No More Learning

" "I beg, sir," returned she, scarcely able to speak, "that
you'll desist, and not make me so very wretched. " "Was ever such
obstinacy known? " cried he again, "to refuse the man whom the family has
such infinite obligations to—who has preserved your sister, and who has
five hundred pounds? What! not have him! " "No, sir, never," replied she,
angrily; "I'd sooner die first! " "If that be the case, then," cried he,
"if you will not have him—I think I must have you myself. " And so
saying, he caught her to his breast with ardour. "My loveliest, my most
sensible of girls," cried he, "how could you ever think your own
Burchell could deceive you, or that Sir William Thornhill could ever
cease to admire a mistress that loved him for himself alone? I have for
some years sought for a woman, who, a stranger to my fortune, could
think I had merit as a man. After having tried in vain, even among the
pert and ugly, how great at last must be my rapture, to have made a
conquest over such sense and such heavenly beauty! " Then turning to
Jenkinson, "As I cannot, sir, part with this young lady myself, for she
has taken a fancy to the cut of my face, all the recompense I can make
is, to give you her fortune, and you may call upon my steward to-morrow
for five hundred pounds. " Thus we had all our compliments to repeat, and
Lady Thornhill underwent the same round of ceremony that her sister had
done before. In the meantime Sir William's gentleman appeared to tell us
that the equipages were ready to carry us to the inn, where everything
was prepared for our reception. My wife and I led the van, and left
those gloomy mansions of sorrow. The generous baronet ordered forty
pounds to be distributed among the prisoners, and Mr. Wilmot, induced by
his example, gave half that sum. We were received below by the shouts of
the villagers, and I saw and shook by the hand two or three of my honest
parishioners, who were among the number. They attended us to our inn,
where a sumptuous entertainment was provided, and coarser provisions
were distributed in great quantities among the populace.

[Illustration:

"_Will you have him? _"—_p. _ 168.
]

After supper, as my spirits were exhausted by the alternation of
pleasure and pain which they had sustained during the day, I asked
permission to withdraw; and leaving the company in the midst of their
mirth, as soon as I found myself alone, I poured out my heart in
gratitude to the Giver of joy as well as sorrow, and then slept
undisturbed till morning.




_CHAPTER XXXII. _

_The conclusion. _


The next morning, as soon as I awaked, I found my eldest son sitting by
my bedside, who came to increase my joy with another turn of fortune in
my favour. First having released me from the settlement that I had made
the day before in his favour, he let me know that my merchant, who had
failed in town, was arrested at Antwerp, and there had given up effects
to a much greater amount than what was due to his creditors. My boy's
generosity pleased me almost as much as this unlooked-for good fortune.
But I had some doubts whether I ought in justice to accept his offer.
While I was pondering upon this, Sir William entered the room, to whom I
communicated my doubts. His opinion was, that as my son was already
possessed of a very affluent fortune by his marriage, I might accept his
offer without hesitation. His business, however, was to inform me that,
as he had the night before sent for the licenses, and expected them
every hour, he hoped that I would not refuse my assistance in making all
the company happy that morning. A footman entered while we were
speaking, to tell us that the messenger was returned; and as I was by
this time ready, I went down, where I found the whole company as merry
as affluence and innocence could make them. However, as they were now
preparing for a very solemn ceremony, their laughter entirely displeased
me. I told them of the grave, becoming, and sublime deportment they
should assume upon this mystical occasion, and read them two homilies
and a thesis of my own composing, in order to prepare them. Yet they
still seemed perfectly refractory and ungovernable. Even as we were
going along to church, to which I led the way, all gravity had quite
forsaken them, and I was often tempted to turn back in indignation. In
church a new dilemma arose, which promised no easy solution. This was,
which couple should be married first: my son's bride warmly insisted
that Lady Thornhill (that was to be) should take the lead; but this the
other refused with equal ardour, protesting she would not be guilty of
such rudeness for the world. The argument was supported for some time
between both with equal obstinacy and good breeding. But as I stood all
this time with my book ready, I was at last quite tired of the contest,
and shutting it, "I perceive," cried I, "that none of you have a mind to
be married, and I think we had as good go back again; for I suppose
there will be no business done here to-day. " This is once reduced them
to reason. The baronet and his lady were first married, and then my son
and his lovely partner.

I had previously that morning given orders that a coach should be sent
for my honest neighbour Flamborough and his family, by which means, upon
our return to the inn, we had the pleasure of finding the two Miss
Flamboroughs alighted before us. Mr. Jenkinson gave his hand to the
eldest, and my son Moses led up the other; and I have since found that
he has taken a real liking to the girl, and my consent and bounty he
shall have, whenever he thinks proper to demand them. We were no sooner
returned to the inn, but numbers of my parishioners, hearing of my
success, came to congratulate me; but among the rest were those who rose
to rescue me, and whom I formerly rebuked with such sharpness. I told
the story to Sir William, my son-in-law, who went out and reproved them
with great severity; but, finding them quite disheartened by his harsh
reproof, he gave them half-a-guinea a-piece to drink his health and
raise their dejected spirits.

Soon after this we were called to a very genteel entertainment, which
was dressed by Mr. Thornhill's cook. And it may not be improper to
observe, with respect to that gentleman, that he now resides in quality
of companion at a relation's house, being very well liked, and seldom
sitting at the side-table, except when there is no room at the other,
for they make no stranger of him. His time is pretty much taken up in
keeping his relation, who is a little melancholy, in spirits, and in
learning to blow the French horn. My eldest daughter, however, still
remembers him with regret; and she has even told me, though I make a
great secret of it, that when he reforms she may be brought to relent.
But to return, for I am not apt to digress thus: when we were to sit
down to dinner our ceremonies were going to be renewed. The question
was, whether my eldest daughter, as being a matron, should not sit above
the two young brides; but the debate was cut short by my son George, who
proposed that the company should sit indiscriminately, every gentleman
by his lady. This was received with great approbation by all, excepting
my wife, who, I could perceive, was not perfectly satisfied, as she
expected to have had the pleasure of sitting at the head of the table,
and carving all the meat for all the company. But, notwithstanding this,
it is impossible to describe our good-humour. I can't say whether we had
more wit among us now than usual, but I am certain we had more laughing,
which answered the end as well. One jest I particularly remember: old
Mr. Wilmot drinking to Moses, whose head was turned another way, my son
replied, "Madam, I thank you;" upon which the old gentleman, winking
upon the rest of the company, observed that he was thinking of his
mistress. At which jest I thought the two Miss Flamboroughs would have
died with laughing. As soon as dinner was over, according to my old
custom, I requested that the table might be taken away, to have the
pleasure of seeing all my family assembled once more by a cheerful
fireside. My two little ones sat upon each knee, the rest of the company
by their partners. I had nothing now on this side of the grave to wish
for—all my cares were over: my pleasure was unspeakable. It now only
remained that my gratitude in good fortune should exceed my former
submission in adversity.




