Till youth's delirious dream is o'er, Sanguine with hope we look before, The future good to find; In age, when error charms no more, For bliss we look behind. RANZ DES VACHES. QUAND reverrai je en un jour Tous les objets de mon amour, Nos clairs ruisseaux, Nos hameaux, Nos coteaux, Nos montagnes, Et l'ornement des nos montagnes La si gentille Isabeau ? Dans l'ombre d'un ormeau, Quand danserai je au son du chalameau ? Quand reverrai je en un jour Tous les objets de mon amour; Mon pere, Ma mere, Mon frere, Ma sœur, Mes agneaux, Mes troupeaux, Ma bergere? Scatter'd by Nature's graceful hand, In briary glens, o'er pasture land, Thy fairy tribes we meet; Gay in the milk-maid's path they stand, They kiss her tripping feet. From winter's farm-yard bondage freed, The cattle bounding o'er the mead, Where green the herbage grows, Among thy fragrant blossoms feed, Upon thy tufts repose. Tossing his forelock o'er his mane, The foal, at rest upon the plain, Sports with thy flexile stalk, But stoops his little neck in vain, To crop it in his walk. Where thick thy primrose blossoms play, Lovely and innocent as they, O'er coppice lawns and dells, In bands the rural children stray, To pluck thy nectar'd bells; Whose simple sweets, with curious skill, The frugal cottage dames distil, Nor envy France the vine, While many a festal cup they fill With Britain's homely wine. Unchanging still from year to year, With undiminish'd rays, Thy vernal constellations cheer The dawn of lengthening days. |