128 DROrS FROM FLORA’S COP. 
To a Snowdrop appearing very early 
in the Season, 
WORDSWORTH. 
Lone flowers, hemmed in with snows, and white 
as they, 
But hardier far, though modestly thou bend 
Thy front — and if such presence could offend! 
Who guards thy slender stock while, day by day, 
Storms, sallying from the mountain-tops, way-lay 
The rising sun, and on the plains descend ? 
Accept the greeting that befits a friend, 
AVhose zeal outruns his promise! Blue-eyed May 
Shall soon behold this border thickly set 
With bright jonquills, their odors lavishing 
On the soft west wind and his frolic peers ; 
Yet will I not thy gentle grace forget, 
Chaste snowdrop, vent’rous harbinger of spring, 
And pensive monitor of fleeting years. 
* 
First in bright Flora’s train Galantha glows, 
And prints with frolic step the melting snows: 
Chides with her dulcet voice the tardy spring, 
Bids slumbering Zephyr stretch his folded wing ; 
Wakes the house cuckoo in his gloomy cave^ 
And calls the wandering dormouse front his grave; 
Bids the mute red-breast cheer the budding grove, 
And plaintive ring-dove tune her notes to love. 
Dadvih. 
