The Avon

From Edge-Hill, Book I Hail, beauteous Avon, hail! on whose fair banks The smiling daisies, and their sister tribes, Violets, and cuckoo-buds, and lady-smocks, A brighter dye disclose, and proudly tell, That Shakspeare, as he stray'd these meads along, Their simple charms admir'd, and in his verse Preserv'd, in never-fading bloom to live. And thou, whose birth these walls unrival'd boast, That mock' st the rules of the proud Stagyrite, And learning's tedious toil hail, mighty bard! Thou great magician, hail! Thy piercing thought Unaided saw each movement of the mind, As skilful artists view the small machine, The secret springs and nice dependencies, And to thy mimic scenes, by fancy wrought To such a wondrous shape, th'impassion'd breast In floods of grief or peals of laughter bow d, Obedient to the wonder-working strain, Like the tun'd string responsive to the touch, Or to the wizard s charm, the passive storm Humour and wit, the tragic pomp, or phrase Familiar, flow'd spontaneous from thy tongue, As flowers from Nature s lap. Thy potent spells From their bright seats aerial sprites detain'd, Or from their unseen haunts, and slumbering shades, Awak'd the fairy tribes, with jocund step The circled green and leafy hail to tread While, from his dripping caves, old Avon sent His willing Naiads to their harmless rout.