The hawthorn bush, with feats beneath the shade,
For talking age and whifp'ring lovers made!
How often have I blefs'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 fpreading tree;
While many a pastime circled in the shade,
The
young contending as the old furvey`d;
And many a gambol frolick'd o'er the ground,
And fleits of art and feats of ftrength went round.
And ftill, as each repeated pleafuse tir'd,
Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspir'd ;
The dancing pair that fimply fought renown,
By holding out to tire each other down;
The fwain, miftruftlefs of his finutted face,
While fecret laughter titter'd round the place;
The bashful virgin's fide-long looks of love,
The matron's glance that would those looks re-
[thefe,

Sweet Auburn! parent of the blissful hour,
Thy glades forlorn confefs the tyrant's pow'r.
Here, as I take my folitary rounds,
Amidft thy tangling walks, and ruin'd grounds;
And, many a year elaps'd, return to view
Where once the cottage ftood, the hawthorn grew;
Remembrance wakes with all her busy train,
Swells at my breaft, and turns the paft to pain.

In all my wand'rings round this world of care,
In all my griefs-and God has given my fhare-
I still had hopes, my latest hours to crown,
Amidst thefe humble bow'rs to lay me down;
To hufband out life's taper at the close,
And keep the flame from wafting by repose:
I ftill had hopes, for pride attends us ftill,
Amidst the fiains to fhew 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 firft he flew,
still had hopes, my long vexations paft,
Here to return and die at home at laft.

I

O bleft retirement, friend to life's decline,
Retreat from care, that never inuft be mine!
How bleft is he, who crowns, in fhades like thefe,
A youth of labour with an age of eafe ;
Who quits a world where strong temptations try,
And, fince 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly!
For him no wretches, born to work and weep,
Explore the mine, or tempt the dang'rous deep;
No furly porter ftands in guilty state,
To fpurn imploring famine from the gate;
But on he moves to meet his latter end,
Angels around befriending virtue's friend ;
Sinks to the grave with unperceiv'd decay,
While refignation gently flopes the way;
And, all his profpects bright'ning to the laft,
His heaven commences ere the world be paft!
Sweet was the found, when oft, at evening's
clofe,

prove

Thefe were thy charms, sweet village! fports like
With fweet fucceffion, taught e'en toil to pleafe;
Thefe round thy bow'rs their cheerful influence
fhed,
[are fled.
These were thy charms, but all thefe charms
Sweet fmiling village, lovelieft of the lawn,
Thy fports are fled, and all thy charms withdrawn;
Amidst thy bow'rs the tyrant's hand is seen,
And defolation faddens all thy green:
One only after grafps the whole domain,
And half a tillage ftints thy fmiling plain;
No more t hy glaffy brook reflects the day,
But, chok'd with fedges, works its weedy way;
Along thy giades, a folitary gueft,
The hollow-founding bittern guards its neft;
Amidst thy defert walks the lapwing flies,
And tires their echoes with unvaried cries.
Sunk are thy bow'rs in shapeless ruin all,
And the long grafs o'ertops the mould'ring wall;
And trem bling, fhrinking from the spoiler's hand,
Far, far away thy children leave the land.

Ill fares the land, to haft'ning 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 peafantry, their country's pride,
When once deftroy'd, can never be fupplied.

A time there was, ere England's griefs began.
When every rood of ground maintain'd its man;
For him light labour fpread her wholesome store;
Juft gave what life requir'd, but gave no more:
His beft companions, innocence and health;
And his best riches, ignorance of wealth.

But times are alter'd trade's unfeeling train
Ufurp the land, and difpoffefs the fwain;
Along the lawn, where fcatter'd hamlets rofe,
Unwieldy wealth and cumb'rous pomp repose;
And ev'ry want to luxury allied,
And ev'ry pang that folly pays to pride.
Thofe gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom,
Thofe calm defires that afk'd but little room,
Thofe healthfulfports that grac'dthe peacefuifcene,
Liv'd in each look, and brighten'd all the green-To feek her nightly fhed, and weep till morn;
Thefe, far departing, feek a kinder fhore, She only left, of all the harmless train,
And rural mirth and manners are no more.
The fad hiftorian of the penfive plain.
P 2

And the loud laugh, that spoke the vacant mind;
Thefe all in tweet confufion fought the shade,
And ill'd each paule the nightingale had made.
But now the founds of population fail,
No cheerfui murmurs fluctuate in the gale,
No bufy fteps the grafs-grown footway tread,
But all the bloomy flush of life is fled:
All but yon widow'd, folitary thing,
That feebly bends befide the plathy fpring;
She, wretched matron! forc'd in age, for bread,
To ftrip the brook with mantling creffes fpread,
To pick her wint'ry faggot from the thorn,

Up yonder hill the village murmur rofe;
There as I pafs'd, with care!efs steps and flow,
The mingling notes came foften'd from below;
The fwain, refponfive as the milk-maid fung,
The fober herd that low'd to meet their young,
The noify geefe that gabbied o'er the pool,
The playful children juft let loofe from school,
The watch-dog's voice that bay`d the whisp'ring
wind,

Near

Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mind,
Unenvied, unmolested, unconfin'd:
But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade,
With all the freaks of wanton wealth array'd,
In thefe, ere triflers half their with obtain,
The toiling pleafure fickens into pain;
And, ev'n while fashion's brightest arts decoy,
The heart diftrufting afks, if this be joy?

