POEMS. 



THE INVITATION TO SELBORNE. 



EE Selborne spreads her boldest beauties 



round, 



The varied valley, and the mountain ground, 

 Wildly majestic ! what is all the pride 

 Of flats, with loads of ornament supplied ? 



Unpleasing, tasteless, impotent expense, 



Compared with Nature's rude magnificence. 

 Arise, my stranger, to these wild scenes haste ; 



The unfinished farm awaits your forming taste : 



Plan the pavilion, airy, light, and true ; 



Through the high arch call in the lengthening view ; 



Expand the forest sloping up the hill ; 



Swell to a lake the scant, penurious rill ; 



Extend the vista, raise the castle mound 



In antique taste with turrets ivy-crowned ; 



O'er the gay lawn the flowery shrub dispread, 



Or with the blending garden mix the mead ; 



Bid China's pale, fantastic fence, delight; 



Or with the mimic statue trap the sight. 



Oft on some evening, sunny, soft, and still, 



The muse shall lead thee to the beach-grown hill, 



To spend in tea the cool, refreshing hour, 



Where nods in air the pensile, nest-like bower j 1 



1 A kind of arbour on the side of a hill. G. W. 



