Page:Beauties of Burn's poems.pdf/55

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Her mantle large, o' greenish hue,
My gazing wonder chiefly drew;
Deep lights and shades, bold-mingling, threw
A lustre grand!
And seem'd, to my astonish'd view,
A well-known land.

Here rivers in the sea were lost,
There mountains in the skies were tost;
Here tumbling billows mark'd the coast
Wi' surging foam;
There distant shone Art's lofty boast,
The lordly dome.

Here Doon pour'd down his far fetch'd floods;
There well-fed Irwine stately thuds!
Auld hermit Ayr staw thro' the woods,
On to the shore;
And mony a lesser torrent scuds,
Wi' seeming roar!

Low in a sandy valley spread,
An ancient Borough rear'd her head,
Still, as in Scottish story read,
She boasts a race
To every nobler virtue bred,
And polish'd grace.

By stately tow'r, or palace fair,
Or ruins pendant in the air,
Bold stems of heroes, here and there,
I cou'd discern;
Some seem'd to muse, some seem'd to dare
Wi' feature stern.