63 PRIMROSE. 



So Virtue blooms, brought forth amid the storms 

 Of chili adversity; in some lone walk 



Of life she rears her head, 



Obscure and unobserved ; — 



While every bleaching breeze that on her blows, 

 Chastens her spotless purity of breast, 



And hardens her to bear, 



Serene, the ills of life. 



THE PRIMROSE. 



MRS. HEMANS. 



I SAW it in my evening walk, 



A little lonely flower; 

 Under a hollow bank it grew, 



Deep in a mossy bovver. 



An oak's gmrl'd root to roof the cave, 



With gothic fretwork sprung, 

 Whence jevvell'd ftrn, and arum leaves, 



And ivy garlands hung. 



And close beneath came sparkling out, 

 From an old tree's fallen shell, 



A liltle rill, that dipt about 

 The lady in her cell. 



And there, methought, with bashful pride, 



She seem'd to sit and look 

 On her own maiden loveliness, 



Pale imaiied in the brook. 



