The Poetical Works (1855) :: :: University of Virginia Library

THE FLEECE.

“Post majores quadrupedes ovilli pecoris secunda ratio est, quæ prima sit, si ad utilitatis magnitudinem referas: nam id præcipue nos contra frigoris violentiam protegit, corporibusque nostris liberaliora præbet velamina.” —Columella.

BOOK I.

THE ARGUMENT.

The subject proposed—Dedicatory address—Of pastures in general fit for sheep: for fine-woolled sheep: for long-woolled sheep— Defects of pastures, and their remedies—Of climates—The moisture of the English climate vindicated—Particular beauties of England—Different kinds of English sheep: the two common sorts of rams described. Different kinds of foreign sheep—The several sorts of food—The distempers arising from thence, with their remedies—Sheep led by instinct to their proper food and physic. Of the shepherd's scrip and its furniture—Care of sheep

in tupping time—Of the castration of lambs, and the folding of sheep—Various precepts relative to changes of weather and seasons—Particular care of new-fallen lambs—The advantages and security of the English shepherd above those in hotter or colder climates; exemplified with respect to Lapland, Italy, Greece, and Arabia—Of sheep-shearing—Song on that occasion— Custom in Wales of sprinkling the rivers with flowers—Sheep-shearing feast and merriments on the banks of the Severn.

The care of Sheep, the labours of the Loom,
And arts of Trade, I sing. Ye rural nymphs,
Ye swains, and princely merchants, aid the verse.
And ye, high-trusted guardians of our isle,
Whom public voice approves, or lot of birth
To the great charge assigns: ye good, of all
Degrees, all sects, be present to my song.
So may distress, and wretchedness, and want,
The wide felicities of labour learn:
So may the proud attempts of restless Gaul
From our strong borders, like a broken wave,
In empty foam retire. But chiefly Thou,
The people's shepherd, eminently plac'd
Over the num'rous swains of ev'ry vale,
With well-permitted pow'r and watchful eye,
On each gay field to shed beneficence,
Celestial office!—Thou protect the song.

On spacious airy downs, and gentle hills,
With grass and thyme o'erspread, and clover wild,
Where smiling Phœbus tempers ev'ry breeze,
The fairest flocks rejoice! they, nor of halt,
Hydropic tumours, nor of rot, complain;
Evils deform'd and foul: nor with hoarse cough
Disturb the music of the past'ral pipe:
But, crowding to the note, with silence soft
The close-wov'n carpet graze; where nature blends
Flowrets and herbage of minutest size,
Innoxious luxury. Wide airy downs
Are Health's gay walks to shepherd and to sheep.

All arid soils, with sand, or chalky flint,
Or shells deluvian mingled; and the turf,
That mantles over rocks of brittle stone,
Be thy regard: and where low-tufted broom,

Or box, or berry'd juniper arise;
Or the tall growth of glossy-rinded beech;
And where the burrowing rabbit turns the dust;
And where the dappled deer delights to bound.

Such are the downs of Banstead, edg'd with woods,
And tow'ry villas; such Dorcestrian fields,
Whose flocks innum'rous whiten all the land:
Such those slow-climbing wilds, that lead the step
Insensibly to Dover's windy cliff,
Tremendous height! and such the clover'd lawns
And sunny mounts of beauteous Normanton,
Health's cheerful haunt, and the selected walk
Of Heathcote's leisure: such the spacious plain
Of Sarum, spread like ocean's boundless round,
Where solitary Stonehenge, grey with moss,
Ruin of ages, nods: such too the leas
And ruddy tilth, which spiry Ross beholds,
From a green hillock, o'er her lofty elms;
And Lemster's brooky tract, and airy Croft;
And such Harleian Eywood's swelling turf,
Wav'd as the billows of a rolling sea:
And Shobden, for its lofty terrace fam'd,
Which from a mountain's ridge, elate o'er woods,
And girt with all Siluria, sees around
Regions on regions blended in the clouds.
Pleasant Siluria, land of various views,
Hills, rivers, woods, and lawns, and purple groves
Pomaceous, mingled with the curling growth
Of tendril hops, that flaunt upon their poles,
More airy wild than vines along the sides

Of treacherous Falernum; or that hill
Vesuvius, where the bow'rs of Bacchus rose,
And Herculanean and Pompeian domes.

But if thy prudent care would cultivate
Leicestrian fleeces, what the sinewy arm
Combs through the spiky steel in lengthen'd flakes;
Rich saponaceous loam, that slowly drinks
The black'ning show'r, and fattens with the draught,
Or marl with clay deep-mix'd, be then thy choice,
Of one consistence, one complexion, spread
Through all thy glebe; where no deceitful veins
Of envious gravel lurk beneath the turf,
To loose the creeping waters from their springs,
Tainting the pasturage: and let thy fields
In slopes descend and mount, that chilling rains
May trickle off, and hasten to the brooks.

Yet some defect in all on earth appears;
All seek for help, all press for social aid.
Too cold the grassy mantle of the marl,
In stormy winter's long and dreary nights,
For cumbent sheep; from broken slumber oft
They rise benumb'd, and vainly shift the couch;
Their wasted sides their evil plight declare.
Hence, tender in his care, the shepherd swain
Seeks each contrivance. Here it would avail,
At a meet distance from the upland ridge,
To sink a trench, and on the hedge-long bank
Sow frequent sand, with lime, and dark manure,
Which to the liquid element will yield
A porous way, a passage to the foe.
Plough not such pastures: deep in spongy grass
The oldest carpet is the warmest lair,
And soundest; in new herbage coughs are heard.

Nor love too frequent shelter: such as decks
The vale of Severn, nature's garden wide,

By the blue steeps of distant Malvern wall'd,
Solemnly vast. The trees of various shade,
Scene behind scene, with fair delusive pomp
Enrich the prospect, but they rob the lawns.
Nor prickly brambles, white with woolly theft,
Should tuft thy fields. Applaud not the remiss
Dimetians, who along their mossy dales
Consume, like grasshoppers, the summer hour;
While round them stubborn thorns and furze increase,
And creeping briars. I knew a careful swain,
Who gave them to the crackling flames, and spread
Their dust saline upon the deep'ning grass:
And oft with labour-strengthen'd arm he delv'd
The draining trench across his verdant slopes,
To intercept the small meand'ring rills
Of upper hamlets: haughty trees, that sour
The shaded grass, that weaken thorn-set mounds,
And harbour villain crows, he rare allow'd:
Only a slender tuft of useful ash,
And mingled beech and elm, securely tall,
The little smiling cottage warm embower'd;
The little smiling cottage, where at eve
He meets his rosy children at the door,
Prattling their welcomes, and his honest wife,
With good brown cake and bacon slice, intent
To cheer his hunger after labour hard.

Nor only soil, there also must be found
Felicity of clime, and aspect bland,
Where gentle sheep may nourish locks of price.
In vain the silken fleece on windy brows,
And northern slopes of cloud-dividing hills
Is sought, though soft Iberia spreads her lap
Beneath their rugged feet, and names their heights
Biscaian, or Segovian. Bothnic realms,
And dark Norwegian, with their choicest fields,

Dingles, and dells, by lofty fir embower'd,
In vain the bleaters court. Alike they shun
Libya's hot plains; what taste have they for groves
Of palm, or yellow dust of gold? no more
Food to the flock, than to the miser wealth,
Who kneels upon the glittering heap, and starves.
Ev'n Gallic Abbeville the shining fleece,
That richly decorates her loom, acquires
Basely from Albion, by th' ensnaring bribe,
The bait of av'rice, which, with felon fraud
For its own wanton mouth, from thousands steals.

How erring oft the judgment in its hate,
Or fond desire! Those slow-descending show'rs,
Those hov'ring fogs, that bathe our growing vales
In deep November (loath'd by trifling Gaul,
Effeminate), are gifts the Pleiads shed,
Britannia's handmaids. As the bev'rage falls,
Her hills rejoice, her valleys laugh and sing.

Hail, noble Albion! where no golden mines,
No soft perfumes, nor oils, nor myrtle bow'rs,
The vig'rous frame and lofty heart of man
Enervate: round whose stern cerulean brows
White-winged snow, and cloud, and pearly rain,
Frequent attend, with solemn majesty;
Rich queen of mists and vapours! These thy sons
With their cool arms compress, and twist their nerves
For deeds of excellence and high renown.
Thus form'd, our Edwards, Henrys, Churchills, Blakes,
Our Lockes, our Newtons, and our Miltons, rose.

See the sun gleams; the living pastures rise,
After the nurture of the fallen show'r,
How beautiful! how blue th' ethereal vault;
How verdurous the lawns, how clear the brooks!
Such noble warlike steeds, such herds of kine,
So sleek, so vast; such spacious flocks of sheep,
Like flakes of gold illumining the green,
What other paradise adorn but thine,
Britannia? happy, if thy sons would know
Their happiness. To these thy naval streams,
Thy frequent towns superb of busy trade,
And ports magnific add, and stately ships,
Innumerous. But whither strays my muse?
Pleas'd, like a traveller upon the strand
Arriv'd of bright Augusta; wild he roves

From deck to deck, through groves immense of masts;
'Mong crowds, bales, cars, the wealth of either Ind;
Through wharfs, and squares, and palaces, and domes,
In sweet surprise; unable yet to fix
His raptur'd mind, or scan in order'd course
Each object singly; with discov'ries new
His native country studious to enrich.

Ye shepherds, if your labours hope success,
Be first your purpose to procure a breed
To soil and clime adapted. Ev'ry soil
And clime, ev'n ev'ry tree and herb, receives
Its habitant peculiar: each to each,
The Great Invisible, and each to all,
Through earth, and sea, and air, harmonious suits.
Tempestuous regions, Darwent's naked peaks,
Snowdon and blue Plynlymmon, and the wide
Aerial sides of Cader-yddris huge;
These are bestow'd on goat-horn'd sheep, of fleece
Hairy and coarse, of long and nimble shank,
Who rove o'er bog or heath, and graze or browse
Alternate, to collect, with due dispatch,
O'er the bleak wild, the thinly-scatter'd meal.
But hills of milder air, that gently rise
O'er dewy dales, a fairer species boast,
Of shorter limb, and frontlet more ornate;
Such the Silurian. If thy farm extends
Near Cotswold downs, or the delicious groves
Of Symmonds, honour'd through the sandy soil
Of elmy Ross, or Devon's myrtle vales,
That drink clear rivers near the glassy sea;
Regard this sort, and hence thy sire of lambs
Select: his tawny fleece in ringlets curls;
Long swings his slender tail; his front is fenc'd
With horns Ammonian, circulating twice
Around each open ear, like those fair scrolls
That grace the columns of th' Iönic dome.

Yet should thy fertile glebe be marly clay,

Like Melton pastures, or Tripontian fields,
Where ever-gliding Avon's limpid wave
Thwarts the long course of dusty Watling-street;
That larger sort, of head defenceless, seek,
Whose fleece is deep and clammy, close and plain:
The ram short-limb'd, whose form compact describes
One level line along his spacious back;
Of full and ruddy eye, large ears, stretch'd head,
Nostrils dilated, breast and shoulders broad,
And spacious haunches, and a lofty dock.

Thus to their kindred soil and air induc'd,
Thy thriving herd will bless thy skilful care,
That copies nature; who, in ev'ry change,
In each variety, with wisdom works,
And pow'rs diversified of air and soil,
Her rich materials. Hence Sabæa's rocks,
Chaldæa's marle, Ægyptus' water'd loam,
And dry Cyrene's sand, in climes alike,
With diff'rent stores supply the marts of trade.
Hence Zembla's icy tracts no bleaters hear;
Small are the Russian herds, and harsh their fleece:
Of light esteem Germanic, far remote
From soft sea-breezes, open winters mild,
And summers bath'd in dew: on Syrian sheep
The costly burden only loads their tails:
No locks Cormandel's, none Malacca's tribe
Adorn; but sleek of flix, and brown like deer,
Fearful and shepherdless, they bound along
The sands. No fleeces wave in torrid climes,
Which verdure boast of trees and shrubs alone,
Shrubs aromatic, coffee wild, or tea,
Nutmeg, or cinnamon, or fiery clove,
Unapt to feed the fleece. The food of wool
Is grass or herbage soft, that ever blooms
In temp'rate air, in the delicious downs
Of Albion, on the banks of all her streams.

Of grasses are unnumber'd kinds, and all
(Save where foul waters linger on the turf)
Salubrious. Early mark, when tepid gleams
Oft mingle with the pearls of summer show'rs,
And swell too hastily the tender plains:
Then snatch away thy sheep; beware the rot;
And with detersive bay-salt rub their mouths;
Or urge them on a barren bank to feed,

In hunger's kind distress, on tedded hay;
Or to the marish guide their easy steps,
If near thy tufted crofts the broad sea spreads.
Sagacious care foreacts: when strong disease
Breaks in, and stains the purple streams of health,
Hard is the strife of art: the coughing pest
From their green pasture sweeps whole flocks away.

That dire distemper sometimes may the swain,
Though late, discern; when, on the lifted lid,
Or visual orb, the turgid veins are pale;
The swelling liver then her putrid store
Begins to drink: ev'n yet thy skill exert,
Nor suffer weak despair to fold thy arms:
Again detersive salt apply, or shed
The hoary med'cine o'er their arid food.

In cold stiff soils the bleaters oft complain
Of gouty ails, by shepherds term'd the halt:
Those let the neighb'ring fold, or ready crook,
Detain; and pour into their cloven feet
Corrosive drugs, deep-searching arsenic,
Dry alum, verdigris, or vitriol keen.
But if the doubtful mischief scarce appears,
'Twill serve to shift them to a drier turf,
And salt again: th' utility of salt
Teach thy slow swains: redundant humours cold
Are the diseases of the bleating kind.

Th' infectious scab, arising from extremes
Of want or surfeit, is by water cur'd
Of lime, or sodden stave-acre, or oil
Dispersive of Norwegian tar, renown'd
By virtuous Berkeley, whose benevolence
Explor'd its pow'rs, and easy med'cine thence
Sought for the poor: ye poor, with grateful voice,
Invoke eternal blessings on his head.

Sheep also pleurisies and dropsies know,
Driv'n oft from nature's path by artful man,
Who blindly turns aside, with haughty hand,
Whom sacred instinct would securely lead.
But thou, more humble swain, thy rural gates
Frequent unbar, and let thy flocks abroad,
From lea to croft, from mead to arid field;
Noting the fickle seasons of the sky.
Rain-sated pastures let them shun, and seek
Changes of herbage and salubrious flow'rs.

By their all-perfect Master inly taught,
They best their food and physic can discern;
For He, Supreme Existence, ever near,
Informs them. O'er the vivid green observe
With what a regular consent they crop,
At ev'ry fourth collection to the mouth,
Unsav'ry crow-flow'r; whether to awake
Languor of appetite with lively change,
Or timely to repel approaching ills,
Hard to determine. Thou, whom nature loves,
And with her salutary rules entrusts,
Benevolent Mackenzie, say the cause.
This truth, howe'er, shines bright to human sense;
Each strong affection of th' unconscious brute,
Each bent, each passion of the smallest mite,
Is wisely giv'n; harmonious they perform
The work of perfect reason, (blush, vain man,)
And turn the wheels of nature's vast machine.

