TO THE SNOWDROP. 
527 
How like a prodigal doth Nature seem, 
When thou, for all thy gold, so common art ! 
Thou teachest me to deem 
More sacredly of every human heart, 
Since each reflects in joy its scanty gleam 
Of heaven, and could some wondrous secret show, 
Did we but pay the love we owe, 
And with a child’s undoubting wisdom look 
On all these living pages of God’s book. 
Burry Cornwall 
P RETTY firstling of the year ! 
Herald of the host of flowers ! 
Hast thou left thy cavern drear, 
In the hope of Summer hours ? 
Back unto thy earthen bowers ! 
Back to thy warm world below, 
Till the strength of suns and showers 
Quell the now relentless snow. 
Art still here ?—Alive and blythe ? 
Though the stormy night hath fled, 
And the frost hath passed his scythe, 
O’er thy small unsheltered head ? 
Ah ! some lie amidst the dead, 
(Many a giant stubborn tree,— 
Many a plant, the spirit shed,) 
That were better nursed than thee 1 
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