Robert Bloomfield

“ GOD keep small-pox and blindness from your door!"
Now, ye who think, whose souls abroad take wing,
And trace out human troubles to their spring,
Say, should Heav'n grant us, in some hallow'd hour,
Means to divest this demon of his power,
To loose his horrid grasp from early worth,
To spread a saving conquest round the earth,
Till ev'ry land shall bow the grateful knee,
Would it not be a glorious day to see?—
That day is come! my soul, in strength arise,
Invoke no muse, no power below the skies;
To Heav'n the energies of verse belong,
Truth is the theme, and truth shall be the song ”

“ Nature cried "halt!" nor could he well refuse;
Stop, Gilbert, breathe awhile, and ask the news.
"News?" cried a stooping grandame of the vale,
Aye, rare news too; I'll tell you such a tale;
But let me rest; this bank is dry and warm;
Do you know Peggy Meldrum at the farm?
Young Herbert's girl? He'as cloath'd her all in white.
You never saw so beautiful a sight!
Ah! he's a fine young man, and such a face! ”

“ Midst infant hills and meads unknown to song,
One to whom poverty and faith were giv'n,
Calm village silence, and the hope of heav'n:
Alone she dwelt; and while each morn brought peace
And health was smiling on her years' increase,
Sudden and fearful, rushing through her frame,
Unusual pains and feverish symptoms came.
Then, when debilitated, faint, and poor,
How sweet to hear a footstep at her door!
To see a neighbour watch life's silent sand,
To hear the sigh, and feel the helping hand! ”

“ Months and years bring their pleasures or pain;
We sigh midst the right and the wrong;
—And then we go round them again!
LOVE OF THE COUNTRY. Written At Clare-Hall, Herts. June 1804.
Welcome silence! welcome peace!
O most welcome, holy shade!
Thus I prove as years increase,
My heart and soul for quiet made.
Thus I fix my firm belief
While rapture's gushing tears descend;
That every flower and every leaf
Is moral Truth's unerring friend.
I would not for a world of gold
That Nature's lovely face should tire ”

“ And I, to tell the truth, so mortal vex'd,
That when he broke this crutch, and stampt and cried,
For John and Peggy, Sir, I could have died,
I know I could; for she was such a child,
So tractable, so sensible, and mild,
The plain Truth. ”

“ We tread the meadow, and we scent the thorn,
We hail the day-spring of a summer's morn
Nor mead at dawning day, nor thymy heath,
Transcends the fragrance of the heifer's breath:
May that dear fragrance, as it floats along
O'er ev'ry flow'r that lives in rustic song;
May all the sweets of meadows and of kine
Embalm, O Health! this offering at thy shrine.
Dear must that moment be when first the mind,
Ranging the paths of science unconfin'd,
Strikes a new light; when, obvious to the sense,
Springs the fresh spark of bright intelligence. ”

“ That sigh is nature, and cannot decay,
'Tis universal as the beams of day;
Man knows and feels its truth; for, Beauty's call
Rouses the coldest mortal of us all;
A glance warms age itself, and gives the boy
The pulse of rapture and the sigh of joy. ”

“ Be modest, to the voice of age attend,
Be honest, and you'll always find a friend:
Your uncle Gilbert, stronger far than I,
Will see you safe; on him you must rely;
I've walk'd too far; this lameness, oh! the pain;
Heav'n bless thee, child! I'll halt me back again;
But when your first fair holiday may be,
Rise with the lark, and spend your hours with me."
Young Herbert Brooks, in strength and manhood bold,
Who, round the meads, his own possessions, stroll'd,
O'erheard the charge, and with a heart so gay,
Whistled his spaniel and pursu'd his way. ”

“ Such was not Herbert—he had never known
Love's genuine smiles, nor suffer'd from his frown;
And as to that most honourable part
Of planting daggers in a parent's heart,
A novice quite:—he past his hours away,
Free as a bird and buxom as the day;
Yet, should a lovely girl by chance arise,
Think not that Herbert Brooks would shut his eyes. ”

“ To be readily and generally understood, to have my simple Tales almost instinctively relished by those who have so decided an influence over the lives, hearts, and manners of us all, is the utmost stretch of my ambition.
I here venture, before the public eye, a selection from the various pieces which have been the source of much pleasure, and the solace of my leisure hours during the last four years, and since the publication of the "Rural Tales." Perhaps, in some of them, more of mirth is intermingled than many who know me would expect, or than the severe will be inclined to approve. ”

