If, when he reach'd his journey's end, And twenty curious scraps of knowledge;- With no new light on love or liquor,- Good sooth, the traveller was to blame, And not the vicarage, or the Vicar. His talk was like a stream which runs, It pass'd from Mahomet to Moses: The planets in their radiant courses, And ending with some precept deep, For dressing cels or shoeing horses. He was a shrewd and sound divine, Of loud Dissent had mortal terror; And when, by dint of page and line, He 'stablish'd truth, or started error, The Baptist found him far too deep; The Deist sigh'd, with saving sorrow; And the lean Levite went to sleep, And dream'd of tasting pork to-morrow. His sermons never said or show'd That earth is foul, that heaven is gracious, Without refreshment on the road From Jerome or from Athanasius; And sure a righteous zeal inspired The hand and head that penn'd and plann'd them, For all who understood, admired, And some who did not understand them. THE VICAR. He wrote, too, in a quiet way, Small treatises, and smaller verses: And sage remarks on chalk and clay, And hints to noble lords and nurses; True histories of last year's ghost, Lines to a ringlet or a turban; And trifles for the Morning Post, And nothing for Sylvanus Urban. He did not think all mischief fair, Although he had a taste for smoking: He held, in spite of all his learning, That if a man's belief is bad, It will not be improved by burning. And he was kind, and loved to sit In the low hut or garnish'd cottage, And praise the farmer's homely wit, And share the widow's homelier pottage: At his approach complaint grew mild, And when his hand unbarr'd the shutter, The clammy lips of Fever smiled The welcome which they could not utter. He always had a tale for me, Of Julius Cæsar or of Venus: I used to singe his powder'd wig, To steal the staff he put such trust in; And make the puppy dance a jig. When he began to quote Augustin. Alack the change! in vain I look For haunts in which my boyhood trifled, The level lawn, the trickling brook, The trees I climb'd, the beds I rifled: The church is larger than before, You reach it by a carriage entry: It holds three hundred people more, And pews are fitted up for gentry. Sit in the Vicar's seat: you'll hear Where is the old man laid? Look down, "HIC JACET GULIELMUS BROWN, VIR NULLA NON DONANDUS LAURO." SUMMER WOODS. COME ye into the summer woods, All greenly wave the chesnut leaves, I cannot tell you half the sights And many a shady tree. There, lightly swung, in bowery glades, The honeysuckles twine; There blooms the rose-red campion, And the dark-blue columbine. There grows the four-leaved plant, “true-love," In some dusk woodland spot; There grows the enchanter's night-shade, And the wood forget-me-not. And many a merry bird is there, The blue-wing'd jay, the woodpecker, Come down, and ye shall see them all, The timid and the bold; For their sweet life of pleasantness, |