And gave the vanquish'd world another form.
Not fuch the fons of Lapland: wifely they
Despise th' infenfate barbarous trade of war;
They ask no more than fimple Nature gives,
They love their mountains and enjoy their storms.
No falfe defires, no pride-created wants,
Disturb the peaceful current of their time;
And thro' the restless ever-tortur'd maze
Of pleasure, or ambition, bid it rage.
'Their rain-deer form their riches. These their tents,
Their robes, their beds, and all their homely wealth Supply, their wholesome fare, and chearful cups. Obfequious at their call, the docile tribe
Yield to the fled their necks, and whirl them swift 855
O'er hill and dale, heap'd into one expanfe
Of marbled fnow, as far as eye can sweep
With a blue cruft of ice unbounded glaz❜d.
By dancing meteors then, that ceaseless hake
A waving blaze refracted o'er the heavens,
And vivid moons, and stars that keener play
With doubled luftre from the gloffy waste,
Even in the depth of Polar Night, they find
A wondrous day: enough to light the chase,
Or guide their daring steps to Finland-fairs.
Wish'd Spring returns; and from the hazy fouth,
While dim Aurora flowly moves before,
K 2
The welcome fun, just verging up at first,
By fmall degrees extends the swelling curve!
Till feen at last for gay rejoicing months,
Still round and round, his spiral course he winds,
And as he nearly dips his flaming orb,
Wheels up again, and reafcends the sky.
In that glad feafon, from the lakes and floods,
Where pure * Niemi's fairy mountains rife,
And fring'd with rofes + Tenglio rolls his ftream,
They draw the copious fry. With these, at eve,
They chearful-loaded to their tents repair;
Where, all day long in ufeful cares employ'd,
Their kind unblemish'd wives the fire prepare. 880
Thrice happy race! by poverty fecur'd
*M. de Maupertuis, in his book on the Figure of the Earth, after having defcribed the beautiful Lake and Mountain of Niemi in Lapland, fays" From this height we had " opportunity Several times to fee those vapours rife from the «Lake which the people of the country call Haltios, and which "they deem to be the guardian Spirits of the Mountains. We
had been frighted with stories of Bears that haunted this place, but few none. It Seem'd rather a place of refort for "Fairies and Genii, than Bears."
The fame Author obferves- “I was furpriz'd to see the banks of this river (the Tenglio) Rofes of as lively a "red as any that are in our gardens."
From legal plunder and rapacious power:
In whom fell intereft never yet has fown
The feeds of vice: whofe fpotlefs fwains ne'er knew Injurious deed, nor, blafted by the breath
Of faithlefs love, their blooming daughters woe.
STILL preffing on, beyond Tornea's lake,
And Hecla flaming thro' a waste of fnow,
And fartheft Greenland, to the pole itself,
Where, failing gradual, life at length goes out, 890
The Muse expands her folitary flight ;
And, hovering o'er the wild ftupendous fcene,
Beholds new feas beneath * another sky.
Thron'd in his palace of cerulean ice, --
Here WINTER holds his unrejoicing court;
And thro' his airy hall the loud mifrule
Of driving tempest is for ever heard :..
Here the grim tyrant meditates his wrath;
Here arms his winds with all-subduing froft;
Moulds his fierce hail, and treasures up his fnows,900
With which he now oppreffes half the globe.
THENCE Winding eastward to the Tartar's coast, She fweeps the howling margin of the main; Where undiffolving, from the first of time,
Snows fwell on fnows amazing to the sky;
And icy mountains high on mountains pil'd,
Seem to the shivering failor from afar,
Shapelefs and white, an atmosphere of clouds.
Projected huge, and horrid, o'er the furge,
Alps frown on Alps; or rufhing hideous down, 910
As if old Chaos was again return'd,
Wide-rend the deep, and shake the folid pole.
Ocean itself no longer can refift
The binding fury; but, in all its rage
Of tempeft taken by the boundless froft,
Is many a fathom to the bottom chain'd,
And bid to roar no more: a bleak expanse,
Shagg'd o'er with wavy rocks, chearless, and void
Of every life, that from the dreary months
Flies confcious fouthward. Miserable they!
Who, here entangled in the gathering ice,
Take their laft look of the descending fun;
While, full of death, and fierce with tenfold froft,
The long long night, incumbent o'er their heads,
Falls horrible. Such was the + BRITON's fate, 925
As with first prow, (what have not BRITONS dar'd!)
He for the paffage fought, attempted fince
So much in vain, and seeming to be shut
† Sir HUGH WILLOUGHBY, fent by QUEEN ELIZABETH to difcover the North-Eaft Paffage.
By jealous Nature with eternal bars.
In these fell regions, in Arzina caught,
And to the ftony deep his idle fhip
Immediate feal'd, he with his hapless crew,
Each full exerted at his feveral task, .
Froze into ftatues; to the cordage glued
The failor, and the pilot to the helm.
HARD by these shores, where fcarce his freezing ftream Rolls the wild Oby, live the last of Men ; And half enlivened by the diftant fun,
That rears and ripens Man, as well as plants,
Here human Nature wears its rudest form.
Deep from the piercing feafon funk in caves,
Here by dull fires, and with unjoyous cheer,
They wafte the tedious gloom. Immers'd in furs,
Doze the grofs race. Nor fprightly jeft, nor fong,
Nor tenderness they know; nor aught of life, 945
Beyond the kindred bears that stalk without.
Till morn at length, her rofes drooping all,
Sheds a long twilight brightening o'er their fields,
And calls the quivered favage to the chace.
WHAT cannot active government perform, 950 New-moulding Man? Wide-stretching from thefe A people favage from remotest time,
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