DAYS.
93
On the smooth threshing-floor, the seventeenth morn,
Observant throw the sheaves of sacred corn:
For chamber furniture the timber hew,
And blocks for ships with shaping axe subdue.
The fourth upon the stocks thy vessel lay,
Soon with light keel to skim the watery way.
The nineteenth mark among the better days
When past the fervour of the noon-tide blaze.
Harmless the ninth: 'tis good to plant the earth,
And fortunate each male and female birth.
Few know the twenty-ninth, nor heed the rules
To broach their casks, and yoke their steers and mules,
And fleet-hoof'd steeds; and on dark ocean's way
Launch the oar'd galley; few will trust the day.
Pierce on the fourth thy cask; the fourteenth prize
As holy; and when morning paints the skies
The twenty-fourth is best; (few this have known;)
But worst of days when noon has fainter grown.
These are the days of which the careful heed
Each human enterprise will favouring speed:
Others there are, which intermediate fall,
Mark'd with no auspice and unomen'd all:
Observant throw the sheaves of sacred corn:
For chamber furniture the timber hew,
And blocks for ships with shaping axe subdue.
The fourth upon the stocks thy vessel lay,
Soon with light keel to skim the watery way.
The nineteenth mark among the better days
When past the fervour of the noon-tide blaze.
Harmless the ninth: 'tis good to plant the earth,
And fortunate each male and female birth.
Few know the twenty-ninth, nor heed the rules
To broach their casks, and yoke their steers and mules,
And fleet-hoof'd steeds; and on dark ocean's way
Launch the oar'd galley; few will trust the day.
Pierce on the fourth thy cask; the fourteenth prize
As holy; and when morning paints the skies
The twenty-fourth is best; (few this have known;)
But worst of days when noon has fainter grown.
These are the days of which the careful heed
Each human enterprise will favouring speed:
Others there are, which intermediate fall,
Mark'd with no auspice and unomen'd all:
