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THE HUMBLE GOOD MAN'S QUIET LIFE AND HAPPY DEATH.
So life glides smoothly and by stealth away,
More golden than that age of fabled gold
Renowned in ancient song; not vexed with care,
Or stained with guilt, beneficent, approved
Of God and man, and peaceful in its end.
So glide my life away! and so at last,
My share of duties decently fulfilled,
May some disease, not tardy to perform
Its destined office, yet, with gentle stroke,
Dismiss me weary to a safe retreat,
Beneath the turf that I have often trod.

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With that light task; but soon, to please her more,
Whom flowers alone knew would little please,
Let fall th' unfinished wreath, and roved for fruit;
Roved far, and gathered much some harsh, 't is
true,

Picked from the thorns and briers of reproof,
But wholesome, well-digested; grateful some
To palates that can taste immortal truth;
Insipid else, and sure to be despised.
But all is in His hand, whose praise I seek.
In vain the poet sings, and the world hears,
If He regard not, though divine the theme.
"T is not in artful measures, in the chime
And idle tinkling of a minstrel's lyre,
To charm His ear, whose eye is on the heart;
Whose frown can disappoint the proudest strain,
Whose approbation — prosper even mine.

Tusser's "February's Husbandry.

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WHO layeth on dung ere he layeth on plow,
Such husbandry useth as thrift doth allow :
One month ere ye spread it, so still let it stand,
Ere ever to plough it ye take it in hand.'

Sow peason and beans in the wane of the moon,2
Who soweth them sooner, he soweth too soon,
That they with the planet may rest and arise,
And flourish with bearing most plentifulwise.
Friend, harrow in time, by some manner of means,
Not only thy peason, but also thy beans;
Both peason and beans sow afore ye do plow;
The sooner ye harrow, the better for you.

* *

Good provender laboring horses would have,
Good hay and good plenty plough-oxen do crave;
To hale out thy muck and to plow up thy ground,
Or else it may hinder thee many a pound.

Who slacketh his tillage a carter to be,
For groat got abroad, at home lose shall three ;
And so, by his doing, he brings out of heart
Both land for the corn and horse for the cart.

Who abuseth his cattle, and starves them for meat,
By carting or plowing, his gain is not great:
Where he that with labor can use them aright,
Hath grain to his comfort, and cattle in plight.
Buy quickset at market, new gathered and small,
Buy bushes or willow to fence it withal;

1 To allow manure to lie unspread, and without ploughing in, is contrary to modern practice and to reason. Mavor. 2 This shows the ancient belief in planetary influences; an absurdity which finds few advocates now.

Set willows to grow in the stead of a stake,
For cattle in summer a shadow to make.
Stick plenty of boughs among runcival pease,
To climber thereon, and to branch at their ease;
So doing, more tender and greater they wex,
If peacock and turkey leave jobbing their bex.
Now sow, and go harrow, where redge ye did draw,
The seed of the bramble, with kernel and haw ;
Which covered, overly, sun to shut out,

Go see it be ditched and fencéd about.1
Where banks be amended and newly up-cast,
Sow mustard-seed after a shower be past;
Where plots full of nettles be noisome to eye,
Sow thereupon hemp-seed, and nettle will die.
Land-meadow that yearly is spared for hay,
Now fence it, and spare it, and dung it ye may.
Get mole-catcher cunningly mole for to kill,
And harrow and cast abroad every hill. *

Friend, alway let this be a part of thy care,
For shift of good pasture lay pasture to spare.
So have you good feeding in bushets and leaze,
And quickly safe finding of cattle at ease.

When cattle may run about roving at will,
From pasture to pasture, poor belly to fill ;
Then pasture and cattle, both hungry and bare,
For want of good husbandry worser do fare.

1 Formerly common fields were fenced off from the pastures by making a ridge of perhaps twenty or thirty feet, which was sown with hips, haws, hazel-nuts, and such like, ditching it round, and weeding it at intervals. In due time this became a productive coppice, and is what we now term a shaw, or spring. -Mavor. This might be very useful on our western prairies.-J. 2 Small closes near home.

Pastorals for February.

BROWNE'S "RESPECT TO AGE."

(A. D. 1614.)

ARGUMENT.

