VI.-EPISTLE TO A FRIEND.

INSPRUCK, 1821.

To thee my old, my

valued friend

Health from the TYROL hills I send.

Oh! that I had the power to grant

The only blessing thou canst want,

Health! of heav'n's gifts almost the best,

Without it what are all the rest?

Come quit with me the world of care,

And breathe this salutary air.

That world together we began,

Its toilsome race together ran;

Together let us seek repose,

And husband life, so near its close:
Fanning the embers of that fire,

Which else might unawares expire.

But no!-'tis still thy praise to find
The joys that suit thy vigorous mind
In scenes of energy, not ease,

(The joys that on reflection please,)
From a lov'd wife and children round:
Of all delights the sweetest found!
From affluence and from honour gain'd
By arduous duties well-sustained;

From gratitude for harms represt,

For rights maintain'd, and wrongs redrest. But yet my friend there is a time

(Believe the truth though told in rhyme) When life should not be spent too fast,

But be economis'd to last.

Of Time (so short at best!) aware

How little I can have to spare,
All cares, save duties, I decline,

And ev'n ambition now resign.

But little miss'd I freely roam,

Leaving a solitary home:

Yet oft of those that most I prize

The well-known forms around me rise;

Still when my evening-walk is o'er,
My inn regain'd, and shut my door,
My winged thoughts delight to stray
O'er land and sea, far, far away:
Some face I see, some voice I hear,
By absence render'd doubly dear,
And in sweet visions pass the night,
Chas'd only by the unwelcom'd light.
The day returns: yet still I seem,
Though broad awake, as much to dream:
So strange the sights that then appear,
So strange the accents that I hear.

Behold the Stork ascend to perch
On the green spire of yon tall church!
Which, like each house, is storied o'er
With tales of legendary lore:

The dragon vanquished by the knight:

The monk that fiends in vain would fright; Who prays, though fires around him rise,

To her that beckons from the skies:

The Giant-form of aspect mild,

That on his shoulder bears a child,

And walks the water as 'twere land,

Wielding an oak-tree in his hand :
The Saint that bears the labourer's yoke
And with the beggar shares his cloak,
Or he, whose cup has power to drown

The flames, that threat th' affrighted Town.
But see the living motley mass!

The dress uncouth that marks each class;
The bare-foot son, the bare-kneed sire,

The hat, now tapering like the spire,

Now broader than a broad umbrella,

Black, white and blue, pea-green or yellow.
The women too-but that's a task,

That well a hundred tongues might ask,
That well a hundred tongues might tire,

So strange, so various, their attire.

Contrasted thus in outward show,

Their minds few shades of difference know;
Priest-ridden, ignorant, unrefin'd,

But just, and brave, and not unkind;
Of each the employment, every day,

To eat and drink and smoke and pray

At every hour, in every street,

The tinkling bell and Host you meet :
At every turn the traveller sees

Crosses almost as thick as trees;

And not a little scorn it rouses

To note more chapels built than houses;

Monks, Friars too, black, white, grey or brown,

With cord, and cowl, and shaven-crown,

With surplice, tunic, cloak or vest,

Lazy and harmless at the best.

Ill fated man! whose doom is such

That still too little, or too much,

Is taught his unsuspecting youth,
By those who scorn, or fear, the truth.

Better, far better, of the two,

To hold each tale devoutly true

That priests have feign'd, or beldames old
Have taught, and trembled as they told;
Than in suspense be tost about

From faith to faith, from doubt to doubt,
Or think, if it deserve that name,

That all from chance, from nothing, came.