OUR CLOSING DAY. 251 



" With beagle, or greyhound, go hunt puss, the hare, 

 Or chase, in gay scarlet, the fox to his lair ; 

 Give me my roach tackle ; of ground bait a heap ; 

 A fig for all else, be the stream swift and deep : 



" For my rod light and limber, &c. 



" You may shoot, you may hunt, you may stalk the red deer ; 

 Let me list to the music of some falling weir, 

 While I tempt the sly chub, the fat barbel, and jack, 

 Oh ! I envy no king if I bear a few back : 



" With my rod light and limber, &c." 



That gallant acquaintance, the gay comrade, was observed 

 closely, and his friends knew by the dignified reserve en- 

 nobling his brow that that tempered brain had prepared for 

 us an intellectual treat. He had dealt with what may be 

 termed the melodramatic aspect of the recreation to which 

 we were all devoted. He"poured out his soul in recitation, 

 thus : 



" I greet thee, friend, upon this autumn day, 

 And give thee welcome to this sheltered lake. 

 Here for a season let us haply stay, 

 Of this good weed Returns I pr'ythee take. 

 So gaze we now upon the tinted leaves 

 Which mix their colours by their own good law. 

 Breathes there the man who in his heart believes 

 That Providence is not above us ? Psha ! 

 Fill up thy pipe, thou tall, thou goodly youth, 

 And strike a light upon this roughened edge. 

 See'st thou the float ? 



" Alack in naked truth 



It still bobs pikeless near yon fringe of sedge. 

 Now let us therefore our discourse resume. 

 Another light ? With pleasure ; strike it low ; 

 (The worst of fusees is their well perfume.) 

 Those drifting clouds are white as driven snow. 

 What is the theory of wind, of heat, of cold ? 

 Why points the needle to the northern pole ? 



