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Ceres, daughter of Saturn and Cybele, was goddess of the productions of the
earth. She taught man the art of agriculture, and is represented crowned
with wheat, holding a torch in one hand, and in the other an ear of corn;
sometimes she carries a sceptre, and sometimes a sickle, and her chariot is
drawn by lions or by serpents.
------------"As tempered suns arise
Sweet beamed, and shedding through the lucid clouds
A pleasing calm: while broad and brown, below
Extensive harvests hang the heavy head.
Rich, silent, deep, they stand: for not a gale
Rolls its light billows o'er the bending plain:
A calm of plenty; till the ruffled air
Falls from its poise, and gives the breeze to blow.
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Rent is the fleecy mantle of the sky,
And back by fits the shadows sweep along.
A gaily chequered, heart-expanding view,
Far as the circling eye can shoot around,
Unbounded, tossing in a flood of corn."