[Page 219]

SKETCH FROM BOWDEN HILL AFTER SICKNESS.

1 How cheering are thy prospects, airy hill,
2 To him who, pale and languid, on thy brow
3 Pauses, respiring, and bids hail again
4 The upland breeze, the comfortable sun,[Page 220]
5 And all the landscape's hues! Upon the point
6 Of the descending steep I stand.
6 How rich,
7 How mantling in the gay and gorgeous tints
8 Of summer! far beneath me, sweeping on,
9 From field to field, from vale to cultured vale,
10 The prospect spreads its crowded beauties wide!
11 Long lines of sunshine, and of shadow, streak
12 The farthest distance; where the passing light
13 Alternate falls, 'mid undistinguished trees,
14 White dots of gleamy domes, and peeping towers,
15 As from the painter's instant touch, appear.
16 As thus the eye ranges from hill to hill,
17 Here white with passing sunshine, there with trees
18 Innumerable shaded, clustering more,
19 As the long vale retires, the ample scene,
20 Warm with new grace and beauty, seems to live.
21 Lives! all is animation! beauty! hope!
22 Snatched from the dark and dreamless grave, so late,
23 Shall I pass silent, now first issuing forth,
24 To feel again thy fragrance, to respire
25 Thy breath, to hail thy look, thy living look,
26 O Nature!
26 Let me the deep joy contrast,
27 Which now the inmost heart like music fills,
28 With the sick chamber's sorrows, oft from morn,
29 Silent, till lingering eve, save when the sound
30 Of whispers steal, and bodings breathed more low,
31 As friends approach the pillow: so awaked
32 From deadly trance, the sick man lifts his eyes,
33 Then in despondence closes them on all,
34 All earth's fond wishes! Oh, how changed are now
35 His thoughts! he sees rich nature glowing round,
36 He feels her influence! languid with delight,[Page 221]
37 And whilst his eye is filled with transient fire,
38 He almost thinks he hears her gently say,
39 Live, live! O Nature, thee, in the soft winds,
40 Thee, in the soothing sound of summer leaves,
41 When the still earth lies sultry; thee, methinks,
42 Ev'n now I hear bid welcome to thy vales
43 And woods again!
43 And I will welcome them,
44 And pour, as erst, the song of heartfelt praise.
45 From yonder line, where fade the farthest hills
46 Which bound the blue lap of the swelling vale,
47 On whose last line, seen like a beacon, hangs
48 Thy tower,
146 Sir Richard Hoare's tower at Stourhead.
benevolent, accomplished Hoare,
49 To where I stand, how wide the interval!
50 Yet instantaneous, to the hurrying eye
51 Displayed; though peeping towers and villages
52 Thick scattered, 'mid the intermingling elms,
53 And towns remotely marked by hovering smoke,
54 And grass-green pastures with their herds, and seats
55 Of rural beauty, cottages and farms,
56 Unnumbered as the hedgerows, lie between!
57 Roaming at large to where the gray sky bends,
58 The eye scarce knows to rest, till back recalled
59 By yonder ivied cloisters
147 Lacock Abbey.
in the plain,
60 Whose turret, peeping pale above the shade,
61 Smiles in the venerable grace of years.
62 As the few threads of age's silver hairs,
63 Just sprinkled o'er the forehead, lend a grace
64 Of saintly reverence, seemly, though compared
65 With blooming Mary's tresses like the morn;
66 So the gray weather-stained towers yet wear
67 A secret charm impressive, though opposed
68 To views in verdure flourishing, the woods,[Page 222]
69 And scenes of Attic taste, that glitter near.
148 Bowood, Mr Dickenson's and Mr Methuen's magnificent mansion.
70 O venerable pile,
149 Lacock Abbey.
though now no more
71 The pensive passenger, at evening, hears
72 The slowly-chanted vesper; or the sounds
73 Of "Miserere," die along the vale;
74 Yet piety and honoured age
150 The venerable Catholic Countess, who resides in the abbey.
retired,
75 There hold their blameless sojourn, ere the bowl
76 Be broken, or the silver chord be loosed.
77 Nor can I pass, snatched from untimely fate,
78 Without a secret prayer, that so my age,
79 When many a circling season has declined,
80 In charity and peace may wait its close.
81 Yet still be with me, O delightful friend,
82 Soothing companion of my vacant hours,
83 Oh, still be with me, Spirit of the Muse!
84 Not to subdue, or hold in moody spell,
85 The erring senses, but to animate
86 And warm my heart, where'er the prospect smiles,
87 With Nature's fairest views; not to display
88 Vain ostentations of a poet's art,
89 But silent, and associate of my joys
90 Or sorrows, to infuse a tenderness,
91 A thought, that seems to mingle, as I gaze,
92 With all the works of God. So cheer my path,
93 From youth to sober manhood, till the light
94 Of evening smile upon the fading scene.
95 And though no pealing clarion swell my fame,
96 When all my days are gone; let me not pass,
97 Like the forgotten clouds of yesterday,
98 Nor unremembered by the fatherless
99 Of the loved village where my bones are laid.

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Title (in Source Edition): SKETCH FROM BOWDEN HILL AFTER SICKNESS.
Author: William Lisle Bowles
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Genres: blank verse

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Bowles, William Lisle, 1762-1850. The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. I. With Memoir, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes by George Gilfillan. Edinburgh: James Nichol, 9 North Bank Street..., 1855, pp. 219-222.  (Page images digitized from a copy held at the University of California Libraries.)

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