Thee, gentle * favage! whom no love of thee
Or thine, but curiofity perhaps,
Or elfe vain glory, prompted us to draw
Forth from thy native bowers, to fhew thee here
With what fuperior skill we can abuse
The gifts of Providence, and squander life.
The dream is past; and thou haft found again
Thy cocoas and bananas, palms and yams,
And homeftall thatched with leaves. But haft thou found
Their former charms? And having feen our ftate,
Our palaces, our ladies, and our pomp
Of equipage, our gardens, and our sports,
And heard our mufic; are thy fimple friends,
Thy fimple fare, and all thy plain delights,
As dear to thee as once? And have thy joys
Loft nothing by comparison with our's?
Rude as thou art, (for we returned thee rude
And ignorant, except of outward show)
I cannot think thee yet fo dull of heart
And fpiritlefs, as never to regret
Sweets tafted here, and left as foon as known.
Methinks I fee thee ftraying on the beach,
And asking of the furge, that bathes thy foot,
lf ever it has washed our diftant fhore.
I fee thee weep, and thine are honeft tears,
A patriot's for his country: thou art fad
At thought of her forlorn and abject ftate,
From which no power of thine can raise her up.
Thus fancy paints thee, and though apt to err,
Perhaps errs little when she paints thee thus.
She tells me too that duly every morn
Thou climbeft the mountain top, with eager eye
Exploring far and wide the watery wafte
For fight of ship from England. Every speck
Seen in the dim horizon turns thee pale
With conflict of contending hopes and fears.
But comes at laft the dull and dusky eve,
And fends thee to thy cabin, well-prepared
To dream all night of what the day denied.
Alas! expect it not. We found no bait
To tempt us in thy country. Doing good,
Difinterested good, is not our trade.
We travel far, 'tis true, but not for nought;
And must be bribed to compass earth again
By other hopes and richer fruits than your's.
But though true worth and virtue in the mild And genial foil of cultivated life
Thrive moft, and may perhaps thrive only there, Yet not in cities oft: in proud and gay
And gain devoted cities. Thither flow,
As to a common and moft noisome fewer,
The dregs and feculence of every land.
In cities foul example on moft minds
Begets its likenefs. Rank abundance breeds
In grofs and pampered cities floth and luft,
And wantonnefs and gluttonous excefs.
In cities vice is hidden with moft eafe,
Or feen with leaft reproach; and virtue, taught
By frequent lapse, can hope no triumph there
Beyond the achievement of fuccefsful flight.
I do confefs them nurseries of the arts,
In which they flourish moft; where, in the beams
Of warm encouragement, and in the eye
Of public note, they reach their perfect size. Such London is, by tafte and wealth proclaimed The faireft capital of all the world,
By riot and incontinence the worst.
There, touched by Reynolds, a dull blank becomes
A lucid mirror, in which Nature fees
All her reflected features. Bacon there
Gives more than female beauty to a stone,
And Chatham's eloquence to marble lips.
Nor does the chiffel occupy alone
The powers of sculpture, but the ftyle as much;
Each province of her art her equal care.
With nice incifion of her guided fteel
She ploughs a brazen field, and clothes a foil
So fterile with what charms foever she will,
The richest scenery and the loveliest forms.
Where finds philofophy her eagle eye,
With which the gazes at yon burning disk
Undazzled, and detects and counts his spots?
In London: where her implements exact,
With which the calculates, computes and scans,
All diftance, motion, magnitude, and now
Measures an atom, and now girds a world?
In London. Where has commerce fuch a mart,
So rich, fo thronged, fo drained, and fo fupplied,
As London-opulent, enlarged, and still
Increafing, London? Babylon of old
Not more the glory of the earth than she,
A more accomplished world's chief glory now.
She has her praife. Now mark a spot or two,
That fo much beauty would do well to purge;
And fhow this queen of cities, that so fair
May yet be foul; fo witty, yet not wife.
It is not feemly, nor of good report,
That she is flack in difcipline; more prompt
To avenge than to prevent the breach of law:
That the is rigid in denouncing death
On petty robbers, and indulges life
And liberty, and oft-times honour too,
To peculators of the public gold;
That thieves at home muft hang; but he that puts
Into his overgorged and bloated purfe
The wealth of Indian provinces, escapes.
Nor is it well, nor can it come to good,
That, through profane and infidel contempt
Of holy writ, she has prefumed to annul
And abrogate, as roundly as the may,
The total ordinance and will of God ;
Advancing fashion to the post of truth,
And centering all authority in modes
And cuftoms of her own, till fabbath rites
Have dwindled into unrefpected forms,
And knees and haffocks are well-nigh divorced.
God made the country, and man made the town. What wonder then that health and virtue, gifts, That can alone make sweet the bitter draught, That life holds out to all, fhould most abound And leaft be threatened in the fields and groves ? Poffefs ye therefore, ye who, borne about In chariots and fedans, know no fatigue But that of idleness, and tafte no scenes But fuch as art contrives, poffefs ye ftill Your element; there only can ye shine;
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