THE
POEMS AND PLAYS
OF
OLIVER GOLDSMITH.




CONTENTS.


POEMS.


THE TRAVELLER; OR, A PROSPECT OF SOCIETY.

THE DESERTED VILLAGE.

THE HAUNCH OF VENISON. A POETICAL EPISTLE TO LORD CLARE.

THE CAPTIVITY. AN ORATORIO.

RETALIATION. —— POSTSCRIPT.

THE HERMIT. A BALLAD.

THE DOUBLE TRANSFORMATION. A TALE.

THE GIFT: TO IRIS, IN BOW STREET, COVENT GARDEN.

THE LOGICIANS REFUTED. IMITATION OF DEAN SWIFT.

ON A BEAUTIFUL YOUTH STRUCK BLIND BY LIGHTNING.

A NEW SIMILE, IN THE MANNER OF SWIFT.

AN ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A MAD DOG.

THE CLOWN'S REPLY.

STANZAS ON WOMAN.

DESCRIPTION OF AN AUTHOR'S BED-CHAMBER.

SONG, INTENDED TO HAVE BEEN SUNG IN THE COMEDY OF "SHE STOOPS TO
CONQUER. "

STANZAS ON THE TAKING OF QUEBEC.

EPITAPH ON DR. PARNELL.

EPITAPH ON EDWARD PURDON.

AN ELEGY ON MRS. MARY BLAIZE.

STANZAS.

SONGS.

A PROLOGUE BY THE POET LABERIUS, WHOM CÆSAR FORCED UPON THE STAGE.

PROLOGUE TO "ZOBEIDE," A TRAGEDY.

EPILOGUE, SPOKEN BY MR. LEE LEWIS.

EPILOGUE TO THE COMEDY OF "THE SISTERS. "

THRENODIA AUGUSTALIS, SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF HER ROYAL HIGHNESS THE
PRINCESS OF WALES.

EPILOGUE TO THE "GOOD-NATURED MAN. "

EPILOGUE TO "SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER. "

AN EPILOGUE, INTENDED FOR MRS. BULKLEY.

EPILOGUE TO "SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER:" INTENDED TO BE SPOKEN BY MRS.
BULKLEY
AND MISS CATLEY.


PLAYS.

THE GOOD-NATURED MAN.

SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER.




THE TRAVELLER;

OR, A PROSPECT OF SOCIETY.


DEDICATION.


TO THE REV. HENRY GOLDSMITH

DEAR SIR,

I am sensible that the friendship between us can acquire no new force
from the ceremonies of a dedication; and perhaps it demands an excuse
thus to prefix your name to my attempts, which you decline giving with
your own. But as a part of this poem was formerly written to you from
Switzerland, the whole can now, with propriety, be only inscribed to
you. It will also throw a light upon many parts of it, when the reader
understands that it is addressed to a man who, despising fame and
fortune, has retired early to happiness and obscurity, with an income of
forty pounds a-year.

I now perceive, my dear brother, the wisdom of your humble choice. You
have entered upon a sacred office, where the harvest is great, and the
labourers are but few; while you have left the field of ambition, where
the labourers are many, and the harvest not worth carrying away. But of
all kinds of ambition—what from the refinement of the times, from
different systems of criticism, and from the divisions of party—that
which pursues poetical fame is the wildest.

Poetry makes a principal amusement among unpolished nations; but in a
country verging to the extremes of refinement, painting and music come
in for a share. As these offer the feeble mind a less laborious
entertainment, they at first rival poetry, and at length supplant her:
they engross all that favour once shown to her, and, though but younger
sisters, seize upon the elder's birthright.

Yet, however this art may be neglected by the powerful, it is still in
greater danger from the mistaken efforts of the learned to improve it.
What criticisms have we not heard of late in favour of blank verse and
Pindaric odes, choruses, anapests and iambics, alliterative care and
happy negligence! Every absurdity has now a champion to defend it; and
as he is generally much in the wrong, so he has always much to say; for
error is ever talkative.

But there is an enemy to this art still more dangerous,—I mean Party.
Party entirely distorts the judgment and destroys the taste. When the
mind is once infected with this disease, it can only find pleasure in
what contributes to increase the distemper. Like the tiger, that seldom
desists from pursuing man after having once preyed upon human flesh, the
reader who has once gratified his appetite with calumny, makes, ever
after, the most agreeable feast upon murdered reputation. Such readers
generally admire some half-witted thing, who wants to be thought a bold
man, having lost the character of a wise one. Him they dignify with the
name of poet: his tawdry lampoons are called satires; his turbulence is
said to be force, and his frenzy fire.

What reception a poem may find which has neither abuse, party, nor blank
verse to support it, I cannot tell, nor am I solicitous to know. My aims
are right. Without espousing the cause of any party, I have endeavoured
to moderate the rage of all. I have attempted to show, that there may be
equal happiness in states that are differently governed from our own;
that every state has a particular principle of happiness, and that this
principle in each may be carried to a mischievous excess. There are few
can judge better than yourself how far these positions are illustrated
in this poem.

I am, dear Sir,

Your most affectionate brother,

OLIVER GOLDSMITH.

[Illustration:

"_Remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow, Or
by the lazy Scheld, or wandering Po. _"—_p. _ 176.
]




THE TRAVELLER;

OR, A PROSPECT OF SOCIETY.


Remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow,
Or by the lazy Scheld, or wandering Po;
Or onward, where the rude Carinthian boor
Against the houseless stranger shuts the door;
Or where Campania's plain forsaken lies,
A weary waste expanding to the skies;
Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see,
My heart untravell'd fondly turns to thee:
Still to my Brother turns, with ceaseless pain,
And drags at each remove a lengthening chain.
Eternal blessings crown my earliest friend,
And round his dwelling guardian saints attend!
Blest be that spot, where cheerful guests retire
To pause from toil, and trim their evening fire;
Blest that abode, where want and pain repair,
And every stranger finds a ready chair;

[Illustration:

"_Or sigh with pity at some mournful tale. _"—_p. _ 177.
]


