ADVERTISEMENT. HE following Sketches were the production of untutored youth, commenced in his twelfth, and occasion ally resumed by the author till his twentieth year; since which time, his talents having been wholly directed to the attainment of excellence in his profession, he has been deprived of the leisure requisite to such a revisal of these sheets, as might have rendered them less unfit to meet the public eye. Conscious of the irregularities and defects to be found in almost every page, his friends have still believed that they possessed a poetical originality, which merited some respite from oblivion. These their opinions remain, however, to be now reproved or confirmed by a less partial public. POETICAL SKETCHES. TO SPRING. THOU with dewy locks, who lookest down Thro' the clear windows of the morning, turn Thine angel eyes upon our western isle, Which in full choir hails thy approach, O Spring! The hills tell each other, and the listening Come o'er the eastern hills, and let our winds O deck her forth with thy fair fingers; pour TO SUMMER. THOU who passest thro' our valleys in Thy strength, curb thy fierce steeds, allay the heat That flames from their large nostrils! thou, O Oft pitched'st here thy golden tent, and oft Beneath our thickest shades we oft have heard Some bank beside a river clear, throw thy Our bards are famed who strike the silver wire : TO AUTUMN. AUTUMN, laden with fruit, and stain'd Beneath my shady roof, there thou mayst rest, "The narrow bud opens her beauties to "The sun, and love runs in her thrilling veins; "Blossoms hang round the brows of morning, and "Flourish down the bright cheek of modest eve, "Till clustering Summer breaks forth into singing, "And feather'd clouds strew flowers round her head. "The spirits of the air live on the smells "Of fruit; and joy, with pinions light, roves round "The gardens, or sits singing in the trees." Thus sang the jolly Autumn as he sat; Then rose, girded himself, and o'er the bleak Hills fled from our sight; but left his golden load. |