Amid Life’s real, or its fancied cares,

Wou’d you, my Silvia, wish a kind relief?

Give moping melancholy sprightly airs,

And clear the gloomy brow of sullen grief.

Then court the rural Muse, her chearful smile

Shall o’er the scene diffuse a lucid ray;

Her pleasing art can ev’ry care beguile

And bid the grove and bid the field be gay.

Text: STE 3/3/6, no. 30, MS, Steele Collection, Angus Library, Regents Park College; also Nonconformist Women Writers, vol. 2 (ed. Julia B. Griffin), p. 182.