156 GLOW-WORM, 



But I disdain these garish fires, 



Sporting on evening's sultry wing ; 



Thy humbler light my eye admires, 

 Thy soft retiring charms I sing. 



Thine is an unobtrusive blaze, 



Content in lowly shades to shine ; 



And much I wish, while thus I gaze, 

 To make thy modest merit mine. 



For, long by youth's wild wishes cast 

 On the false world's tempestuous sea, 



I seek retirement's shore at last, 

 And find a monitor in thee. 



Dr. Darwin also, in his admired poem, 

 the Botanic Garden, commemorates the splen- 

 dour of the Glow-worm among other pheno- 

 mena, supposed to be produced under the 

 superintendance of the nymphs of fire. 



" You with light gas the lamps nocturnal feed 

 That dance and glimmer on the marshy mead ; 

 Shine round Calendula at twilight hours. 

 And tip with silver all her saffron flowers ; 

 Warm on her mossy couch the radiant worm, 

 Guard from cold dews her love-illumined form, 

 From leaf to leaf conduct the virgin light. 

 Star of the earth, and diamond of the night !" 



