Classic Poem

Where rolls Cegidog highly born,
With hasty steps to meet
The Alyn, Terrig, sister waves,
It washes Cymmau's feet.

Astonish'd by a world of charms,
By every rural grace;
The Naiads twist and curl its course,
As loth to leave the place.

The stubborn oak, the forest's pride,
In love with scenes like this,
Leans from the rocky cliff, and bends,
The playful stream to kiss.

The alders wave, the willows twine,
The ash ambitious towers,
While laughing Satyrs bend the boughs,
And braid them into bowers.

And he, who, with poetic eye,
Explores this blest retreat,
Will, unforseen, a Cottage find,
And in it — good old K ATE .

The worthy dame, of snowy locks,
The kindest welcome gives;
Her smiles declare the peace within,
And Neatness with her lives.

Fortune, a lass of boundless whim,
Whose views no man can tell,
Decreed, that in this little cot
Th' industrious Kate should dwell.

Hall, parlour, kitchen, tea-room, one,
And yet minutely nice;
A clock she boasts, a cupboard too,
That once conceal'd the spice.

In rank and file, her crockery's plac'd,
Her Buckley ware, her delf;
So well the tidy soul has learnt
The tactics of the shelf.

Her chair, the wheel that's seldom still,
Half fill her little floor;
And Toby , trotting to and fro,
Yet watching still the door.

The hearth so neat, her pitchers clean,
The Fairies come with glee
To hold their gay nocturnal feasts,
And leave the morning fee.

Her looks a temp'rate lesson give,
That's seldom learnt by Wealth,
For cheerful Kate, at eighty-two,
Can still shake hands with Health.

Ye fair, who swell the crowd of Courts,
And Windsor's terrace grace;
Who, haunted by ennui , pursue
An endless change of place:

Would Fate in some good humour'd hour,
Design your hands a treat,
'Twould be to bring you quickly down
To drink your tea with Kate.

The Muse herself, however grave,
Could wish this freak to share —
To see such folk a cottage fill,
The dear old damsel stare.

Kate visits Cymmau's worthy Dame,
By every kindness led;
They smile and curtsey — curtsey, smile,
But not a word is said.

We seldom find such meetings now,
For gossips meet to speak;
The Ladies' tongues to English tun'd,
But Kate's to mountain Greek.

The case is this, that Cymmau's Dame
Descends of Saxon blood,
And Kate, of Cambrian parents born,
Can trace them to the flood.

She has them all, a thousand Aps,
In story strait and clear —
The flood — 'tis well a Briton born
Will deign to stop e'en here.

To no one spot in ample space,
To no one race confin'd;
Content is every where at home —
That home's the worthy mind.

So Kate, whose independent soul,
O'er half an acre reigns,
Is truly great, compar'd to him
Who sighs for large domains.

With beans and sage her garden blooms,
They hide the teeming hives;
Surrounded by the sweets they love,
The busy Nation thrives.

In this — a world of good and ill —
In vain, even poets preach;
For Pistill , though in tenfold shades,
Is yet in Rapine's reach.

Enwrapt within a midnight cloud,
The prowling robber creeps;
For watchful guilt is wide awake,
While virtue soundly sleeps.

Poor Kate possess'd, as evening fell,
A Hybla all her own;
Ere morn on Brymbo's summits broke,
Her every hive was gone!

Yet, Kate, the day shall surely come,
The hours are on the wing,
When all the honey shall be thine,
And his th' eternal sting !