Page:The Poems of John Dyer (1903).djvu/64

Gently convey to the warm cot and oft,
Between the lark's note and the nightingale's,
His hungry bleating still with tepid milk:
In this soft office may thy children join, 435
And charitable habits learn in sport:
Nor yield him to himself ere vernal airs
Sprinkle thy little croft with daisy flowers:
Nor yet forget him; life has rising ills:
Various as ether is the past'ral care: 440
Thro' slow experience, by a patient breast,
The whole long lesson gradual is attain'd,
By precept after precept, oft receiv'd
With deep attention; such as Nuceus sings
To the full vale near Soar's enamour'd brook, 445
While all is silence: sweet Hinclean swain!
Whom rude Obscurity severely clasps:
The Muse, howe'er, will deck thy simple cell
With purple violets and primrose flowers,
Well-pleas'd thy faithful lessons to repay. 450
Sheep no extremes can bear: both heat and cold
Spread sores cutaneous; but more frequent heat.
The fly-blown vermin from their woolly nest
Press to the tortur'd skin, and flesh, and bone,
In littleness and number dreadful foes! 455
Long rains in miry winter cause the halt;
Rainy luxuriant summers rot your flock;
And all excess, ev'n of salubrious food,
As sure destroys as famine or the wolf.
Inferior theirs to man's world-roving frame, 460
Which all extremes in every zone endures.
With grateful heart, ye British Swains! enjoy
Your gentle seasons and indulgent clime.
Lo! in the sprinkling clouds your bleating hills
Rejoice with herbage, while the horrid rage 465
Of winter irresistible o'erwhelms