462 POEMS. 



Or where the Hermit hangs the straw-clad cell,* 

 Emerging gently from the leafy dell ; 

 By Fancy planned j as once the' inventive maid 

 Met the hoar sage amid the secret shade ; 

 Romantic spot ! from whence in prospect lie? 

 Whate'er of landscape charms our feasting eye^ ; 

 The pointed spire, the hall, the pasture-plain. 

 The russet fallow, or the golden grain, 

 The breezy lake that sheds a gleaming light, 

 Till all the fading 'picture fail the sight. 



Each to his task ; all different ways retire ; 

 Cull the dry stick ; call forth the seeds of fire ; 

 Deep fix the kettle's props, a forky row, 

 Or give with fanning hat the breeze to blow. 



Whence is this taste, the furnish'd hall forgot, 

 To feast in gardens, or the unhandy grot ? 

 Or novelty with some new charms surprise?, 

 Or from our very shifts some joy arises. 

 Hark, while below the village-bells ring round, 

 Echo, sweet nymph, returns the soften'd sound ; 

 But if gusts rise, the rushing forests roar, 

 Like the tide tumbling on the pebbly shore. 



Adown the vale, in lone, sequester'd nook, 

 Where skirting woods embrown the dimpling brook, 

 The ruin'd convent lies ; here wont to dwell 

 The lazy canon midst his cloister'd eel! ; t 

 While papal darkness brooded o'er the land, 

 Ere Reformation made her glorious stand : 

 Still oft at eve belated shepherd-swains 

 See the cowl'd spectre skim the folded plains. 



To the high Te*apl? v;oul^. n:y stranger go,J 



* A grotesque building, contrived by a young gentleman, who used on 

 occasion to appear in the character of a hermit. 



f The ruins of a priory, founded by Peter de Rupibus, Bishop of Winchester. 



The remains of a preceptory of the Knights Templars ; at least it was a 

 farm dependent upon some preceptory of that order. I find it was a preceptory 

 called the Preceptory of Sudington ; now called Southingtbn. 



