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PART III. ON GENERAL SUBJECTS.
45

Her roof was a woodbine that tastefully spread
Its close-woven tendrils o'erarching her head;
Her bed was of moss that each morning made new;
She din'd on a sunbeam and supp'd on the dew;
Her neighbour the nightingale sang her to rest,
And care had ne'er planted its thorn in her breast.

One morning she saw on the opposite side
A Foxglove displaying his colours of pride;
She gazed on his form, that in stateliness grew,
And envied his height and his beautiful hue;
She mark'd how the flow'rets all gave way before him.
While they press'd round her dwelling with far less decorum.
Dissatisfied, jealous, and peevish she grows,
And the sight of this Foxglove destroys her repose.

She tires of her vesture, and swelling with spleen,
Cries, "Ne'er such a dowdy blue mantle was seen!"
Nor keeps to herself any longer her pain,
But thus to a Primrose begins to complain:
"I envy your mood, that can patient abide

The respect paid that Foxglove, his airs and his pride: