With steady zeal, each honest rustic ran;
Even 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.

5. Beside yon straggling fence that skirts' the way,
With blossom'd furze unprofitably gay,
There, in his noisy mansion, skill' 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.

6. 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 ränged around;

And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew,
That one small head could carry all he knew.

1Skirts (skêrts).—' Furze (fêrz).—3 Rule (rỗ1).— Mås' ter.- Stern.•Truant (tro' ant).- Disasters (diz ås' terz).—" Learn' ing.

But past is all his fame. The věry spot
Where many a time he triumph'd is forgot.

7. 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 graybeard mirth and smiling toil retired,
Where village statesmen talk'd with looks profound,
And news much older than their ale went round.
Imagination fondly stops to trace

The parlor splendors of that festive place;
The whitewash'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 teacups, wisely kept for show,
Ranged o'er the chimney, glisten'd in a row.
8. Vain, transitory splendors! 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.

9. Yes! let the rich deride, the proud disdain,
These simple blessings of the lowly train;

'Draught (dråft).—3 Rules (rôlz).—* Heårth.— Re påir”.

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;
And e'en while fashion's brightest arts decoy,
The heart, distrusting, asks if this be joy.

1.

50. THE DESERTED VILLAGE

CONCLUDED.

E 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 her shōre:
Hoards e'en beyond the miser's wish abound,
And rich men flock from all the world around.
Yět 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 slōth
Has robb'd the neighboring 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,

Yours (yorz). Her.- Equipage (êk' we påj).

While thus the land, adorn'd for pleasure all,
In barren splendor feebly waits the fall.
2. 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 förth, 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 splendors 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.
8. Where, then, ah! where shall Poverty reside,
To escape 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 pomp 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.

4. 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 bless'd,
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.

5. 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 shōre;
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,

1 Square (skwår) U ni ver' sal.-' First (först).