See that thy scrip have store of healing tar,
And marking pitch and raddle; nor forget
Thy sheers true pointed, nor th' officious dog
Faithful to teach thy stragglers to return:
So mayst thou aid who lag along, or steal
Aside into the furrows or the shades,
Silent to droop; or who, at ev'ry gate,
Or hillock, rub their sores and loosen'd wool.
But rather these, the feeble of thy flock,
Banish before th' autumnal months: ev'n age
Forbear too much to favour; oft renew,
And through thy fold let joyous youth appear.

Beware the season of imperial love,
Who through the world his ardent spirit pours;
Ev'n sheep are then intrepid: the proud ram
With jealous eye surveys the spacious field;
All rivals keep aloof, or desp'rate war
Suddenly rages; with impetuous force,
And fury irresistible, they dash
Their hardy frontlets; the wide vale resounds;
The flock amaz'd stands safe afar; and oft
Each to the other's might a victim falls:

As fell of old, before that engine's sway,
Which hence Ambition imitative wrought,
The beauteous tow'rs of Salem to the dust.

Wise custom, at the fifth or sixth return,
Or ere they've past the twelfth of orient morn,
Castrates the lambkins; necessary rite,
Ere they be number'd of the peaceful herd.
But kindly watch whom thy sharp hand has griev'd,
In those rough months, that lift the turning year:
Not tedious is the office; to thy aid
Favonius hastens; soon their wounds he heals,
And leads them skipping to the flow'rs of May;
May, who allows to fold, if poor the tilth,
Like that of dreary, houseless, common fields,
Worn by the plough: but fold on fallows dry;
Enfeeble not thy flock to feed thy land:
Nor in too narrow bounds the pris'ners crowd:
Nor ope the wattled fence, while balmy morn
Lies on the reeking pasture; wait till all
The crystal dews, impearl'd upon the grass,
Are touch'd by Phœbus' beams, and mount aloft,
With various clouds to paint the azure sky.

In teasing fly-time, dank, or frosty days,
With unctuous liquids, or the lees of oil,
Rub their soft skins, between the parted locks;
Thus the Brigantes; 'tis not idle pains:
Nor is that skill despis'd, which trims their tails,
Ere summer heats, of filth and tagged wool.
Coolness and cleanliness to health conduce.

To mend thy mounds, to trench, to clear, to soil
Thy grateful fields, to medicate thy sheep,
Hurdles to weave, and cheerly shelters raise,
Thy vacant hours require: and ever learn
Quick æther's motions: oft the scene is turn'd;
Now the blue vault, and now the murky cloud,
Hail, rain, or radiance; these the moon will tell,
Each bird and beast, and these thy fleecy tribe:
When high the sapphire cope, supine they couch,
And chew the cud delighted; but, ere rain,
Eager, and at unwonted hour, they feed:
Slight not the warning; soon the tempest rolls,

Scatt'ring them wide, close rushing at the heels
Of th' hurrying o'ertaken swains: forbear
Such nights to fold; such nights be theirs to shift
On ridge or hillock; or in homesteads soft,
Or softer cotes, detain them. Is thy lot
A chill penurious turf, to all thy toils
Untractable? Before harsh winter drowns
The noisy dykes, and starves the rushy glebe,
Shift the frail breed to sandy hamlets warm:
There let them sojourn, till gay Procne skims
The thick'ning verdure, and the rising flow'rs.
And while departing Autumn all embrowns
The frequent-bitten fields; while thy free hand
Divides the tedded hay; then be their feet
Accustom'd to the barriers of the rick,
Or some warm umbrage; lest, in erring fright,
When the broad dazzling snows descend, they run
Dispers'd to ditches, where the swelling drift
Wide overwhelms: anxious, the shepherd swains
Issue with axe and spade, and, all abroad,
In doubtful aim explore the glaring waste;
And some, perchance, in the deep delve upraise,
Drooping, ev'n at the twelfth cold dreary day,
With still continued feeble pulse of life;
The glebe, their fleece, their flesh, by hunger gnaw'd.

Ah, gentle shepherd, thine the lot to tend,
Of all, that feel distress, the most assail'd,
Feeble, defenceless: lenient be thy care:
But spread around thy tend'rest diligence
In flow'ry spring-time, when the new-dropt lamb,
Tott'ring with weakness by his mother's side,
Feels the fresh world about him; and each thorn,
Hillock, or furrow, trips his feeble feet:
O guard his meek sweet innocence from all
Th' innum'rous ills, that rush around his life;
Mark the quick kite, with beak and talons prone,
Circling the skies to snatch him from the plain;
Observe the lurking crows; beware the brake,
There the sly fox the careless minute waits;
Nor trust thy neighbour's dog, nor earth, nor sky:
Thy bosom to a thousand cares divide.

Eurus oft flings his hail; the tardy fields
Pay not their promis'd food; and oft the dam
O'er her weak twins with empty udder mourns,
Or fails to guard, when the bold bird of prey
Alights, and hops in many turns around,
And tires her also turning: To her aid
Be nimble, and the weakest, in thine arms,
Gently convey to the warm cote, and oft,
Between the lark's note and the nightingale's,
His hungry bleating still with tepid milk:
In this soft office may thy children join,
And charitable habits learn in sport:
Nor yield him to himself, ere vernal airs
Sprinkle thy little croft with daisy flow'rs:
Nor yet forget him: life has rising ills:
Various as æther is the past'ral care:
Through slow experience, by a patient breast,
The whole long lesson gradual is attain'd,
By precept after precept, oft received
With deep attention: such as Nuceus sings
To the full vale near Soar's enamour'd brook,
While all is silence: sweet Hinclean swain!
Whom rude obscurity severely clasps:
The muse, howe'er, will deck thy simple cell
With purple violets and primrose flow'rs,
Well-pleas'd thy faithful lessons to repay.

Sheep no extremes can bear: both heat and cold
Spread sores cutaneous; but, more frequent, heat:
The fly-blown vermin, from their woolly nest,
Press to the tortur'd skin, and flesh, and bone,
In littleness and number dreadful foes.
Long rains in miry winter cause the halt;
Rainy luxuriant summers rot your flock;
And all excess, ev'n of salubrious food,
As sure destroys, as famine or the wolf.
Inferior theirs to man's world-roving frame,
Which all extremes in ev'ry zone endures.

With grateful heart, ye British swains, enjoy
Your gentle seasons and indulgent clime.
Lo, in the sprinkling clouds, your bleating hills
Rejoice with herbage, while the horrid rage
Of winter irresistible o'erwhelms
Th' Hyperborean tracts: his arrowy frosts,

That pierce through flinty rocks, the Lappian flies;
And burrows deep beneath the snowy world;
A drear abode, from rose-diffusing hours,
That dance before the wheels of radiant day,
Far, far remote; where, by the squalid light
Of fœtid oil inflam'd, sea monster's spume,
Or fir-wood, glaring in the weeping vault,
Twice three slow gloomy months, with various ills
Sullen he struggles; such the love of life!
His lank and scanty herds around him press,
As, hunger-stung, to gritty meal he grinds
The bones of fish, or inward bark of trees,
Their common sustenance. While ye, O swains,
Ye, happy at your ease, behold your sheep
Feed on the open turf, or crowd the tilth,
Where, thick among the greens, with busy mouths
They scoop white turnips: little care is yours;
Only, at morning hour, to interpose
Dry food of oats, or hay, or brittle straw,
The wat'ry juices of the bossy root
Absorbing: or from noxious air to screen
Your heavy teeming ewes, with wattled fence
Of furze or copse-wood, in the lofty field,
Which bleak ascends among the whistling winds.
Or, if your sheep are of Silurian breed,
Nightly to house them dry on fern or straw,
Silk'ning their fleeces. Ye, nor rolling hut,
Nor watchful dog, require; where never roar
Of savage tears the air, where careless night
In balmy sleep lies lull'd, and only wakes
To plenteous peace. Alas! o'er warmer zones
Wild terror strides: their stubborn rocks are rent;
Their mountains sink; their yawning caverns flame;
And fiery torrents roll impetuous down,
Proud cities deluging; Pompeian tow'rs,
And Herculanean, and what riotous stood
In Syrian valley, where now the Dead Sea
'Mong solitary hills infectious lies.

See the swift furies, Famine, Plague, and War,
In frequent thunders rage o'er neighb'ring realms,
And spread their plains with desolation wide:
Let your mild homesteads, ever-blooming, smile
Among embracing woods; and waft on high
The breath of plenty, from the ruddy tops
Of chimneys, curling o'er the gloomy trees,

In airy, azure ringlets, to the sky.
Nor ye by need are urg'd, as Attic swains,
And Tarentine, with skins to clothe your sheep;
Expensive toil; howe'er expedient found
In fervid climates, while from Phœbus' beams
They fled to rugged woods and tangling brakes.
But those expensive toils are now no more,
Proud tyranny devours their flocks and herds:
Nor bleat of sheep may now, nor sound of pipe,
Soothe the sweet plains of once sweet Arcady,
The shepherds' kingdom: dreary solitude
Spreads o'er Hymettus, and the shaggy vale
Of Athens, which, in solemn silence, sheds
Her venerable ruins to the dust.

The weary Arabs roam from plain to plain,
Guiding the languid herd in quest of food;
And shift their little home's uncertain scene
With frequent farewell: strangers, pilgrims all,
As were their fathers. No sweet fall of rain
May there be heard; nor sweeter liquid lapse
Of river, o'er the pebbles gliding by
In murmurs: goaded by the rage of thirst,
Daily they journey to the distant clefts
Of craggy rocks, where gloomy palms o'erhang
The ancient wells, deep sunk by toil immense,
Toil of the patriarchs, with sublime intent
Themselves and long posterity to serve.
There, at the public hour of sultry noon,
They share the bev'rage, when to wat'ring come,
And grateful umbrage, all the tribes around,
And their lean flocks, whose various bleatings fill
The echoing caverns: then is absent none,
Fair nymph or shepherd, each inspiring each
To wit, and song, and dance, and active feats;
In the same rustic scene, where Jacob won
Fair Rachel's bosom, when a rock's vast weight
From the deep dark-mouth'd well his strength remov'd,
And to her circling sheep refreshment gave.

Such are the perils, such the toils of life,
In foreign climes. But speed thy flight, my Muse;

Swift turns the year; and our unnumber'd flocks
On fleeces overgrown uneasy lie.

Now, jolly swains, the harvest of your cares
Prepare to reap, and seek the sounding caves
Of high Brigantium, where, by ruddy flames,
Vulcan's strong sons, with nervous arm, around
The steady anvil and the glaring mass,
Clatter their heavy hammers down by turns,
Flatt'ning the steel: from their rough hands receive
The sharpen'd instrument, that from the flock
Severs the fleece. If verdant elder spreads
Her silver flow'rs; if humble daisies yield
To yellow crow-foot, and luxuriant grass,
Gay shearing-time approaches. First, howe'er,
Drive to the double fold, upon the brim
Of a clear river, gently drive the flock,
And plunge them one by one into the flood;
Plung'd in the flood, not long the struggler sinks,
With his white flakes, that glisten through the tide;
The sturdy rustic, in the middle wave,
Awaits to seize him rising; one arm bears
His lifted head above the limpid stream,
While the full clammy fleece the other laves
Around, laborious, with repeated toil;
And then resigns him to the sunny bank,
Where, bleating loud, he shakes his dripping locks.

Shear them the fourth or fifth return of morn,
Lest touch of busy fly-blows wound their skin:
Thy peaceful subjects without murmur yield
Their yearly tribute: 'tis the prudent part
To cherish and be gentle, while ye strip
The downy vesture from their tender sides.
Press not too close; with caution turn the points;
And from the head in reg'lar rounds proceed:
But speedy, when ye chance to wound, with tar
Prevent the wingy swarm and scorching heat;
And careful house them, if the low'ring clouds
Mingle their stores tumultuous: through the gloom
Then thunder oft with pond'rous wheels rolls loud,
And breaks the crystal urns of heav'n: adown
Falls streaming rain. Sometimes among the steeps
Of Cambrian glades, (pity the Cambrian glades)
Fast tumbling brooks on brooks enormous swell,

And sudden overwhelm their vanish'd fields:
Down with the flood away the naked sheep,
Bleating in vain, are borne, and straw-built huts,
And rifted trees, and heavy, enormous rocks,
Down with the rapid torrent to the deep.

At shearing-time, along the lively vales,
Rural festivities are often heard:
Beneath each blooming arbour all is joy
And lusty merriment: while on the grass
The mingled youth in gaudy circles sport,
We think the golden age again return'd,
And all the fabled Dryades in dance.
Leering they bound along, with laughing air,
To the shrill pipe, and deep remurm'ring cords
Of th' ancient harp, or tabor's hollow sound.

While th' old apart, upon a bank reclin'd,
Attend the tuneful carol, softly mixt
With ev'ry murmur of the sliding wave,
And ev'ry warble of the feather'd choir;
Music of paradise! which still is heard,
When the heart listens; still the views appear
Of the first happy garden, when Content
To Nature's flow'ry scenes directs the sight.
Yet we abandon those Elysian walks,
Then idly for the lost delight repine:
As greedy mariners, whose desp'rate sails
Skim o'er the billows of the foamy flood,
Fancy they see the less'ning shores retire,
And sigh a farewell to the sinking hills.

Could I recall those notes, which once the Muse
Heard at a shearing, near the woody sides
Of blue-topp'd Wreakin. Yet the carols sweet,
Through the deep maze of the memorial cell,
Faintly remurmur. First arose in song
Hoar-headed Damon, venerable swain,
The soothest shepherd of the flow'ry vale.
“This is no vulgar scene: no palace roof
Was e'er so lofty, nor so nobly rise
Their polish'd pillars, as these aged oaks,
Which, o'er our fleecy wealth and harmless sports
Thus have expanded wide their shelt'ring arms,

Thrice told an hundred summers. Sweet Content,
Ye gentle shepherds, pillows us at night.”

“Yes, tuneful Damon, for our cares are short,
Rising and falling with the cheerful day,”
Colin reply'd, “and pleasing weariness
Soon our unaching heads to sleep inclines.
Is it in cities so? where, poets tell,
The cries of sorrow sadden all the streets,
And the diseases of intemp'rate wealth.
Alas, that any ills from wealth should rise!

“May the sweet nightingale on yonder spray,
May this clear stream, these lawns, those snow-white lambs,
Which, with a pretty innocence of look,
Skip on the green, and race in little troops;
May that great lamp, which sinks behind the hills,
And streams around variety of lights,
Recall them erring: this is Damon's wish.

“Huge Breaden's stony summit once I climb'd
After a kidling: Damon, what a scene!
What various views unnumber'd spread beneath!
Woods, tow'rs, vales, caves, dells, cliffs, and torrent floods;
And here and there, between the spiry rocks,
The broad flat sea. Far nobler prospects these,
Than gardens black with smoke in dusty towns,
Where stenchy vapours often blot the sun:
Yet flying from his quiet, thither crowds
Each greedy wretch for tardy-rising wealth,
Which comes too late; that courts the taste in vain,
Or nauseates with distempers. Yes, ye rich,
Still, still be rich, if thus ye fashion life;
And piping, careless, silly shepherds we,
We silly shepherds, all intent to feed
Our snowy flocks, and wind the sleeky fleece.”

