Seats of my youth,* when every sport could please, Where humble happiness endear'd each scene! The shelter'd cot, the cultivated farm, The never-failing brook, the busy mill, The decent church that topp'd the neighb'ring hill, *"Seats of my youth."-This epithet seems most likely to point at Lissoy or Bally. oughter as the region of country designated as Auburn. The general characteristics of the scenery in the place first mentioned are very similar to those portrayed so vividly in the poem, while some contend that the description is as appropriate to the other. How often have I bless'd the coming day,* And many a gambol frolick'd o'er the ground, Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspir'd; *There is no good reason for the inference some have drawn here, that Goldsmith alluded to saints' days. At the date of this poem, and later, recreations of the kind alluded to were customary in Ireland on Sunday. The swain mistrustless of his smutted face, While secret laughter titter'd round the place; The matron's glance that would those looks reprove. Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms withdrawn ; One only master grasps the whole domain,* No more thy glassy brook reflects the day, The hollow-sounding bittern guards its nest; Ill fares the land, to hast'ning ills a prey, A breath can make them, as a breath has made; This keen reproach seems to refer to General Robert Napier, who purchased a large Irish estate, including Lissoy, in 1730. Desiring to inclose a considerable park, he ejected all the tenants (the Goldsmiths excepted), numbering upward of a hundred persons, many of whom emigrated to America. But a bold peasantry, their country's pride, A time there was, ere England's griefs began,* But times are alter'd; trade's unfeeling train *From this assertion, and what follows, it is apparent that the principle intended to be illustrated in the poem by a particular place, wherever it may be, is applied to England as well as to Ireland. And every want to luxury allied, And every pang that folly pays to pride. Those gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom, Those healthful sports that grac'd the peaceful scene, These, far departing, seek a kinder shore, ||These, And rural mirth and manners are no more. Sweet Auburn! parent of the blissful hour, Thy glades forlorn confess the tyrant's power. Here, as I take my solitary rounds, Amidst thy tangling walks, and ruin'd grounds, And, many a year elaps'd, return to view Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew, Remembrance wakes with all her busy train Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain. In all my wand'rings round this world of care, And, as a hare whom hounds and horns pursue, O blest retirement, friend to life's decline, 2* |