“ When age itself, and manhood's hardy prime,
With horror saw their short-liv'd friendships end.
Yet dar'd not visit e'en the dying friend?
Contagion, a foul serpent lurking near,
Mock'd Nature's sigh and Friendship's holy tear.
Love ye your children?—let that love arise,
Pronounce the sentence, and the serpent dies;
Bid welcome a mild stranger at your door,
Distress shall cease, those terrors reign no more.
Love ye your neighbours?—let that love be shown;
Risk not their children while you guard your own ”

“ What means this zeal of thine, this kindling fire?
The rescu'd infant and the dying sire.'
Kind heart, who o'er the pictur'd Seasons glow'd,
When smiles approv'd the verse, or tears have flow'd,
Was then the lowly minstrel dear to thee?
Himself appeals—What, if that child were HE!
[Illustration: men digging a grave?]
What, if those midnight sighs a farewel gave,
While hands, all trembling, clos'd his father's grave!
Though love enjoin'd not infant eyes to weep,
In manhood's zenith shall his feelings sleep?
Sleep not my soul! indulge a nobler flame ”

“ What a lasting, what an unspeakable satisfaction would it be to know that the Ballads, the Plowman Stories, and the "Broken Crutch" of your father would eventually contribute to lighten your steps to manhood, and make your own crutch, through life, rather a memorial of affection than an object of sorrow. ”

“ I anticipate some approbation from such readers as have been pleased with the "Rural Tales;" yet, though I will not falsify my own feelings by assuming a diffidence which I do not conceive to be either manly or becoming, the conviction that some reputation is hazarded in "a third attempt," is impressed deeply on my mind.
With such sentiments, and with a lively sense of the high honour, and a hope of the bright recompence, of applause from the good, when heightened by the self-approving voice of my own conscience, I commit the book to its fate. ”

“ Others, more lax in virtue, not in pride,
Sported the wink of cunning on one side;
"He'll buy, no doubt, what Peggy has to sell,
A little gallantry becomes him well."
Meanwhile the youth with self-determin'd aim,
Disdaining fraud, and pride's unfeeling claim,
Marriage proposed
Above control pursued his generous way,
And talk'd to Peggy of the marriage day.
Poor girl! she heard, with anguish and with doubt,
What her too knowing neighbours preach'd about,
That Herbert would some nobler match prefer,
And surely never, never marry her ”

“ All night I heard the bubbling stream,
Yet, Barnham Water wants a shade.
Whatever hurts my country's fame,
When wits and mountaineers deride,
To me grows serious, for I name
My native plains and streams with pride.
No mountain charms have I to sing,
No loftier minstrel's rights invade;
From trifles oft my raptures spring;
—Sweet Barnham Water wants a shade
MARY'S EVENING SIGH How bright with pearl the western sky! ”

“ ROBERT BLOOMFIELD. DEDICATION. TO MY ONLY SON. MY DEAR BOY, In thus addressing myself to you, and in expressing my regard for your person, my anxiety for your health, and my devotion to your welfare, I enjoy an advantage over those dedicators who indulge in adulation;—I shall at least be believed.
Should you arrive at that period when reason shall be mature, and affection or curiosity induce you to look back on your father's poetical progress through life, you may conclude that he had many to boast as friends, whose names, in a dedication, would have honoured both him and his children ”

“ Build me a shrine, and I could kneel
To Rural Gods, or prostrate fall;
Did I not see, did I not feel,
That one GREAT SPIRIT governs all.
O heav'n permit that I may lie
Where o'er my corse green branches ware;
And those who from life's tumult fly
With kindred feelings press my grave. ”

“ To lead abroad upborne on Pleasure's wing,
Our children, midst the glories of the spring;
Our fellow sufferers, our only wealth,
To gather daisies in the breeze of health!
'Twas then, too, when our prospects grew so fair,
And Sabbath bells announc'd the morning pray'r ”

“ Johnson, has said, in his preface to Shakspeare, that—"Nothing can please many, and please long, but just representations of general nature." My representations of nature, whatever may be said of their justness, are not general, unless we admit, what I suspect to be the case, that nature in a village is very much like nature every where else. ”