“Deem not, howe'er, our occupation mean,”
Damon replied, “while the Supreme accounts
Well of the faithful shepherd, rank'd alike
With king and priest: they also shepherds are;
For so th' All-seeing styles them, to remind
Elated man, forgetful of his charge.”

“But haste, begin the rites: see purple Eve
Stretches her shadows: all ye nymphs and swains
Hither assemble. Pleas'd with honours due,
Sabrina, guardian of the crystal flood,

Shall bless our cares, when she by moonlight clear
Skims o'er the dales, and eyes our sleeping folds:
Or in hoar caves, around Plynlymmon's brow,
Where precious min'rals dart their purple gleams,
Among her sisters she reclines; the lov'd
Vaga, profuse of graces, Ryddol rough,
Blithe Ystwith, and Clevedoc swift of foot;
And mingles various seeds of flow'rs, and herbs,
In the divided torrents, ere they burst
Through the dark clouds, and down the mountain roll.
Nor taint-worm shall infect the yearning herds,
Nor penny-grass, nor spearwort's poisonous leaf.”

He said: with light fantastic toe, the nymphs
Thither assembled, thither ev'ry swain;
And o'er the dimpled stream a thousand flow'rs,
Pale lilies, roses, violets, and pinks,
Mix'd with the greens of burnet, mint, and thyme,
And trefoil, sprinkled with their sportive arms.

Such custom holds along th' irriguous vales,
From Wreakin's brow to rocky Dolvoryn,
Sabrina's early haunt, ere yet she fled
The search of Guendolen, her stepdame proud,
With envious hate enrag'd. The jolly cheer,
Spread on a mossy bank, untouch'd abides,
Till cease the rites: and now the mossy bank
Is gaily circled, and the jolly cheer
Dispers'd in copious measure; early fruits,
And those of frugal store, in husk or rind;
Steep'd grain, and curdled milk with dulcet cream
Soft temper'd, in full merriment they quaff,
And cast about their gibes; and some apace
Whistle to roundelays: their little ones
Look on delighted; while the mountain-woods,
And winding valleys, with the various notes
Of pipe, sheep, kine, and birds, and liquid brooks,

Unite their echoes: near at hand, the wide
Majestic wave of Severn slowly rolls
Along the deep-divided glebe: the flood,
And trading bark with low contracted sail,
Linger among the reeds and copsy banks
To listen; and to view the joyous scene.

BOOK II.

ARGUMENT.

Introduction—Recommendation of mercifulness to animals—Of the winding of wool—Diversity of wool in the fleece; skill in the assorting of it, particularly among the Dutch—The uses of each sort—Severe winters pernicious to the fleece—Directions to prevent their effects—Wool lightest in common fields; inconveniences of common fields—Vulgar errors concerning the wool of England; its real excellencies, and directions in the choice—No good wool in cold or wet pastures; yet all pastures improveable; exemplified in the drainage of Bedford Level—Britain in ancient times not esteemed for wool—Countries esteemed for wool before the Argonautic expedition—Of that expedition, and its consequences —Countries afterwards esteemed for wool—The decay of arts and sciences in the barbarous ages; their revival, first at Venice—Countries noted for wool in the present times—Wool the best of all the various materials for clothing—The wool of our island, peculiarly excellent, is the combing wool—Methods to prevent its exportation—Apology of the author for treating this subject—Bishop Blaise, the inventor of wool-combing—Of the dyeing of wool—Few dyes the natural product of England— Necessity of trade for importing them—The advantages of trade, and its utility in the moral world; exemplified in the prosperity and ruin of the elder Tyre.

Now, of the sever'd lock begin the song,
With various numbers, through the simple theme
To win attention: this, ye shepherd swains,
This is a labour. Yet, O Wray, if thou
Cease not with skilful hand to point her way,
The lark-wing'd Muse, above the grassy vale,
And hills, and woods, shall, singing, soar aloft;
And he, whom learning, wisdom, candour, grace,

Who glows with all the virtues of his sire,
Royston approve, and patronize the strain.

Through all the brute creation, none, as sheep,
To lordly man such ample tribute pay.
For him their udders yield nectareous streams:
For him their downy vestures they resign;
For him they spread the feast: ah! ne'er may he
Glory in wants, which doom to pain and death
His blameless fellow-creatures. Let disease,
Let wasted hunger, by destroying live;
And the permission use with trembling thanks,
Meekly reluctant: 'tis the brute beyond:
And gluttons ever murder, when they kill.
Ev'n to the reptile ev'ry cruel deed
Is high impiety. Howe'er, not all,
Not of the sanguinary tribe are all;
All are not savage. Come, ye gentle swains,
Like Brama's healthy sons on Indus' banks,
Whom the pure stream and garden fruits sustain,
Ye are the sons of Nature; your mild hands
Are innocent: ye, when ye shear, relieve.
Come, gentle swains, the bright unsullied locks
Collect: alternate songs shall soothe your cares,
And warbling music break from ev'ry spray.
Be faithful; and the genuine locks alone
Wrap round: nor alien flake, nor pitch enfold:
Stain not your stores with base desire to add
Fallacious weight: nor yet, to mimic those,
Minute and light, of sandy Urchinfield,
Lessen, with subtle artifice, the fleece:
Equal the fraud. Nor interpose delay,
Lest busy æther through the open wool
Debilitating pass, and ev'ry film
Ruffle and sully with the valley's dust.
Guard, too, from moisture, and the fretting moth
Pernicious: she, in gloomy shade conceal'd,
Her lab'rinth cuts, and mocks the comber's care.
But in loose locks of fells she most delights,
And feeble fleeces of distemper'd sheep,
Whither she hastens, by the morbid scent
Allur'd; as the swift eagle to the fields
Of slaught'ring war, or carnage: such apart
Keep for their proper use. Our ancestors
Selected such, for hospitable beds

To rest the stranger, or the gory chief,
From battle, or the chase of wolves, return'd.

When many-colour'd ev'ning sinks behind
The purple woods and hills, and opposite
Rises, full-orb'd, the silver harvest-moon,
To light th' unwearied farmer, late afield
His scatter'd sheaves collecting; then expect
The artists, bent on speed, from pop'lous Leeds,
Norwich, or Froome; they traverse ev'ry plain,
And ev'ry dale, where farm or cottage smokes:
Reject them not; and let the season's price
Win thy soft treasures: let the bulky wain
Through dusty roads roll nodding; or the bark,
That silently adown the cerule stream
Glides with white sails, dispense the downy freight
To copsy villages on either side,
And spiry towns, where ready diligence,
The grateful burden to receive, awaits,
Like strong Briareus, with his hundred hands.

In the same fleece diversity of wool
Grows intermingled, and excites the care
Of curious skill to sort the sev'ral kinds.
But in this subtle science none exceed
Th' industrious Belgians, to the work who guide
Each feeble hand of want: their spacious domes
With boundless hospitality receive
Each nation's outcasts: there the tender eye
May view the maim'd, the blind, the lame, employ'd,
And unrejected age; ev'n childhood there
Its little fingers turning to the toil
Delighted; nimbly, with habitual speed,
They sever lock from lock, and long, and short,
And soft, and rigid, pile in sev'ral heaps.

This the dusk hatter asks; another shines,
Tempting the clothier; that the hosier seeks;
The long bright lock is apt for airy stuffs;
But often it deceives the artist's care,
Breaking unuseful in the steely comb;
For this long spongy wool no more increase
Receives, while Winter petrifies the fields;
The growth of Autumn stops; and what though Spring
Succeeds with rosy finger, and spins on
The texture? yet in vain she strives to link
The silver twine to that of Autumn's hand.
Be then the swain advis'd to shield his flocks
From Winter's dead'ning frosts and whelming snows:
Let the loud tempest rattle on the roof,
While they, secure within, warm cribs enjoy,
And swell their fleeces, equal to the worth
Of cloth'd Apulian, by soft warmth improv'd:
Or let them inward heat and vigour find,
By food of cole or turnip, hardy plants.
Besides, the lock of one continued growth
Imbibes a clearer and more equal dye.

But lightest wool is theirs, who poorly toil,
Through a dull round, in unimproving farms
Of common-fields: inclose, inclose, ye swains;
Why will you joy in common-field, where pitch,
Noxious to wool, must stain your motley flock,
To mark your property? The mark dilates,
Enters the flake depreciated, defil'd,
Unfit for beauteous tint: besides, in fields
Promiscuous held, all culture languishes;
The glebe, exhausted, thin supply receives;
Dull waters rest upon the rushy flats
And barren furrows: none the rising grove
There plants for late posterity, nor hedge
To shield the flock, nor copse for cheering fire;
And, in the distant village, ev'ry hearth
Devours the grassy sward, the verdant food
Of injur'd herds and flocks, or what the plough
Should turn and moulder for the bearded grain:
Pernicious habit, drawing gradual on
Increasing beggary and nature's frowns.
Add too, the idle pilf'rer easier there
Eludes detection, when a lamb or ewe
From intermingled flocks he steals; or when,

With loosened tether of his horse or cow,
The milky stalk of the tall green-ear'd corn,
The year's slow-rip'ning fruit, the anxious hope
Of his laborious neighbour he destroys.

There are, who over-rate our spongy stores,
Who deem that nature grants no clime but ours,
To spread upon its fields the dews of heaven,
And feed the silky fleece; that card, nor comb,
The hairy wool of Gaul can e'er subdue,
To form the thread, and mingle in the loom,
Unless a third from Britain swell the heap:
Illusion all: though of our sun and air
Not trivial is the virtue: nor their fruit,
Upon our snowy flocks, of small esteem;
The grain of brightest tincture none so well
Imbibes: the wealthy Gobelins must to this
Bear witness, and the costliest of their looms.

And though, with hue of crocus or of rose,
No pow'r of subtle food, or air, or soil,
Can dye the living fleece; yet 'twill avail
To note their influence in the tinging vase.
Therefore from herbage of old-pastur'd plains,
Chief from the matted turf of azure marle,
Where grow the whitest locks, collect thy stores.
Those fields regard not, through whose recent turf
The miry soil appears: not ev'n the streams
Of Yare, or silver Stroud, can purify
Their frequent-sully'd fleece; nor what rough winds,
Keen-biting on tempestuous hills, imbrown.

Yet much may be perform'd, to check the force
Of nature's rigor: the high heath, by trees
Warm-shelter'd, may despise the rage of storms:
Moors, bogs, and weeping fens, may learn to smile,
And leave in dykes their soon-forgotten tears.
Labour and art will ev'ry aim achieve
Of noble bosoms. Bedford Level, erst
A dreary pathless waste, the coughing flock
Was wont with hairy fleeces to deform;
And, smiling with her lure of summer flow'rs,
The heavy ox, vain-struggling, to ingulph;
Till one, of that high-honour'd patriot name,
Russel, arose, who drain'd the rushy fen,
Confin'd the waves, bid groves and gardens bloom,
And through his new creation led the Ouze,
And gentle Camus, silver-winding streams:

Godlike beneficence: from chaos drear
To raise the garden and the shady grove.

But see Ierne's moors and hideous bogs,
Immeasurable tract. The traveller
Slow tries his mazy step on th' yielding tuft,
Shudd'ring with fear: Ev'n such perfidious wilds,
By labour won, have yielded to the comb
The fairest length of wool. See Deeping fens,
And the long lawns of Bourn. 'Tis Art and Toil
Gives Nature value, multiplies her stores,
Varies, improves, creates: 'tis Art and Toil
Teaches her woody hills with fruits to shine,
The pear and tasteful apple: decks with flow'rs
And foodful pulse the fields, that often rise,
Admiring to behold their furrows wave
With yellow corn. What changes cannot Toil,
With patient Art, effect? There was a time,
When other regions were the swain's delight,
And shepherdless Britannia's rushy vales,
Inglorious, neither trade nor labour knew,
But of rude baskets, homely rustic gear,
Wov'n of the flexile willow; till, at length,
The plains of Sarum open'd to the hand
Of patient culture, and, o'er sinking woods,
High Cotswold show'd her summits. Urchinfield,
And Lemster's crofts, beneath the pheasant's brake,
Long lay unnoted. Toil new pasture gives;
And, in the regions oft of active Gaul,
O'er lessening vineyards spread the growing turf.

In eldest times, when kings and hardy chiefs
In bleating sheepfolds met, for purest wool
Phœnicia's hilly tracts were most renown'd,
And fertile Syria's and Judæ's land,
Hermon, and Seir, and Hebron's brooky sides;
Twice with the murex, crimson hue, they ting'd
The shining fleeces: hence their gorgeous wealth;
And hence arose the walls of ancient Tyre.

Next busy Colchis, bless'd with frequent rains,
And lively verdure (who the lucid stream
Of Phasis boasted, and a portly race
Of fair inhabitants) improv'd the fleece;
When, o'er the deep by flying Phryxus brought,
The fam'd Thessalian ram enrich'd her plains.

This rising Greece with indignation view'd,
And youthful Jason an attempt conceiv'd
Lofty and bold: along Peneus' banks,
Around Olympus' brows, the Muses' haunts,
He rous'd the brave to redemand the fleece.
Attend, ye British swains, the ancient song.
From ev'ry region of Ægea's shore
The brave assembled; those illustrious twins,
Castor and Pollux; Orpheus, tuneful bard;
Zetes and Calais, as the wind in speed;
Strong Hercules; and many a chief renown'd.

On deep Iolcos' sandy shore they throng'd,
Gleaming in armour, ardent of exploits;
And soon, the laurel cord and the huge stone
Up-lifting to the deck, unmoor'd the bark;
Whose keel, of wondrous length, the skilful hand
Of Argus fashion'd for the proud attempt;
And in th' extended keel a lofty mast
Up-rais'd, and sails full-swelling; to the chiefs
Unwonted objects: now, first now they learn'd
Their bolder steerage over ocean wave,
Led by the golden stars, as Chiron's art
Had mark'd the sphere celestial. Wide abroad
Expands the purple deep; the cloudy isles,
Scyros, and Scopelos, and Icos, rise,
And Halonesos: soon huge Lemnos heaves
Her azure head above the level brine,
Shakes off her mists, and brightens all her cliffs:
While they, her flatt'ring creeks and op'ning bow'rs
Cautious approaching, in Myrina's port
Cast out the cabled stone upon the strand.
Next to the Mysian shore they shape their course,
But with too eager haste: in the white foam
His oar Alcides breaks; howe'er, not long
The chance detains; he springs upon the shore,
And, rifting from the roots a tap'ring pine,
Renews his stroke. Between the threat'ning tow'rs
Of Hellespont they ply the rugged surge,
To Hero's and Leander's ardent love
Fatal: then smooth Propontis' wid'ning wave,
That like a glassy lake expands, with hills,
Hills above hills, and gloomy woods, begirt.
And now the Thracian Bosphorus they dare,
Till the Symplegades, tremendous rocks,

Threaten approach; but they, unterrified,
Through the sharp-pointed cliffs and thund'ring floods
Cleave their bold passage: nathless by the crags
And torrents sorely shatter'd: as the strong
Eagle or vulture, in th' entangling net
Involv'd, breaks through, yet leaves his plumes behind.
Thus, through the wide waves, their slow way they force
To Thynia's hospitable isle. The brave
Pass many perils, and to fame by such
Experience rise. Refresh'd, again they speed
From cape to cape, and view unnumber'd streams,
Halys, with hoary Lycus, and the mouths
Of Asparus and Glaucus, rolling swift
To the broad deep their tributary waves;
Till in the long-sought harbour they arrive
Of golden Phasis. Foremost on the strand
Jason advanc'd: the deep capacious bay,
The crumbling terrace of the marble port,
Wond'ring he view'd, and stately palace-domes,
Pavilions proud of luxury: around,
In ev'ry glitt'ring hall, within, without,
O'er all the timbrel-sounding squares and streets,
Nothing appear'd but luxury, and crowds
Sunk in deep riot. To the public weal
Attentive none he found: for he, their chief
Of shepherds, proud Æetes, by the name
Sometimes of king distinguish'd, 'gan to slight
The shepherd's trade, and turn to song and dance:
Ev'n Hydrus ceas'd to watch; Medea's songs
Of joy, and rosy youth, and beauty's charms,
With magic sweetness lull'd his cares asleep,
Till the bold heroes grasp'd the golden fleece.
Nimbly they wing'd the bark, surrounded soon
By Neptune's friendly waves: secure they speed
O'er the known seas, by ev'ry guiding cape,
With prosperous return. The myrtle shores,
And glassy mirror of Iolcos' lake,
With loud acclaim receiv'd them. Ev'ry vale,
And ev'ry hillock, touch'd the tuneful stops
Of pipes unnumber'd, for the ram regain'd.

