The Poems of Robert Bloomfield :: :: University of Virginia Library

The Poems of Robert Bloomfield

In Three Volumes

Bloomfield, Robert (1766-1823)

VOL. I. THE FARMER'S BOY, AND GOOD TIDINGS.

THE FARMER'S BOY.

GOOD TIDINGS;

II.

VOL. II. RURAL TALES, AND WILD FLOWERS.

III.

VOL. III. BANKS OF WYE, AND MAY-DAY WITH THE MUSES.

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Bright vale of Severn! shall the song
That wildly devious roves along,
The charms of nature to explore,
On history rest, or themes of yore?
More joy the thoughts of home supply;
Short be the glance at days gone by,
Though gallant Tewkesbury, clean and gay,
Hath much to tempt the traveller's stay—
Her noble abbey, with its dead,
A powerful claim: a silent dread,
Sacred as holy virtue, springs
Where rests the dust of chiefs and kings;
With his who by foul murder died,
The fierce Lancastrian's hope and pride,

107

(When brothers brothers could destroy)
Heroic Margaret's red-rose boy .

Muse, turn thee from the field of blood,
Rest to the brave, peace to the good:
Avon, with all thy charms, adieu!
For Cheltenham mocks thy pilgrim crew;
And like a girl in beauty's power,
Flirts in the fairings of an hour.

Queen of the valley! soon behind
Gleam'd thy bright fanes, in sun and wind,
Fair Glo'ster. Though thy fabric stands,
The boast of Severn's winding sands,
If grandeur, beauty, grace, can stay
The traveller on his homeward way.

108

There rests the Norman prince who rose
In zeal against the christians' foes,
Yet doom'd at home to pine and die,
Of birthright robb'd, and liberty;
His tide of wrongs he could not stem,
His brothers filch'd his diadem .
There sleeps the king who aim'd to spurn
The daring Scots, at Bannockburn;
But turn'd him back, with humbled fame,
And Berkley's “shrieks ” declare his name.

Cease, cease the lay—the goal is won—
Yet memory still shall revel on.
Fast closed the day, the last bright hour,
The setting sun, on Dursley tower,

109

Welcomed us home, and forward bade,
To Uley valley's peaceful shade.

Frince Edward, son of Henry the Sixth, taken prisoner with his mother, Margaret of Anjou, at the battle of Tewkesbury, and murdered by the Duke of Gloucester, afterwards Richard the Third.

The eldest son of William the Conqueror was imprisoned eight-and-twenty years by his own brother!

“Shrieks of an agonizing king.”