Her elbows ruffled, and her tott'ring form
Ill-propp’d upon French heels; she might be deem'd
(But that the basket dangling on her arm
Interprets her more truly) of a rank
Too proud for dairy-work, or sale of eggs.
Expect her soon with foot-boy at her heels,
No longer blushing for her awkward load,
Her train and her umbrella all her care !
The town has ting'd the country; and the stain
Appears a spot upon a vestal's robe,
The worse for what it soils. The fashion runs
Down into scenes still rural; but, alas,
Scenes rarely grac'd with rural manners now !
Time was when in the pastoral retreat
Th’unguarded door was safe ; men did not watch
To invade another's right or guard their own.
Then sleep was undisturb’d by fear, unscar'd
By drunken howlings; and the chilling tale
Of midnight murder was a wonder heard
With doubtful credit, told to frighten babes.
But, farewell now to unsuspicious nights,
And slumbers unalarm’d! Now, ere you sleep,
See that your polish'd arms be prim’d with care,
And drop the nightbolt; ruffians are abroad:
And the first larum of the cock's shrill throat
May prove a trumpet, summoning your ear
To horrid sounds of hostile feet within.
E’en daylight has its dangers; and the walk [once
Through pathless wastes and woods, unconscious
Of other tenants than melodious birds,
Or harmless flocks, is hazardous and bold.
Lamented change! to which full many a cause
Invet’rate, hopeless of a cure, conspires.
The course of human things from good to ill,
From ill to worse, is fatal, never fails.
Increase of pow'r begets increase of wealth ;
Wealth luxury, and luxury excess ;
Excess the scrofulous and itchy plague,
That seizes first the opulent, descends
To the next rank contagious, and in time
Taints downward all the graduated scale
Of order, from the chariot to the plough.
The rich, and they that have an arm to check
The license of the lowest in degree,
Desert their office; and themselves, intent
On pleasure, haunt the capital, and thus
To all the violence of lawless hands
Resign the scenes their presence might protect.
Authority herself not seldom sleeps,
Though resident, and witness of the wrong.
The plump convivial parson often bears
The magisterial sword in vain, and lays
His rev’rence and his worship both to rest
On the same cushion of habitual sloth.
Perhaps timidity restrains his arm;
When he should strike he trembles, and sets free,
Himself enslav'd by terror of the band,
Th’audacious convict whom he dares not bind.
Perhaps, though by profession ghostly pure,
He too may have his vice, and sometimes prove
Less dainty than becomes his grave outside
In lucrative concerns. Examine well
His milkwhite hand; the palm is hardly lean-
But here and there an ugly smutch appears.
Foh! 'twas a bribe that left it: he has touch'd
Corruption. Whoso seeks an audit here
Propitious, pays his tribute, game or fish,
Wild fowl or ven’son; and his errand speeds.
But faster far, and more than all the rest,
A noble cause, which none, who bears a spark
Of public virtue, ever wish'd remoy'd,
Works the deplor'd and mischievous effect.
'Tis universal soldiership has stabb’d
The heart of merit in the meaner class.
Arms, through the vanity and brainless rage
Of those that bear them, in whatever cause,
Seem most at variance with all moral good, And incompatible with serious thought. The clown, the child of nature, without guile, Blest with an infant's ignorance of all But his own simple pleasures; now and then A wrestling match, a footrace, or a fair ; Is ballotted, and trembles at the news; Sheepish he doffs his hat, and mumbling swears A bible oath to be whate'er they please, To do he knows not what. The task perform’d, That instant he becomes the sergeant's care, His pupil, and his torment, and his jest. His awkward gait, his introverted toes, Bent knees, round shoulders, and dejected looks, Procure him many a curse. By slow degrees, Unapt to learn, and fermed of stubborn stuff, He yet by slow degrees puts off himself, Grows conscious of a change, and likes it well : He stands erect; his slouch becomes a walk; He steps right onward, martial in his air, His form, and movement; is as smart above As meal and larded locks can make him; wears His hat, or his plum'd helmet, with a grace ; And, his three years of heroship expir'd, Returns indignant to the slighted plough. He hates the field, in which no fife or drum Attends him; drives his cattle to a march; And sighs for the smart comrades he has left. "Twere well if his exterior change were allBut with his clumsy port the wretch has lost His ignorance and harmless manners too. To swear, to game, to drink; to show at home By lewdness, idleness, and Sabbath-breach, The great proficiency he made abroad; T' astonish and to grieve his gazing friends, To break some maiden's and his mother's heart; To be a pest where he was useful once; Are his sole aim, and all his glory, now.
Man in society is like a flow'r
Blown in its native bed: 'tis there alone
His faculties, expanded in full bloom,
Shine out; there only reach their proper use.
But man, associated and leagu'd with man
By regal warrant, or self-join'd by bond
For intrest-sake, or swarming into clans
Beneath one head, for purposes of war,
Like flow'rs selected from the rest, and bound
And bundled close to fill some crowded vase, is
Fades rapidly, and, by compression marr’d,
Contracts defilement not to be endur'd.
Hence charter'd boroughs are such public plagues ;
And burghers, men immaculate perhaps
In all their private functions, once combin'd,
Become a loathsome body, only fit
For dissolution, hurtful to the main.
Hence merchants, unimpeachable of sin
Against the charities of domestic life,
Incorporated, seem at once to lose
Their nature, and disclaiming all regard
For mercy and the common rights of man,
Build factories with blood, conducting trade
At the sword's point, and dying the white robe
Of innocent commercial Justice red.
Hence to the field of glory, as the world
Misdeems it, dazzled
by its bright array,
With all its majesty of thund'ring pomp,
Enchanting music and immortal wreaths.
Is but a school, where thoughtlessness is taught
On principle, where foppery atones
For folly, gallantry for ev'ry vice.
But slighted as it is, and
by the great
Abandon'd, and which still I more regret,
Infected with the manners and the modes
It knew not once, the country wins me still.
I never fram’d a wish, or form'd a plan,
That flattered me with hopes of earthly bliss,
But there I laid the scene. There early stray'd
My fancy, ere yet liberty of choice
Had found me, or the hope of being free.
My very dreams were rural; rural too
The first-born efforts of my youthful muse,
Sportive and jingling her poetic bells,
Ere yet her ear was mistress of their pow'rs.
No bard could please me but whose lyre was tun'd
To Nature's praises. Heroes and their feats
Fatigu'd me, never weary of the pipe
Of Tityrus, assembling, as he sang,
The rustic throng beneath his fav'rite beech.
Then Milton had indeed a poet's charms :
New to my taste his Paradise surpass'd
The struggling efforts of my boyish tongue,
To speak its excellence. I danc'd for joy.
I marvell'd much, that, at so ripe an age
As twice seven years, his beauties had then first
Engag'd my wonder; and admiring still,
And still admiring, with regret suppos'd
The joy half lost, because not sooner found.
There too enamour'd of the life I lov'd,
Pathetic in its praise, in its pursuit
Determin’d, and possessing it at last
With transports, such as favour'd lovers feel,
I studied, priz'd, and wish'd that I had known
Ingenious Cowley! and, though now reclaim'd
By modern lights from an erroneous taste,
I cannot but lament thy splendid wit
Entangled in the cobwebs of the schools.
I still revere thee, courtly though retir'd!
Though stretch'd at ease in Chertsey's silent bow'rs,
Not unemploy'd; and finding rich amends
For a lost world in solitude and verse.
"Tis born with all: the love of Nature's works
Is an ingredient in the compound man
Infus'd at the creation of the kind.
And, though th' Almighty Maker has throughout
|