of heaven,
And ask their humble dole. The various turns
Of fortune ponder; that your sons may want
What now, with hard reluctance, faint, ye give.

The lovely young Lavinia once had friends;
185 And fortune smil'd, deceitful, on her birth.
For in her helpless years depriv'd of all,
Of every stay, save innocence and Heaven,
She with her widow'd mother, feeble, old,
And poor, liv'd in a cottage, lost far up
190 Amid the windings of a woody vale;

B

Safe from the cruel, blasting arts of man;
Almost on Nature's common bounty fed,

Like the gay birds that sung them to repose,

170 glancing oft on every Side 189, 190 far retir'd || Among
the Windings For 191:

By Solitude and deep surrounding Shades,
But more by bashful Modesty, conceal'd,
Together thus they shunn'd the cruel Scorn
Which Virtue, sunk to Poverty, would meet
From giddy Fashion and low-minded Pride:
Almost on Nature's etc.

MS 190 Among P

which he gives thus: World

[185]

191 BP, save the last of the five new lines
From the base Pride of the malignant

B178 C177

195

Content, and careless of to-morrow's fare.
Her form was fresher than the morning-rose,

When the dew wets its leaves; unstain'd, and pure,
As is the lily, or the mountain snow.

The modest virtues mingled in her eyes,
Still on the ground deject, and darting all
200 Their humid beams into the blooming flowers:
Or when the stories that her mother told,
Of what her faithless fortune flatter'd once,
Thrill'd in her thought, they, like the dewy star
Of evening, shone in tears. A native grace

205

Sat fair-proportion'd on her polish'd limbs,
Veil'd in a simple robe; for loveliness

Needs not the foreign aid of ornament,
But is when unadorn'd adorn'd the most.
Thoughtless of beauty, she was Beauty's self,
210 Recluse among the woods; if city-dames

Will deign their faith. And thus she went compell'd
By strong necessity, with as serene,

And pleas'd a look as patience can put on,

To glean Palæmon's fields. The pride of swains

215 Palæmon was, the generous, and the rich,

B 199 dejected, darting all

201 stories that] mournful Tale

210-213 thus

202 flatter'd] promis'd 206 simple Robe, their best Attire, ||
Beyond the Pomp of Dress; for Loveliness
expanded:

Recluse amid the close-embowering Woods.
As in the hollow Breast of Appenine

[210]

Beneath the Shelter of encircling Hills,

With smiling Patience in her Looks, she went
To glean Palemon's Fields.

MS 201-213 BP, with [209] deep-embowering and [212] Eyes.

P also deletes l. 208, but T restores it.

Palaestra LXVI.

13

Who led the rural life in all its joy,
And elegance, such as Arcadian song
Transmits from antient, incorrupted times;
When tyrant custom had not shackled man,
220 And free to follow nature was the mode.
He then, his fancy with autumnal scenes
Amusing, chanc'd beside his reaper-train
To walk, when poor Lavinia drew his eye;
Unconscious of her power, and turning quick
225 With unaffected blushes from his gaze.

He saw her charming, but he saw not half
The charms her downcast modesty conceal'd.
That very moment love and chast desire
Sprung in his bosom, to himself unknown;
230 For still the world prevail'd, and its dread laugh,
Which scarce the firm philosopher can scorn,
Should his heart own a gleaner in the field:
And thus in secret to his soul he sigh'd.

What pity! that so delicate a form,

235 By beauty kindled, and harmonious shap'd,
Where sense sincere, and goodness seem to dwell,
Should be devoted to the rude embrace

Of some indecent clown? She looks, methinks,
Of old Acasto's line; and to my mind

240 Recalls that patron of my happy life,

From whom my liberal fortune took its rise;
Now to the dust gone down; his houses, lands,
And once fair-spreading family dissolv'd.
I've heard that, in some waste obscure retreat,
245 Urg'd by remembrance sad, and decent pride,

B

218 uncorrupted

244

220 But free 235, 236 kindled, where
enlivening Sense, || And more than vulgar Goodness
'Tis said that waste] lone

MS 235, 236 BP (first exalted for enlivening) 239 line; ] Blood
P 244 (Tis rumour'd that in some obscure retreat) T

B238 C237

Far from those scenes which knew their better days,
His aged widow and his daughter live;

Whom yet my fruitless search could never find.
Romantic wish, would this the daughter were!

250 When, strict enquiring, from herself he found
She was the same, the daughter of his friend,
The bountiful Acasto; who can speak

The mingling passion that surpriz'd his heart,
And thro' his nerves in shivering transport ran?
255 Then blaz'd his smother'd flame, avow'd, and bold;
And as he run her, ardent, o'er and o'er,
Love, gratitude, and pity wept at once.
Confus'd, and frighten'd at his sudden tears,
Her rising beauties flush'd a higher bloom,
260 As thus Palæmon, passionate, and just,
Pour'd out the pious rapture of his soul.

And art thou then Acasto's dear remains?
She, whom my restless gratitude has sought
So long in vain? oh yes! the very same,
265 The soften'd image of my noble friend,
Alive, his every feature, every look,
More elegantly touch'd. Fairer than spring!
Thou sole surviving blossom from the root,
That nourish'd up my fortune, say, ah where,
270 In what unsmiling desart, hast thou drawn
The kindest aspect of delighted heaven?
Into such beauty spread? and blown so white?
Tho' poverty's cold wind, and crushing rain,
Beat keen, and heavy, on thy tender years.

275 O let me now, into a richer soil,

Transplant thee safe! where vernal suns, and showers,

B254 C253

B266 C265