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 282 ARNOLD

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��FLEE FRO' THE PRESS

O BORN in days when wits were fresh and clear And life ran gaily as the sparkling Thames; Before this strange disease of modern life,

With its sick hurry, its divided aims,

Its heads o'ertaxed, its palsied hearts, was rife Fly hence, our contact fear !

Still fly, plunge deeper in the bowering wood! Averse, as Dido did with gesture stern From her false friend's approach in Hades turn,

Wave us away and keep thy solitude !

Still nursing the unconquerable hope,

Still clutching the inviolable shade,

With a free, onward impulse brushing through, By night, the silvered branches of the glade

Far on the forest-skirts, where none pursue,

On some mild pastoral slope Emerge, and resting on the moonlit pales

Freshen thy flowers as in former years

With dew, or listen with enchanted ears, From the dark dingles, to the nightingales !

But fly our paths, our feverish contact fly! For strong the infection of our mental strife,

Which, though it gives no bliss, yet spoils for rest ; And we should win thee from thy own fair life,

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