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WINTER.

ARGUMENT.

Tenderness to Cattle. Frozen Turnips. The Cow-yard. Night. The Farm-house. Fire-side. Farmer's

Advice and Instruction.

Nightly Cares of the

Stable. Dobbin. The Post-horse. Sheep-stealing

Dogs. Walks occasioned thereby. The Ghost,

Lamb time. Returning Spring. Conclusion.

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WITH kindred pleasures mov'd, and cares opprest,

Sharing alike our weariness and rest;

Who lives the daily partner of our hours,

Through every change of heat, and frost, and show'rs;

Partakes our cheerful meals, partaking first

In mutual labour and fatigue and thirst;

The kindly intercourse will ever prove

A bond of amity and social love.

Benevolence springing from mutual sufferings and pleasure. v. 9.

To more than man this generous warmth extends,

And oft the team and shivʼring herd befriends ;
Tender solicitude the bosom fills,

And Pity executes what Reason wills :
Youth learns compassion's tale from ev'ry tongue,
And flies to aid the helpless and the young;
When now, unsparing as the scourge of war,
Blasts follow blasts, and groves dismantled roar,
Around their home the storm-pinch'd CATTLE lows,
No nourishment in frozen pastures grows ;
Yet frozen pastures every morn resound
With fair abundance thund'ring to the ground.
For though on hoary twigs no buds peep out,
And e'en the hardy brambles cease to sprout,
Beneath dread WINTER's level sheets of snow
The sweet nutritious Turnip deigns to grow.
Till now imperious want and wide-spread dearth
Bid Labour claim her treasures from the earth.

v. 27.

Ice broken and Snow cleared for the Cattle.

On GILES, and such as Giles, the labour falls,
To strew the frequent load where hunger calls.
On driving gales sharp hail indignant flies,
And sleet, more irksome still, assails his eyes;
Snow clogs his feet; or if no snow is seen,
The field with all its juicy store to screen,
Deep goes the frost, till every root is found
A rolling mass of ice upon the ground.
No tender ewe can break her nightly fast,
Nor heifer strong begin the cold repast,
Till Giles with pond'rous beetle foremost go,
And scatt'ring splinters fly at every blow;
When pressing round him, eager for the prize,
From their mixt breath warm exhalations rise.

In beaded rows if drops now deck the spray,
While the sun grants a momentary ray,
Let but a cloud's broad shadow intervene,

And stiffen'd into gems the drops are seen;

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