Myrtle-leaf that ill-besped,
Pinest in the gladsome ray;
Soiled beneath the common tread,
Far from thy protecting spray!

When the partridge o'er the sheaf
Whirred along the yellow vale,
Sad I saw thee, heedless leaf!
Love the dalliance of the gale.

Lightly didst thou, foolish thing!
Heave and flutter to his sighs,
While the flatterer on his wing,
Woo'd and whispered thee to rise.

Gaily from thy mother stalk
Wert thou danced and wafted high--
Soon upon this sheltered walk,
Flung to fade, to rot, and die.

Mr. Coleridge having requested me to decide concerning the introduction
into his volume of the two preceding Poems, I approved of the second,
with certain alterations, (which was accordingly printed,) and rejected
the first, for the reasons assigned in the following letter. This letter
is introduced for the sake of Mr. C.'s reply, and to exhibit the candid
and untenacious quality of his mind. As a mark of Mr. Coleridge's
solicitude to obtain the observations of another, without surrendering
his own ultimate judgment, he always encouraged my remarks on his
compositions. When about to send the second edition of his Poems to the
press, he thus wrote to me.