Page:The works of Anna Laetitia Barbauld volume 1.djvu/177



. Lib. iv. Eleg. 8. aged head now stoops its honours low, Bowed with the load of fifty winters' snow; And for the raven's glossy black assumes The downy whiteness of the cygnet's plumes: Loose scattered hairs around my temples stray, And spread the mournful shade of sickly gray: I bend beneath the weight of broken years, Averse to change, and chilled with causeless fears. The season now invites me to retire To the dear lares of my household fire;