Page:Paradise lost by Milton, John.djvu/240

Stream, and perpetual draw their humid train.—
The dry land, Earth, and the great receptacle
Of congregated waters he called Seas;
And saw that it was good, and said:—'Let the earth
Put forth the verdant grass, herb yielding seed,310
And fruit-tree yielding fruit after her kind,
Whose seed is in herself upon the earth.'
He scarce had said, when the bare earth, till then
Desert and bare, unsightly, unadorned,
Brought forth the tender grass, whose verdure clad
Her universal face with pleasant green;
Then herbs of every leaf, that sudden flowered,
Opening their various colors, and made gay
Her bosom, smelling sweet; and, these scarce blown,
Forth flourished thick the clustering vine, forth crept
The swelling gourd, up stood the corny reed321
Embattled in her field, and the humble shrub,
And bush with frizzled hair implicit: last
Rose, as in dance, the stately trees, and spread
Their branches hung with copious fruit, or gemmed
Their blossoms. With high woods the hills were crowned,
With tufts the valleys and each fountain-side,
With borders long the rivers; that Earth now