Ye friends to truth, ye ftatelimen who furvey
The rich man's joys increafe, the poor's decay,
'Tis yours to judge how wide the limits stand
Between a fplendid and a happy land.
Proud fwells the tide with loads of freighted ore,
And fhouting folly hails them from her shore;
Hoards, ev'n beyond the mifer's wish, abound,
And rich men flock from all the world around;
Yet count our gains: this wealth is but a name
That leaves our ufeful product still the fame.
Not fo the lofs: 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 horfes, equipage, and hounds;
The robe that wraps his limbs in filken floth
Has robb'd the neighb'ring fields of half their
growth;

His feat, where folitary fports are feen,
Indignant spurns the cottage from the green;
Around the world cach needful product flies,
For all the luxuries the world fupplies.
While thus the land adorn'd for pleasure all,
In barren fplendour feebly waits the fall.

As fome fair female, unadorn'd and plain,
Secure to please while youth confirms her reign,
Slights ev'ry borrow'd charm that dre's fupplies:
Nor fhares with art the triumph of her eyes;
But when thofe charms are paft (for charms are frail),
When time advances, and when lovers fail,
She then fhines forth, folicitous to blefs,
In all the glaring impotence of drefs.
Thus fares the land, by luxury betray'd,
In nature's fimpleft charms at first array'd;
But, verging to decline, its fplendours rife,
Its viftas ftrike, its palaces furprife.
While, fcourg'd by famine from the fmiling land,
The mournful peafant leads his humble band;
And while he finks, without one arm to fave,
The country blooms-a garden and a grave!

Where then, ah where, fhall poverty refide,
To 'fcape the preffure of contiguous pride?
If, to fome common's fencelefs limits stray'd,
He drives his flock to pick the fcanty blade,
Thofe fenceless fields the fons of wealth divide,
And ev'n the bare-worn common is denied.

If to the city fped-what waits him there?
To fee profufion that he must not share;
To fee ten thousand baneful arts combin'd
To pamper luxury, and thin mankind;
To fee cach joy the fons of pleasure know
Extorted from his fellow-creature's woe.
Here, while the courtier glitters in brocade,
There the pale artift plies the fickly trade;
Here, while the proud their long-drawn pomps
difplay,
There the black gibbet glooms befide the way,

The dome where pleasure holds her midnight.
reign,

Here, richly deck'd, admits the gorgeous train ;
Tumultuous grandeur crowds the blazing fquare,
The rattling chariots clafh, the torches glare.
Sure fcenes like thefe no troubles e'er annoy!
Sure thefe denote one univerfal joy! [eyes
Are thefe thy ferious thoughts? Ah, turn thine
Where the poor houfelefs thiv'ring female lies.
She, once, perhaps, in village plenty blest,
Has wept at tales of innocence diftreft;
Her modeft looks the cottage might adorn,
Sweet as the primrofe peeps beneath the thorn:
Now loft to all; her friends, her virtue fled,
Near her betrayer's door the lays her head;
And pinch'd with cold, and fhrinking from the
fhow'r,

With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour,
When idly firft, ambitious of the town,

She left her wheel, and robes of country brown.

Dothine, fweet Auburn,thine, the lovelieft train,
Do thy fair tribes participate her pain?
Ev'n now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led,
At proud men's doors they afk 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 diff'rent there from all that charm'd before,
The various terrors of that horrid fhore;
1 hofe blazing funs that dart a downward ray,
And fiercely thed intolerable day;
Thofe matted woods where birds forget to fing,
But filent bats in drowsy clusters cling:
Thofe pois nous fields with rank luxuriance
crown'd,

Where the dark scorpion gathers death around;
Where at cach step the stranger fears to wake
The rattling terrors of the vengeful fnake;
Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey;
And favage men, more murd'rous ftill than they
While oft in whirls the mad tornado flies,
Mingling the ravag'd landscape with the skies.
Far diff'rent thefe from ev'ry former scene,
The cooling brook, the graffy-vested green,
The breezy covert of the warbling glove,
That only fhelter'd thefts of harmless love.
Good Heaven! what forrows gloom'd that part-
ing day,

That called them from their native walks away;
When the poor exiles, ev'ry pleafure paft, [laft,
Hung round the bow'rs, and fondly look'd their
And took a long farewel, and wish'd in vain
For feats like thefe beyond the western main;
And fhudd'ring ftill to face the diftant deep,
Return'd and wept, and ftill return'd to weep!
The good old fire the first prepar'd to go
To new-found worlds, and wept for others' woe;
But for himself, in confcious virtue brave,
He only with'd for worlds beyond the grave.
His lovely daughter, lovelier in her tears,
The fond companion of his hapless years,
Silent went next, neglectful of her charms,
And left a lover's for her father's arms. .

P3

With

With louder plaints the mother spoke her woes, ' Forbear, my son,' the Hermit cries,
And blefs'd the cot where every pleasure rofe;
And kifs'd her thoughtless babes with many a tear,
And clafp'd them clofe, in forrow doubly dear;
Whilft her fond husband strove to lend relicf
In all the filent manliness of grief.

To tempt the dang'rous gloom;
For yonder phantom only flies
To lure thee to thy doom.