Old Neddy's poverty they mourn, Who whilome was a swain

That had more sheep himself alone Than ten upon the plain.

THOMALIN.

WHERE is every piping lad,
That the fields are not yclad

With their milk-white sheep?

Tell me is it holiday,
Or if, in the month of May,
Use they long to sleep?

PIERS.

Thomalin, 't is not too late,
For the turtle and her mate

Sitten yet in nest;

And the thrustle hath not been Gathering worms yet on the green,

But attends her rest.

Not a bird hath taught her young, Nor her morning's lesson sung,

In the shady grove :
But the nightingale, in dark,
Singing, woke the mounting lark;
She records her love.

Not the sun hath with his beams
Gilded yet our crystal streams
Rising from the sea.

Mists do crown the mountain's tops,
And each pretty myrtle drops,
"T is but newly day.
Yet see yonder (though unwist)
Some man cometh in the mist;

Hast thou him beheld?
With a dog, and staff in hand,,
Limping for his eld.

THOMALIN.

Yes, I see him, and do know him, And we all do rev'rence owe him; 'Tis the aged sire,

Neddy, that was wont to make Such great feasting at the wake, And the blessing-fire.1

Good old man! see how he walks, Painful and among the balks

Picking locks of wool;

I have known the day when he

1 The midsummer-fires (St. John's, Baal's, or Beltane fires) are called blessing-fires, in the west part of England.

Had as much as any three,

When their lofts were full.
Underneath yond hanging rocks,
All the valley with his flocks
Was whilome overspread :

He had milch goats without peers,
Well-hung kine, and fattened steers
Many hundred head.
Wilkins' cote his dairy was,
For a dwelling it may pass

With the best in town.

Curds and creams, with other cheer, Have I had there in the year

For a greeny gown.

Lasses kept it, as again

Were not fitted on the plain

For a lusty dance :

And at parting home would take us

Flawns or syllabubs to make us

For our jouissance.

And though some, in spite, would tell, Yet old Neddy took it well;

Bidding us again

Never at his cote be strange :-. Unto him that wrought this change Mickle be the pain!

PIERS.

What disaster, Thomalin,

This mischance hath clothed him in, Quickly tellen me :

Rue I do his state the more,

That he clipped heretofore

Some felicity.

Have by night accursed thieves

Slain his lambs or stolen his beeves?

Or consuming fire

Brent his shearing-house, or stall, Or a deluge drowned all?

Tell me it entire.

Have the winters been so set

To rain and snow, that they have wet
All his driest laire ;

By which means his sheep have got
Such a deadly, cureless rot,
That none living are?

THOMALIN.

Neither waves, nor thieves, nor fire, Nor have rots impoored this sire,

Suretyship, nor yet

Was the usurer helping on

With his damned extortion,

Nor the chains of debt.

But deceit, that ever lies,
Strongest armed for treacheries

In a bosomed friend

That (and only that) hath brought it, Cursed be the head that wrought it!

And the basest end.

Grooms he had, and he did send them,
With his herds afield to tend them,
Had they further been:
Sluggish, lazy, thriftless elves,
Sheep had better kept themselves

From the foxes teen.

Some would kill their sheep, and then Bring their master home again

Nothing but the skin; Telling him, how in the morn

In the fold they found them torn,

And near lying lin.

If they went unto the fair
With a score of fattened ware,

And did chance to sell,
If old Neddy had again
Half his own; I dare well sain,

That but seldom fell.

They at their return would say,
Such a man, or such, would pay,

Well known of your hyne.
Alas, poor man! that subtle knave
Undid him and vaunts it brave,

Though his master pine.

Of his master he would beg
Such a lamb that broke his leg:
And if there were none,

To the fold by night he'd hie,
And them hurt full ruefully,
Or with staff or stone.

He would have petitions new,
And for desperate debts would sue
Neddy had forgot:

He would grant: the other then
Tares from poor and aged men ;
Or in jails they rot.
Neddy lately rich in store,
Giving much, deceived more,

On a sudden fell.

Then the steward lent him gold,
Yet no more than might be told
Worth his master's cell.
That is gone, and all beside
(Well-a-day, alack the tide);
In a hollow den,
Underneath yond gloomy wood
Wons he now, and wails the brood
Of ungrateful men.

