The russet fallow, or the golden grain, 
Till all the fading picture fail the sight. 
Deep fix the kettle’s props, a forky row, 
Or from our very shifts some joy arises. 
Still oft at eve belated shepherd-swains 
In Jewry first this order found a name, 
THE INVITATION TO SELBORNE, 
Romantic spot ! from whence in prospect lies 
‘Whate’er of landscape charms our feasting eyes ; 
The pointed spire, the hall, the pasture-plain, 
The breezy lake that sheds a gleaming light, 
Each to his task ; all different ways retire ; 
Cull the dry stick ; call forth the seeds of fire ; 
Or give with fanning hat the breeze to blow. 
Whence is this taste, the furnish’d hall forgot, 
To feast in gardens, or the unhandy grot ? 
Or novelty with some new charms surprises, 
Hark, while below the village-bells ring round, 
y Echo, sweet nymph, returns the soften’d sound ; 
But if gusts rise, the rushing forests roar, 
’ Like the tide tumbling on the pebbly shore. 
Adown the vale, in lone, sequester’d nook, 
Where skirting woods embrown the dimpling brook, 
The ruin’d convent lies ; here wont to dwell 
The lazy canon midst his cloister’d cell ;? 
While papal darkness brooded o’er the land, 
Ere Reformation made her glorious stand : 
See the cowl’d spectre skim the folded plains. 
To the high Temple would my stranger go,” 
The mountain-brow commands the woods below : 
When madding Croisades set the world in flame ; 
When western climes, urged on by Pope and priest, 
Pour’d forth their millions o’er the deluged East : 
XV 
1 The ruins of a priory, founded by Peter de Rupibus, Bishop of Win- 
chester. 
2 The remains of a preceptory of the Knights Templars; at least it was 
40K 01 farm dependent upon some preceptory of that order. 
