Not thus the land appear'd in ages past,
A dreary defert, and a gloomy waste,
To savage beasts and savage laws a prey,
And kings more furious and fevere than they;
Who claim'd the skies, difpeopled air and floods,
The lonely lords of empty wilds and woods:
Cities laid waste, they storm'd the dens and caves
(For wifer brutes were backward to be flaves).
What could be free, when lawless beasts obey'd,
And ev'n the elements a Tyrant sway'd?
In vain kind seasons fwell'd the teeming grain,
Soft showers diftill'd, and funs grew warm in vain;
The swain with tears his frustrate labour yields,
And famish'd dies amidst his ripen'd fields.
What wonder then, a beast or subject flain
Were equal crimes in a defpotic reign?
Both doom'd alike for sportive Tyrants bled,
But, while the fubject starv'd, the beast was fed.
Proud Nimrod first the bloody chace began,
A mighty hunter, and his prey was man:
Our haughty Norman boasts that barbarous name,
And makes his trembling flaves the royal game.
Ver. 49. Originally thus in the MS.
From towns laid wafte, to dens and caves they ran (For who first stoop'd to be a flave was man).
No wonder favages or fubjects flain
But fubjects starv'd, while favages were fed.
It was originally thus, but the word Savages is not properly applied to beafts but to men; which occafioned the alteration,
The fields are ravish'd from th' industrious swains, 65
From men their cities, and from Gods their fanes :
The level'd towns with weeds lie cover'd o'er;
The hollow winds through naked temples roar;
Round broken columns clasping ivy twin'd;
O'er heaps of ruin stalk'd the stately hind;
The fox obfcene to gaping tombs retires,
And favage howlings fill the facred quires.
Aw'd by his Nobles, by his Commons curst,
Th' Oppreffor rul'd tyrannic where he durft,
Stretch'd o'er the Poor and Church his iron rod,
And ferv'd alike his Vaffals and his God.
Whom ev'n the Saxon fpar'd, and bloody Dane,
The wanton victims of his sport remain.
But fee, the man who spacious regions gave
A wafte for beafts, himself deny'd a grave!
Stretch'd on the lawn his fecond hope furvey,
At once the chacer, and at once the prey:
Lo Rufus, tugging at the deadly dart,
Bleeds in the foreft like a wounded hart.
Succeeding monarchs heard the subjects cries,
Nor faw difpleas'd the peaceful cottage rife.
Then gathering flocks on unknown mountains fed,
O'er fandy wilds were yellow harvests spread,
The forefts wonder'd at th' unusual grain,
And fecret transport touch'd the conscious swain.
Ver. 72. And wolves with howling fill, &c.] The Author thought this an error, wolves not being common in England at the time of the Conqueror.
Fair Liberty, Britannia's Goddess, rears
Her chearful head, and leads the golden years.
Ye vigorous fwains! while youth ferments your blood,
And purer spirits fwell the sprightly flood,
Now range the hills, the gameful woods beset,
Wind the shrill horn, or spread the waving net.
When milder autumn fummer's heat fucceeds,
And in the new-fhorn field the partridge feeds,
Before his lord the ready spaniel bounds,
Panting with hope, he tries the furrow'd grounds; 100
But when the tainted gales the game betray,
Couch'd close he lies, and meditates the prey:
Secure they trust th' unfaithful field befet,
Till hovering o'er them sweeps the swelling net.
Thus (if fmall things we may with great compare) 105
When Albion fends her eager fons to war,
Oh may no more a foreign master's rage,
With wrongs yet legal, curfe a future age!
Still fpread, fair Liberty! thy heav'nly wings,
Breathe plenty on the fields, and fragrance on the fprings,
When yellow autumn fummer's heat fucceeds,
And into wine the purple harvest bleeds,
The partridge feeding in the new-fhorn fields,
Both morning fports and ev'ning pleasure yields.
Ver. 107. It ftood thus in the first edition:
Pleas'd, in the General's fight, the host lie down
Sudden before fome unfufpecting town;
The young, the old, one inftant makes our prize,
And o'er their captive heads Britannia's standard flies,
Some thoughtlefs Town, with ease and plenty bleft,
Near and more near, the clofing lines inveft;
Sudden they feize th' amaz'd, defenceless prize,
And high in air Britannia's standard flies.
See! from the brake the whirring pheasant fprings,
And mounts exulting on triumphant wings :
Short is his joy; he feels the fiery wound,
Flutters in blood, and panting beats the ground,
Ah! what avail his gloffy, varying dies,
His purple crest, and scarlet circled eyes,
The vivid green his shining plumes unfold,
His painted wings, and breast that flames with gold?
Nor yet, when moist Arcturus clouds the sky,
The woods and fields their pleafing toils deny.
To plains with well-breath'd beagles we repair,
And trace the mazes of the circling hare
(Beafts, urg'd by us, their fellow beasts pursue,
And learn of man each other to undo):
With flaughtering guns th' unweary'd fowler roves, 125
When frofts have whiten'd all the naked groves;
Where doves in flocks the leaflefs trees o'erfhade,
And lonely woodcocks haunt the watery glade.
He lifts the tube, and levels with his eye;
Strait a fhort thunder breaks the frozen fky:
Oft, as in airy rings they skim the heath,
The clamorous lapwings feel the leaden death:
Ver. 126. O'er ruftling leaves around the naked groves. Ver. 129. The fowler lifts his level'd tube on high.
Oft, as the mounting larks their notes prepare,
They fall, and leave their little lives in air.
In genial spring, beneath the quivering shade,
Where cooling vapours breathe along the mead,
The patient fisher takes his filent stand,
Intent, his angle trembling in his hand :
With looks unmov'd, he hopes the fcaly breed,
And eyes the dancing cork and bending reed.
Our plenteous streams a various race supply,
The bright-ey'd perch with fins of Tyrian dye,
The filver eel, in shining volumes roll'd,
The yellow carp, in scales bedropp'd with gold,
Swift trouts, diverfify'd with crimson stains,
And pykes, the tyrants of the watery plains.
Now Cancer glows with Phoebus' fiery car:
The youth rush eager to the fylvan war,
Swarm o'er the lawns, the foreft walks surround,
Rouze the fleet hart, and cheer the opening hound. 150
Th' impatient courfer pants in every vein,
And, pawing, seems to beat the distant plain :
Hills, vales, and floods, appear already crofs'd,
And, ere he starts, a thousand steps are lost.
See the bold youth strain up the threatening fteep, 155
Rush through the thickets, down the valleys sweep,
Hang o'er their courfers heads with eager fpeed,
And earth rolls back beneath the flying steed.
Let old Arcadia boast her ample plain,
Th' immortal huntress, and her virgin-train;
Nor envy, Windfor! fince thy fhades have seen
As bright a Goddess, and as chaste a QUEEN;
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