"While I
In yonder _spring_ of roses intermix'd
With _myrtles_ find what to redress till noon."
_Par. Lost_, ix. 217.
he had probably in his mind the _cespuglio_ in the first canto of the
_Orlando Furioso_; for _spring_ had not been used in the sense of thickets,
clumps, by any previous English poet. I am of opinion that _spring_ occurs
for the last time in our poetry in the following lines of Pope:
"See thy bright altars throng'd with prostrate kings,
And heap'd with products of Sabæan _springs_."
_Messiah_, 93.