Blest be those feasts, with simple plenty crown'd,
Where all the ruddy family around
Laugh at the jests or pranks that never fail,
Or sigh with pity at some mournful tale;
Or press the bashful stranger to his food,
And learn the luxury of doing good.
But me, not destined such delights to share,
My prime of life in wandering spent and care;
Impell'd, with steps unceasing, to pursue
Some fleeting good, that mocks me with the view;
That, like the circle bounding earth and skies,
Allures from far, yet, as I follow, flies;
My fortune leads to traverse realms alone,
And find no spot of all the world my own.
Even now, where Alpine solitudes ascend,
I sit me down a pensive hour to spend;
And, placed on high above the storm's career,
Look downward where a hundred realms appear;
Lakes, forests, cities, plains extending wide,
The pomp of kings, the shepherd's humbler pride.
When thus Creation's charms around combine,
Amidst the store should thankless pride repine?
Say, should the philosophic mind disdain
That good which makes each humbler bosom vain?
Let school-taught pride dissemble all it can,
These little things are great to little man;
And wiser he, whose sympathetic mind
Exults in all the good of all mankind.
Ye glittering towns, with wealth and splendour crown'd;
Ye fields, where summer spreads profusion round;
Ye lakes, whose vessels catch the busy gale;
Ye bending swains, that dress the flowery vale;
For me your tributary stores combine:
Creation's heir, the world, the world is mine!
As some lone miser, visiting his store,
Bends at his treasure, counts, recounts it o'er;
Hoards after hoards his rising raptures fill,
Yet still he sighs, for hoards are wanting still:
Thus to my breast alternate passions rise,
Pleased with each good that Heaven to man supplies;
Yet oft a sigh prevails, and sorrows fall,
To see the hoard of human bliss so small;
And oft I wish, amidst the scene to find
Some spot to real happiness consign'd,
Where my worn soul, each wandering hope at rest,
May gather bliss to see my fellows blest.
But where to find that happiest spot below,
Who can direct, when all pretend to know?
The shuddering tenant of the frigid zone
Boldly proclaims that happiest spot his own;
Extols the treasures of his stormy seas,
And his long nights of revelry and ease:
The naked negro, panting at the line,
Boasts of his golden sands and palmy wine,
Basks in the glare, or stems the tepid wave,
And thanks his gods for all the good they gave.
Such is the patriot's boast where'er we roam,
His first, best country, ever is at home.
And yet, perhaps, if countries we compare,
And estimate the blessings which they share,
Though patriots flatter, still shall wisdom find
An equal portion dealt to all mankind;
As different good, by art or nature given
To different nations, makes their blessings even.
Nature, a mother kind alike to all,
Still grants her bliss at labour's earnest call!
With food as well the peasant is supplied
On Idra's cliffs as Arno's shelvy side;
And though the rocky-crested summits frown,
These rocks, by custom, turn to beds of down.
From art more various are the blessings sent,
Wealth, commerce, honour, liberty, content;
Yet these each other's power so strong contest,
That either seems destructive of the rest.
Where wealth and freedom reign contentment fails,
And honour sinks where commerce long prevails.
Hence every state, to one loved blessing prone,
Conforms and models life to that alone;
Each to the fav'rite happiness attends,
And spurns the plan that aims at other ends;
Till, carried to excess in each domain,
This fav'rite good begets peculiar pain.
But let us try these truths with closer eyes,
And trace them through the prospect as it lies:
Here for a while, my proper cares resign'd,
Here let me sit in sorrow for mankind;
Like yon neglected shrub, at random cast,
That shades the steep, and sighs at every blast.
Far to the right, where Appenine ascends,
Bright as the summer, Italy extends;
Its uplands sloping deck the mountain's side,
Woods over woods in gay theatric pride;
While oft some temple's mouldering tops between
With venerable grandeur mark the scene.
Could Nature's bounty satisfy the breast,
The sons of Italy were surely blest.
Whatever fruits in different climes are found,
That proudly rise, or humbly court the ground;
Whatever blooms in torrid tracts appear,
Whose bright succession decks the varied year;
Whatever sweets salute the northern sky
With vernal lives, that blossom but to die;
These, here disporting, own the kindred soil,
Nor ask luxuriance from the planter's toil;
While sea-born gales their gelid wings expand
To winnow fragrance round the smiling land.
But small the bliss that sense alone bestows,
And sensual bliss is all the nation knows.
In florid beauty groves and fields appear,—
Man seems the only growth that dwindles here.
Contrasted faults through all his manners reign;
Though poor, luxurious; though submissive, vain;
Though grave, yet trifling; zealous, yet untrue;
And even in penance planning sins anew.
All evils here contaminate the mind,
That opulence departed leaves behind;
For wealth was theirs, not far removed the date,
When commerce proudly flourish'd through the state;
At her command the palace learned to rise,
Again the long-fallen column sought the skies;
The canvas glow'd beyond e'en nature warm;
The pregnant quarry teem'd with human form;
Till, more unsteady than the southern gale,
Commerce on other shores display'd her sail;
While nought remained of all that riches gave,
But towns unmann'd, and lords without a slave:
And late the nation found, with fruitless skill,
Its former strength was but plethoric ill.
Yet still the loss of wealth is here supplied
By arts, the splendid wrecks of former pride:
From these the feeble heart and long-fallen mind
An easy compensation seem to find.
Here may be seen, in bloodless pomp array'd,
The pasteboard triumph and the cavalcade;
Processions form'd for piety and love,—
A mistress or a saint in every grove.
By sports like these are all their cares beguiled,—
The sports of children satisfy the child;
Each nobler aim, repress'd by long control,
Now sinks at last, or feebly mans the soul;
While low delights, succeeding fast behind,
In happier meanness occupy the mind.
As in those domes where Cæsars once bore sway,
Defaced by time and tottering in decay,
There in the ruin, heedless of the dead,
The shelter-seeking peasant builds his shed:
And, wondering man could want the larger pile,
Exults, and owns his cottage with a smile.

[Illustration:

"_Here may be seen, in bloodless pomp array'd,
The pasteboard triumph and the cavalcade. _"—_p. _ 180.
]


