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John Greenleaf Whittier - To -----
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LINES WRITTEN AFTER A SUMMER DAY`S EXCURSION.

Fair Nature`s priestesses! to whom,
In hieroglyph of bud and bloom,
Her mysteries are told;
Who, wise in lore of wood and mead,
The seasons` pictured scrolls can read,
In lessons manifold!

Thanks for the courtesy, and gay
Good-humor, which on Washing Day
Our ill-timed visit bore;
Thanks for your graceful oars, which broke
The morning dreams of Artichoke,
Along his wooded shore!

Varied as varying Nature`s ways,
Sprites of the river, woodland fays,
Or mountain nymphs, ye seem;
Free-limbed Dianas on the green,
Loch Katrine`s Ellen, or Undine,
Upon your favorite stream.

The forms of which the poets told,
The fair benignities of old,
Were doubtless such as you;
What more than Artichoke the rill
Of Helicon? Than Pipe-stave hill
Arcadia`s mountain-view?

No sweeter bowers the bee delayed,
In wild Hymettus` scented shade,
Than those you dwell among;
Snow-flowered azaleas, intertwined
With roses, over banks inclined
With trembling harebells hung!

A charmed life unknown to death,
Immortal freshness Nature hath;
Her fabled fount and glen
Are now and here: Dodona`s shrine
Still murmurs in the wind-swept pine,--
All is that e`er hath been.

The Beauty which old Greece or Rome
Sung, painted, wrought, lies close at home;
We need but eye and ear
In all our daily walks to trace
The outlines of incarnate grace,
The hymns of gods to hear!
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