BiG: BT RY. 
{ bended to the primrose low, 
And ask’d, if health might there reside ? 
“She left me,’ said the flower, ‘ but now, 
For yonder violet’s purple pride.’ 
I question’d next the violet queen, 
Where buxom health was to be found ? 
She told me, that she late was seen 
With cowslips toying on the ground. 
Then thrice I kiss’d the cowslips, pale, ° 
And in their dew-drops bath’d my face ; 
I told them all my tender tale, 
And begg’d their aid coy health to trace. 
* From us,’ exclaimed a lowly flower, 
¢ The nymph has many a day been gone; 
But now she rests within the bower 
Where yonder hawthorn blooms alone.” 
Quick to that bower I ran, I flew, 
And yet no nymph I there could find ; 
But fresh the breeze of morning blew, 
And Spring was gay, and Flora kind. 
If I return’d sedate and slow, 
What if the nymph I could not see? 
The blush that pass’d along my brow 
Was proof of her divinity. 
Aad still her votary to prove, , 
And still her dulcet smiles to share, 
I'll tread the fields, I’]] haunt the grove, 
With untir’d steps and fondest care. 
O sprite belov’d ! vouchsafe to give 
A boon, a precious boon to me ; 
Within thy influence let me tive, 
And sometimes too thy beauties see. 
So shall the muse, in nobler verse, 
And strength renew’d, exulting sing ; 
Thy praise, thy charms, thy power rehearse, 
And sweep, with bolder hand, the string. 
[*157 
A TALE 