My soul, turn from them; turn we to survey
Where rougher climes a nobler race display,
Where the bleak Swiss their stormy mansion tread,
And force a churlish soil for scanty bread:
No product here the barren hills afford,
But man and steel, the soldier and his sword;
No vernal blooms their torpid rocks array,
But winter lingering chills the lap of May;
No zephyr fondly sues the mountain's breast,
But meteors glare, and stormy glooms invest.
Yet still, even here, content can spread a charm,
Redress the clime, and all its rage disarm.
Though poor the peasant's hut, his feast though small,
He sees his little lot the lot of all;
Sees no contiguous palace rear its head,
To shame the meanness of his humble shed;
No costly lord the sumptuous banquet deal,
To make him loathe his vegetable meal;
But calm, and bred in ignorance and toil,
Each wish contracting, fits him to the soil.
Cheerful, at morn, he wakes from short repose,
Breathes the keen air, and carols as he goes;
With patient angle trolls the finny deep,
Or drives his venturous ploughshare to the steep;
Or seeks the den where snow-tracks mark the way,
And drags the struggling savage into day.
At night returning, every labour sped.
He sits him down the monarch of a shed;
Smiles by his cheerful fire, and round surveys
His children's looks, that brighten at the blaze;
While his loved partner, boastful of her hoard,
Displays her cleanly platter on the board:
And haply too some pilgrim, thither led,
With many a tale repays the nightly bed.
Thus every good his native wilds impart
Imprints the patriot passion on his heart;
And e'en those ills that round his mansion rise,
Enhance the bliss his scanty fund supplies.
Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms,
And dear that hill which lifts him to the storms;
And as a child, when scaring sounds molest,
Clings close and closer to the mother's breast,
So the loud torrent, and the whirlwind's roar,
But bind him to his native mountains more.
Such are the charms to barren states assign'd;
Their wants but few, their wishes all confined.
Yet let them only share the praises due;
If few their wants, their pleasures are but few:
For every want that stimulates the breast
Becomes a source of pleasure when redrest;
Whence from such lands each pleasing science flies
That first excites desire, and then supplies;
Unknown to them, when sensual pleasures cloy,
To fill the languid pause with finer joy;
Unknown those powers that raise the soul to flame,
Catch every nerve, and vibrate through the frame;
Their level life is but a smouldering fire,
Unquench'd by want, unfann'd by strong desire;
Unfit, for raptures, or, if raptures cheer
On some high festival of once a year,
In wild excess the vulgar breast takes fire,
Till, buried in debauch, the bliss expire.
But not their joys alone thus coarsely flow;
Their morals, like their pleasures, are but low:
For, as refinement stops, from sire to son
Unalter'd, unimproved the manners run;
And love's and friendship's finely-pointed dart
Fall blunted from each indurated heart.
Some sterner virtues o'er the mountain's breast
May sit, like falcons cowering on the nest;
But all the gentler morals, such as play
Through life's more cultured walks, and charm the way,
These, far dispersed, on timorous pinions fly,
To sport and flutter in a kinder sky.
To kinder skies, where gentler manners reign,
I turn; and France displays her bright domain.
Gay, sprightly land of mirth and social ease,
Pleased with thyself, whom all the world can please!
How often have I led thy sportive choir,
With tuneless pipe, beside the murmuring Loire;
Where shading elms along the margin grew,
And, freshen'd from the wave, the zephyr flew;
And haply, though my harsh touch, faltering still,
But mock'd all tune and marr'd the dancer's skill,
Yet would the village praise my wondrous power,
And dance, forgetful of the noontide hour.
Alike all ages. Dames of ancient days
Have led their children through the mirthful maze,
And the gay grandsire, skill'd in gestic lore,
Has frisk'd beneath the burden of threescore.
So blest a life these thoughtless realms display,
Thus idly busy rolls their world away:
Theirs are those arts that mind to mind endear,
For honour forms the social temper here.
Honour, that praise which real merit gains,
Or e'en imaginary worth obtains,
Here passes current; paid from hand to hand,
It shifts in splendid traffic round the land;
From courts to camps, to cottages it strays,
And all are taught an avarice of praise:
They please, are pleased; they give to get esteem,
Till, seeming blest, they grow to what they seem.
But while this softer art their bliss supplies,
It gives their follies also room to rise;
For praise too dearly loved, or warmly sought,
Enfeebles all internal strength of thought:
And the weak soul, within itself unblest,
Leans for all pleasure on another's breast.
Hence ostentation here, with tawdry art,
Pants for the vulgar praise which fools impart;
Here vanity assumes her pert grimace,
And trims her robes of frieze with copper lace;
Here beggar pride defrauds her daily cheer,
To boast one splendid banquet once a year:
The mind still turns where shifting fashion draws,
Nor weighs the solid worth of self-applause.
To men of other minds my fancy flies,
Embosom'd in the deep where Holland lies;
Methinks her patient sons before me stand,
Where the broad ocean leans against the land,
And, sedulous to stop the coming tide,
Lift the tall rampire's artificial pride.
Onward, methinks, and diligently slow,
The firm-connected bulwark seems to grow,
Spreads its long arms amidst the watery roar,
Scoops out an empire, and usurps the shore,
While the pent ocean, rising o'er the pile,
Sees an amphibious world beneath him smile;
The slow canal, the yellow-blossom'd vale,
The willow-tufted bank, the gliding sail,
The crowded mart, the cultivated plain,—
A new creation rescued from his reign.
Thus, while around the wave-subjected soil
Impels the native to repeated toil,
Industrious habits in each bosom reign,
And industry begets a love of gain.
Hence all the good from opulence that springs,
With all those ills superfluous treasure brings,
Are here display'd. Their much-loved wealth imparts
Convenience, plenty, elegance, and arts:
But view them closer, craft and fraud appear,
Even liberty itself is barter'd here:
At gold's superior charms all freedom flies,
The needy sell it, and the rich man buys;
A land of tyrants, and a den of slaves,
Here wretches seek dishonourable graves,
And calmly bent, to servitude conform,
Dull as their lakes that slumber in the storm.

[Illustration:

"_Here vanity assumes her pert grimace,
And trims her robes of frieze with copper lace. _"—_p. _ 184.
]

