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THE RETIREMENT.

Stanzas irreguliers.

TO MR. ISAAC WALTON.

1.

FAREWELL thou busy world, and may
We never meet again :

Here I can eat, and sleep, and pray,
And do more good in one short day,

Than he who his whole age out-wears

Upon the most conspicuous theatres,

Where nought but vanity and vice do reign.

11.

Good God! how sweet are all things here!
How beautiful the fields appear!

How cleanly do we feed and lie!

Lord! what good hours do we keep !
How quietly we sleep!

What peace! what unanimity!
How innocent from the leud fashion

"Is all our business, all our conversation!

IV.

O solitude! the soul's best friend,

That man acquainted with himself dost make, And all his Maker's wonders to intend;

With thee I here converse at will,

And would be glad to do so still;

For it is thou alone that keep'st the soul awake.

VI.

0 my beloved nymph, fair DOVE, Princess of rivers! How I love

Upon thy flowery banks to lie,

And view thy silver stream,
When gilded by a summer's beam,
And in it all thy wanton fry

Playing at liberty,

And with my angle upon them,

The all of treachery,

I ever learn'd, to practice and to try!

IX.

Oh my beloved caves! from dog-star heats,

And hotter persecution, safe retreats,

What safety, privacy, what true delight
In the artificial night,

Your gloomy entrails make,

Have I taken, do I take!

How oft, when grief has made me fly,

To hide me from society,

Even of my dearest friends, have I

In your recess's friendly shade

All my sorrows open laid,

And my most secret woes entrusted to your privacy!

X.

Lord! would men let me alone,

What an over-happy one

Should I think myself to be,

Might I in this desart place,

Which most men by their voice disgrace,

Live but undisturb'd and free.

Here, in this despised recess,

Would I, maugre winter's cold,

And the summer's worst excess,

Try to live out to sixty full years old, And all the while,

Without an envious eye

On any thriving under fortune's smile,

Contented live, and then contented die.

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THE Cock has crow'd an hour ago,
'Tis time we now dull sleep forego;
Tir'd nature is by sleep redrest,

And labour's overcome by rest.

II.

We have out-done the work of night,
"Tis time we rise t' attend the light,
And e'er he shall his beams display,
To plot new business for the day.

*

The morning curtains now are drawn,
And now appears the blushing dawn;
Aurora has her roses shed,

To strew the way Sol's steeds must tread.

VI.

Xanthus and Ethon harnest are
To roll away the burning car;

And, snorting flame, impatient bear
The dressing of the charioteer.

VII.

The sable cheeks of sullen night
Are streak'd with rosy streams of light,
While she retires away in fear,

To shade the other hemisphere.

VIII.

The merry lark now takes her wings, And long'd-for day's loud welcome sings, Mounting her body out of sight,

As if she meant to meet the light.

IX.

Now doors and windows are unbarr'd,
Each where are chearful voices heard,
And round about good-morrows fly,
As if day taught humanity.

X.

The chimneys now to smoke begin,
And the old wife sits down to spin,
Whilst Kate, taking her pail, does trip
Mull's swoln and stradling paps to strip.

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