PIERS.

But, alas! now he is old,

Bit with hunger, nipt with cold, What is left him?

Or to succor, or relieve him,

Or from wants off to reprieve him.

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Shuts out proud Fortune, with her scorns and
No feared treason breaks his quiet sleep :
Singing all day, his flocks he learns to keep;
Himself as innocent as are his simple sheep.

No Serian worms he knows, that with their thread
Draw out their silken lives; nor silken pride :
His lambs' warm fleece well fits his little need,
Not in that proud Sidonian tincture dyed :
No empty hopes, no courtly fears, him fright;
Nor begging wants his middle fortune bite :
But sweet content exiles both misery and spite.
Instead of music and base flattering tongues,
Which wait to first salute my lord's uprise ;
The cheerful lark wakes him with early songs,
And birds' sweet whistling notes unlock his eyes;
In country plays is all the strife he uses,
Or song, or dance unto the rural Muses;
And, but in music's sports, all difference refuses.
His certain life, that never can deceive him,

Is full of thousand sweets and rich content:
The smooth-leaved beeches in the field receive him
With coolest shades till noontide's rage is spent:
His life is neither tost in boisterous seas
Or troublous world, nor lost in slothful ease;
Pleased and full blessed he lives, when he his God
can please.

His bed of wool yields safe and quiet sleeps,
While by his side his faithful spouse hath place;
His little son into his bosom creeps,

The lively picture of his father's face:
Never his humble house or state torment him;
Less he could like, if less his God had sent him;
And when he dies, green turfs with grassy tomb
content him.

Dyer's "Fleece."

BOOK I.

ARGUMENT.

The subject proposed. Dedicatory address. Of pastures in general fit for sheep; for fine-woolled sheep; for longwoolled sheep. Defects of pastures, and their remedies. Of climates. The moisture of the English climate vindicated. Particular beauties of England. Different kinds of English sheep; the two common sorts of rams described. Different kinds of foreign sheep. The several sorts of food. The distempers arising from thence, with their remedies. Sheep led by instinct to their proper food and physic. Of the shepherd's scrip, and its furni ture. Care of sheep in tupping-time. Of the castration of lambs, and the folding of sheep. Various precepts relative to changes of weather and seasons. Particular care of new-fallen lambs. The advantages and security of the English shepherd, above those in hotter or colder climates, exemplified with respect to Lapland, Italy, Greece, and Arabia. Of sheep-shearing. Song on that occasion. Custom in Wales of sprinkling the rivers with flowers. Sheep-shearing feast and merriments on the banks of the Severn.

SUBJECTSHEEP; WEAVING, TRADE; ADDRESS TO NYMPHS,
SWAINS, AND MERCHANTS, LEGISLATORS, AND THE KING.
THE care of sheep, the labors of the loom,
And arts of trade,' I sing. Ye rural nymphs!
Ye swains, and princely merchants! aid the verse,
And ye, high-trusted guardians of our isle,
Whom public voice approves, or lot of birth
To the great charge assigns! ye good of all
Degrees, all sects! be present to my song.
So may distress, and wretchedness, and want,
The wide felicities of labor learn:

So may the proud attempts of restless Gaul
From our strong borders, like a broken wave,
In empty foam retire. But chiefly thou,
The people's shepherd, eminently placed
Over the numerous swains of every vale,
With well-permitted power and watchful eye
On each gay field to shed beneficence,
Celestial office! thou protect the song.

THE BEST PASTURES DESCRIBED; AIRY DOWNS AND GENTLE
HILLS; ARID, SANDY, CHALKY, FLINTY, ETC.
On spacious airy downs and gentle hills,
With grass and thyme o'erspread, and clover wild,
Where smiling Phoebus tempers every breeze,
The fairest flocks rejoice: they, nor of halt,
Hydropic tumors, nor of rot, complain,
Evils deformed and foul; nor with hoarse cough
Disturb the music of the pastoral pipe;
But, crowding to the note, with silence soft
The close-woven carpet graze, where Nature blends
Flowerets and herbage of minutest size,
Innoxious luxury. Wide airy downs

Are Health's gay walks to shepherd and to sheep.
All arid soils, with sand or chalky flint,
Or shells diluvian mingled, and the turf

1 See note at the end of Book ш., p. 509.

That mantles over rocks of brittle stone,
Be thy regard; and where low-tufted broom,
Or box, or berried juniper arise;

Or the tall growth of glossy-rinded beech;
And where the burrowing rabbit turns the dust;
And where the dappled deer delights to bound.

THE FAMOUS SHEEP LANDS OF ENGLAND NAMED; BANSTEAD,
DORCHESTER, DOVER, NORMANTON, SALISBURY PLAIN, ROSS,
LEOMINSTER, CROFT, EYWOOD, SHOBDEN.

Such are the downs of Banstead, edged with woods
And towery villas; such Dorcestrian fields,
Whose flocks innumerous whiten all the land:
Such those slow-climbing wilds that lead the step
Insensibly to Dover's windy cliff,

Tremendous height! and such the clovered lawns
And sunny mounts of beauteous Normanton,1
Health's cheerful haunt, and the selected walk
Of Heathcote's leisure: such the spacious plain
Of Sarum,' spread like Ocean's boundless round,
Where solitary Stonehenge, gray with moss,
Ruin of ages! nods: such, too, the leas
And ruddy tilth which spiry Ross beholds,
From a green hillock, o'er her lofty elms;
And Lemster's brooky tract, and airy Croft; 2
And such Harleian Eywood's 3 swelling turf,
Waved as the billows of a rolling sea;
And Shobden,4 for its lofty terrace famed,
Which from a mountain's ridge, elate o'er woods,
And girt with all Siluria, sees around
Regions on regions blended in the clouds.
SILURIA (HEREFORDSHIRE, MONMOUTHSHIRE, ETC.) DESCRIBED;
FALERNUM, VESUVIUS.

Pleasant Siluria! land of various views,
Hills, rivers, woods, and lawns, and purple groves
Pomaceous, mingled with the curling growth
Of tendril hops, that flaunt upon their poles,
More airy wild than vines along the sides
Of treacherous Falernum, or that hill
Vesuvius, where the bowers of Bacchus rose,
And Herculanean and Pompeian domes.

BEST LANDS FOR LONG-WOOL SHEEP DESCRIBED.

But if thy prudent care would cultivate Leicestrian fleeces, what the sinewy arm Combs through the spiky steel in lengthened flakes; 1 Normanton, a seat of Sir John Heathcote, in Rutlandshire. Sarum is Salisbury. Ross and Leominster are in W. England.

2 Croft, a seat of Sir Archer Croft.

8 Eywood, a seat of the Earl of Oxford.

4 Shobden, a seat of Lord Bateman.

Siluria, the part of England which lies west of the Severn, namely, Herefordshire, Monmouthshire, etc.

Treacherous Falernum; because part of the hills of Falernum was many years ago overturned by an eruption of fire, and is now a high and barren mount of cinders, called Monte Nuovo.

Rich saponaceous loam, that slowly drinks
The blackening shower, and fattens with the draught,
Or marl with clay deep-mixed, be then thy choice,
Of one consistence, one complexion, spread
Through all thy glebe; where no deceitful veins
Of envious gravel lurk beneath the turf,
To loose the creeping waters from their springs,
Tainting the pasturage and let thy fields

In slopes descend and mount, that chilling rains
May trickle off, and hasten to the brooks.

HOW TO MAKE COLD SHEEP-LANDS WARM OLD HERBAGE MAKES THE BEST LAIR.

Yet some defect in all on earth appears; All seek for help, all press for social aid. Too cold the grassy mantle of the marl, In stormy winter's long and dreary nights, For cumbent sheep from broken slumber oft They rise benumbed, and vainly shift the couch; Their wasted sides their evil plight declare: Hence, tender in his care, the shepherd swain Seeks each contrivance. Here it would avail At a meet distance from the upland ridge To sink a trench, and on the hedge-long bank Sow frequent sand, with lime, and dark manure, Which to the liquid element will yield A porous way, a passage to the foe. Plough not such pastures; deep in spongy grass The oldest carpet is the warmest lair,

And soundest in new herbage coughs are heard.

