"O shady vale, O fair enriched meads,
O sacred flowers, sweet fields, and rising mountains;
O painted flowers, green herbs where Flora treads,
Refresh'd by wanton winds and watry fountains!"
"Is there one word or even accent obsolete in this picturesque and truly poetical stanza?
"But if such a tender and moral fancy be ever allowed to trifle, is there any thing of the same kind in the whole compass of English poetry more exquisite, more delicately imagined, or expressed with more finished and happy artifice of language, than Rosalind's Madrigal, beginning—
"Love in my bosom, like a bee,
Doth suck his sweet:
Now with his wings he plays with me,