Till, more unsteady than the southern gale, Commerce on other shores display'd her sail, While nought remained, of all that riches gave, But towns unmann'd and lords without a slaveAnd late the nation found, with fruitless skill, Its former strength was but plethoric ill.

Yet, still the loss of wealth is here supplied By arts, the splendid wrecks of former pride: From these the feeble heart and long-fallen mind An easy compensation seem to find.

Here may

be seen, in bloodless pomp array'd, The pasteboard triumph and the cavalcade;

By sports like these are all their cares beguil'd;
The sports of children satisfy the child.
Each nobler aim, represt by long control,
Now sinks at last, or feebly mans the soul;
While low delights, succeeding fast behind,
In happier meanness occupy the mind.

As in those domes, where Cæsars once bore sway,
Defac'd by time and tottering in decay,

There in the ruin, heedless of the dead,
The shelter-seeking peasant builds his shed;
And, wondering man could want the larger pile,
Exults, and owns his cottage with a smile.

My soul, turn from them, turn we to survey
Where rougher climes a nobler race display-
Where the bleak Swiss their stormy mansions tread,
And force a churlish soil for scanty bread.
No product here the barren hills afford

But man and steel, the soldier and his sword;
No vernal blooms their torpid rocks array,
But winter lingering chills the lap of May;
No zephyr fondly sues the mountain's breast,
But meteors glare, and stormy glooms invest.

Yet still, even here, content can spread a charm,
Redress the clime, and all its rage disarm.

Though poor the peasant's hut, his feasts though small, He sees his little lot the lot of all

Sees no contiguous palace rear its head,

To shame the meanness of his humble shed

No costly lord the sumptuous banquet deal,
To make him loathe his vegetable meal—
But calm, and bred in ignorance and toil,
Each wish contracting, fits him to the soil.
Cheerful at morn, he wakes from short repose,
Breathes the keen air, and carols as he goes;
With patient angle trolls the finny deep;

Or drives his venturous ploughshare to the steep;
Or seeks the den where snow-tracks mark the way,
And drags the struggling savage into day.

At night returning, every labour sped,

He sits him down the monarch of a shed;
Smiles by his cheerful fire, and round surveys
His children's looks, that brighten at the blaze-
While his lov'd partner, boastful of her hoard,
Displays her cleanly platter on the board:

Thus ev'ry good his native wilds impart Imprints the patriot passion on his heart; And e'en those hills, that round his mansion rise, Enhance the bliss his scanty fund supplies:

Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms, And dear that hill which lifts him to the storms; And as a child, when scaring sounds molest, Clings close and closer to the mother's breastSo the loud torrent, and the whirlwind's roar, But bind him to his native mountains more.

Such are the charms to barren states assign'd--
Their wants but few, their wishes all confin'd;
Yet let them only share the praises due,
If few their wants, their pleasures are but few:
For every want that stimulates the breast
Becomes a source of pleasure when redress'd.
Whence from such lands each pleasing science flies,
That first excites desire, and then supplies.
Unknown to them, when sensual pleasures cloy,
To fill the languid pause with finer joy;
Unknown those powers that raise the soul to flame,
Catch every nerve and vibrate through the frame :
Their level life is but a smouldering fire,
Unquench'd by want, unfann'd by strong desire;
Unfit for raptures, or, if raptures cheer
On some high festival of once a year,

In wild excess the vulgar breast takes fire,
Till, buried in debauch, the bliss expire.

No costly lord the sumptuous banquet deal,
To make him loathe his vegetable meal—
But calm, and bred in ignorance and toil,
Each wish contracting, fits him to the soil.
Cheerful at morn, he wakes from short repose,
Breathes the keen air, and carols as he goes;
With patient angle trolls the finny deep;

Or drives his venturous ploughshare to the steep;
Or seeks the den where snow-tracks mark the way,
And drags the struggling savage into day.
At night returning, every labour sped,
He sits him down the monarch of a shed;
Smiles by his cheerful fire, and round surveys
His children's looks, that brighten at the blaze-
While his lov'd partner, boastful of her hoard,
Displays her cleanly platter on the board: