Well had the boding tremblers learned to trace
The day's disasters in his morning's face;
Full well they laughed with counterfeited glee
At all his jokes, for many a joke had he;
Full well the busy whisper circling round,
Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned:
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 owned his skill,
For e'en though vanquished, he could argue still;
While words of learned length, and thundering sound,
Amazed the gazing rustics, ranged around;
And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew,
That one small head could carry all he knew.
ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY
CHURCHYARD.-Gray.
THE curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herds wind slowly o'er the lea,
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;
Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower,
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such as, wandering near her secret bower,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn,
The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed, The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.
For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care:
No children run to lisp their sire's return,
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.
Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield;
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke; How jocund did they drive their team afield!
How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy stroke! Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor.
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Await alike the inevitable hour;
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.
Nor you, ye Proud, impute to these the fault,
If Memory o'er their tomb no trophies raise,
Where through the long-drawn aisle, and fretted
vault,
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise. Can storied urn, or animated bust
Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath? Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or Flattery soothe the dull cold ear of Death? Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid
Some heart, once pregnant with celestial fire;
Hands, that the rod of empire might have swayed,
Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre.
But knowledge to their eyes her ample page,
Rich with the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll;
Chill Penury repressed their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.
Full many a gem, of purest ray serene,
The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
Some village Hampden, that, with dauntless breast,
The little Tyrant of his fields withstood;
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.
The applause of listening senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
And read their history in a nation's eyes, Their lot forbade : nor circumscribed alone
Their growing virtues, but their crimes confined; Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne, And shut the gates of mercy on mankind; The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide, To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame, Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride
With incense kindled at the Muse's flame. Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife, Their sober wishes never learned to stray; Along the cool sequestered vale of life
They kept the noiseless tenor of their way. Yet ev❜n these bones from insult to protect, Some frail memorial still erected nigh,
With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture decked, Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.
Their name, their years, spelt by the unlettered
The place of fame and elegy supply:
And many a holy text around she strews,
That teach the rustic moralist to die.
For who, to dumb Forgetfulness a prey,
This pleasing anxious being e'er resigned,
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing, lingering look behind?
On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires;
Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
Ev'n in our Ashes live their wonted Fires.
For thee, who, mindful of the unhonoured Dead,
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate ;
If chance, by lonely Contemplation led,
Some kindred Spirit shall inquire thy fate;
Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,
"Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn,
Brushing with hasty steps the dews away,
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.
There, at the foot of yonder nodding beech,
That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high,
His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.
Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,
Muttering his wayward fancies he would rove:
Now drooping, woful, wan, like one forlorn,
Or crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless love.
One morn I missed him on the 'customed hill;
Along the heath, and near his favourite tree;
Another came; nor yet beside the rill,
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he. The next, with dirges due, in sad array,
Slow through the churchyard path we saw him borne; Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay, Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn."
Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth,
A youth, to Fortune and to Fame unknown ;
Fair Science frowned not on his humble birth,
And Melancholy marked him for her own.
Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,
Heaven did a recompence as largely send;
He gave to Misery all he had, a tear;
He gained from Heaven ('twas all he wished) a friend. No farther seek his merits to disclose,
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, (There they alike, in trembling hope, repose) The bosom of his Father and his God.
TELL me not of Arthur's table,
As a vague, uncertain rhyme;
Must our good be all a fable,
Only true our deeds of crime?
Doth the past deserve our scorning,
Dimly mirrored from afar,
Like a twilight without morning,
Like a midnight without star?
Sires of future generations,
We are sons of ages gone,
Tribes and families and nations,
Varying as they journey on.
Each retain the genuine features
Of the parent stock of old;
Ruder forms, and hardier natures,
Not less true, and not less bold.
Every warrior in his glory,
Every patriot in his fame,
Hath a prototype in story,
In some well-remembered name;
Name which there is no forgetting,
Though the deeds have passed from sight;
Gem which has survived its setting,
Floating in its own clear light.
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