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THE CONSERVATORY. 



[TRANSLATED FROM THE LATIN OF LORD TENTERDEN.] 



FLORA, no more, as in old Rome, 



To thee we raise the marble dome, 



And place npon the glittering shrine 



An image of thy form divine. 



Whither the laughing crowd resort, 



With wanton glee and drunken sport, 



To crown thy altars, bright with flowers, 



While mirth re-echoes from thy bowers. 



But on the open sunny plain 



We lodge thee in a glassy fane, 



Pervious to every genial ray 



That vivifies our brightest day, 



Through which, unmoved, you see, driven forth 



By the fierce wind that rules the north, 



The bounding hail and snowy shower, 



And all stern winter's spells of power. 



And here, beneath our fostering care, 



You bloom as fresh, and look as fair, 



As if Tarentum's glorious sky, 



In all its cloudles brilliancy, 



Or far Syenas, by the Nile, 



Was beaming on you all the while. 



Transmitted from th' adjacent stoves, 



The heat around thy dwelling roves. 



In many a secret devious course, 



Or water from the hidden source, 



In leaden channels firmly bound, 



Ebbing and flowing, spreads around 



Incessant heat, a genial glow 



Such as more favour'd climates know; 



And still the gentle element 



Rejoices in the favour lent, 



Well pleased by its sweet ministry. 



To spread around felicity, 



And hence to breezes not their own, 

 The children of the burning south 



Exhale their sweets, while India's zone 



Sends flow'rs and plants from Ganges' mouth. 



In all their Eastern beauty drest, 



To vie with those that deck the West ; 



Nor grieve they for their native skies. 



And if enamour'd of their dyes, 



The sailor or the traveller bore 



Them home to grace his native shore, 



Safe from the perils of the deep, 



From suns that scorch and winds that sweep. 



The crowd in admiration gaze 



At the new wonders he displays 



More wond'rous than the beast that came, 



With eyes of fire and breath of flame, 