“ Plough'd the rough waves, and gain'd our northern clime,
In manhood's ripening sense and nature's prime.
Oh! had the fiend been vanquished ere he came,
The gen'rous youth had spread my country's fame.
Had known that honour dwells among the brave,
And England had not prov'd the stranger's grave:
Then, ere his waning sand of life had run,
Poor ABBA THULE might hare seen his son! [A]
[Footnote A: Lee Boo, second son of the King of the Pelew Islands, was
brought to England by Capt. Wilson, and died of the Small-pox at
Rotherhithe, in 1784.]
Rise, exultation! spirit, louder speak! ”

“ I've told thee truth, and all I know:
Truth should breed truth; that comes of course;
If I sow wheat, why wheat will grow."
"Yes, Abner, but thus soon to yield,
Neighbours would fleer, and look behind 'em;
Though, with a husband in the field,
Perhaps, indeed, I should not mind 'em.
"I've known your generous nature well,
My first denial cost me dear ”

“ Must exultation mingle with a sigh?
Thought takes the retrospect of years just fled,
And, conjuring up the spirits of the dead,
Whispers each dear and venerated name
Of the last victims ere the blessing came,
Worthies, who through the lands that gave them birth
Breath'd the strong evidence of growing worth;
Parents, cut down in life's meridian day,
And childhood's thousand thousand swept away;
Life's luckless mariners! ye, we deplore
Who sunk within a boat's length of the shore [A] . ”

“ In Suffolk husbandry the man who, (whether by merit or by sufferance I know not) goes foremost through the harvest with the scythe or the sickle, is honoured with the title of "Lord," and at the Horkey, or harvest-home feast, collects what he can, for himself and brethren, from the farmers and visitors, to make a "frolick" afterwards, called "the largess spending." ”

“ I have witnessed the destruction described in my brother's family: and I have, in my own, insured the lives of four children by Vaccine Inoculation, who, I trust, are destined to look back upon the Small-pox of the scourge of days gone by.—My hopes are high, and my prayers sincere, for its universal adoption.
The few notes subjoined are chiefly from "Woodville on Inoculation;" and if I may escape the appearance of affectation of research, or a scientific treatment of the subject, I think the egotism, so conspicuous in the poem, (as facts give force to argument,) ought to be forgiven. ”

“ The earliest patron of my unprotected strains has the warm thanks which are his due, for the introduction of blessings which have been diffused through our whole family, and nothing will ever change this sentiment. ”

“ THE HORKEY. A Provincial Ballad.
What gossips prattled in the sun,
Who talk'd him fairly down,
Up, memory! tell; 'tis Suffolk fun,
And lingo of their own.
Ah! Judie Twitchet! [A] though thou'rt dead,
With thee the tale begins;
For still seems thrumming in my head
The rattling of thy pins.
[Footnote A: Judie Twitchet was a real person, who lived many years with my mother's cousin Bannock, at Honnington.]
Thou Queen of knitters! for a ball
Of worsted was thy pride;
With dangling stockings great and small,
And world of clack beside!
"We did so laugh; the moon shone bright ”

“ By way of returning thanks, though perhaps formerly of much more, or of different signification, they immediately leave the seat of festivity, and with a very long and repeated shout of "a largess," the number of shouts being regulated by the sums given, seem to wish to make themselves heard by the people of the surrounding farms. ”

“ Beneath the blessed sunshine of Peru [3] .
[Footnote 3: In 1520, says Mr. Woodville, when the small-pox visited New
Spain, it proved fatal to one half of the people in the provinces to which
the infection extended; being carried thither by a negro slave, who
attended Narvaez in his expedition against Cortes. He adds, about fifty
years after the discovery of Peru, The small-pox was carried over from
Europe to America by way of Carthagena, when it overran the Continent of
the New World, and destroyed upwards of 100,000 Indians in the single
province of Quito.—Hist. of Inoculation.] ”

“ Scourge of the world! who, borne on ev'ry wind,
From bow'rs of roses [1] sprang to curse mankind.
[Footnote 1: The first medical account of the small-pox is given by the
Arabian physicians, and is traced no farther back than the siege of
Alexandria, about the year of Christ, 640.—Woodville.]
The Indian palm thy devastation knows:
Thou sweep'st the regions of eternal snows [2] :
[Footnote 2: First introduced into Greenland in 1733, and almost
depopulated the country.—Ibid.]
Climbing the mighty period of his years,
The British oak his giant bulk uprears ”