Sonnet. To Lydia, On Her Birth-Day.

"Thou art indeed a lovely flower,     And I, just like the fleeting hour,     Which few will heed on folly's brink,     So rarely deigns the wor"

"Love, Cupid, Gallantry, whate'er     We call that elf, seen every where,     Half frolicsome, half ennuyeuse,     Had chanced a country walk to"

"Still e'er that shrine defiance rears its head,     Which rolls in sullen murmurs o'er the dead,     That shrine which conquest, as it stems the"

"Sweet are the hours when roseate spring     With health and joy salutes the day.     When zephyr, borne on wanton wing,     Soft whispering, wa"

"Here morning in the ploughman's songs is met     Ere yet one footstep shows in all the sky,     And twilight in the east, a doubt as yet,     S"

"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"