Thus Phasis lost his pride: his slighted nymphs
Along the with'ring dales and pastures mourn'd;

The trade-ship left his streams; the merchant shunn'd
His desert borders: each ingenious Art,
Trade, Liberty, and Affluence, all retir'd,
And left to Want and Servitude their seats;
Vile successors! and gloomy Ignorance
Following, like dreary night, whose sable hand
Hangs on the purple skirts of flying Day.

Sithence the fleeces of Arcadian plains,
And Attic, and Thessalian, bore esteem;
And those in Grecian colonies dispers'd,
Caria and Doris, and Iönia's coast,
And fam'd Tarentum, where Galesus' tide,
Rolling by ruins hoar of ancient towns,
Through solitary valleys seeks the sea.
Or green Altinum, by an hundred Alps
High-crown'd, whose woods and snowy peaks aloft
Shield her low plains from the rough northern blast.
Those, too, of Bœtica's delicious fields,
With golden fruitage bless'd of highest taste,
What need I name? The Turdetanian tract,
Or rich Coraxus, whose wide looms unroll'd
The finest webs? where scarce a talent weigh'd
A ram's equivalent. Then only tin
To late-improv'd Britannia gave renown.

Lo, the revolving course of mighty Time,
Who loftiness abases, tumbles down
Olympus' brow, and lifts the lowly vale.
Where is the majesty of ancient Rome,
The throng of heroes in her splendid streets,
The snowy vest of peace, or purple robe,
Slow trail'd triumphal? Where the Attic fleece,
And Tarentine, in warmest litter'd cotes,
Or sunny meadows, cloth'd with costly care?
All in the solitude of ruin lost,
War's horrid carnage, vain ambition's dust.

Long lay the mournful realms of elder fame
In gloomy desolation, till appear'd
Beauteous Venetia, first of all the nymphs,
Who from the melancholy waste emerg'd:
In Adria's gulph her clotted locks she lav'd,
And rose another Venus: each soft joy,
Each aid of life, her busy wit restor'd;
Science reviv'd, with all the lovely arts,
And all the graces. Restituted trade
To ev'ry virtue lent his helping stores,

And clear'd the vales around; again the pipe,
And bleating flocks, awak'd the echoing lawns.

The glossy fleeces now of prime esteem
Soft Asia boasts, where lovely Cassimere,
Within a lofty mound of circling hills,
Spreads her delicious stores; woods, rocks, caves, lakes,
Hills, lawns, and winding streams; a region term'd
The paradise of Indus. Next, the plains
Of Lahor, by that arbour stretch'd immense,
Through many a realm, to Agra, the proud throne
Of India's worshipped prince, whose lust is law:
Remote dominions; nor to ancient fame
Nor modern known, till public-hearted Roe,
Faithful, sagacious, active, patient, brave,
Led to their distant climes advent'rous Trade.

Add too the silky wool of Libyan lands,
Of Caza's bow'ry dales, and brooky Caus,
Where lofty Atlas spreads his verdant feet,
While in the clouds his hoary shoulders bend.
Next proud Iberia glories in the growth
Of high Castile, and mild Segovian glades.

And beauteous Albion, since great Edgar chas'd
The prowling wolf, with many a lock appears
Of silky lustre; chief, Siluria, thine;
Thine, Vaga, favour'd stream; from sheep minute
On Cambria bred: a pound o'erweighs a fleece.
Gay Epsom's too, and Banstead's, and what gleams
On Vecta's isle, that shelters Albion's fleet,
With all its thunders: or Salopian stores,
Those which are gather'd in the fields of Clun:
High Cotswold also 'mong the shepherd swains
Is oft remembered, though the greedy plough
Preys on its carpet: He, whose rustic Muse
O'er heath and craggy holt her wing display'd,
And sung the bosky bourns of Alfred's shires,
Has favour'd Cotswold with luxuriant praise.

Need we the levels green of Lincoln note,
Or rich Leicestria's early plains, for length
Of whitest locks and magnitude of fleece
Peculiar; envy of the neighb'ring realms?
But why recount our grassy lawns alone,
While ev'n the tillage of our cultur'd plains,
With bossy turnip, and luxuriant cole,
Learns through the circling year their flocks to feed.

Ingenious Trade, to clothe the naked world,
Her soft materials, not from sheep alone,
From various animals, reeds, trees, and stones,
Collects sagacious: in Eubœa's isle
A wond'rous rock is found, of which are wov'n
Vests incombustible: Batavia, flax;
Siam's warm marish yields the fissile cane;
Soft Persia, silk; Balasor's shady hills
Tough bark of trees; Peruvian Pito, grass;
And ev'ry sultry clime the snowy down
Of cotton, bursting from its stubborn shell
To gleam amid the verdure of the grove.
With glossy hair of Tibet's shaggy goat
Are light tiaras wov'n, that wreathe the head,
And airy float behind: the beaver's flix
Gives kindliest warmth to weak enervate limbs,
When the pale blood slow rises through the veins.
Still shall o'er all prevail the shepherd's stores,
For num'rous uses known: none yield such warmth,
Such beauteous hues receive, so long endure;
So pliant to the loom, so various, none.

Wild rove the flocks, no burdening fleece they bear
In fervid climes: nature gives nought in vain.
Carmenian wool on the broad tail alone
Resplendent swells, enormous in its growth:
As the sleek ram from green to green removes,
On aiding wheels his heavy pride he draws,
And glad resigns it for the hatter's use.
Ev'n in the new Columbian world appears
The woolly covering: Apacheria's glades,
And Canses, echo to the pipes and flocks

Of foreign swains. While time shakes down his sands,
And works continual change, be none secure:
Quicken your labours, brace your slack'ning nerves,
Ye Britons; nor sleep careless on the lap
Of bounteous nature; she is elsewhere kind.
See Mississippi lengthen on her lawns,
Propitious to the shepherds: see the sheep
Of fertile Arica, like camels form'd;
Which bear huge burdens to the sea-beat shore,
And shine with fleeces soft as feathery down.

Coarse Bothnic locks are not devoid of use;
They clothe the mountain carl, or mariner
Lab'ring at the wet shrouds, or stubborn helm,
While the loud billows dash the groaning deck.
All may not Stroud's or Taunton's vestures wear:
Nor what, from fleece Ratæan, mimic flow'rs
Of rich Damascus: many a texture bright
Of that material in Prætorium wov'n,
Or in Norvicum, cheats the curious eye.

If any wool peculiar to our isle
Is giv'n by nature, 'tis the comber's lock,
The soft, the snow-white, and the long-grown flake.
Hither be turn'd the public's wakeful eye,
This golden fleece to guard, with strictest watch,
From the dark hand of pilf'ring Avarice,
Who, like a spectre, haunts the midnight hour,
When Nature wide around him lies supine
And silent, in the tangles soft involv'd
Of death-like sleep: he then the moment marks,
While the pale moon illumes the trembling tide,
Speedy to lift the canvas, bend the oar,
And waft his thefts to the perfidious foe.

Happy the patriot, who can teach the means
To check his frauds, and yet untroubled leave
Trade's open channels. Would a gen'rous aid
To honest toil, in Cambria's hilly tracts,
Or where the Lune or Coker wind their streams,
Be found sufficient? Far, their airy fields,
Far from infectious luxury arise.
O might their mazy dales, and mountain sides,
With copious fleeces of Ierne shine,
And gulphy Caledonia, wisely bent

On wealthy fisheries and flaxen webs;
Then would the sister realms, amid their seas,
Like the three Graces in harmonious fold,
By mutual aid enhance their various charms,
And bless remotest climes—To this lov'd end
Awake, Benevolence; to this lov'd end,
Strain all thy nerves, and ev'ry thought explore.
Far, far away, whose passions would immure,
In your own little hearts, the joys of life;
(Ye worms of pride) for your repast alone,
Who claim all Nature's stores, woods, waters, meads,
All her profusion; whose vile hands would grasp
The peasant's scantling, the weak widow's mite,
And in the sepulchre of Self entomb
Whate'er ye can, whate'er ye cannot use.
Know, for superior ends th' Almighty Power
(The Power, whose tender arms embrace the worm)
Breathes o'er the foodful earth the breath of life,
And forms us manifold; allots to each
His fair peculiar; wisdom, wit, and strength;
Wisdom, and wit, and strength, in sweet accord,
To aid, to cheer, to counsel, to protect,
And twist the mighty bond. Thus feeble man,
With man united, is a nation strong;
Builds tow'ry cities, satiates ev'ry want,
And makes the seas profound, and forests wild,
The gardens of his joys. Man, each man's born
For the high business of the public good.

For me, 'tis mine to pray, that men regard
Their occupation with an honest heart,
And cheerful diligence: like the useful bee,
To gather for the hive not sweets alone,
But wax, and each material; pleas'd to find
Whate'er may soothe distress, and raise the fall'n,
In life's rough race: O be it as my wish!
'Tis mine to teach th' inactive hand to reap
Kind Nature's bounties, o'er the globe diffus'd.

For this I wake the weary hours of rest;
With this desire, the merchant I attend;
By this impell'd, the shepherd's hut I seek,
And, as he tends his flock, his lectures hear

Attentive, pleas'd with pure simplicity,
And rules divulg'd beneficent to sheep:
Or turn the compass o'er the painted chart,
To mark the ways of traffic; Volga's stream,
Cold Hudson's cloudy straits, warm Afric's cape,
Latium's firm roads, the Ptolemean fosse,
And China's long canals. These noble works,
These high effects of civilizing trade,
Employ me, sedulous of public weal:
Yet not unmindful of my sacred charge;
Thus also mindful, thus devising good,
At vacant seasons, oft; when ev'ning mild
Purples the valleys, and the shepherd counts
His flock, returning to the quiet fold,
With dumb complacence: for Religion, this,
To give our ev'ry comfort to distress,
And follow virtue with an humble mind;
This pure religion. Thus, in elder time,
The rev'rend Blasius wore his leisure hours,
And slumbers, broken oft: Till, fill'd at length
With inspiration, after various thought,
And trials manifold, his well-known voice
Gather'd the poor, and o'er Vulcanian stoves,
With tepid lees of oil, and spiky comb,
Shew'd how the fleece might stretch to greater length,
And cast a glossier whiteness. Wheels went round;
Matrons and maids with songs reliev'd their toils;
And ev'ry loom receiv'd the softer yarn.
What poor, what widow, Blasius, did not bless,
Thy teaching hand? thy bosom, like the morn,
Op'ning its wealth? What nation did not seek,
Of thy new-modell'd wool, the curious webs?

Hence the glad cities of the loom his name
Honour with yearly festals: through their streets
The pomp, with tuneful sounds, and order just,
Denoting labour's happy progress moves,
Procession slow and solemn: first the rout;
Then servient youth, and magisterial eld;

Each after each, according to his rank,
His sway, and office, in the commonweal;
And to the board of smiling Plenty's stores
Assemble, where delicious cates and fruits
Of ev'ry clime are pil'd; and with free hand,
Toil only tastes the feast, by nerveless Ease
Unrelish'd. Various mirth and song resound;
And oft they interpose improving talk,
Divulging each to other knowledge rare,
Sparks from experience that sometimes arise
Till night weighs down the sense, or morning's dawn
Rouses to labour, man to labour born.

Then the sleek bright'ning lock, from hand to hand,
Renews its circling course: this feels the card;
That, in the comb, admires its growing length;
This, blanch'd, emerges from the oily wave;
And that, the amber tint, or ruby, drinks.

For it suffices not, in flow'ry vales,
Only to tend the flock, and shear soft wool:
Gums must be stor'd of Guinea's arid coast;
Mexican woods, and India's bright'ning salts;
Fruits, herbage, sulphurs, minerals, to stain
The fleece prepar'd, which oil-imbibing earth
Of Wooburn blanches, and keen alum-waves
Intenerate. With curious eye observe,
In what variety the tribe of salts,
Gums, ores, and liquors, eye-delighting hues
Produce, abstersive or restringent; how
Steel casts the sable: how pale pewter, fus'd
In fluid spirituous, the scarlet dye:
And how each tint is made, or mixt, or chang'd,
By mediums colourless: why is the fume
Of sulphur kind to white and azure hues,
Pernicious else: why no materials yield
Singly their colours, those except that shine
With topaz, sapphire, and cornelian rays:
And why, though Nature's face is cloth'd in green,
No green is found to beautify the fleece,
But what repeated toil by mixture gives.

To find effects, while causes lie conceal'd,
Reason uncertain tries: howe'er, kind chance
Oft with equivalent discov'ry pays
Its wand'ring efforts; thus the German sage,
Diligent Drebbel, o'er alchymic fire,
Seeking the secret source of gold, receiv'd

Of alter'd cochineal the crimson store.
Tyrian Melcartus thus (the first who brought
Tin's useful ore from Albion's distant isle,
And, for unwearied toils and arts, the name
Of Hercules acquir'd), when o'er the mouth
Of his attendant sheep-dog he beheld
The wounded murex strike a purple stain,
The purple stain on fleecy woofs he spread,
Which lur'd the eye, adorning many a nymph,
And drew the pomp of trade to rising Tyre.

