Alexandria Gazette & Daily Advertiser

RETIREMENT

FAR from the cares that vex the world's restless
Here on my mossy couch I rest: repose,
Reflection's limpid tide serenely flows,
And no rough passions riot in my breast.
The vernal bloom, that purples o'er the vales,
The flowering arbour, fann'd by cooling gales,
The grove's wild warblings, and the chirpings shrill,
Of the rude streams, that wander at their will.
And hill, and dale, and forest, lake and lawn,
And light and shade, in sweet confusion thrown-
Delight the soul to pensiveness inclined,
And sooth to solemn thought the musing mind.
Here, in these peaceful scenes,
Daughter of God, indulgent Nature reigns,
Divinely fair! as when her infant brows,
From the wild waves of teeming chaos rose,
When choral angels with a pleas'd surprise,
Hail'd the young lustre sparkling in her eyes,
And in her radiant form, and lovely face,
Saw their own heaven with full reflected grace.

[Port Folio.