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 Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn, Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms withdrawn ; 36 Amidst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen And desolation saddens all thy green: One only master grasps the whole domain, And half a tillage stints thy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. 40 No more thy glassy brook reflects the day, But, choked with sedges, works its weedy way; Along the glades, a solitary guest, The hollow sounding bittern guards its nest; And trembling, shrinking from the spoiler's hand, Far, far away thy children leave the land. 50 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: 54 Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to glow, And quite forgot their vices in their woe; 160 Careless their merits or their faults to scan, His pity gave ere charity began. Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride, And c'en his failings leaned to Virtue's side; But in his duty prompt at every call, 165 He watched and wept, he prayed 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 dismayed, 172 The reverend champion stood. At his control Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul; Comfort came down the trembling wretch to 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, 190 Tho' 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, trace The day's disasters in his morning face; 200 The mournful peasant leads his humble band, To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride? If to the city sped - what waits him there? 314 There the black gibbet glooms beside the way. The dome where pleasure holds her midnight reign 319 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 : 330 Now lost to all; her friends, her virtue fled, With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour, liest train, The various terrors of that horrid shore; But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling; 350 Those poisonous fields with rank luxuriance crowned, 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 When the poor exiles, every pleasure past, Hung round the bowers, and fondly looked their last, 371 366 And took a long farewell, and wished in vain For seats like these beyond the western main, And shuddering still to face the distant deep, Returned and wept, and still returned 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 wished for worlds beyond the grave. His lovely daughter, lovelier in her tears, 375 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 Thou guide by which the nobler arts excel, Tho' very poor, may still be very blest; 426 That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay, As ocean sweeps the laboured mole away; FROM RETALIATION * 430 was such, We scarcely can praise it, or blame it too much; 1 on the boundary between Russia and Sweden 2 a mountain in Ecuador 3 Lines 427-30 were added by Dr. Johnson. Dr. Barnard, Dean of Derry Edmund Burke 5 |