To Leven-Water

    18th century author and poet Tobias Smollet was born in Dumbartonshire, Scotland. A place with picturesque scenery and one of the most beautiful lochs in Scotland, Loch Lomond, is located. The River Leven, which Smollet features in the following poem flows into the loch and his words bring the poem alive. I can nearly hear the ripples of the water and see the trout and salmon leaping as they make there way up river.

Loch Lomond

To Leven-Water

On Leven's banks, while free to rove

And tune the rural pipe to love

I envied not the happiest swain

That ever trod the Arcadian plain

Pure stream! In whose transparent wave

My youthful limbs I want to lave

No torrents stain they limpid source

No rocks impede they dimpling course

That sweetly warbles over its bed

With white, round, polished pebbles spread

While, lightly poised, the scaly brood

In myriads cleave thy crystal flood

The springing trout, in speckled pride

The salmon monarch of the tide

The ruthless pike, intent on war

The silver eel, and mottled par 

Devolving from thy parent lake

A charming maze thy waters make

By bowers of birch, and groves of pine

And hedges flowered with eglantine

Still on thy banks, so gaily green

May numerous hers and flocks be seen

And lasses chanting over the pail

And shepherd piping in the dale

And ancient faith that knows no guile

And industry enbrowned with toil

And hands resolved, and hands prepared

The blessings they enjoy to guard

Eglantine (Briar)

                       By Tobias Smollet  1721-1771