These and the tasks successive masters brought
The French they conn'd, the curious works they wrought:
The hours they made their taper fingers strike
Note after note, all dull to them alike;
Their drawings, dancings on appointed days,
Playing with globes, and getting parts of plays;
The tender friendships made 'twixt heart and
heart,
When the dear friends had nothing to impart :
All! all! are over;-now th' accomplish'd maid Longs for the world, of nothing there afraid: Dreams of delight invade her gentle breast, And fancied lovers rob the heart of rest; At the paternal door a carriage stands,
Love knits their hearts and Hymen joins their hands.
Ah!-world unknown! how charming is thy view,
Thy pleasures many, and each pleasure new:
Ah!-world experienced! what of thee is told?
How few thy pleasures, and those few how old!
Within a silent street, and far apart
From noise of business, from a quay or mart,
Stands an old spacious building, and the din
You hear without, explains the work within;
Unlike the whispering of the nymphs, this noise
Loudly proclaims a "Boarding-School for Boys;"
The master heeds it not, for thirty years
Have render'd all familiar to his ears;
He sits in comfort, 'mid the various sound
Of mingled tones for ever flowing round;
Day after day he to his task attends, -
Unvaried toil, and care that never ends:
Boys in their works proceed; while his employ
Admits no change, or changes but the boy;
Yet time has made it easy;-he beside
Has power supreme, and power is sweet to pride:
But grant him pleasure;-what can teachers feel,
Dependent helpers always at the wheel?
Their power despised, their compensation small,
Their labour dull, their life laborious all;
Set after set the lower lads to make
Fit for the class which their superiors take;
The road of learning for a time to track
In roughest state, and then again go back:
Just the same way on other troops to wait,
Attendants fix'd at learning's lower gate.
The Day-tasks now are over,- -to their ground Rush the gay crowd with joy-compelling sound; Glad to illude the burthens of the day,
The eager parties hurry to their play: (1)
"Be it a weakness, it deserves some praise,—
We love the play-place of our early days;
The scene is touching, and the heart is stone
That feels not at that sight-and feels at none.
The wall on which we tried our graving skill;
The very name we carved subsisting still;
The bench on which we sat while deep employ'd,
Though mangled, hack'd, and hew'd, yet not destroy'd.
The little ones unbutton'd, glowing hot,
Playing our games, and on the very spot;
As happy as we once to kneel and draw
The chalky ring and knuckle down at taw.
Then in these hours of liberty we find
The native bias of the opening mind;
They yet possess not skill the mask to place,
And hide the passions glowing in the face;
Yet some are found—the close, the sly, the mean,
Who know already all must not be seen.
Lo! one who walks apart, although so young,
He lays restraint upon his eye and tongue; (1)
Nor will he into scrapes or dangers get,
And half the school are in the stripling's debt:
Suspicious, timid, he is much afraid
Of trick and plot :-he dreads to be betray'd:
He shuns all friendship, for he finds they lend,
When lads begin to call each other friend:
Yet self with self has war; the tempting sight
Of fruit on sale provokes his appetite ;-
See how he walks the sweet seduction by;
That he is tempted, costs him first a sigh,—
'Tis dangerous to indulge, 't is grievous to deny !
This he will choose, and whispering asks the price,
The purchase dreadful, but the portion nice;
This fond attachment to the well-known place,
When first we started into life's long race,
Maintains its hold with such unfailing sway,
We feel it e'en in age and at our latest day."- COWPER.
(1) [In this description Mr. Crabbe, condescended to borrow, though pro bably with some alterations and improvements, the ideas and the language of his second son; whose School Eclogues,' written in boyhood, much struck and gratified his father. Mr. John Crabbe has since written many imitations of his father's poetry, some of which, it is hoped, may yet be published.]
Within the pocket he explores the pence;
Without, temptation strikes on either sense,
The sight, the smell;—but then he thinks again
Of money gone! while fruit nor taste remain.
Meantime there comes an eager thoughtless boy,
Who gives the price and only feels the joy:
Example dire! the youthful miser stops,
And slowly back the treasured coinage drops:
Heroic deed! for should he now comply,
Can he to-morrow's appetite deny?
Beside, these spendthrifts who so freely live,
Cloy'd with their purchase, will a portion give:-
Here ends debate, he buttons up his store,
And feels the comfort that it burns no more.
Unlike to him the Tyrant-boy (1), whose sway All hearts acknowledge; him the crowds obey: At his command they break through every rule Whoever governs, he controls the school: 'Tis not the distant emperor moves their fear, But the proud viceroy who is ever near.
Verres could do that mischief in a day, For which not Rome, in all its power, could pay; And these boy-tyrants will their slaves distress, And do the wrongs no master can redress: The mind they load with fear: it feels disdain For its own baseness; yet it tries in vain
(1) [This schoolboy despot was drawn, Mr. Crabbe said, from a tyrant who was his own terror in the school at Stowmarket.]
To shake th' admitted power;-the coward comes
'Tis more than present pain these tyrants give, Long as we've life some strong impressions live; And these young ruffians in the soul will sow Seeds of all vices that on weakness grow.
Hark! at his word the trembling younglings flee,
Where he is walking none must walk but he;
See from the winter-fire the weak retreat,
His the warm corner, his the favourite seat,
Save when he yields it to some slave to keep
Awhile, then back, at his return, to creep:
At his command his poor dependants fly,
And humbly bribe him as a proud ally;
Flatter'd by all, the notice he bestows,
Is gross abuse, and bantering and blows;
Yet he's a dunce, and, spite of all his fame
Without the desk, within he feels his shame :
For there the weaker boy, who felt his scorn,
For him corrects the blunders of the morn;
And he is taught, unpleasant truth! to find
The trembling body has the prouder mind.
Hark! to that shout, that burst of empty noise, From a rude set of bluff, obstreperous boys; They who, like colts let loose, with vigour bound, And thoughtless spirit, o'er the beaten ground; Fearless they leap, and every youngster feels His Alma active in his hands and heels.
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