Classic Poem

Oft have shepherds enamoured, in pastoral lays,
Sweetly sung of the grove, grot, or fountain,
No scene that is rural, but loudly it's praise
They have echoed from mountain to mountain.
Some delighted have been with a meadow or vale,
But with these my taste never could tally;
The meadow is pleasant, enchanting the dale,
But a hill I prefer to a valley.

For prospect extended, and landscape most rare,
With health-breathing breezes inviting,
No daisy-pied mead with a hill can compare,
No garden yield sweets more delighting;
As a mole-heap's excell'd by a mound that's rais'd high,
As a street may exceed a small alley,
Even so to my mind, when these objects are nigh,
Is the hill I prefer to a valley.

But the hill of all hills, the most pleasing to me,
Is famed Cotton , the pride of North Devon ;
When it's summit I climb, O, I then seem to be
Just as if I approached nearer heaven!
When with troubles depress'd, to this hill I repair,
My spirits then instantly rally;
It was near this bless'd spot I first drew vital air,
So — a hill I prefer to a valley.