Heavens! how unlike their Belgic sires of old!
Rough, poor, content, ungovernably bold;
War in each breast, and freedom on each brow;—
How much unlike the sons of Britain now!
Fired at the sound, my genius spreads her wing,
And flies where Britain courts the western spring;
Where lawns extend that scorn Arcadian pride,
And brighter streams than famed Hydaspes glide;
There all around the gentlest breezes stray,
There gentle music melts on every spray;
Creation's mildest charms are there combined,
Extremes are only in the master's mind!
Stern o'er each bosom reason holds her state,
With daring aims irregularly great;
Pride in their port, defiance in their eye,
I see the lords of human kind pass by;
Intent on high designs, a thoughtful band,
By forms unfashion'd, fresh from Nature's hand,
Fierce in their native hardiness of soul,
True to imagined right, above control,
While e'en the peasant boasts these rights to scan,
And learns to venerate himself as man.
Thine, Freedom, thine the blessings pictured here,
Thine are those charms that dazzle and endear;
Too blest, indeed, were such without alloy,
But, foster'd e'en by Freedom, ills annoy:
That independence Britons prize too high
Keeps man from man, and breaks the social tie;
The self-dependent lordlings stand alone,
All claims that bind and sweeten life unknown;
Here by the bonds of nature feebly held,
Minds combat minds, repelling and repell'd:
Ferments arise, imprison'd factions roar,
Repress'd ambition struggles round her shore,
Till, overwrought, the general system feels
Its motion stop, or frenzy fire the wheels.
Nor this the worst. As Nature's ties decay,
As duty, love, and honour fail to sway,
Fictitious bonds, the bonds of wealth and law,
Still gather strength and force unwilling awe.
Hence all obedience bows to these alone,
And talent sinks, and merit weeps unknown:
Till time may come, when, stript of all her charms,
The land of scholars, and the nurse of arms,
Where noble stems transmit the patriot flame,
Where kings have toil'd, and poets wrote far fame,
One sink of level avarice shall lie,
And scholars, soldiers, kings, unhonour'd die.
Yet think not, thus when Freedom's ills I state,
I mean to flatter kings or court the great:
Ye powers of truth that bid my soul aspire,
Far from my bosom drive the low desire;
And thou, fair Freedom, taught alike to feel
The rabble's rage, and tyrant's angry steel;
Thou transitory flower, alike undone
By proud contempt, or favour's fostering sun,
Still may thy blooms the changeful clime endure,
I only would repress them to secure:
For just experience tells, in every soil,
That those that think must govern those that toil;
And all that Freedom's highest aims can reach,
Is but to lay proportion'd loads on each.
Hence, should one order disproportion'd grow,
Its double weight must ruin all below.
Oh, then, how blind to all that truth requires,
Who think it freedom when a part aspires!
Calm is my soul, nor apt to rise in arms,
Except when fast-approaching danger warms:
But when contending chiefs blockade the throne,
Contracting regal power to stretch their own;
When I behold a factious band agree
To call it freedom when themselves are free;
Each wanton judge new penal statutes draw,
Laws grind the poor, and rich men rule the law;
The wealth of climes where savage nations roam
Pillaged from slaves, to purchase slaves at home;
Fear, pity, justice, indignation start,
Tear off reserve, and bare my swelling heart;
Till half a patriot, half a coward grown,
I fly from petty tyrants to the throne.
Yes, Brother, curse with me that baleful hour,
When first ambition struck at regal power;
And, thus polluting honour in its source,
Gave wealth to sway the mind with double force.
Have we not seen, round Britain's peopled shore,
Her useful sons exchanged for useless ore?
Seen all her triumphs but destruction haste,
Like flaring tapers brightening as they waste?
Seen opulence, her grandeur to maintain,
Lead stern depopulation in her train,
And over fields where scatter'd hamlets rose,
In barren solitary pomp repose?
Have we not seen at pleasure's lordly call
The smiling long-frequented village fall?
Beheld the duteous son, the sire decay'd,
The modest matron, and the blushing maid,
Forced from their homes, a melancholy train,
To traverse climes beyond the western main;
Where wild Oswego spreads her swamps around,
And Niagara stuns with thundering sound?
E'en now, perhaps, as there some pilgrim strays
Through tangled forests and through dangerous ways;
Where beasts with man divided empire claim,
And the brown Indian marks with murderous aim;
There, while above the giddy tempest flies,
And all around distressful yells arise,
The pensive exile, bending with his woe,
To stop too fearful, and too faint to go,
Casts a long look where England's glories shine,
And bids his bosom sympathise with mine.
Vain, very vain, my weary search to find
That bliss which only centres in the mind:
Why have I stray'd from pleasure and repose,
To seek a good each government bestows?
In every government, though terrors reign,
Though tyrant kings or tyrant laws restrain,
How small, of all that human hearts endure,
That part which laws or kings can cause or cure!
Still to ourselves in every place consign'd,
Our own felicity we make or find:
With secret course, which no loud storms annoy,
Glides the smooth current of domestic joy.
The lifted axe, the agonising wheel,
Luke's iron crown, and Damiens' bed of steel,
To men remote from power but rarely known,
Leave reason, faith, and conscience, all our own.


THE DESERTED VILLAGE.


DEDICATION.


TO SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

DEAR SIR,

I can have no expectations, in an address of this kind, either to add to
your reputation or to establish my own. You can gain nothing from my
admiration, as I am ignorant of that art in which you are said to excel;
and I may lose much by the severity of your judgment, as few have a
juster taste in poetry than you. Setting interest therefore aside, to
which I never paid much attention, I must be indulged at present in
following my affections. The only dedication I ever made was to my
brother, because I loved him better than most other men. He is since
dead. Permit me to inscribe this poem to you.

How far you may be pleased with the versification and mere mechanical
parts of this attempt, I do not pretend to inquire; but I know you will
object (and indeed several of our best and wisest friends concur in the
opinion), that the depopulation it deplores is nowhere to be seen, and
the disorders it laments are only to be found in the poet's own
imagination. To this I can scarcely make any other answer than that I
sincerely believe what I have written; that I have taken all possible
pains in my country excursions, for these four or five years past, to be
certain of what I allege; and that all my views and inquiries have led
me to believe those miseries real which I here attempt to display. But
this is not the place to enter into an inquiry, whether the country be
depopulating or not; the discussion would take up much room, and I
should prove myself, at best, an indifferent politician, to tire the
reader with a long preface, when I want his unfatigued attention to a
long poem.

In regretting the depopulation of the country, I inveigh against the
increase of our luxuries; and here also I expect the shout of modern
politicians against me. For twenty or thirty years past, it has been the
fashion to consider luxury as one of the greatest national advantages,
and all the wisdom of antiquity, in that particular, as erroneous.
Still, however, I must remain a professed ancient on that head, and
continue to think those luxuries prejudicial to states by which so many
vices are introduced, and so many kingdoms have been undone. Indeed, so
much has been poured out of late on the other side of the question,
that, merely for the sake of novelty and variety, one would sometimes
wish to be in the right.

I am, dear Sir,

Your sincere friend and ardent admirer,

OLIVER GOLDSMITH.

[Illustration:

"_The bashful virgin's sidelong looks of love,
The matron's glance that would those looks reprove. _"—_p. _ 191.
]




THE DESERTED VILLAGE.


