Page:The Seasons - Thomson (1791).djvu/184

 Autumn scatters his departing gleams, Warn'd of approaching Winter, gather'd, play The swallow-people; and toss'd wide around, O'er the calm sky, in convolution swift, The feather'd eddy floats: rejoicing once, Ere to their wintry slumbers they retire; In clusters clung, beneath the mouldring bank, And where, unpierc'd by frost, the cavern sweats. Or rather into warmer climes convey'd, With other kindred birds of season, there They twitter chearful, till the vernal months Invite them welcome back: for, thronging, now Innumerous wings are in commotion all.

the Rhine loses his majestic force In Belgian plains, won from the raging deep, By diligence amazing, and the strong Unconquerable hand of Liberty, The stork-assembly meets; for many a day, Consulting deep, and various, ere they take Their arduous voyage thro' the liquid sky And now their rout design'd, their leaders chose, Their tribes adjusted, clean'd their vigorous wings; And many a circle, many a short essay, Wheel'd round and round, in congregation full, The figur'd flight ascends; and, riding high Th' aërial billows, mixes with the clouds.

where the Northern ocean, in vast whirls, Boils round the naked melancholy isles Of farthest Thule, and th' Atlantic surge Pours in among the stormy Hebrides; Who can recount what transmigrations there Are annual made? what nations come and go? And how the living clouds on clouds arise? Infinite