THE BOROUGH.

LETTER I.

GENERAL DESCRIPTION.

These did the ruler of the deep ordain,

To build proud navies, and to rule the main.

POPE'S Homer's Iliad, b. vi.

Such scenes has Deptford, navy-building town,
Woolwich and Wapping, smelling strong of pitch;
Such Lambeth, envy of each band and gown,
And Twickenham such, which fairer scenes enrich.

POPE'S Imitation of Spenser.

Et cum cœlestibus undis

Æquoreæ miscentur aquæ: caret ignibus æther,
Cæcaque nox premitur tenebris hiemisque suisque;
Discutient tamen has, præbentque micantia lumen
Fulmina: fulmineis ardescunt ignibus undæ.

OVID. Metamorph. lib. (1)

(1) ["Sweet waters mingle with the briny main :
No star appears to lend his friendly light;
Darkness and tempest make a double night:
But flashing fires disclose the deep by turns,

And while the lightnings blaze, the water burns."-DRYDEN.]

The Difficulty of describing Town Scenery - A Comparison with certain Views in the Country The River and Quay

-The Shipping and Business- Ship-Building Sea-Boys and Port-Views - Village and Town Scenery again compared-Walks from Town - Cottage and adjoining Heath, &c. - House of Sunday Entertainment-The Sea: a Summer and Winter View A Shipwreck at Night, and its Effects on Shore - Evening Amusements in the Borough - An Apology for the imperfect View which can be given of these Subjects.

"DESCRIBE the Borough"-though our idle tribe
May love description, can we so describe,
That you shall fairly streets and buildings trace,
And all that gives distinction to a place?
This cannot be; yet, moved by your request,
A part I paint-let Fancy form the rest.

Cities and towns, the various haunts of men,
Require the pencil; they defy the pen :
Could he, who sang so well the Grecian fleet,
So well have sung of alley, lane, or street?
Can measured lines these various buildings show,
The Town-Hall Turning, or the Prospect Row?
Can I the seats of wealth and want explore,
And lengthen out my lays from door to door?

Then let thy Fancy aid me-I repair

From this tall mansion of our last-year's Mayor,

Till we the outskirts of the Borough reach,
And these half-buried buildings next the beach;
Where hang at open doors the net and cork,
While squalid sea-dames mend the meshy work;
Till comes the hour, when fishing through the tide,
The weary husband throws his freight aside;
A living mass, which now demands the wife,
Th' alternate labours of their humble life.

Can scenes like these withdraw thee from thy wood,

Thy upland forest or thy valley's flood?

Seek then thy garden's shrubby bound, and look,
As it steals by, upon the bordering brook; (1)
That winding streamlet, limpid, lingering, slow,
Where the reeds whisper when the zephyrs blow;
Where in the midst, upon her throne of green,
Sits the large Lily (2) as the water's queen;
And makes the current, forced awhile to stay,
Murmur and bubble as it shoots away;
Draw then the strongest contrast to that stream,
And our broad river will before thee seem.

With ceaseless motion comes and goes the tide, Flowing, it fills the channel vast and wide;

(1) [See Vol. I. p. 200. The parsonage at Muston, here alluded to, looked full on the church-yard, by no means like the common forbidding receptacles of the dead, but truly ornamental ground; for some fine elms partially concealed the small beautiful church and its spire, while the eye, travelling through their stems, rested on the banks of a stream and a picturesque old bridge: the garden enclosed the other two sides of this churchyard; but the crown of the whole was a gothic archway, cut through a thick hedge and many boughs, for through this opening, as in the deep frame of a picture, appeared, in the centre of the aerial canvass, the unrivalled Belvoir.]

(2) The white water-lily, Nymphæa alba.

Then back to sea, with strong majestic sweep
It rolls, in ebb yet terrible and deep ;

Here Samphire-banks (1) and Salt-wort (2) bound the flood,

There stakes and sea-weeds withering on the mud;
And higher up, a ridge of all things base,

Which some strong tide has roll'd upon the place.
Thy gentle river boasts its pigmy boat,
Urged on by pains, half grounded, half afloat;
While at her stern an angler takes his stand,
And marks the fish he purposes to land;
From that clear space, where, in the cheerful ray
Of the warm sun, the scaly people play.

Far other craft our prouder river shows, Hoys (3), pinks (4) and sloops; brigs, brigantines (5) and snows: (6)

Nor angler we on our wide stream descry,
But one poor dredger where his oysters lie:
He, cold and wet, and driving with the tide,
Beats his weak arms against his tarry side,
Then drains the remnant of diluted gin,
To aid the warmth that languishes within;
Renewing oft his poor attempts to beat
His tingling fingers into gathering heat.

(1) The jointed glasswort, Salicornia, is here meant, not the true samphire, the Crithmum maritimum.

(2) The Salsola of botanists.

(3) [A small vessel, usually rigged as a sloop, and employed in carrying passengers and goods from one place to another, particularly on the seacoast. (4) The name given to ships with a very narrow stern. (5) Small merchant ships with two masts. (6) A vessel equipped with two masts, resembling the main and foremasts of a ship, and a third small mast just abaft the main-mast. - BURNEY.]