Sweet Auburn! loveliest village of the plain,
Where health and plenty cheer'd the labouring swain,
Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid,
And parting summer's lingering blooms delay'd:
Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease,
Seats of my youth, when every sport could please,
How often have I loiter'd o'er thy green,
Where humble happiness endear'd each scene!
How often have I paused on every charm,—
The shelter'd cot, the cultivated farm,
The never-failing brook, the busy mill,
The decent church that topp'd the neighbouring hill,
The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade,
For talking age and whispering lovers made!
How often have I bless'd the coming day,
When toil remitting lent its turn to play,
And all the village train, from labour free,
Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree;
While many a pastime circled in the shade,
The young contending as the old survey'd;
And many a gambol frolick'd o'er the ground,
And sleights of art and feats of strength went round;
And still as each repeated pleasure tired,
Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspired:
The dancing pair that simply sought renown,
By holding out to tire each other down;
The swain, mistrustless of his smutted face,
While secret laughter titter'd round the place;
The bashful virgin's sidelong looks of love,
The matron's glance that would those looks reprove.
These were thy charms, sweet village! sports like these,
With sweet succession, taught e'en toil to please;
These round thy bowers their cheerful influence shed,
These were thy charms—but all these charms are fled.
Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn,
Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms withdrawn;
Amidst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen,
And desolation saddens all thy green:
One only master grasps the whole domain,
And half a tillage stints thy smiling plain;
No more thy glassy brook reflects the day,
But, choked with sedges, works its weedy way;
Along thy glades a solitary guest,
The hollow-sounding bittern guards its nest;
Amidst thy desert walks the lapwing flies,
And tires their echoes with unvaried cries.
Sunk are thy bowers in shapeless ruin all,
And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall;
And, trembling, shrinking from the spoiler's hand,
Far, far away, thy children leave the land.
Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates, and men decay:
Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade—
A breath can make them, as a breath has made—
But a bold peasantry, their country's pride,
When once destroy'd, can never be supplied.
A time there was, ere England's griefs began,
When every rood of ground maintain'd its man:
For him light labour spread her wholesome store,
Just gave what life required, but gave no more:
His best companions, innocence and health,
And his best riches, ignorance of wealth.
But times are alter'd; trade's unfeeling train
Usurp the land, and dispossess the swain:
Along the lawn where scatter'd hamlets rose,
Unwieldy wealth and cumbrous pomp repose;
And every want to luxury allied,
And every pang that folly pays to pride.
Those gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom,
Those calm desires that ask'd but little room,
Those healthful sports that graced the peaceful scene,
Lived in each look, and brighten'd all the green,
These, far departing, seek a kinder shore,
And rural mirth and manners are no more.
Sweet Auburn! parent of the blissful hour,
Thy glades forlorn confess the tyrant's power.
Here, as I take my solitary rounds
Amidst thy tangling walks and ruin'd grounds,
And, many a year elapsed, return to view
Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew,
Remembrance wakes, with all her busy train,
Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain.
In all my wanderings round this world of care,
In all my griefs—and God has given my share—
I still had hopes my latest hours to crown,
Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down;
To husband out life's taper at the close,
And keep the flame from wasting by repose:
I still had hopes,—for pride attends us still,—
Amidst the swains to show my book-learn'd skill;
Around my fire an evening group to draw,
And tell of all I felt, and all I saw;
And, as a hare whom hounds and horns pursue,
Pants to the place from whence at first he flew,
I still had hopes, my long vexations past,
Here to return—and die at home at last.
O blest retirement, friend to life's decline,
Retreats from care, that never must be mine,
How blest is he who crowns, in shades like these,
A youth of labour with an age of ease;
Who quits a world where strong temptations try,
And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly!
For him no wretches, born to work and weep,
Explore the mine, or tempt the dangerous deep;
Nor surly porter stands in guilty state
To spurn imploring famine from the gate:
But on he moves to meet his latter end,
Angels around befriending virtue's friend;

[Illustration:

"_The swain responsive as the milk-maid sung. _"—_p. _ 193.
]


Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay,
While resignation gently slopes the way;
And, all his prospects brightening to the last,
His heaven commences ere the world be past.
Sweet was the sound, when oft, at evening's close,
Up yonder hill the village murmur rose;
There, as I pass'd with careless steps and slow,
The mingling notes came soften'd from below:
The swain responsive as the milk-maid sung,
The sober herd that low'd to meet their young;
The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool,
The playful children just let loose from school;
The watch-dog's voice, that bay'd the whispering wind,
And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind;
These all in sweet confusion sought the shade,
And fill'd each pause the nightingale had made.
But now the sounds of population fail,
No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale;
No busy steps the grass-grown footway tread,
But all the bloomy flush of life is fled:
All but yon widow'd, solitary thing,
That feebly bends beside the plashy spring;
She, wretched matron! forced in age, for bread,
To strip the brook with mantling cresses spread,
To pick her wintry faggot from the thorn,
To seek her nightly shed, and weep till morn;
She only left of all the harmless train,
The said historian of the pensive plain.
Near yonder copse, where once the garden smiled,
And still where many a garden flower grows wild,
There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose,
The village preacher's modest mansion rose.
A man he was to all the country dear,
And passing rich with forty pounds a year;
Remote from towns he ran his godly race,
Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change, his place;
Unskilful he to fawn, or seek for power
By doctrines fashion'd to the varying hour;
Far other aims his heart had learnt to prize,
More bent to raise the wretched than to rise.
His house was known to all the vagrant train;
He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain:
The long-remember'd beggar was his guest,
Whose beard descending swept his aged breast;
The ruin'd spendthrift, now no longer proud,
Claim'd kindred there, and had his claims allow'd;
The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay,
Sat by his fire, and talk'd the night away;
Wept o'er his wounds, or, tales of sorrow done,
Shoulder'd his crutch, and show'd how fields were won.
Pleased with his guests, the good man learn'd to glow,
And quite forgot their vices in their woe;
Careless their merits or their faults to scan,
His pity gave ere charity began.
Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride,
And e'en his failings lean'd to virtue's side;
But in his duty prompt at every call,
He watch'd and wept, he pray'd and felt for all;
And, as a bird each fond endearment tries
To tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies,
He tried each art, reproved each dull delay,
Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way.
Beside the bed where parting life was laid,
And sorrow, guilt, and pain, by turns dismay'd,
The reverend champion stood. At his control
Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul;
Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise,
And his last faltering accents whisper'd praise.
At church, with meek and unaffected grace,
His looks adorn'd the venerable place;
Truth from his lips prevail'd with double sway,
And fools, who came to scoff, remain'd to pray.
The service past, around the pious man,
With steady zeal, each honest rustic ran;
E'en children follow'd with endearing wile,
And pluck'd his gown, to share the good man's smile.
His ready smile a parent's warmth express'd,
Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distress'd;
To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given,
But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven.
As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form,
Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm,
Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread,
Eternal sunshine settles on its head.
Beside yon straggling fence, that skirts the way
With blossom'd furze unprofitably gay,
There, in his noisy mansion, skill'd to rule,
The village master taught his little school:
A man severe he was, and stern to view,—
I knew him well, and every truant knew;
Well had the boding tremblers learn'd to trace
The day's disasters in his morning face;
Full well they laugh'd with counterfeited glee
At all his jokes, for many a joke had he;
Full well the busy whisper circling round,
Convey'd the dismal tidings when he frown'd:
Yet he was kind, or, if severe in aught,
The love he bore to learning was in fault.
The village all declared how much he knew,
'Twas certain he could write, and cipher too;
Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage,
And e'en the story ran—that he could gauge:
In arguing, too, the parson own'd his skill,
For e'en though vanquish'd, he could argue still;
While words of learned length and thundering sound
Amazed the gazing rustics ranged around;
And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew
That one small head could carry all he knew.
But past is all his fame. The very spot
Where many a time he triumph'd is forgot.
Near yonder thorn, that lifts its head on high,
Where once the sign-post caught the passing eye,
Low lies that house where nut-brown draughts inspired,
Where grey-beard mirth, and smiling toil retired,
Where village statesmen talk'd with looks profound,
And news much older than their ale went round.
Imagination fondly stoops to trace
The parlour splendours of that festive place:
The white-wash'd wall, the nicely sanded floor;
The varnish'd clock that click'd behind the door;
The chest contrived a double debt to pay,
A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day;
The pictures placed for ornament and use;
The Twelve Good Rules, the royal game of goose;
The hearth, except when winter chill'd the day,
With aspen boughs, and flowers, and fennel gay;
While broken tea-cups, wisely kept for show,
Ranged o'er the chimney, glisten'd in a row.
Vain transitory splendours! could not all
Reprieve the tottering mansion from its fall?
Obscure it sinks, nor shall it more impart
An hour's importance to the poor man's heart;
Thither no more the peasant shall repair,
To sweet oblivion of his daily care;
No more the farmer's news, the barber's tale,
No more the woodman's ballad shall prevail;
No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear,
Relax his ponderous strength, and learn to hear:
The host himself no longer shall be found
Careful to see the mantling bliss go round;
Nor the coy maid, half willing to be press'd,
Shall kiss the cup to pass it to the rest.
Yes! let the rich deride, the proud disdain,
These simple blessings of the lowly train;
To me more dear, congenial to my heart,
One native charm, than all the gloss of art.
Spontaneous joys, where nature has its play,
The soul adopts, and owns their first-born sway;
Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mind,
Unenvied, unmolested, unconfined.
But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade,
With all the freaks of wanton wealth array'd,
In these, ere triflers half their wish obtain,
The toiling pleasure sickens into pain;

