Pen and pencil pictures from the poets . F r c e d o m. 9 OWPEI^. ilv not the boy, who, when the breeze of morn First shakes the ghttering drops from every thorn,>^ Unfolds his flock, then under bank or bushSits Unking cherry-stones, or platting rush,How fair is freedom?—he was always free ;To carve his rustic name upon a snare the mole, or with ill-fashioned hookTo draw the incautious minnow from the brook,Are lifes prime pleasures in his simple view, His flock the cliief concern he ever knew ; She shines but little in his heedless eyes, The good we never miss we rarely prize. But
Pen and pencil pictures from the poets . F r c e d o m. 9 OWPEI^. ilv not the boy, who, when the breeze of morn First shakes the ghttering drops from every thorn,>^ Unfolds his flock, then under bank or bushSits Unking cherry-stones, or platting rush,How fair is freedom?—he was always free ;To carve his rustic name upon a snare the mole, or with ill-fashioned hookTo draw the incautious minnow from the brook,Are lifes prime pleasures in his simple view, His flock the cliief concern he ever knew ; She shines but little in his heedless eyes, The good we never miss we rarely prize. But ask the noble drudge in state affairs, Escaped from office and its constant cares. What charms he sees in Freedoms smile expressed, In freedom lost so long, now repossessed ; The tongue whose strains were cogent as commantls, Revered at home, and felt in foreign lands, Shall own itself a stammerer in that cause. Or plead its silence as its best applause. He knows indeed that whether dressed or rude, Wild without art, or artfully subdued, Nature in every form
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, booksubjectpoetry, bookyear1876