SHEEP-PASTURES SHOULD NOT HAVE TOO MUCH SHADE, LIKE THE VALE OF SEVERN; MALVERN HILLS; NOR BRAMBLES, LIKE SOUTHERN WALES.

1

Nor love too frequent shelter; such as decks The vale of Severn, Nature's garden wide, By the blue steeps of distant Malvern walled, Solemnly vast. The trees of various shade, Scene behind scene, with fair delusive pomp Enrich the prospect, but they rob the lawns. Nor prickly brambles, white with woolly theft, Should tuft thy fields. Applaud not the remiss Dimetians, who along their mossy dales Consume, like grasshoppers, the summer hour, While round them stubborn thorns and furze increase, And creeping briers.

ASHES A GOOD DRESSING FOR SHEEP-PASTURES. THE LITTLE SMILING COTTAGE-HOME OF THE WELSH SHEPHERD.

I knew a careful swain

Who gave them to the crackling flames, and spread
Their dust saline upon the deepening grass;
And oft with labor-strengthened arm he delved
The draining trench across his verdant slopes,
To intercept the small, meandering rills
Of upper hamlets. Haughty trees, that sour
The shaded grass, that weaken thorn-set mounds,
And harbor villain crows, he rare allowed;
Only a slender tuft of useful ash,
And mingled beech and elm, securely tall,
The little, smiling cottage warm embowered;

1 Malvern, a high ridge of hills near Worcester.

2 Dimetia, Caermarthenshire, in South Wales.

The little, smiling cottage! where at eve
He meets his rosy children at the door,
Prattling their welcomes, and his honest wife,
With good brown cake and bacon slice, intent
To cheer his hunger after labor hard.

LOFTY

CLIMATE AND ASPECT OF SHEEP-WALKS. AVOID NORTHERN SLOPES. NORWAY. LIBYA. ABBEVILLE FLEECE.AVARICE AND FRAUD.

Nor only soil; there also must be found
Felicity of clime and aspect bland,

Where gentle sheep may nourish locks of price.
In vain the silken fleece on windy brows,
And northern slopes of cloud-dividing hills,
Is sought, though soft Iberia spreads her lap
Beneath their rugged feet, and names their heights
Biscaian or Segovian; Bothnic realms,
And dark Norwegian, with their choicest fields,
Dingles and dells by lofty fir embowered,
In vain the bleaters court. Alike they shun
Libya's hot plains. What taste have they for groves
Of palm, or yellow dust of gold! no more
Food to the flock than to the miser wealth,
Who kneels upon the glittering heap and starves.
Even Gallic Abbeville the shining fleece,
That richly decorates her loom, acquires
Basely from Albion, by the ensnaring bribe,
The bait of avarice, which with felon fraud,
For its own wanton mouth, from thousands steals.
ADVANTAGES OF THE ENGLISH CLIMATE; FOGS, SNOWS, IN-
VIGORATING. GREAT MEN OF ENGLAND.

How erring oft the judgment in its hate
Or fond desire ! Those slow-descending showers,
Those hovering fogs, that bathe our growing vales
In deep November (loathed by trifling Gaul,
Effeminate), are gifts the Pleiads shed,
Britannia's handmaids as the beverage falls
Her hills rejoice, her valleys laugh and sing.

Hail, noble Albion ! where no golden mines, No soft perfumes, nor oils, nor myrtle bowers, The vigorous frame and lofty heart of man Enervate round whose stern, cerulean brows White-winged snow, and cloud, and pearly rain, Frequent attend, with solemn majesty :

Rich queen of mists and vapors ! these thy sons With their cool arms compress, and twist their nerves For deeds of excellence and high renown. [Blakes, Thus formed our Edwards, Henrys, Churchills, Our Lockes, our Newtons, and our Miltons, rose.

ENGLISH PASTORAL SCENERY; HORSES, CATTLE, SHEEP.

See, the sun gleams; the living pastures rise, After the nurture of the fallen shower, How beautiful! how blue the ethereal vault! How verdurous the lawns! how clear the brooks! Such noble warlike steeds, such herds of kine, So sleek, so vast, such spacious flocks of sheep, Like flakes of gold illumining the green, What other paradise adorn but thine, Britannia! happy, if thy sons would know Their happiness.

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