Our valleys yield not, or but sparing yield,
The dyer's gay materials. Only weld,
Or root of madder, here, or purple woad,
By which our naked ancestors obscur'd
Their hardy limbs, inwrought with mystic forms,
Like Egypt's obelisks. The pow'rful sun
Hot India's zone with gaudy pencil paints,
And drops delicious tints o'er hill and dale,
Which Trade to us conveys. Not tints alone;
Trade to the good physician gives his balms;
Gives cheering cordials to th' afflicted heart;
Gives, to the wealthy, delicacies high;
Gives, to the curious, works of nature rare:
And when the priest displays, in just discourse,
Him, the all-wise Creator, and declares
His presence, pow'r, and goodness, unconfin'd,
'Tis Trade, attentive voyager, who fills
His lips with argument. To censure Trade,
Or hold her busy people in contempt,
Let none presume. The dignity and grace,
And weal, of human life, their fountains owe
To seeming imperfections, to vain wants,
Or real exigencies; passions swift
Forerunning reason; strong contrarious bents,
The steps of men dispersing wide abroad
O'er realms and seas. There, in the solemn scene,
Infinite wonders glare before their eyes,
Humiliating the mind enlarg'd; for they
The clearest sense of Deity receive,
Who view the widest prospect of his works,
Ranging the globe with Trade thro' various climes:
Who see the signatures of boundless love,
Nor less the judgments of Almighty Pow'r,
That warn the wicked, and the wretch who 'scapes
From human justice: who, astonish'd view

Etna's loud thunders and tempestuous fires;
The dust of Carthage; desert shores of Nile;
Or Tyre's abandon'd summit, crown'd of old
With stately tow'rs; whose merchants, from their isles,
And radiant thrones, assembled in her marts;
Whither Arabia, whither Kedar, brought
Their shaggy goats, their flocks and bleating lambs;
Where rich Damascus pil'd his fleeces white,
Prepar'd, and thirsty for the double tint,
And flow'ring shuttle. While th' admiring world
Crowded her streets; ah! then the hand of Pride
Sow'd imperceptible his pois'nous weed,
Which crept destructive up her lofty domes,
As ivy creeps around the graceful trunk
Of some tall oak. Her lofty domes no more,
Not ev'n the ruins of her pomp, remain;
Not ev'n the dust they sunk in; by the breath
Of the Omnipotent, offended, hurl'd
Down to the bottom of the stormy deep:
Only the solitary rock remains,
Her ancient site; a monument to those,
Who toil and wealth exchange for sloth and pride.

BOOK III.

ARGUMENT.

Introduction—Recommendation of labour—The several methods of spinning—Description of the loom, and of weaving—Variety of looms—The fulling-mill described, and the progress of the manufacture —Dyeing of cloth, and the excellence of the French in that art—Frequent negligence of our artificers—The ill consequences of idleness—Country workhouses proposed; with a description of one—Good effects of industry exemplified in the prospect of Burstal and Leeds; and the cloth market there described—Preference of the labours of the loom to other manufactures, illustrated by some comparisons—History of the art of

weaving: its removal from the Netherlands, and settlement in several parts of England—Censure of those who would reject the persecuted and the stranger—Our trade and prosperity owing to them—Of the manufacture of tapestry, taught us by the Saracens —Tapestries of Blenheim described—Different arts, procuring wealth to different countries—Numerous inhabitants, and their industry, the surest source of it—Hence a wish that our country were open to all men—View of the roads and rivers through which our manufactures are conveyed—Our navigations not far from the seats of our manufactures: other countries less happy —The difficult work of Egypt in joining the Nile to the Red Sea; and of France in attempting, by canals, a communication between the ocean and the Mediterranean—Such junctions may more easily be performed in England, and the Trent and Severn united to the Thames—Description of the Thames, and the port of London.

Proceed, Arcadian Muse, resume the pipe
Of Hermes, long disus'd, though sweet the tone,
And to the songs of nature's choristers
Harmonious. Audience pure be thy delight,
Though few: for ev'ry note which virtue wounds,
However pleasing to the vulgar herd,
To the purg'd ear is discord. Yet too oft
Has false dissembling Vice to am'rous airs
The reed apply'd, and heedless youth allur'd:
Too oft, with bolder sound, inflam'd the rage
Of horrid war. Let now the fleecy looms
Direct our rural numbers, as of old,
When plains and sheepfolds were the Muses' haunts.

So thou, the friend of ev'ry virtuous deed
And aim, though feeble, shalt these rural lays
Approve, O Heathcote, whose benevolence
Visits our valleys; where the pasture spreads,
And where the bramble; and would justly act
True charity, by teaching idle Want
And Vice the inclination to do good,
Good to themselves, and in themselves to all,
Through grateful toil. E'en Nature lives by toil:
Beast, bird, air, fire, the heav'ns, and rolling worlds,
All live by action: nothing lies at rest,
But death and ruin: man is born to care;
Fashion'd, improv'd by labour. This of old
Wise states, observing, gave that happy law,
Which doom'd the rich and needy, ev'ry rank,
To manual occupation; and oft call'd
Their chieftains from the spade, or furrowing plough,
Or bleating sheepfold. Hence utility

Through all conditions; hence the joys of health;
Hence strength of arm, and clear judicious thought;
Hence corn, and wine, and oil, and all in life
Delectable. What simple Nature yields
(And Nature does her part) are only rude
Materials, cumbers on the thorny ground;
'Tis toil that makes them wealth; that makes the fleece,
(Yet useless, rising in unshapen heaps)
Anon, in curious woofs of beauteous hue,
A vesture usefully succinct and warm,
Or, trailing in the length of graceful folds,
A royal mantle. Come, ye village nymphs,
The scatter'd mists reveal the dusky hills;
Grey dawn appears; the golden morn ascends,
And paints the glitt'ring rocks, and purple woods,
And flaming spires; arise, begin your toils;
Behold the fleece beneath the spiky comb
Drop its long locks, or from the mingling card
Spread in soft flakes, and swell the whiten'd floor.

Come, village nymphs, ye matrons, and ye maids,
Receive the soft material: with light step
Whether ye turn around the spacious wheel,
Or, patient sitting, that revolve, which forms
A narrower circle. On the brittle work
Point your quick eye; and let the hand assist
To guide and stretch the gently-less'ning thread:
Even, unknotted twine will praise your skill.

A diff'rent spinning ev'ry diff'rent web
Asks from your glowing fingers: some require
The more compact, and some the looser wreath;
The last for softness, to delight the touch
Of chamber'd delicacy; scarce the cirque
Need turn-around, or twine the length'ning flake.

There are, to speed their labour, who prefer
Wheels double-spol'd, which yield to either hand
A sev'ral line: and many yet adhere
To th' ancient distaff, at the bosom fix'd,
Casting the whirling spindle as they walk:
At home, or in the sheepfold, or the mart,
Alike the work proceeds. This method still
Norvicum favours, and the Icenian towns:

It yields their airy stuffs an apter thread.
This was of old, in no inglorious days,
The mode of spinning, when th' Egyptian prince
A golden distaff gave that beauteous nymph,
Too beauteous Helen: no uncourtly gift
Then, when each gay diversion of the fair
Led to ingenious use. But patient art,
That on experience works, from hour to hour,
Sagacious, has a spiral engine form'd,
Which, on a hundred spoles, a hundred threads,
With one huge wheel, by lapse of water, twines,
Few hands requiring; easy-tended work,
That copiously supplies the greedy loom.

Nor hence, ye nymphs, let anger cloud your brows;
The more is wrought, the more is still requir'd:
Blithe o'er your toils, with wonted song, proceed:
Fear not surcharge; your hands will ever find
Ample employment. In the strife of trade,
These curious instruments of speed obtain
Various advantage, and the diligent
Supply with exercise, as fountains sure,
Which, ever-gliding, feed the flow'ry lawn.
Nor, should the careful State, severely kind,
In ev'ry province, to the house of toil
Compel the vagrant, and each implement
Of ruder art, the comb, the card, the wheel,
Teach their unwilling hands, nor yet complain.
Yours, with the public good, shall ever rise,
Ever, while o'er the lawns, and airy downs
The bleating sheep and shepherd's pipe are heard;
While in the brook ye blanch the glist'ning fleece,
And th' am'rous youth, delighted with your toils,
Quavers the choicest of his sonnets, warm'd
By growing traffic, friend to wedded love.

The am'rous youth with various hopes inflam'd,
Now on the busy stage see him step forth,
With beating breast: high-honour'd he beholds
Rich industry. First, he bespeaks a loom:
From some thick wood the carpenter selects
A slender oak, or beech of glossy trunk,
Or saplin ash: he shapes the sturdy beam,
The posts, and treadles; and the frame combines.
The smith, with iron screws, and plated hoops,
Confirms the strong machine, and gives the bolt

That strains the roll. To these the turner's lathe
And graver's knife, the hollow shuttle add.
Various professions in the work unite:
For each on each depends. Thus he acquires
The curious engine, work of subtle skill;
Howe'er in vulgar use around the globe
Frequent observ'd, of high antiquity
No doubtful mark: th' advent'rous voyager,
Toss'd over ocean to remotest shores,
Hears on remotest shores the murm'ring loom;
Sees the deep-furrowing plough, and harrow'd field,
The wheel-mov'd waggon, and the discipline
Of strong-yok'd steers. What needful art is new?

Next, the industrious youth employs his care
To store soft yarn; and now he strains the warp
Along the garden-walk, or highway side,
Smoothing each thread; now fits it to the loom,
And sits before the work: from hand to hand
The thready shuttle glides along the lines,
Which open to the woof, and shut altern:
And ever and anon, to firm the work,
Against the web is driv'n the noisy frame,
That o'er the level rushes, like a surge,
Which, often dashing on the sandy beach,
Compacts the trav'ller's road: from hand to hand
Again, across the lines oft op'ning, glides
The thready shuttle, while the web apace
Increases, as the light of eastern skies
Spread by the rosy fingers of the morn;
And all the fair expanse with beauty glows.

Or if the broader mantle be the task,
He chooses some companion to his toil.
From side to side, with amicable aim,
Each to the other darts the nimble bolt,
While friendly converse, prompted by the work,
Kindles improvement in the op'ning mind.

What need we name the sev'ral kinds of looms?
Those delicate, to whose fair-colour'd threads
Hang figur'd weights, whose various numbers guide
The artist's hand: he, unseen flow'rs, and trees,
And vales, and azure hills, unerring works.
Or that, whose num'rous needles, glitt'ring bright,

Weave the warm hose to cover tender limbs:
Modern invention: modern is the want.

Next, from the slacken'd beam the woof unroll'd,
Near some clear-sliding river, Aire or Stroud,
Is by the noisy fulling-mill receiv'd;
Where tumbling waters turn enormous wheels,
And hammers, rising and descending, learn
To imitate the industry of man.

Oft the wet web is steep'd, and often rais'd,
Fast-dripping, to the river's grassy bank;
And sinewy arms of men, with full-strain'd strength,
Wring out the latent water; then, up-hung
On rugged tenters, to the fervid sun
Its level surface, reeking, it expands;
Still bright'ning in each rigid discipline,
And gath'ring worth; as human life, in pains,
Conflicts, and troubles. Soon the clothier's shears
And burler's thistle skim the surface sheen.
The round of work goes on, from day to day,
Season to season. So the husbandman
Pursues his cares; his plough divides the glebe;
The seed is sown; rough rattle o'er the clods
The harrow's teeth; quick weeds his hoe subdues;
The sickle labours, and the slow team strains;
Till grateful harvest-home rewards his toils.

Th' ingenious artist, learn'd in drugs, bestows
The last improvement; for th' unlabour'd fleece
Rare is permitted to imbibe the dye.
In penetrating waves of boiling vats
The snowy web is steep'd, with grain of weld,
Fustic, or logwood mix'd, or cochineal,
Or the dark purple pulp of Pictish woad,
Of stain tenacious, deep as summer skies,
Like those that canopy the bow'rs of Stow
After soft rains, when birds their notes attune,
Ere the melodious nightingale begins.

From yon broad vase behold the saffron woofs
Beauteous emerge; from these the azure rise;
This glows with crimson; that the auburn holds;
These shall the prince with purple robes adorn;
And those the warrior mark, and those the priest.

Few are the primal colours of the art;
Five only; black, and yellow, blue, brown, red;
Yet hence innumerable hues arise.

That stain alone is good which bears unchang'd
Dissolving water's, and calcining sun's,

And thieving air's attacks. How great the need,
With utmost caution to prepare the woof,
To seek the best-adapted dyes, and salts,
And purest gums! since your whole skill consists
In op'ning well the fibres of the woof,
For the reception of the beauteous dye,
And wedging ev'ry grain in ev'ry pore,
Firm as a diamond in rich gold enchas'd.

But what the pow'rs, which lock them in the web;
Whether incrusting salts, or weight of air,
Or fountain-water's cold contracting wave,
Or all combin'd, it well befits to know.
Ah! wherefore have we lost our old repute?
And who inquires the cause, why Gallia's sons
In depth and brilliancy of hues excel?
Yet yield not, Britons; grasp in ev'ry art
The foremost name. Let others tamely view,
On crowded Smyrna's and Byzantium's strand,
The haughty Turk despise their proffer'd bales.

Now see, o'er vales, and peopled mountain-tops,
The welcome traders gath'ring ev'ry web
Industrious, ev'ry web too few. Alas!
Successless oft their industry, when cease
The loom and shuttle in the troubled streets;
Their motion stopt by wild Intemperance,
Toil's scoffing foe, who lures the giddy rout
To scorn their task-work, and to vagrant life
Turns their rude steps; while Misery, among
The cries of infants, haunts their mould'ring huts.

O when, through ev'ry province, shall be rais'd
Houses of labour, seats of kind constraint,
For those who now delight in fruitless sports,
More than in cheerful works of virtuous trade,
Which honest wealth would yield, and portion due
Of public welfare? Ho, ye poor! who seek,
Among the dwellings of the diligent,
For sustenance unearn'd; who stroll abroad
From house to house, with mischievous intent,
Feigning misfortune: Ho, ye lame! ye blind!
Ye languid limbs, with real want oppress'd,
Who tread the rough highways, and mountains wild,
Through storms, and rains, and bitterness of heart;
Ye children of Affliction! be compell'd
To happiness: the long-wish'd daylight dawns,
When charitable rigour shall detain
Your step-bruis'd feet. Ev'n now the sons of Trade,

Where'er their cultivated hamlets smile,
Erect the mansion: here soft fleeces shine;
The card awaits you, and the comb, and wheel:
Here shroud you from the thunder of the storm;
No rain shall wet your pillow: here abounds
Pure bev'rage; here your viands are prepar'd;
To heal each sickness the physician waits,
And priest entreats to give your Maker praise.

Behold, in Calder's vale, where wide around
Unnumber'd villas creep the shrubby hills,
A spacious dome for this fair purpose rise.
High o'er the open gates, with gracious air,
Eliza's image stands. By gentle steps
Up-rais'd, from room to room we slowly walk,
And view with wonder, and with silent joy,
The sprightly scene; where many a busy hand,
Where spoles, cards, wheels, and looms, with motion quick,
And ever-murm'ring sound, th' unwonted sense
Wrap in surprise. To see them all employ'd,
All blithe, it gives the spreading heart delight,
As neither meats, nor drinks, nor aught of joy
Corporeal, can bestow. Nor less they gain
Virtue than wealth, while, on their useful works
From day to day intent, in their full minds
Evil no place can find. With equal scale
Some deal abroad the well-assorted fleece;
These card the short, those comb the longer flake;
Others the harsh and clotted lock receive,
Yet sever and refine with patient toil,
And bring to proper use. Flax too, and hemp,
Excite their diligence. The younger hands
Ply at the easy work of winding yarn
On swiftly-circling engines, and their notes
Warble together, as a choir of larks:
Such joy arises in the mind employ'd.
Another scene displays the more robust,
Rasping or grinding tough Brasilian woods,
And what Campeachy's disputable shore
Copious affords to tinge the thirsty web;
And the Caribbee isles, whose dulcet canes

Equal the honey-comb. We next are shown
A circular machine, of new design,
In conic shape: it draws and spins a thread
Without the tedious toil of needless hands.
A wheel, invisible, beneath the floor,
To ev'ry member of th' harmonious frame
Gives necessary motion. One, intent,
O'erlooks the work: the carded wool, he says,
Is smoothly lapp'd around those cylinders,
Which, gently turning, yield it to yon cirque
Of upright spindles, which, with rapid whirl,
Spin out, in long extent, an even twine.

