POEMS. THE INVITATION TO SELBORNE. EE Selborne spreads her boldest beauties The varied valley, and the mountain ground, Unpleasing, tasteless, impotent expense, Through the high arch call in the length'ning view; Oft on some evening, sunny, soft, and still, 1 A kind of arbour on the side of a hill.-G. W. Or where the Hermit hangs the straw-clad cell,' By Fancy plann'd; as once th' inventive maid Each to his task; all different ways retire; 3 1 A grotesque building, contrived by a young gentleman, who used on occasion to appear in the character of a hermit.-G. W. 2 The ruins of a priory, founded by Peter de Rupibus, Bishop of Winchester.-G. W. 3 The remains of a preceptory of the Knights Templars; at least it was a farm dependant upon some preceptory of that order. I find it was a preceptory, called the Preceptory of Sudington; now called Southington.-G. W. The mountain-brow commands the woods below; When madding Croisades set the world in flame; To mortal fight Turcéstan chivalry. Nor be the Parsonage by the muse forgot; The partial bard admires his native spot; Smit with its beauties, loved, as yet a child, (Unconscious why) its scapes grotesque, and wild. High on a mound th' exalted gardens stand, Beneath, deep valleys scoop'd by Nature's hand. A Cobham here, exulting in his art, Might blend the General's with the Gardener's part; Of rampart, bastion, fosse, and palisade; Now climb the steep, drop now your eye below, Where round the blooming village orchards grow; There, like a picture, lies my lowly seat, A rural, shelter'd, unobserved retreat. Me far above the rest Selbornian scenes, The pendent forests, and the mountain greens |