Page:Beachy Head and Other Poems.pdf/22

14

If no such commerce of destruction known, He were content with what the earth affords To human labour; even where she seems Reluctant most. More happy is the hind, Who, with his own hands rears on some black moor, Or turbary, his independent hut Cover'd with heather, whence the slow white smoke Of smouldering peat arisesA few sheep, His best possession, with his children share The rugged shed when wintry tempests blow; But, when with Spring's return the green blades rise Amid the russet heath, the household live Joint tenants of the waste throughout the day, And often, from her nest, among the swamps, Where the gemm'd sun-dew grows, or fring'd buck-bean, They scare the plover, that with plaintive cries