[Illustration:

"_But in his duty prompt at every call. _"—_p. _ 194.
]


And e'en while fashion's brightest arts decoy,
The heart, distrusting, asks if this be joy?
Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen who survey
The rich man's joys increase, the poor's decay,
'Tis yours to judge, how wide the limits stand
Between a splendid and a happy land.
Proud swells the tide with loads of freighted ore,
And shouting folly hails them from the shore;
Hoards e'en beyond the misers wish abound,
And rich men flock from all the world around.
Yet count our gains. This wealth is but a name,
That leaves our useful products still the same.
Not so the loss. The man of wealth and pride
Takes up a space that many poor supplied;
Space for his lake, his park's extended bounds,
Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds;
The robe that wraps his limbs in silken sloth
Has robb'd the neighbouring fields of half their growth;
His seat, where solitary sports are seen,
Indignant spurns the cottage from the green;
Around the world each needful product flies,
For all the luxuries the world supplies.
While thus the land, adorn'd for pleasure all,
In barren splendour feebly waits the fall.
As some fair female, unadorn'd and plain,
Secure to please while youth confirms her reign,
Slights every borrow'd charm that dress supplies,
Nor shares with art the triumph of her eyes;
But when those charms are past—for charms are frail—
When time advances, and when lovers fail,
She then shines forth, solicitous to bless,
In all the glaring impotence of dress.
Thus fares the land by luxury betray'd:
In nature's simplest charms at first array'd,
But, verging to decline, its splendours rise,
Its vistas strike, its palaces surprise;
While, scourged by famine from the smiling land
The mournful peasant leads his humble band;
And while he sinks, without one arm to save,
The country blooms—a garden, and a grave.
Where then, ah! where shall poverty reside,
To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride?
If to some common's fenceless limits stray'd,
He drives his flock to pick the scanty blade,
Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide,
And e'en the bare-worn common is denied.
If to the city sped—what waits him there?
To see profusion that he must not share;
To see ten thousand baneful arts combined
To pamper luxury, and thin mankind;
To see each joy the sons of pleasure know,
Extorted from his fellow-creature's woe,
Here, while the courtier glitters in brocade,
There the pale artist plies the sickly trade;
Here, while the proud their long-drawn pomps display,
There the black gibbet glooms beside the way.
The dome where pleasure holds her midnight reign,
Here, richly deck'd, admits the gorgeous train:
Tumultuous grandeur crowds the blazing square,
The rattling chariots clash, the torches glare.
Sure scenes like these no troubles e'er annoy!
Sure these denote one universal joy!
Are these thy serious thoughts? Ah! turn thine eyes
Where the poor houseless shivering female lies.
She once, perhaps, in village plenty blest,
Has wept at tales of innocence distrest;
Her modest looks the cottage might adorn,
Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn;
Now lost to all, her friends, her virtue fled,
Near her betrayer's door she lays her head,
And pinch'd with cold, and shrinking from the shower,
With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour
When idly first, ambitious of the town,
She left her wheel and robes of country brown.
Do thine, sweet Auburn, thine, the loveliest train,
Do thy fair tribes participate her pain?
E'en now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led,
At proud men's doors they ask a little bread!
Ah! no. To distant climes, a dreary scene,
Where half the convex world intrudes between,
Through torrid tracts with fainting steps they go,
Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe.
Far different there from all that charm'd before,
The various terrors of that horrid shore;
Those blazing suns that dart a downward ray,
And fiercely shed intolerable day;
Those matted woods where birds forget to sing,
But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling;
Those poisonous fields, with rank luxuriance crown'd,
Where the dark scorpion gathers death around;
Where at each step the stranger fears to wake
The rattling terrors of the vengeful snake;
Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey,
And savage men, more murderous still than they;
While oft in whirls the mad tornado flies,
Mingling the ravaged landscape with the skies.
Far different these from every former scene,—
The cooling brook, the grassy-vested green,
The breezy covert of the warbling grove,
That only shelter'd thefts of harmless love.
Good Heaven! what sorrows gloom'd that parting day,
That call'd them from their native walks away:
When the poor exiles, every pleasure past,
Hung round the bowers, and fondly look'd their last,
And took a long farewell, and wish'd in vain
For seats like these beyond the western main;
And, shuddering still to face the distant deep,
Return'd and wept, and still return'd to weep.
The good old sire the first prepared to go
To new-found worlds, and wept for others' woe;
But for himself, in conscious virtue brave,
He only wish'd for worlds beyond the grave.
His lovely daughter, lovelier in her tears,
The fond companion of his helpless years,
Silent went next, neglectful of her charms,
And left a lover's for a father's arms.
With louder plaints the mother spoke her woes,
And blessed the cot where every pleasure rose;
And kiss'd her thoughtless babes with many a tear,
And clasp'd them close, in sorrow doubly dear;
Whilst her fond husband strove to lend relief,
In all the silent manliness of grief.
O luxury! thou curst by Heaven's decree,
How ill exchanged are things like these for thee!
How do thy potions, with insidious joy,
Diffuse their pleasures only to destroy!
Kingdoms by thee, to sickly greatness grown,
Boast of a florid vigour not their own:
At every draught more large and large they grow,
A bloated mass of rank unwieldy woe;
Till sapp'd their strength, and every part unsound,
Down, down they sink, and spread a ruin round.
E'en now the devastation is begun,
And half the business of destruction done;
E'en now, methinks, as pondering here I stand,
I see the rural virtues leave the land.
Down where yon anchoring vessel spreads the sail,
That idly waiting flaps with every gale,
Downward they move, a melancholy band,
Pass from the shore, and darken all the strand.
Contented toil, and hospitable care,
And kind connubial tenderness, are there;

