[Page 213]

To a GENTLEMAN, On his intending to cut down a GROVE to enlarge his Prospect.

By the Same.
1 IN plaintive sounds, that tun'd to woe
2 The sadly sighing breeze,
3 A weeping HAMADRYAD mourn'd
4 Her fate-devoted trees.
5 Ah! stop thy sacrilegious hand,
6 Nor violate the shade,
7 Where Nature form'd a silent haunt
8 For Contemplation's aid.
9 Can'st thou, the son of Science, bred
10 Where learned Isis flows,
11 Forget that, nurs'd in shelt'ring groves,
12 The Grecian genius rose?
[Page 214]
13 Within the plantane's spreading shade,
14 Immortal PLATO taught;
15 And fair LYCEUM form'd the depth
16 Of ARISTOTLE'S thought.
17 To Latian groves reflect thy views,
18 And bless the Tuscan bloom;
19 Where Eloquence deplor'd the fate
20 Of Liberty and Rome.
21 Retir'd beneath the beechen shade,
22 From each inspiring bough
23 The Muses wove th' unfading wreaths
24 That circled VIRGIL'S brow.
25 Reflect before the fatal ax
26 My threaten'd doom has wrought;
27 Nor sacrifice to sensual taste
28 The nobler growth of thought.
29 Not all the glowing fruits that blush
30 On India's sunny coast,
31 Can recompence thee for the worth
32 Of one idea lost.
33 My shade a produce may supply,
34 Unknown to solar fire;
35 And what excludes APOLLO'S rays,
36 Shall harmonize his lyre.

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Title (in Source Edition): To a GENTLEMAN, On his intending to cut down a GROVE to enlarge his Prospect.
Author: Elizabeth Carter
Themes: gardens
Genres: ballad metre; Chevy Chase stanza; address
References: DMI 25344

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Source edition

Dodsley, Robert, 1703-1764. A Collection of Poems in Six Volumes. By Several Hands. Vol. III. London: printed by J. Hughs, for R. and J. Dodsley, 1763 [1st ed. 1758], pp. 213-214. 6v.: music; 8⁰. (ESTC T131163; OTA K104099.003) (Page images digitized by the Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive from a copy in the archive's library.)

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