From this delightful mansion (if we seek
Still more to view the gifts which honest toil
Distributes) take we now our eastward course,
To the rich fields of Burstal. Wide around
Hillock and valley, farm and village, smile:
And ruddy roofs, and chimney-tops appear,
Of busy Leeds, up-wafting to the clouds
The incense of thanksgiving: all is joy;
And trade and business guide the living scene,
Roll the full cars, adown the winding Aire
Load the slow-sailing barges, pile the pack
On the long tinkling train of slow-pac'd steeds.
As when a sunny day invites abroad
The sedulous ants, they issue from their cells
In bands unnumber'd, eager for their work;
O'er high, o'er low, they lift, they draw, they haste
With warm affection to each other's aid;
Repeat their virtuous efforts, and succeed.
Thus all is here in motion, all is life:
The creaking wain brings copious store of corn:
The grazier's sleeky kine obstruct the roads:
The neat dress'd housewives, for the festal board
Crown'd with full baskets, in the field-way paths
Come tripping on; th' echoing hills repeat
The stroke of axe and hammer; scaffolds rise,
And growing edifices; heaps of stone,
Beneath the chisel, beauteous shapes assume
Of frieze and column. Some, with even line,
New streets are making in the neighb'ring fields,
And sacred domes of worship. Industry,
Which dignifies the artist, lifts the swain,
And the straw cottage to a palace turns,

Over the work presides. Such was the scene
Of hurrying Carthage, when the Trojan chief
First view'd her growing turrets. So appear
Th' increasing walls of busy Manchester,
Sheffield, and Birmingham, whose redd'ning fields
Rise and enlarge their suburbs. Lo! in throngs,
For ev'ry realm, the careful factors meet,
Whisp'ring each other. In long ranks the bales,
Like war's bright files, beyond the sight extend.
Straight, ere the sounding bell the signal strikes
Which ends the hour of traffic, they conclude
The speedy compact; and, well-pleas'd, transfer,
With mutual benefit, superior wealth
To many a kingdom's rent, or tyrant's hoard.

Whate'er is excellent in art proceeds
From labour and endurance: deep the oak
Must sink in stubborn earth its roots obscure,
That hopes to lift its branches to the skies:
Gold cannot gold appear, until man's toil
Discloses wide the mountain's hidden ribs,
And digs the dusky ore, and breaks and grinds
Its gritty parts, and laves in limpid streams,
With oft-repeated toil, and oft in fire
The metal purifies: with the fatigue,
And tedious process of its painful works,
The lusty sicken, and the feeble die.

But cheerful are the labours of the loom,
By health and ease accompany'd: they bring
Superior treasures speedier to the state
Than those of deep Peruvian mines, where slaves
(Wretched requital) drink, with trembling hand,
Pale palsy's baneful cup. Our happy swains
Behold arising, in their fatt'ning flocks,
A double wealth; more rich than Belgium's boast,
Who tends the culture of the flaxen reed;
Or the Cathayan's, whose ignobler care
Nurses the silk-worm; or of India's sons,
Who plant the cotton-grove by Ganges' stream.
Nor do their toils and products furnish more
Than gauds and dresses, of fantastic web,
To the luxurious: but our kinder toils
Give clothing to necessity; keep warm

Th' unhappy wand'rer, on the mountain wild
Benighted, while the tempest beats around.

No, ye soft sons of Ganges, and of Ind,
Ye feebly delicate, life little needs
Your fem'nine toys, nor asks your nerveless arm
To cast the strong-flung shuttle, or the spear.
Can ye defend your country from the storm
Of strong Invasion? Can ye want endure,
In the besieged fort, with courage firm?
Can ye the weather-beaten vessel steer,
Climb the tall mast, direct the stubborn helm,
'Mid wild discordant waves, with steady course?
Can ye lead out, to distant colonies,
Th' o'erflowings of a people, or your wrong'd
Brethren, by impious persecution driv'n,
And arm their breasts with fortitude to try
New regions; climes, though barren, yet beyond
The baneful pow'r of tyrants? These are deeds
To which their hardy labours well prepare
The sinewy arm of Albion's sons. Pursue,
Ye sons of Albion, with unyielding heart,
Your hardy labours: let the sounding loom
Mix with the melody of ev'ry vale;
The loom, that long-renown'd, wide-envy'd gift
Of wealthy Flandria, who the boon receiv'd
From fair Venetia; she from Grecian nymphs;
They from Phenice, who obtain'd the dole
From old Ægyptus. Thus, around the globe
The golden-footed Sciences their path
Mark, like the sun, enkindling life and joy;
And, followed close by Ignorance and Pride,
Lead day and night o'er realms. Our day arose
When Alva's tyranny the weaving arts
Drove from the fertile valleys of the Scheld,
With speedy wing, and scatter'd course they fled,
Like a community of bees, disturb'd
By some relentless swain's rapacious hand;
While good Eliza, to the fugitives
Gave gracious welcome; as wise Egypt erst
To troubled Nilus, whose nutritious flood
With annual gratitude enrich'd her meads.
Then, from fair Antwerp, an industrious train
Cross'd the smooth channel of our smiling seas;

And in the vales of Cantium, on the banks
Of Stour alighted, and the naval wave
Of spacious Medway: some on gentle Yare,
And fertile Waveney, pitch'd; and made their seats
Pleasant Norvicum, and Colcestria's towers:
Some to the Darent sped their happy way:
Berghem, and Sluys, and elder Bruges, chose
Antona's chalky plains, and stretch'd their tents
Down to Clausentum, and that bay supine
Beneath the shade of Vecta's cliffy isle.
Soon o'er the hospitable realm they spread,
With cheer reviv'd; and in Sabrina's flood,
And the Silurian Tame, their textures blanch'd:
Not undelighted with Vigornia's spires,
Nor those, by Vaga's stream, from ruins rais'd
Of ancient Ariconium; nor less pleas'd
With Salop's various scenes; and that soft tract
Of Cambria, deep-embay'd, Dimetian land,
By green hills fenc'd, by ocean's murmur lull'd;
Nurse of the rustic bard, who now resounds
The fortunes of the fleece; whose ancestors
Were fugitives from superstition's rage,
And erst from Devon thither brought the loom;
Where ivy'd walls of old Kidwelly's tow'rs,
Nodding, still on their gloomy brows project
Lancastria's arms, emboss'd in mould'ring stone.

Thus, then, on Albion's coast, the exil'd band.
From rich Menapian towns, and the green banks
Of Scheld, alighted; and, alighting, sang
Grateful thanksgiving. Yet, at times, they shift
Their habitations, when the hand of pride,
Restraint, or southern luxury, disturbs
Their industry, and urges them to vales
Of the Brigantes; where, with happier care
Inspirited, their art improves the fleece,
Which occupation erst, and wealth immense,
Gave Brabant's swarming habitants, what time
We were their shepherds only; from which state

With friendly arm they rais'd us: nathless some
Among our old and stubborn swains misdeem'd,
And envy'd, who enrich'd them; envy'd those,
Whose virtues taught the varletry of towns
To useful toil to turn the pilf'ring hand.

And still, when bigotry's black clouds arise
(For oft they sudden rise in papal realms),
They from their isle, as from some ark secure,
Careless, unpitying, view the fiery bolts
Of superstition, and tyrannic rage,
And all the fury of the rolling storm,
Which fierce pursues the suff'rers in their flight.
Shall not our gates, shall not Britannia's arms
Spread ever open to receive their flight?
A virtuous people, by distresses oft
(Distresses for the sake of truth endur'd)
Corrected, dignify'd; creating good
Wherever they inhabit: this our isle
Has oft experienc'd; witness all ye realms
Of either hemisphere, where commerce flows:
Th' important truth is stampt on every bale;
Each glossy cloth, and drape of mantle warm,
Receives th' impression; ev'ry airy woof,
Cheyney, and baize, and serge, and alepine,
Tammy, and crape, and the long countless list
Of woollen webs; and ev'ry work of steel;
And that crystalline metal, blown or fus'd,
Limpid as water dropping from the clefts
Of mossy marble: not to name the aids
Their wit has giv'n the fleece, now taught to link
With flax, or cotton, or the silk-worm's thread,
And gain the graces of variety:
Whether to form the matron's decent robe,
Or the thin-shading trail for Agra's nymphs;
Or solemn curtains, whose long gloomy folds
Surround the soft pavilions of the rich.

They too the many-colour'd Arras taught
To mimic nature, and the airy shapes
Of sportive fancy: such as oft appear
In old mosaic pavements, when the plough
Up-turns the crumbling glebe of Weldon field;
Or that, o'ershaded erst by Woodstock's bow'r,
Now grac'd by Blenheim in whose stately rooms

Rise glowing tapestries, that lure the eye
With Marlb'ro's wars: here Schellenberg exults,
Behind surrounding hills of ramparts steep,
And vales of trenches dark; each hideous pass
Armies defend; yet on the hero leads
His Britons, like a torrent, o'er the mounds.
Another scene is Blenheim's glorious field,
And the red Danube. Here, the rescu'd states
Crowding beneath his shield; there, Ramillies'
Important battle: next, the tenfold chain
Of Arleux burst, and th' adamantine gates
Of Gaul flung open to the tyrant's throne.
A shade obscures the rest—Ah, then what pow'r
Invidious from the lifted sickle snatch'd
The harvest of the plain? So lively glows
The fair delusion, that our passions rise
In the beholding, and the glories share
Of visionary battle. This bright art
Did zealous Europe learn of pagan hands,
While she assay'd with rage of holy war
To desolate their fields: but old the skill:
Long were the Phrygians' pict'ring looms renown'd;
Tyre also, wealthy seat of arts, excell'd,
And elder Sidon, in th' historic web.

Far distant Tibet in her gloomy woods
Rears the gay tent, of blended wool unwov'n,
And glutinous materials: the Chinese
Their porcelain, Japan its varnish boasts.
Some fair peculiar graces ev'ry realm,
And each from each a share of wealth acquires.

But chief by numbers of industrious hands
A nation's wealth is counted: numbers raise
Warm emulation: where that virtue dwells,
There will be traffic's seat; there will she build

Her rich emporium. Hence, ye happy swains!
With hospitality inflame your breast,
And emulation: the whole world receive,
And with their arts, their virtues deck your isle.
Each clime, each sea, the spacious orb of each,
Shall join their various stores, and amply feed
The mighty brotherhood; while ye proceed,
Active and enterprising, or to teach
The stream a naval course, or till the wild,
Or drain the fen, or stretch the long canal,
Or plough the fertile billows of the deep.
Why to the narrow circle of our coast
Should we submit our limits, while each wind
Assists the stream and sail, and the wide main
Woos us in ev'ry port? See Belgium build,
Upon the foodful brine her envy'd power;
And, half her people floating on the wave,
Expand her fishy regions. Thus our isle,
Thus only may Britannia be enlarg'd.—
But whither, by the visions of the theme
Smit with sublime delight, but whither strays
The raptur'd Muse, forgetful of her task?

No common pleasure warms the gen'rous mind,
When it beholds the labours of the loom;
How widely round the globe they are dispers'd,
From little tenements by wood or croft,
Through many a slender path, how sedulous,
As rills to rivers broad, they speed their way
To public roads, to Fosse, or Watling-street,
Or Armine, ancient works; and thence explore,
Through ev'ry navigable wave, the sea,
That laps the green earth round: through Tyne, and Tees,
Through Weare, and Lune, and merchandizing Hull,
And Swale, and Aire, whose crystal waves reflect
The various colours of the tinctur'd web:
Through Ken, swift rolling down his rocky dale,
Like giddy youth impetuous, then at Wick
Curbing his train, and, with the sober pace
Of cautious eld, meand'ring to the deep;
Through Dart and sullen Exe, whose murm'ring wave
Envies the Dune and Rother, who have won
The serge and kersie to their blanching streams;
Through Towy, winding under Merlin's tow'rs,
And Usk that, frequent among hoary rocks,
On her deep waters paints th' impending scene,

Wild torrents, crags, and woods, and mountain snows.
The northern Cambrians, an industrious tribe,
Carry their labour on pigmean steeds,
Of size exceeding not Leicestrian sheep,
Yet strong and sprightly: over hill and dale
They travel unfatigued, and lay their bales
In Salop's streets, beneath whose lofty walls
Pearly Sabrina waits them with her barks,
And spreads the swelling sheet. For no-where far
From some transparent river's naval course
Arise, and fall, our various hills and vales,
No-where far distant from the masted wharf.
We need not vex the strong laborious hand
With toil enormous, as th' Egyptian king,
Who join'd the sable waters of the Nile
From Memphis' tow'rs, to th' Erythræan gulph:
Or as the monarch of enfeebled Gaul,
Whose will imperious forc'd an hundred streams,
Through many a forest, many a spacious wild,
To stretch their scanty trains from sea to sea,
That some unprofitable skiff might float
Across irriguous dales, and hollow'd rocks.

Far easier pains may swell our gentler floods,
And through the centre of the isle conduct
To naval union. Trent and Severn's wave,
By plains alone disparted, woo to join
Majestic Thamis. With their silver urns
The nimble-footed Naiads of the springs
A wait, upon the dewy lawn, to speed
And celebrate the union; and the light
Wood-nymphs, and those who o'er the grots preside,
Whose stores bituminous, with sparkling fires,
In summer's tedious absence cheer the swains,
Long sitting at the loom; and those besides,
Who crown with yellow sheaves the farmer's hopes;
And all the genii of commercial toil:
These on the dewy lawns await, to speed
And celebrate the union, that the fleece,

And glossy web, to ev'ry port around
May lightly glide along. Ev'n now behold,
Adown a thousand floods the burden'd barks,
With white sails glistening, through the gloomy woods
Haste to their harbours. See the silver maze
Of stately Thamis, ever chequer'd o'er
With deeply-laden barges, gliding smooth
And constant as his stream: in growing pomp,
By Neptune still attended, slow he rolls
To great Augusta's mart, where lofty Trade,
Amid a thousand golden spires enthron'd,
Gives audience to the world: the strand around
Close swarms with busy crowds of many a realm.
What bales, what wealth, what industry, what fleets!
Lo, from the simple fleece how much proceeds.

BOOK IV.

THE ARGUMENT.

Our manufactures exported—Voyage through the Channel, and by the coast of Spain—View of the Mediterranean—Decay of our Turkey trade—Address to the factors there—Voyage through the Baltic—The mart of Petersburg—The ancient channels of commerce to the Indies—The modern course thither—Shores of Afric—Reflections on the slave-trade—The Cape of Good Hope, and the eastern coast of Afric—Trade to Persia and Indostan precarious through tyranny and frequent insurrections—Disputes between the French and English, on the coast of Cormandel, censured—A prospect of the Spice Islands, and of China—Traffic at Canton—Our woollen manufactures known at Pekin, by the caravans from Russia—Description of that journey—Transition to the Western hemisphere—Voyage of Raleigh—The state and advantages of our North American colonies—Severe winters in those climates; hence the passage through Hudson's Bay impracticable —Enquiries for an easier passage into the Pacific Ocean —View of the coasts of South America, and of those tempestuous seas—Lord Anson's expedition, and success against the Spaniards— The naval power of Britain consistent with the welfare of all nations—View of our probable improvements in traffic, and the distribution of our woollen manufactures over the whole globe.

