And where his breast may drink the mountain-breeze,
And where the fervour of the sunny vale
May beat upon his brow, through devious paths
Beckons his rapid courser. Nor when ease,
Cool ease and welcome slumbers have becalm'd
His eager bosom, does the queen of health
Her pleasing care withold. His decent board
She guards, presiding; and the frugal powers
With joy fedate leads in: and while the brown
Ennæan dame with Pan presents her stores ;
While changing still, and comely in the change,
Vertumnus and the Hours before him spread
The garden's banquet; you to crown his feast,
To crown his 'feast, o Naiads, you the fair
Hygeia calls : and from your shelving seats,
And groves of poplar, plenteous cups ye bring,
To Make his veins ; till soon a purer tide
Flows down those loaded channels; washeth off
The dregs of luxury, the lurking seeds
Of crude disease; and through the abodes of life
Sends vigour, sends repose. Hail, Naiads : hail,
Who give, to labour, health; to stooping age,
The joys which youth had squander'd. Oft your urns
Will I invoke; and, frequent in your praise,
Abash the frantic Thyrsus with my song.

For not estrang'd from your benignant arts
Is he, the God, to whose mysterious shrine
My youth was sacred, and

my

votive cares

Are due; the learned Pæon. Oft when all
His cordial treasures he hath search'd in vain;
When herbs, and potent trees, and drops of balm
Rich with the genial influence of the sun,
(To rouze dark fancy from her plaintive dreams,
To braće the nerveless arm, with food to win
Sick appetite, or hush the unquiet breast
Which pines with silent paflion) he in vain
Hath prov'd; to your deep manfions he descends.
Your gates of humid rock, your dim arcades,
He entereth; where impurpled veins of ore
Gleam on the roof; where through the rigid mine
Your trickling rills insinuate. There the God
From your indulgent hands the streaming bowl
Wafts to his pale-ey d suppliants; wafts the feeds
Metallic and the elemental falts
Wah'd from the pregnant glebe. They drink : and soon
Flies pain; Alies inauspicious care: and foon
The social haunt or unfrequented shade
Hears Io, Io Pæan; as of old,
When Python fell. And, O propitious Nymphs,
Oft as for hapless mortals I implore
Your salutary springs, thro' every urn
O fhed selected atoms, and with all
Your healing powers inform the recent wave.

My lyre Mall pay your bounty. Nor disdain
That humble tribute. Though a mortal hand
Excite the strings to utterance, yet for themes

Not

Not unregarded of coelestial powers,
I frame their language ; and the Muses deign
To guide the pious tenour of my lay.
The Muses (sacred by their gifts divine)
In early days did to my wondering sense
Their secrets oft reveal : oft my rais'd ear
In sumber felt their music: oft at noon
Or hour of sunset, by some lonely stream,
In field or shady grove, they taught me words
Of power from death and envy to preserve
The good man's name. whence yet with grateful mind, ,
And offerings unprofan'd by ruder eye,
My vows I send, my homage, to the seats
Of rocky Cirrha, where with you they dwell:
Where you their chaste companions they admit
Through all the hallow'd scene: where oft intent,
And leaning o'er Caftalia's mossy verge,
They mark the cadence of your confluent urns,
How tunefull, yielding gratefullest repose
To their conforted measure: till again,
With emulation all the founding choir,
And bright Apollo, leader of the song,
Their voices through the liquid air exalt,
And sweep their lofty strings : those awful firings,
That charm the mind of Gods: that fill the courts
Of wide Olympus with oblivion sweet
Of evils, with immortal rest from cares;
Assuage the terrours of the throne of Jove;

And

And quench the formidable thunderbolt
Of unrelenting fire. With slacken’d wings,
While now the solemn concert breathes around,
Incumbent o'er the sceptre of his lord
Sleeps the stern eagle; by the number'd notes,
Poffefs'd; and satiate with the melting tone :
Sovereign of birds. The furious God of war,
His darts forgetting and the rapid wheels
That bear him vengeful o'er the embattled plain,
Relents, and fooths his own fierce heart to ease,
Unwonted ease. The fire of Gods and men,
In that great moment of divine delight,
Looks down on all that live; and whatsoe'er
He loves not, o'er the peopled earth and o'er
The interminated ocean, he beholds
Curs'd with abhorrence by his doom severe,
And troubled at the found. Ye, Naiads, ye
With ravish'd ears the melody attend
Worthy of sacred silence. But the slaves
Of Bacchus with tempestuous clamours strive
To drown the heavenly strains ; of highest Jove,
Irreverent; and by mad presumption fir'd
Their own discordant

raptures to advance
With hoftile emulation. Down they rush
From Nysa's vine-impurpled cliff, the dames
Of Thrace, the Satyrs, and the unruly Fauns,
With old Silenus, through the midnight gloom
Toffing the torch impure, and high in air

The

The brandiń'd Thyrsus, to the Phrygian pipe's
Shrill voice, and to the clashing cymbals, mix'd
With shrieks and frantic uproar. May the Gods
From every unpolluted ear avert
Their orgies ! If within the seats of men,
Within the seats of men, the walls, the gates
Which Pallas rules, if haply there be found
Who loves to mingle with the revel-band
And hearken to their accents; who aspires
From such instructers to inform his breast
With verse; let him, fit votarist, implore
Their inspiration. He perchance the gifts
Of young Lyæus, and the dread exploits,
May fing in aptest numbers : he the fate
Of sober Pentheus, he the Paphian rites,
And naked Mars with Cytheræa chain'd,
And strong Alcides in the spinster's robe,
May celebrate, applauded. But with you,
O Naiads, far from that unhallow'd rout,
Muit dwell the man whoe'er to praised themes
Învokes the immortal Muse. the immortal Muse
To your calm habitations, to the cave
Corycian or the Delphic mount, will guide
His footsteps ; and with your unfullied streams
His lips will bathe : whether the eternal lore
Of Themis, or the majesty of Jove,
To mortals he reveal; or teach his lyre
The unenvied guerdon of the patriot's toils,