Page:The Seasons - Thomson (1791).djvu/125

 From disembowel'd earth the virgin gold; And o'er the vary'd landskip, restless, rove, Fervent with life of every fairer kind: A land of wonders! which the sun still eyes With ray direct, as of the lovely realm Inamour'd, and delighting there to dwell.

chang'd the scene! In blazing height of noon, The sun, oppress'd, is plung'd in thickest gloom. Still Horror reigns, a dreary twilight round, Of struggling night and day malignant mix'd. For to the hot equator crouding fast, Where, highly rarefy'd, the yielding air Admits their stream, incessant vapours roll, Amazing clouds on clouds continual heap'd; Or whirl'd tempestuous by the gusty wind, Or silent borne along, heavy, and slow, With the big stores of streaming oceans charg'd. Meantime, amid these upper seas, condens'd Around the cold aërial mountain's brow, And by conflicting winds together dash'd, The thunder holds his black tremendous throne, From cloud to cloud the rending Lightnings rage; Till, in the furious elemental war Dissolv'd, the whole precipitated mass Unbroken floods and solid torrents pours.

treasures these, hid from the bounded search Of ancient knowledge; whence, with annual pomp, Rich king of floods! o'erflows the swelling Nile. From his two springs, in Gojam's sunny realm, Pure-welling out, he thro' the lucid lake Of fair Dambea rolls his infant-stream. There, by the Naiads nurs'd, he sports away His playful youth, amid the fragrant isles That