Now, with our woolly treasures amply stor'd,
Glide the tall fleets into the wid'ning main,

A floating forest: ev'ry sail, unfurl'd,
Swells to the wind, and gilds the azure sky.
Meantime, in pleasing care, the pilot steers
Steady; with eye intent upon the steel,
Steady before the breeze the pilot steers:
While gaily o'er the waves the mounting prows
Dance, like a shoal of dolphins, and begin
To streak with various paths the hoary deep.
Batavia's shallow sounds by some are sought,
Or sandy Elb, or Weser, who receive
The swain's and peasant's toil with grateful hand,
Which copious gives return; while some explore
Deep Finnic gulfs, and a new shore and mart,
The bold creation of that Kesar's pow'r,
Illustrious Peter, whose magnific toils
Repair the distant Caspian, and restore
To trade its ancient ports. Soon Thanet's strand,
And Dover's chalky cliff, behind them turn.
Soon sinks away the green and level beach
Of Romney marish and Rye's silent port,
By angry Neptune clos'd, and Vecta's isle,
Like the pale moon in vapour, faintly bright.
An hundred opening marts are seen, are lost;
Devonia's hills retire, and Edgecombe mount,
Waving its gloomy groves, delicious scene.
Yet steady o'er the waves they steer: and now
The fluctuating world of waters wide,
In boundless magnitude, around them swells;
O'er whose imaginary brim, nor towns,
Nor woods, nor mountain tops, nor aught appears,
But Phœbus' orb, refulgent lamp of light,
Millions of leagues aloft: heav'n's azure vault
Bends overhead, majestic, to its base,
Uninterrupted clear circumference;
Till, rising o'er the flick'ring waves, the cape
Of Finisterre, a cloudy spot, appears.
Again, and oft, th' advent'rous sails disperse;
These to Iberia, others to the coast
Of Lusitania, th' ancient Tharsis deem'd
Of Solomon; fair regions, with the webs

Of Norwich pleas'd, or those of Manchester;
Light airy clothing for their vacant swains,
And visionary monks. We, in return
Receive Cantabrian steel, and fleeces soft,
Segovian or Castilian, far renown'd;
And gold's attractive metal, pledge of wealth,
Spur of activity, to good or ill
Pow'rful incentive; or Hesperian fruits,
Fruits of spontaneous growth, the citron bright,
The fig, and orange, and heart-cheering wine.

Those ships, from ocean broad, which voyage through
The gates of Hercules, find many seas,
And bays unnumber'd, op'ning to their keels;
But shores inhospitable oft to fraud
And rapine turn'd, or dreary tracts become
Of desolation. The proud Roman coasts,
Fall'n, like the Punic, to the dashing waves
Resign their ruins: Tiber's boasted flood,
Whose pompous moles o'erlook'd the subject deep,
Now creeps along, through brakes and yellow dust,
While Neptune scarce perceives its murm'ring rill:
Such are th' effects, when Virtue slacks her hand;
Wild Nature back returns. Along these shores
Neglected Trade with difficulty toils,
Collecting slender stores, the sun-dried grape,
Or capers from the rock, that prompt the taste
Of luxury. Ev'n Egypt's fertile strand,
Bereft of human discipline, has lost
Its ancient lustre: Alexandria's port,
Once the metropolis of trade, as Tyre,
And elder Sidon, as the Attic town,
Beautiful Athens, as rich Corinth, Rhodes,
Unhonour'd droops. Of all the num'rous marts,
That in those glitt'ring seas with splendour rose,
Only Byzantium, of peculiar site,
Remains in prosp'rous state; and Tripolis,
And Smyrna, sacred ever to the Muse.

To these resort the delegates of trade,
Social in life, a virtuous brotherhood;
And bales of softest wool from Bradford looms,
Or Stroud, dispense; yet see, with vain regret,
Their stores, once highly priz'd, no longer now,
Or sought, or valued: copious webs arrive,
Smooth-wov'n of other than Britannia's fleece,

On the throng'd strand alluring; the great skill
Of Gaul, and greater industry, prevails;
That proud imperious foe. Yet ah—'tis not—
Wrong not the Gaul; it is the foe within
Impairs our ancient marts: it is the bribe;
'Tis he who pours into the shops of trade
That impious poison: it is he who gains
The sacred seat of parliament by means,
That vitiate and emasculate the mind;
By sloth, by lewd intemp'rance, and a scene
Of riot, worse than that which ruin'd Rome.
This, this the Tartar, and remote Chinese,
And all the brotherhood of life, bewail.

Meantime (while those, who dare be just, oppose
The various pow'rs of many-headed vice),
Ye delegates of trade, by patience rise
O'er difficulties; in this sultry clime
Note what is found of use: the flix of goat,
Red-wool, and balm, and coffee's berry brown,
Or dropping gum, or opium's lenient drug;
Unnumber'd arts await them: trifles oft,
By skilful labour, rise to high esteem.
Nor what the peasant, near some lucid wave,
Pactolus, Simoïs, or Meander slow,
Renown'd in story, with his plough upturns,
Neglect; the hoary medal, and the vase,
Statue, and bust, of old magnificence
Beautiful relics: oh, could modern time
Restore the mimic art, and the clear mien
Of patriot sages, Walsinghams, and Yorkes,
And Cecils, in long-lasting stone preserve!
But mimic art and nature are impair'd—
Impair'd they seem—or in a varied dress
Delude our eyes; the world in change delights;
Change then your searches, with the varied modes
And wants of realms. Sabean frankincense
Rare is collected now: few altars smoke
Now in the idol fane: Panchaia views
Trade's busy fleets regardless pass her coast:
Nor frequent are the freights of snow-white woofs,
Since Rome, no more the mistress of the world.
Varies her garb, and treads her darken'd streets
With gloomy cowl, majestical no more.

See the dark spirit of tyrannic power.
The Thracian channel, long the road of trade
To the deep Euxine and its naval streams,

And the Mæotis, now is barr'd with chains,
And forts of hostile battlement. In aught
That joys mankind the arbitrary Turk
Delights not: insolent of rule, he spreads
Thraldom and desolation o'er his realms.

Another path to Scythia's wide domains
Commerce discovers: the Livonian gulph
Receives her sails, and leads them to the port
Of rising Petersburgh, whose splendid streets
Swell with the webs of Leeds: the Cossack there,
The Calmuc, and Mungolian, round the bales
In crowds resort, and their warm'd limbs enfold,
Delighted; and the hardy Samoid,
Rough with the stings of frost, from his dark caves
Ascends, and thither hastes, ere winter's rage
O'ertake his homeward step; and they that dwell
Along the banks of Don's and Volga's streams,
And borderers of the Caspian, who renew
That ancient path to India's climes, which fill'd
With proudest affluence the Colchian state.

Many have been the ways to those renown'd
Luxuriant climes of Indus, early known
To Memphis; to the port of wealthy Tyre;
To Tadmor, beauty of the wilderness,
Who down the long Euphrates sent her sails;
And sacred Salem, when her num'rous fleets,
From Ezion-geber, pass'd th' Arabian gulph.

But later times, more fortunate, have found
O'er ocean's open wave a surer course,
Sailing the western coast of Afric's realms,
Of Mauritania, and Nigritian tracts,
And islands of the Gorgades, the bounds,
On the Atlantic brine, of ancient trade;
But not of modern, by the virtue led
Of Gama and Columbus. The whole globe
Is now, of commerce, made the scene immense;
Which daring ships frequent, associated,
Like doves, or swallows, in th' ethereal flood,
Or, like the eagle, solitary seen.

Some, with more open course, to Indus steer:
Some coast from port to port, with various men
And manners conversant; of th' angry surge,
That thunders loud, and spreads the cliffs with foam,
Regardless, or the monsters of the deep,

Porpoise, or grampus, or the rav'nous shark,
That chase their keels; or threat'ning rock, o'erhead,
Of Atlas old; beneath the threat'ning rocks,
Reckless, they furl their sails, and, bart'ring, take
Soft flakes of wool; for in soft flakes of wool,
Like the Silurian, Atlas' dales abound.

The shores of Sus inhospitable rise,
And high Bojador; Zara too displays
Unfruitful deserts; Gambia's wave inisles
An oozy coast, and pestilential ills
Diffuses wide; behind are burning sands,
Adverse to life, and Nilus' hidden fount.

On Guinea's sultry strand, the drap'ry light
Of Manchester or Norwich is bestow'd
For clear transparent gums, and ductile wax,
And snow-white iv'ry; yet the valued trade,
Along this barb'rous coast, in telling, wounds
The gen'rous heart, the sale of wretched slaves;
Slaves by their tribes condemn'd, exchanging death
For life-long servitude; severe exchange!
These till our fertile colonies, which yield
The sugar-cane, and the Tobago-leaf,
And various new productions, that invite
Increasing navies to their crowded wharfs.

But let the man, whose rough tempestuous hours
In this advent'rous traffic are involv'd,
With just humanity of heart pursue
The gainful commerce: wickedness is blind:
Their sable chieftains may in future times
Burst their frail bonds, and vengeance execute
On cruel unrelenting pride of heart
And av'rice. There are ills to come for crimes.

Hot Guinea too gives yellow dust of gold,
Which, with her rivers, rolls adown the sides
Of unknown hills, where fiery-winged winds,
And sandy deserts rous'd by sudden storms,
All search forbid: howe'er, on either hand
Valleys and pleasant plains, and many a tract
Deem'd uninhabitable erst, are found
Fertile and populous: their sable tribes,
In shade of verdant groves, and mountains tall,
Frequent enjoy the cool descent of rain,
And soft refreshing breezes: nor are lakes
Here wanting; those a sea-wide surface spread,
Which to the distant Nile and Senegal

Send long meanders: whate'er lies beyond,
Of rich or barren, ignorance o'ercasts
With her dark mantle. Mon'motapa's coast
Is seldom visited; and the rough shore
Of Cafres, land of savage Hottentots,
Whose hands unnatural hasten to the grave
Their aged parents; what barbarity
And brutal ignorance, where social trade
Is held contemptible! Ye gliding sails,
From these inhospitable gloomy shores
Indignant turn, and to the friendly Cape,
Which gives the cheerful mariner good hope
Of prosp'rous voyage, steer: rejoice to view,
What trade, with Belgian industry, creates,
Prospects of civil life, fair towns, and lawns,
And yellow tilth, and groves of various fruits,
Delectable in husk or glossy rind:
There the capacious vase from crystal springs
Replenish, and convenient store provide,
Like ants, intelligent of future need.

See, through the fragrance of delicious airs,
That breathe the smell of balms, how traffic shapes
A winding voyage, by the lofty coast
Of Sofala, thought Ophir; in whose hills
Ev'n yet some portion of its ancient wealth
Remains, and sparkles in the yellow sand
Of its clear streams, though unregarded now;
Ophirs more rich are found. With easy course
The vessels glide! unless their speed be stopp'd
By dead calms, that oft lie on those smooth seas
While ev'ry zephyr sleeps: then the shrouds drop;
The downy feather, on the cordage hung,
Moves not; the flat sea shines like yellow gold,
Fus'd in the fire; or like the marble floor
Of some old temple wide. But where so wide,

100

In old or later time, its marble floor
Did ever temple boast as this, which here
Spreads its bright level many a league around?
At solemn distances its pillars rise,
Sofal's blue rocks, Mozambic's palmy steeps,
And lofty Madagascar's glittering shores,
Where various woods of beauteous vein and hue,
And glossy shells in elegance of form,
For Pond's rich cabinet, or Sloan's, are found.
Such calm oft checks their course, 'till this bright scene
Is brush'd away before the rising breeze,
That joys the busy crew, and speeds again
The sail full-swelling to Socotra's isle,
For aloes fam'd; or to the wealthy marts
Of Ormus or Gombroon, whose streets are oft
With caravans and tawny merchants throng'd,
From neighb'ring provinces and realms afar;
And fill'd with plenty, though dry sandy wastes
Spread naked round; so great the pow'r of trade.

Persia few ports; more happy Indostan
Beholds Surat and Goa on her coasts,
And Bombay's wealthy isle, and harbour fam'd,
Supine beneath the shade of cocoa groves.
But what avails, or many ports or few?
Where wild Ambition frequent from his lair
Starts up; while fell revenge and famine lead
To havoc, reckless of the tyrant's whip,
Which clanks along the vallies: oft in vain
The merchant seeks upon the strand whom erst,
Associated by trade, he deck'd and cloth'd;
In vain, whom rage or famine has devour'd,
He seeks; and with increas'd affection thinks
On Britain. Still howe'er Bombaya's wharfs
Pile up blue indigo, and, of frequent use,
Pungent saltpetre, woods of purple grain,
And many-colour'd saps from leaf and flow'r,
And various gums; the clothier knows their worth;
And wool resembling cotton, shorn from trees,
Not to the fleece unfriendly; whether mixt
In warp or woof, or with the line of flax,
Or softer silk's material: though its aid
To vulgar eyes appears not; let none deem

101

The fleece in any traffic unconcern'd;
By ev'ry traffic aided; while each work
Of art yields wealth to exercise the loom,
And ev'ry loom employs each hand of art.
Nor is there wheel in the machine of trade,
Which Leeds, or Cairo, Lima, or Bombay,
Helps not, with harmony, to turn around,
Though all unconscious of the union act.

Few the peculiars of Canara's realm,
Or sultry Malabar; where it behoves
The wary pilot, while he coasts their shores,
To mark o'er ocean the thick rising isles;
Woody Chaetta, Birter rough with rocks;
Green-rising Barmur, Mincoy's purple hills;
And the minute Maldivias, as a swarm
Of bees in summer on a poplar's trunk,
Clust'ring innumerable; these behind
His stern receding, o'er the clouds he views
Ceylon's grey peaks, from whose volcanos rise
Dark smoke and ruddy flame, and glaring rocks
Darted in air aloft; around whose feet
Blue cliffs ascend, and aromatic groves,
In various prospect; Ceylon also deem'd
The ancient Ophir. Next Bengala's bay,
On the vast globe the deepest, while the prow
Turns northward to the rich disputed strand
Of Cormandel, where Traffic grieves to see
Discord and Avarice invade her realms,
Portending ruinous war, and cries aloud,
“Peace, peace, ye blinded Britons, and ye Gauls;
Nation to nation is a light, a fire
Enkindling virtue, sciences, and arts:”
But cries aloud in vain. Yet wise defence,
Against Ambition's wide-destroying pride,
Madras erected, and Saint David's Fort,
And those which rise on Ganges' twenty streams,
Guarding the woven fleece, Calcutta's tow'r,
And Maldo's and Patana's: from their holds
The shining bales our factors deal abroad,
And see the country's products, in exchange,
Before them heap'd; cotton's transparent webs,
Aloes, and cassia, salutiferous drugs,
Alom, and lacque, and clouded tortoiseshell,
And brilliant diamonds, to decorate

102

Britannia's blooming nymphs. For these, o'er all
The kingdoms round, our draperies are dispers'd,
O'er Bukor, Cabul, and the Bactrian vales,
And Cassimere, and Atoc, on the stream
Of old Hydaspes, Porus' hardy realm;
And late-discover'd Tibet, where the fleece,
By art peculiar, is compress'd and wrought
To threadless drap'ry, which in conic forms,
Of various hues, their gaudy roofs adorns.

