POEMS. 511 



ON THE 



DARK, STILL, DRY, WARM WEATHER, 



OCCASIONALLY HAPPENING IN THE WINTER MONTHS. 



THE* imprison'd winds slumber within their caves 

 Fast bound : the fickle vane, emblem of change, 

 Wavers no more, long settling to a point. 



All Nature nodding seems composed : thick steams 

 From land, from flood updrawn, dimming the day, 

 " Like a dark ceiling stand :" slow through the air 

 Gossamer floats, or stretch'd from blade to blade 

 The wavy network whitens all the field. 



Push'd by the weightier atmosphere, up springs 

 The ponderous mercury, from scale to scale 

 Mounting, amidst the Torricellian tube l . 



While high in air, and poised upon his wings, 

 Unseen, the soft, enamour'd woodlark runs 

 Through all his maze of melody ; the brake 

 Loud with the blackbird's bolder note resounds. 

 Sooth' d by the genial warmth, the cawing rook 

 Anticipates the spring, selects her mate, 

 Haunts her tall nest-trees, and with sedulous care 

 Repairs her wicker eyrie, tempest torn. 



The ploughman inly smiles to see upturn 

 His mellow glebe, best pledge of future crop. 

 With glee the gardener eyes his smoking beds : 

 E'en pining sickness feels a short relief. 



The happy schoolboy brings transported forth 

 His long forgotten scourge, and giddy gig : 

 O'er the white paths he whirls the rolling hoop, 

 Or triumphs in the dusty fields of taw. 



1 The barometer. 



