By her own wants, she from her store of meal Takes one unsparing handful for the scrip Of this old Mendicant, and, from her door Returning with exhilarated heart,
Sits by her fire, and builds her hope in heaven.
Then let him pass, a blessing on his head! And while in that vast solitude to which The tide of things has borne him, he appears To breathe and live but for himself alone,
Unblamed, uninjured, let him bear about
The good which the benignant law of Heaven Has hung around him: and, while life is his, Still let him prompt the unlettered Villagers To tender offices and pensive thoughts.
Then let him pass, a blessing on his head! And, long as he can wander, let him breathe The freshness of the valleys; let his blood Struggle with frosty air and winter snows; And let the chartered wind that sweeps the heath Beat his gray locks against his withered face. Reverence the hope whose vital anxiousness Gives the last human interest to his heart. May never HOUSE, misnamed of INDUSTRY,
Make him a captive! for that pent-up din, Those life-consuming sounds that clog the air, Be his the natural silence of old age! Let him be free of mountain solitudes; And have around him, whether heard or not, The pleasant melody of woodland birds. Few are his pleasures: if his eyes have now Been doomed so long to settle on the earth That not without some effort they behold The countenance of the horizontal sun, Rising or setting, let the light at least Find a free entrance to their languid orbs. And let him, where and when he will, sit down Beneath the trees, or by the grassy bank Of highway side, and with the little birds Share his chance-gathered meal; and, finally, As in the eye of Nature he has lived, So in the eye of Nature let him die!
THE FARMER OF TILSBURY VALE.
'Tis not for the unfeeling, the falsely refined, The squeamish in taste, and the narrow of mind, And the small critic wielding his delicate pen, That I sing of old Adam, the pride of old men.
He dwells in the centre of London's wide Town; His staff is a sceptre his gray hairs a crown;
Erect as a sunflower he stands, and the streak Of the unfaded rose still enlivens his cheek.
Mid the dews, in the sunshine of morn,- mid the joy Of the fields, he collected that bloom, when a Boy; There fashioned that countenance, which, in spite of a stain That his life hath received, to the last will remain.
THE FARMER OF TILSBURY VALE. 309
A Farmer he was; and his house far and near Was the boast of the Country for excellent cheer: How oft have I heard in sweet Tilsbury Vale
Of the silver-rimmed horn whence he dealt his mild ale!
Yet Adam was far as the farthest from ruin,
His fields seemed to know what their Master was doing; And turnips, and corn-land, and meadow, and lea, All caught the infection as generous as he.
Yet Adam prized little the feast and the bowl, — The fields better suited the ease of his Soul;
He strayed through the fields like an indolent Wight, The quiet of nature was Adam's delight.
For Adam was simple in thought, and the Poor, Familiar with him, made an inn of his door: He them the best that he had; or, to say gave What less may mislead you, they took it away.
Thus thirty smooth years did he thrive on his farm; The Genius of plenty preserved him from harm : At length, what to most is a season of sorrow,
His means are run out, he must beg, or must borrow.
To the neighbours he went,-all were free with their mone For his hive had so long been replenished with honey, That they dreamt not of dearth;-He continued his rounds Knocked here and knocked there, pounds still addin
He paid what he could with this ill-gotten pelf, And something, it might be, reserved for himself: Then, (what is too true,) without hinting a word, Turned his back on the Country; and off like a Bird.
you frame A judgment too harsh of the sin and the shame;
In him it was scarcely a business of art,
For this he did all in the ease of his heart.
To London a sad emigration I ween
grey hairs he went from the brook and the green;
And there, with small wealth but his legs and his hands, As lonely he stood as a Crow on the sands.
All trades, as need was, did old Adam assume, Served as Stable-boy, Errand-boy, Porter, and Groom; But nature is gracious, necessity kind,
And, in spite of the shame that may lurk in his mind,
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