The keels, which voyage through Molucca's straits,
Amid a cloud of spicy odours sail,
From Java and Sumatra breath'd, whose woods
Yield fiery pepper, that destroys the moth
In woolly vestures: Ternate and Tidore
Give to the festal board the fragrant clove
And nutmeg, to those narrow bounds confin'd;
While gracious nature, with unsparing hand,
The needs of life o'er ev'ry region pours.

Near those delicious isles, the beauteous coast
Of China rears its summits. Know ye not,
Ye sons of Trade, that ever-flowery shore,
Those azure hills, those woods and nodding rocks?
Compare them with the pictures of your chart;
Alike the woods and nodding rocks o'erhang.
Now the tall glossy towers of porcelain,
And pillar'd pagods shine; rejoic'd they see
The port of Canton op'ning to their prows,
And in the winding of the river moor.

Upon the strand they heap their glossy bales,
And works of Birmingham, in brass or steel,
And flint, and pond'rous lead from deep cells rais'd,
Fit ballast in the fury of the storm,
That tears the shrouds, and bends the stubborn mast:
These for the artists of the fleece procure
Various materials; and for affluent life
The flavour'd tea, and glossy painted vase;
Things elegant, ill-titled luxuries,
In temp'rance us'd, delectable and good.
They too from hence receive the strongest thread
Of the green silkworm. Various is the wealth
Of that renown'd and ancient land, secure
In constant peace and commerce; till'd to th' height
Of rich fertility; where, thick as stars,

103

Bright habitations glitter on each hill,
And rock, and shady dale: ev'n on the waves
Of copious rivers, lakes, and bord'ring seas,
Rise floating villages. No wonder, when
In ev'ry province, firm and level roads,
And long canals, and navigable streams,
Ever, with ease, conduct the works of toil
To sure and speedy markets, through the length
Of many a crowded region, many a clime,
To th' imperial towers of Cambalu,
Now Pekin, where the fleece is not unknown;
Since Calder's woofs, and those of Exe and Frome,
And Yare and Avon slow, and rapid Trent,
Thither by Russic caravans are brought,
Through Scythia's num'rous regions, waste and wild,
Journey immense! which to th' attentive ear,
The Muse, in faithful notes, shall brief describe.

From the proud mart of Petersburgh, ere-while
The wat'ry seat of Desolation wide,
Issue these trading caravans, and urge,
Through dazzling snows, their dreary trackless road;
By compass steering oft from week to week,
From month to month; whole seasons view their toils.
Neva they pass, and Kesma's gloomy flood,
Volga, and Don, and Oka's torrent prone,
Threat'ning in vain; and many a cataract
In its fall stopp'd, and bound with bars of ice.

Close on the left, unnumber'd tracts they view
White with continual frost; and on the right
The Caspian lake, and ever flow'ry realms,
Though now abhorr'd, behind them turn, the haunt
Of arbitrary rule, where regions wide
Are destin'd to the sword; and on each hand
Roads hung with carcases, or under foot
Thick strown; while in their rough bewilder'd vales,
The blooming rose its fragrance breathes in vain,
And silver fountains fall, and nightingales
Attune their notes, where none are left to hear.

Sometimes o'er level ways, on easy sleds,
The gen'rous horse conveys the sons of Trade;
And ever and anon the docile dog,
And now the light rein-deer, with rapid pace
Skims over icy lakes; now slow they climb

104

Aloft o'er clouds, and then adown descend
To hollow valleys, till the eye beholds
The roofs of Tobol, whose hill-crowning walls
Shine, like the rising moon, thro' wat'ry mists:
Tobol, th' abode of those unfortunate
Exiles of angry state, and thralls of war;
Solemn fraternity! where carl, and prince,
Soldier, and statesman, and uncrested chief,
On the dark level of adversity,
Converse familiar; while, amid the cares
And toils for hunger, thirst, and nakedness,
Their little public smiles, and the bright sparks
Of trade are kindled. Trade arises oft,
And virtue, from adversity and want;
Be witness, Carthage, witness, ancient Tyre,
And thou, Batavia, daughter of distress.
This, with his hands, which erst the truncheon held,
The hammer lifts; another bends and weaves
The flexile willow; that the mattock drives:
All are employ'd; and by their works acquire
Our fleecy vestures. From their tenements,
Pleas'd and refresh'd, proceeds the caravan
Thro' lively-spreading cultures, pastures green,
And yellow tillages in op'ning woods:
Thence on, thro' Narim's wilds, a pathless road
They force, with rough entangling thorns perplext;
Land of the lazy Oztiacs, thin dispers'd,
Who, by avoiding, meet the toils they loathe,
Tenfold augmented; miserable tribe,
Void of commercial comforts; who, nor corn,
Nor pulse, nor oil, nor heart-enliv'ning wine,
Know to procure; nor spade, nor scythe, nor share,
Nor social aid; beneath their thorny bed
The serpent hisses, while in thickets nigh
Loud howls the hungry wolf. So on they fare,
And pass by spacious lakes, begirt with rocks
And azure mountains; and the heights admire
Of white Imaus, whose snow-nodding crags
Frighten the realms beneath, and from their urns
Pour mighty rivers down, th' impetuous streams
Oby, and Irtis, and Jenisca, swift,
Which rush upon the northern pole, upheave
Its frozen seas, and lift their hills of ice.

105

These rugged paths and savage landscapes pass'd,
A new scene strikes their eyes: among the clouds
Aloft they view, what seems a chain of cliffs,
Nature's proud work; that matchless work of art,
The wall of Sina, by Chihoham's pow'r,
In earliest times, erected. Warlike troops
Frequent are seen in haughty march along
Its ridge, a vast extent, beyond the length
Of many a potent empire; tow'rs and ports,
Three times a thousand, lift thereon their brows
At equal spaces, and in prospect 'round
Cities, and plains, and kingdoms, overlook.

At length the gloomy passage they attain
Of its deep-vaulted gates, whose op'ning folds
Conduct at length to Pekin's glitt'ring spires,
The destin'd mart, where joyous they arrive.

Thus are the textures of the fleece convey'd
To Sina's distant realm, the utmost bound
Of that flat floor of steadfast earth; for so
Fabled antiquity, ere peaceful Trade
Inform'd the op'ning mind of curious man.

Now to the other hemisphere, my Muse,
A new world found, extend thy daring wing.
Be thou the first of the harmonious Nine
From high Parnassus, the unweary'd toils
Of industry and valour, in that world
Triumphant, to reward with tuneful song.

Happy the voyage o'er th' Atlantic brine
By active Raleigh made, and great the joy,
When he discern'd, above the foamy surge,
A rising coast, for future colonies
Op'ning her bays, and figuring her capes,
Ev'n from the northern tropic to the pole.
No land gives more employment to the loom,
Or kindlier feeds the indigent; no land
With more variety of wealth rewards
The hand of Labour: thither, from the wrongs
Of lawless rule, the free-born spirit flies;
Thither Affliction, thither Poverty,
And Arts and Sciences: thrice happy clime,
Which Britain makes th' asylum of mankind.

But joy superior far his bosom warms,
Who views those shores in ev'ry culture dress'd;
With habitations gay, and num'rous towns,
On hill and valley, and his countrymen

106

Form'd into various states, pow'rful and rich,
In regions far remote: who from our looms
Take largely for themselves, and for those tribes
Of Indians, ancient tenants of the land,
In amity conjoin'd, of civil life
The comforts taught, and various new desires,
Which kindle arts, and occupy the poor,
And spread Britannia's flocks o'er ev'ry dale.

Ye, who the shuttle cast along the loom,
The silkworm's thread inweaving with the fleece,
Pray for the culture of the Georgian tract,
Nor slight the green savannahs, and the plains
Of Carolina, where thick woods arise
Of mulberries, and in whose water'd fields
Up springs the verdant blade of thirsty rice.
Where are the happy regions, which afford
More implements of commerce, and of wealth?

Fertile Virginia, like a vig'rous bough,
Which overshades some crystal river, spreads
Her wealthy cultivations wide around,
And, more than many a spacious realm, rewards
The fleecy shuttle: to her growing marts
The Iroquese, Cheroques, and Oubacks, come,
And quit their feath'ry ornaments uncouth,
For woolly garments; and the cheers of life,
The cheers, but not the vices, learn to taste.
Blush, Europeans, whom the circling cup
Of luxury intoxicates; ye routs,
Who, for your crimes, have fled your native land;
And ye voluptuous idle, who, in vain,
Seek easy habitations, void of care:
The sons of Nature, with astonishment
And detestation, mark your evil deeds;
And view, no longer aw'd, your nerveless arms,
Unfit to cultivate Ohio's banks.

See the bold emigrants of Acadie,
And Massachusett, happy in those arts,
That join the politics of Trade and War,
Bearing the palm in either; they appear
Better exemplars; and that hardy crew,
Who, on the frozen beach of Newfoundland,
Hang their white fish amid the parching winds:

107

The kindly fleece, in webs of Duffield woof,
Their limbs, benumb'd, enfolds with cheerly warmth,
And frieze of Cambria, worn by those, who seek,
Thro' gulphs and dales of Hudson's winding bay,
The beaver's fur, tho' oft they seek in vain,
While winter's frosty rigour checks approach,
Ev'n in the fiftieth latitude. Say why
(If ye, the travell'd sons of Commerce, know),
Wherefore lie bound their rivers, lakes, and dales,
Half the sun's annual course, in chains of ice?
While the Rhine's fertile shore, and Gallic realms,
By the same zone encircled, long enjoy
Warm beams of Phœbus, and, supine, behold
Their plains and hillocks blush with clust'ring vines.

Must it be ever thus? or may the hand
Of mighty Labour drain their gusty lakes,
Enlarge the bright'ning sky, and, peopling, warm
The op'ning valleys, and the yellowing plains?
Or, rather, shall we burst strong Darien's chain,
Steer our bold fleets between the cloven rocks,
And through the great Pacific ev'ry joy
Of civil life diffuse? Are not her isles
Num'rous and large? Have they not harbours calm,
Inhabitants, and manners? haply, too,
Peculiar sciences, and other forms
Of trade, and useful products, to exchange
For woolly vestures? 'Tis a tedious course
By the Antarctic circle: nor beyond
Those sea-wrapt gardens of the dulcet reed,
Bahama and Caribbee, may be found
Safe mole or harbour, till on Falkland's Isle
The standard of Britannia shall arise.
Proud Buenos Ayres, low-couched Paraguay,
And rough Corrientes, mark, with hostile eye,
The lab'ring vessel: neither may we trust
The dreary naked Patagonian land,
Which darkens in the wind. No traffic there,
No barter for the fleece. There angry storms
Bend their black brows, and, raging, hurl around
Their thunders. Ye advent'rous mariners,
Be firm; take courage from the brave. 'Twas there
Perils and conflicts inexpressible,
Anson, with steady undespairing breast,
Endur'd, when o'er the various globe he chas'd

108

His country's foes. Fast-gath'ring tempests rous'd
Huge ocean, and involv'd him: all around
Whirlwind, and snow, and hail, and horror: now,
Rapidly, with the world of waters, down
Descending to the channels of the deep,
He view'd th' uncover'd bottom of th' abyss;
And now the stars, upon the loftiest point
Toss'd of the sky-mix'd surges. Oft the burst
Of loudest thunder, with the dash of seas,
Tore the wild-flying sails and tumbling masts;
While flames, thick-flashing in the gloom, reveal'd
Ruins of decks, and shrouds, and sights of death.

Yet on he far'd, with fortitude his cheer,
Gaining, at intervals, slow way beneath
Del Fuego's rugged cliffs, and the white ridge,
Above all height, by op'ning clouds reveal'd,
Of Montegorda, and inaccessible
Wreck-threatening Staten-land's o'erhanging shore,
Enormous rocks on rocks, in ever-wild
Posture of falling; as when Pelion, rear'd
On Ossa, and on Ossa's tott'ring head
Woody Olympus, by the angry gods
Precipitate on earth were doom'd to fall.

At length, through ev'ry tempest, as some branch,
Which from a poplar falls into a loud
Impetuous cataract, though deep immers'd,
Yet reascends, and glides, on lake or stream,
Smooth through the valleys: so his way he won
To the serene Pacific, flood immense,
And rear'd his lofty masts, and spread his sails.
Then Paita's walls, in wasting flames involv'd,
His vengeance felt, and fair occasion gave
To show humanity and continence,
To Scipio's not inferior. Then was left
No corner of the globe secure to pride
And violence: although the far-stretch'd coast

109

Of Chili, and Peru, and Mexico,
Arm'd in their evil cause; though fell disease,
Un'bating labour, tedious time, conspir'd,
And heat inclement, to unnerve his force;
Though that wide sea, which spreads o'er half the world,
Deny'd all hospitable land or port;
Where, seasons voyaging, no road he found
To moor, no bottom in th' abyss, whereon
To drop the fast'ning anchor; though his brave
Companions ceas'd, subdu'd by toil extreme;
Though solitary left in Tinian's seas,
Where never was before the dreaded sound
Of Britain's thunder heard; his wave-worn bark
Met, fought, the proud Iberian, and o'ercame.
So fare it ever with our country's foes.

Rejoice, ye nations, vindicate the sway
Ordain'd for common happiness. Wide, o'er
The globe terraqueous, let Britannia pour
The fruits of plenty from her copious horn.
What can avail to her, whose fertile earth
By ocean's briny waves are circumscrib'd,
The armed host, and murd'ring sword of war,
And conquest o'er her neighbours? She ne'er breaks
Her solemn compacts in the lust of rule:
Studious of arts and trade, she ne'er disturbs
The holy peace of states. 'Tis her delight
To fold the world with harmony, and spread,
Among the habitations of mankind,
The various wealth of toil, and what her fleece,
To clothe the naked, and her skilful looms,
Peculiar give. Ye too, rejoice, ye swains;
Increasing commerce shall reward your cares.
A day will come, if not too deep we drink
The cup, which luxury on careless wealth,
Pernicious gift, bestows; a day will come
When, through new channels sailing, we shall clothe
The Californian coast, and all the realms
That stretch from Anian's Straits to proud Japan,

110

And the green isles, which on the left arise
Upon the glassy brine, whose various capes
Not yet are figur'd on the sailor's chart:
Then ev'ry variation shall be told
Of the magnetic steel, and currents mark'd,
Which drive the heedless vessel from her course.

That portion too of land, a tract immense,
Beneath th' Antarctic spread, shall then be known,
And new plantations on its coast arise.
Then rigid winter's ice no more shall wound
The only naked animal; but man
With the soft fleece shall everywhere be cloth'd.
Th' exulting Muse shall then, in vigour fresh,
Her flight renew. Meanwhile, with weary wing,
O'er ocean's wave returning, she explores
Siluria's flow'ry vales, her old delight,
The shepherd's haunts, where the first springs arise
Of Britain's happy trade, now spreading wide,
Wide as th' Atlantic and Pacific seas,
Or as air's vital fluid o'er the globe.