Accompanies no. 3 of 12 watercolor designs for Milton's early poems L'Allegro and Il Penseroso that contrast the cheerful man with the melancholic, thoughtful one. Blake created them on commission for Thomas Butts about 1816-1820. The two series were separated in 1903 and were not reunited until 1949, when they were acquired by the Library. Each of the watercolors in this series is accompanied by Blake's transcription of the relevant portion of the poem as well as his notes on his design.
20 lines of text written in ink on the recto of a sheet of laid paper accompanying the watercolor, The Sun at His Eastern Gate (1949.4:3, cataloged separately). Lines 1-12 are quoted from Milton's "L'Allegro," lines 57-68.
Transcription: "3 Sometimes walking not unseen / By hedge row Elms on Hillocks green / Right against the Eastern Gate / Where the Great Sun begins his state / Robed in Flames & amber Light / The Clouds in thousand Liveries dight / While the Plowman near at hand / Whistles o'er the Furrowd Land / And the Milkmaid singeth blithe / And the Mower whets his Scythe / And every Shepherd tells his Tale / Under the Hawthorne in the Dale / The Great Sun is represented clothed in / Flames Surrounded by the Clouds in their / Liveries, in their various Offices at the / Eastern Gate. beneath in Small Figures / Milton walking by Elms on Hillocks green / The Plowman. The Milkmaid The Mower / whetting his Scythe. & the Shepherd & his / Lass under a Hawthorne in the dale"