The Oak one day address'd the Reed:   "To you ungenerous indeed
  Has nature been, my humble friend,
  With weakness aye obliged to bend.
  The smallest bird that flits in air
  Is quite too much for you to bear;
  The slightest wind that wreathes the lake
  Your ever-trembling head doth shake.
  The while, my towering form
    Dares with the mountain top
    The solar blaze to stop,
  And wrestle with the storm.
  What seems to you the blast of death,
  To me is but a zephyr's breath.
  Beneath my branches had you grown,
  Less suffering would your life have known,
    Unhappily you oftenest show
      In open air your slender form,
    Along the marshes wet and low,
      That fringe the kingdom of the storm.
    To you, dec............