But One among the rest, who view’d me stand Intent, and gazing on the prospect near, Came forth, and gently touch’d my trembling hand, And bade me mark his words, and nothing fear:
“And seest thou not (said he) these vary’d flow’rs, Contending still for beauty or for sway? Such are the contests which employ man’s hours, In life’s short, busy, transitory day.
For what is gaudy beauty’s short-liv’d bloom, The pomp of pow’r, of riches, or of pride; Soon bury’d in the undistinguish’d tomb, Which all their boasted pomp at once must hide?
VIRTUE alone survives, immortal maid! Her truly amaranthine flow’r shall blow, When all the rest are wrapt in dusky shade, And laid in dark and dusty ruins low.
Hear, and attend!—improve the moral strain, So may’st thou sail safe through life’s dang’rous sea; So from these scenes thou wisdom may’st attain, And FLORA prove MINERVA’S self to thee.”
He ceas’d; and well I mark’d the prudent lore, And much revolv’d his saying in my mind; Bent all the mystic moral to explore, By this romantic, splendid scene design’d.
But, the full concert swelling on my ear, The bands of Sleep dissolv’d, away he flies; At once the train of phantoms disappear, And on my waking sight the vision dies.
No longer now near FLORA’S bow’r I stood, But view’d with op’ning eyes the rising day; Then down the Valley fair my path pursu’d, And homeward took my solitary way.
[Illustration: _Fab. I The Holly Hock & Lily of the Vale_]
[Illustration: _Fab. II The Aloe in Blossom_]
’Twas early morn, Sol’s radiant beams Illum’d the landscape round. The dew-drops glitter’d on the day, And gem-like deck’d the ground.
Within the garden’s cultur’d walks A Hollyhock there grew; And there the Lily of the Vale Kept humble distance due.
Elate with pride, the gaudy flow’r Expands its swelling breast; And, joying in the vernal scene, The LILY thus address’d:
“What dost thou here, mean paltry thing, “Go blow in yonder field; “Nor thus disgrace fair FLORA’S tribes, “That heav’nly beauties yield.
“Go, with thy faint and sickly hue; “Some chearless vale adorn; “But here intrude not on our reign, “Nor drink the dew of morn.
“Whilst I with heighten’d colours glow, “In Summer’s liv’ry gay; “Imbibe the softest tints of light, “And glitter on the day.