A GOOD WORD FOR WINTER. 25 



Master and lord I am, says he, 

 And of good right so ought to be, 

 Since I make causeys, safely croat, 

 Of mud, with just a pinch of frost. 



But there is no recognition of Winter as the best of out-door 

 company. 



Even Emerson, an open-air man, and a bringer of it, if 

 ever any, confesses, 



The frost-king ties my fumbling feet, 

 Sings in my ear, my hands are stones, 

 Curdles the blood to the marble bones, 

 Tugs at the heartstrings, numbs the sense, 

 And hems in life with narrowing fence. 



Winter was literally the inverted year, as Thomson 

 called him ; for such entertainments as could be had must be 

 got within doors. What cheerfulness there was in brumal 

 verse was that of Horace s dissolve frigus ligna super foco 

 large reponens, so pleasantly associated with the cleverest 

 scene in Roderick Random. This is the tone of that poem 

 of Walton s friend Cotton, which won the praise of Words 

 worth : 



Let us home, 



Our mortal enemy is come ; 

 Winter and all his blustering train 

 Have made a voyage o er the main. 



Fly, fly, the foe advances fas 

 Into our fortress let us haste, 

 Where all the roarers of the north 

 Can neither storm nor starve us forth. 



There underground a magazine 

 Of sovereign juice is cellared in, 

 Liquor that will the siege maintain 

 Should Phoebus ne er return again. 



Whilst we together jovial sit 

 Careless, and crowned with mirth and wit, 

 Where, though bleak winds confine us home 

 Our fancies round the world shall roam. 



Thomson s view of Winter is also, on the whole, a hostile 

 one, though he does justice to his grandeur. 



Thus Winter falls, 



A heavy gloom oppressive o er the world, 

 Through Nature shedding influence malign. 



He finds his consolations, like Cotton, in the house, though 

 more refined : 



