The Subject proposed Remarks upon Pastoral Poetry — A Tract of Country near the Coast described An impoverished Borough Smugglers and their Assistants Rude Manners of the Inhabitants - Ruinous Effects of a high Tide — The Village Life more generally considered : Evils of it-The youthful Labourer - The old Man: his Soliloquy- The Parish Workhouse: its Inhabitants - The sick Poor: their Apothecary - The dying Pauper — The Village Priest.

THE

VILLAGE.

BOOK I.

ད

THE Village Life, and every care that reigns
O'er youthful peasants and declining swains;
What labour yields, and what, that labour past.
Age, in its hour of languor, finds at last;
What form the real Picture of the Poor,
Demand a song-the Muse can give no more.
Fled are those times, when, in harmonious strains,
The rustic poet praised his native plains:
No shepherds now, in smooth alternate verse,
Their country's beauty or their nymphs' rehearse ;(')
Yet still for these we frame the tender strain,
Still in our lays fond Corydons complain,
And shepherds' boys their amorous pains reveal,
The only pains (2), alas! they never feel.

(1) [Strephon." In spring the fields, in autumn hills I love
At morn the plains, at noon the shady grove,
But Delia always; absent from her sight,
Nor plains at morn, nor groves at noon delight.

Daphnis. Sylvia's like autumn ripe, yet mild as May,

More bright than noon, yet fresh as early day," &c. POPE.] (3) [" In order to form a right judgment of pastoral poetry, it will be necessary to cast back our eyes on the first ages of the world. The abundance they were possessed of, secured them from avarice, ambition, or envy; they could scarce have any anxieties or contentions, where every

On Mincio's banks, in Cæsar's bounteous reign, If Tityrus found the Golden Age again, Must sleepy bards the flattering dream prolong, Mechanic echoes of the Mantuan song?

From Truth and Nature shall we widely stray, Where Virgil, not where Fancy, leads the way ?(1)

one had more than he could tell what to do with. Love, indeed, might occasion some rivalships amongst them, because many lovers fix upon one subject, for the loss of which they will be satisfied with no compensation. Otherwise it was a state of ease, innocence, and contentment; where plenty begot pleasure, and pleasure begot singing, and singing begot poetry, and poetry begot pleasure again. An author, therefore, that would write pastorals should form in his fancy a rural scene of perfect ease and tranquillity, where innocence, simplicity, and joy abound. It is not enough that he writes about the country; he must give us what is agreeable in that scene, and hide what is wretched. Let the tranquillity of the pastoral life appear full and plain, but hide the meanness of it; represent its simplicity as clear as you please, but cover its misery. As there is no condition exempt from anxiety, I will allow shepherds to be afflicted with such misfortunes as the loss of a favourite lamb, or a faithless mistress. He may, it you please, pick a thorn out of his foot, or vent his grief for losing the prize in dancing; but these being small torments, they recommend that state which only produces such trifling evils." — - STEELE.]

(1) ["This year (1783) I had," says Boswell," an opportunity of seeing, by means of one of his friends, a proof that Dr. Johnson's talents, as well as his obliging services to authors, were ready as ever. He had revised 'The Village,' an admirable poem, by the Rev. Mr. Crabbe. Its sentiments as to the false notions of rustic happiness and rustic virtue were quite congenial with his own; and he took the trouble, not only to suggest slight corrections and variations, but to furnish some lines, when he thought he could give the writer's meaning better than in the words of the manuscript. I shall give an instance, marking the original by Roman, and Johnson's substitution in Italic characters:

"In fairer scenes, where peaceful pleasures spring,
Tityrus the pride of Mantuan swains might sing:
But, charm'd by him, or smitten with his views,
Shall modern poets court the Mantuan muse?
From Truth and Nature shall we widely stray,

Where Fancy leads, or Virgil led the way?'

"On Mincio's banks, in Cæsar's bounteous reign,' &c.

Here we find Dr. Johnson's poetical and critical powers undiminished. I must, however, observe, that the aids he gave to this poem were so small as by no means to impair the distinguished merit of the author."— CROKER'S Boswell, vol. v. p. 55.

Yes, thus the Muses sing of happy swains, Because the Muses never knew their pains:

They boast their peasants' pipes; but peasants now
Resign their pipes and plod behind the plough;
And few, amid the rural-tribe, have time

To number syllables, and play with rhyme;
Save honest Duck,(1) what son of verse could share
The poet's rapture and the peasant's care?
Or the great labours of the field degrade,
With the new peril of a poorer trade? (2)

From this chief cause these idle praises spring,
That themes so easy few forbear to sing ;
For no deep thought the trifling subjects ask;
To sing of shepherds is an easy task : (3)

(1) [Stephen Duck, the poetical thresher. "It was his lot," says Mr. Southey," to be duck-peck'd by his lawful wife, who told all the neighbourhood that her husband dealt with the devil, or was going mad; for he did nothing but talk to himself and tell his fingers." Some of his verses having been shown to Queen Caroline, she settled twelve shillings a week upon him, and appointed him keeper of her select library at Richmond, called Merlin's Cave. He afterwards took orders, and obtained the living of Byfleet, in Surrey. Gay, in a letter to Swift, says, "I do not envy Stephen Duck, who is the favourite poet of the court;" and Swift wrote upon him the following epigram:

"The thresher, Duck, could o'er the Queen prevail;

The proverb says, ' no fence against a flail'

From threshing corn, he turns to thresh his brains,

For which her Majesty allows him grains;

Though 'tis confest, that those who ever saw

His poems, think them all not worth a straw.

Thrice happy Duck! employ'd in threshing stubble,

Thy toil is lessen'd, and thy profits double."

Stephen's end was an unhappy one. Growing melancholy, in 1750, he threw himself into the river near Reading, and was drowned.]

(2) [" Robert Bloomfield had better have remained a shoemaker, or even a farmer's boy; for he would have been a farmer perhaps in time; and now he is an unfortunate poet."- CRABBE's Journal, 1817.]

(3) [Orig. Ed. They ask no thought, require no deep design,

But swell the song, and liquify the line.]

The happy youth assumes the common strain,
A nymph his mistress, and himself a swain ;
With no sad scenes he clouds his tuneful prayer,
But all, to look like her, is painted fair.

I grant indeed that fields and flocks have charms
For him that grazes or for him that farms;
But when amid such pleasing scenes I trace
The poor laborious natives of the place,
And see the mid-day sun, with fervid ray,
On their bare heads and dewy temples play;
While some, with feebler heads and fainter hearts,
Deplore their fortune, yet sustain their parts —
Then shall I dare these real ills to hide
In tinsel trappings of poetic pride?

No; cast by Fortune on a frowning coast,
Which neither groves nor happy valleys boast; (')
Where other cares than those the Muse relates,
And other shepherds dwell with other mates;
By such examples taught, I paint the Cot,
As Truth will paint it, and as Bards will not.
Nor you, ye Poor, of letter'd scorn complain,
To
you the smoothest song is smooth in vain ;
O'ercome by labour, and bow'd down by time,
Feel you the barren flattery of a rhyme ?

Can poets soothe you, when you pine for bread,
By winding myrtles round your ruin'd shed?
Can their light tales your weighty griefs o'erpower,
Or glad with airy mirth the toilsome hour?

(1) [Aldborough was, half a century ago, a poor and wretched place. It consisted of two parallel and unpaved streets, running between mean and scrambling houses, the abodes of seafaring men, pilots, and fishers.... Such was the squalid scene that first opened on the author of "The Village." See antè, Vol. I. p. 9.]