[Illustration:

"_Near her betrayer's door she lays her head. _"—_p. _ 199.
]


And piety with wishes placed above,
And steady loyalty, and faithful love.
And thou, sweet Poetry! thou loveliest maid,
Still first to fly where sensual joys invade;
Unfit, in these degenerate times of shame,
To catch the heart, or strike for honest fame;
Dear charming nymph, neglected and decried,
My shame in crowds, my solitary pride;
Thou source of all my bliss and all my woe,
That found'st me poor at first, and keep'st me so;
Thou guide, by which the nobler arts excel,
Thou nurse of every virtue, fare thee well!
Farewell; and oh! where'er thy voice be tried,
On Torno's cliffs or Pambamarca's side,
Whether where equinoctial fervours glow,
Or winter wraps the polar world in snow,
Still let thy voice, prevailing over time,
Redress the rigours of the inclement clime;
Aid slighted truth with thy persuasive strain;
Teach erring man to spurn the rage of gain;
Teach him that states, of native strength possess'd,
Though very poor, may still be very blest;
That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay,
As ocean sweeps the labour'd mole away;
While self-dependent power can time defy,
As rocks resist the billows and the sky.




THE HAUNCH OF VENISON.

A POETICAL EPISTLE TO LORD CLARE.


Thanks, my Lord, for your Ven'son; for finer or fatter,
Ne'er ranged in a forest or smoked in a platter.
The haunch was a picture for painters to study,
The fat was so white, and the lean was so ruddy;
Though my stomach was sharp, I could scarce help regretting
To spoil such a delicate picture by eating:
I had thoughts in my chamber to place it in view,
To be shown to my friends as a piece of virtù;
As in some Irish houses, where things are so-so,
One gammon of bacon hangs up for a show;
But, for eating a rasher of what they take pride in,
They'd as soon think of eating the pan it is fried in.
But hold—let me pause—Don't I hear you pronounce
This tale of the bacon's a damnable bounce?
Well! suppose it a bounce—sure a poet may try,
By a bounce now and then, to get courage to fly.
But, my lord, it's no bounce: I protest in my turn,
It's a truth—and your lordship may ask Mr. Burn. [2]
To go on with my tale—as I gazed on the Haunch,
I thought of a friend that was trusty and staunch;
So I cut it, and sent it to Reynolds undrest,
To paint it, or eat it, just as he liked best.
Of the neck and the breast I had next to dispose—
'Twas a neck and a breast that might rival Monroe's:
But in parting with these I was puzzled again,
With the how, and the who, and the where, and the when.
There's H—d, and C—y, and H—rth, and H—ff,
I think they love ven'son—I know they love beef;
There's my countryman, Higgins—Oh! let him alone
For making a blunder, or picking a bone.
But, hang it! to poets, who seldom can eat,
Your very good mutton's a very good treat;
Such dainties to them their health it might hurt;
It's like sending them ruffles when wanting a shirt.
While thus I debated, in reverie centred,
An acquaintance—a friend as he call'd himself—enter'd:
An under-bred, fine-spoken fellow was he;
And he smiled as he look'd at the Ven'son and me.
"What have we got here? —Why, this is good eating!
Your own, I suppose—or is it in waiting? "
"Why, whose should it be? " cried I, with a flounce;
"I get these things often"—but that was a bounce:
"Some lords, my acquaintance, that settle the nation,
Are pleased to be kind—but I hate ostentation. "
"If that be the case then," cried he, very gay,
"I'm glad I have taken this house in my way.
To-morrow you take a poor dinner with me;
No words—I insist on't—precisely at three:
We'll have Johnson and Burke; all the wits will be there;
My acquaintance is slight or I'd ask my Lord Clare.
And, now that I think on't, as I am a sinner!
We wanted this Ven'son to make out a dinner.
What say you—a pasty? —it shall, and it must,
And my wife, little Kitty, is famous for crust.
Here, porter! —this Ven'son with me to Mile-end;
No stirring, I beg,—my dear friend—my dear friend! "
Thus, snatching his hat, he brush'd off like the wind,
And the porter and eatables follow'd behind.

Footnote 2:

Lord Clare's nephew.

Left alone to reflect, having emptied my shelf,
And "nobody with me at sea but myself,"[3]
Though I could not help thinking my gentleman hasty,
Yet Johnson, and Burke, and a good ven'son pasty,
Were things that I never disliked in my life,
Though clogg'd with a coxcomb, and Kitty his wife.
So next day, in due splendour to make my approach,
I drove to his door in my own hackney-coach.
When come to the place where we all were to dine,
(A chair-lumber'd closet, just twelve feet by nine,)
My friend bade me welcome, but struck me quite dumb
With tidings that Johnson and Burke would not come.
"For I knew it," he cried; "both eternally fail,
The one with his speeches, and t'other with Thrale.
But no matter, I'll warrant we'll make up the party
With two full as clever, and ten times as hearty.
The one is a Scotchman, the other a Jew;
They're both of them merry, and authors like you.
The one writes the 'Snarler,' the other the 'Scourge:'
Some think he writes 'Cinna'—he owns to 'Panurge. '"
While thus he described them by trade and by name,
They entered, and dinner was served as they came.
At the top a fried liver and bacon were seen,
At the bottom was tripe in a swingeing tureen;
At the sides there was spinach and pudding made hot;
In the middle a place where the Pasty—was not.
Now, my Lord, as for tripe, it's my utter aversion,
And your bacon I hate like a Turk or a Persian;
So there I sat stuck like a horse in a pound,
While the bacon and liver went merrily round:
But what vexed me most was that d——d Scottish rogue,
With his long-winded speeches, his smiles, and his brogue;
And, "Madam," quoth he, "may this bit be my poison,
A prettier dinner I never set eyes on!
Pray, a slice of your liver, though, may I be curst,
But I've eat of your tripe till I'm ready to burst. "
"The tripe! " quoth the Jew, with his chocolate cheek,
"I could dine on this tripe seven days in a week;
I like these here dinners, so pretty and small:
But your friend there, the Doctor, eats nothing at all. "
"Oho! " quoth my friend, "he'll come on in a trice:
He's keeping a corner for something that's nice;
There's a Pasty"—"A Pasty! " repeated the Jew,
"I don't care if I keep a corner for't too. "

Footnote 3:

See the letters that passed between his Royal Highness Henry Duke of
Cumberland, and Lady Grosvenor. 12mo.