Such songs of gladness from her plains, such flowers upon the trees;
And then her dowered children stood like jewels in her crown,
Or sun-clad monuments on which Time’s rays come proudly down,
To gild with beauty e’en decay—but what decay hast thou?
Oh! was not the world beautiful when Florence decked her brow?
This world of ours was beautiful in England’s palmy times,
When merrily from church and tower pealed out the sportive chimes,
When deep within the greenwood haunts dwelt honest men and free,
With hearts as gay and minds as light as birds upon the tree;
Right honestly the day was passed; at night, upon the green,