Volume 3 — SONNET IV. TO HONORA SNEYD,[75] WHOSE HEALTH WAS ALWAYS BEST IN WINTER. MAY 1770.

And now the youthful, gay, capricious Spring, Piercing her showery clouds with crystal light, And with their hues reflected streaking bright Her radiant bow, bids all her warblers sing; The lark, shrill carolling on soaring wing; The lonely thrush, in brake, with blossoms white, That tunes his pipe so loud; while, from the sight Coy bending their dropt heads, young cowslips fling Rich perfume o’er the fields.—It is the prime Of hours that beauty robes:—yet all they gild, Cheer and delight in this their fragrant time, For thy dear sake, to me less pleasure yield Than, veil’d in sleet, and rain, and hoary rime, Dim Winter’s naked hedge and plashy field.