A DEVONSHIRE SKETCH. BY THE LATE REV. JOHN MARRIOTT, OF BROADCLYST

Ye green hills of Devon! I love to look o’er ye;

The glow of your verdure refreshes my sight!

In the wild and majestic let Westmoreland glory;

But yours is the palm of more tranquil delight.

Not that robes of rich beauty, in which Nature dresses

Her features of boldness, your limits disown;

To him who could deem so, deep Lymouth’s recesses,

And Dart’s rocky borders, must all be unknown.

But your own proper boast is the Combe, neatly rounded,

Which preserves through all seasons its emerald hue;

Whilst the dews, o’er the uplands by which it is bounded,

Impart, in soft contrast, the mist’s tender blue;

Not deserted, though lonely: the vale in its centre,

Girt with Barn and rough Linhay, encloses a farm;

And o’er the warm nook of its deepest indenture,

The orchard’s fair bloom sheds its fugitive charm.

An eye little used to such leafy profusion,

Might fancy yon hedge-row one wide-waving wood;

And furze and plumed fern, as to aid the illusion,

Here and there on the tameness of culture intrude.

But wildest the mixture of shrub, bush, and bramble,

And sweetest the scent which the wild flowers breathe,

Where the birchen-banks mark the stream’s devious ramble,

And the ear drinks its musical murmurs beneath.

How soothing the sense of serenity stealing

O’er the mind, whilst on plenty and peace thus we gaze!

Less grateful, perhaps, though more lively, the feeling

Awaken’d by prospects that awe and amaze.

If in those we acknowledge the symbols of greatness;

If earth’s pillars its Maker’s omnipotence prove;

In these let us hail Him, “whose clouds distil fatness,”

And who crowneth the year with his goodness and love.