A COLLOQUIAL POEM.
JACOB! I do not love to see thy nose
Turned up in scornful curve at yonder pig.
It would be well, my friend, if thou and I
Had, like that pig, attained the perfectness
Made reachable by Nature! why dislike
The sow-born grunter ?-he is obstinate,
Thou answerest, ugly, and the filthiest beast
That banquets upon offal. Now I pray you
Hear the pig's counsel.
Is he obstinate?
We must not, Jacob, be deceived by words,
By sophist sounds. A democratic beast,
He knows that his unmerciful drivers seek
Their profit, and not his. He hath not learnt
That pigs were made for man, born to be brawn'd
And baconiz'd; that he must please to give
Just what his gracious masters please to take;
Perhaps his tusks, the weapons Nature gave
For self-defence, the general privilege;
Perhaps-hark, Jacob! dost thou hear that horn?
Woe to the young posterity of pork!
Their enemy is at hand,
The pig is ugly. Jacob, look at him!
Those eyes have taught the lover flattery.
His face,-nay, Jacob, Jacob! were it fair
To judge a lady in her dishabille?
Fancy it drest, and with saltpetre rouged.
Behold his tail, my friend; with curls like that
The wanton hop marries her stately spouse;
So crisp in beauty Amoretta's hair
Rings round her lover's soul the chains of love.
And what is beauty but the aptitude
Of parts harmonious? give thy fancy scope,
And thou wilt find that no imagined change
Can beautify this beast. Place at his end
The starry glories of the peacock's pride;
Give him the swan's white breast for his horn-hoofs;
Shape such a foot and ankle as the waves
Crowded in eager rivalry to kiss,
When Venus from the enamour'd sea arose ;-
Jacob, thou canst but make a monster of him;
All alteration man could think, would mar
His pig-perfection.
The last charge-he lives
A dirty life. Here I could shelter him
With noble and right-reverend precedents,
And show, by sanction of authority,
That 'tis a very honourable thing
To thrive by dirty ways. But let me rest
On better ground the unanswerable defence:
The pig is a philosopher, who knows
No prejudice. Dirt? Jacob, what is dirt?
If matter,-why the delicate dish that tempts
An o'ergorged epicure to the last morsel
That stuffs him to the throat-gates, is no more.
If matter be not, but as sages say
Spirit is all, and all things visible
Are one, the infinitely modified,
Think, Jacob, what that pig is, and the mire
In which he stands knee-deep?
And there! that breeze
Pleads with me, and has won thee to the smile
That speaks conviction. O'er yon blossom'd field
Of beans it came, and thoughts of bacon rise.
WHILE HIS NOSE WAS BEING BORED.
HARK! hark! that pig--that pig! the hideous note,
More loud, more dissonant, each moment grows-
Would one not think the knife was in his throat?
And yet they are only boring through his nose.
You foolish beast, so rudely to withstand
Your master's will, to feel such idle fears!
Why, pig, there's not a lady in the land
Who has not also bored and ring'd her ears.
Pig! 'tis your master's pleasure then be still, And hold your nose to let the iron through! Dare you resist your lawful sovereign's will? Rebellious swine! you know not what you do!
To man o'er every beast the power was given,
Pig, hear the truth, and never murmur more!
Would you rebel against the will of Heaven?
You impious beast, be still, and let them bore!
The social pig resigns his natural rights
When first with man he covenants to live;
He barters them for safer stye delights,
For grains and wash, which man alone can give.
Sure is provision on the social plan,
Secure the comforts that to each belong:
Oh, happy swine! the impartial sway of man
Alike protects the weak pig and the strong.
And you resist! you struggle now because
Your master has thought fit to bore your nose!
You grunt in flat rebellion to the laws
Society finds needful to impose!
Go to the forest, piggy, and deplore
The miserable lot of savage swine!
See how the young pigs fly from the great boar,
And see how coarse and scantily they dine!
Behold their hourly danger, when who will
May hunt, or snare, or seize them for his food!
Oh, happy pig! whom none presumes to kill
Till your protecting master thinks it good!
And when, at last, the closing hour of life
Arrives (for pigs must die as well as man), When in your throat you feel the long sharp knife, And the blood trickles to the pudding pan;
And, when at last, the death wound yawning wide, Fainter and fainter grows the expiring cry,
Is there no grateful joy, no loyal pride,
To think that for your master's good you die?
READER! hast thou ever stood to see
The eye that contemplates it well perceives
Its glossy leaves
Ordered by an intelligence so wise
As might confound the atheist's sophistries.
Below, a circling fence, its leaves are seen
Wrinkled and keen,
No grazing cattle through their prickly round
Can reach to wound;
But as they grow where nothing is to fear, Smooth and unarm'd the pointless leaves appear.
I love to view these things with curious eyes,
And moralize;
And in the wisdom of the holly tree
Can emblems see
Wherewith perchance to make a pleasant rhyme,
Such as may profit in the after-time.
So, though abroad perchance I might appear
Harsh and austere,
To those who on my leisure would intrude
Reserved and rude;
Gentle at home amid my friends I'd be,
Like the high leaves upon the holly tree.
And should my youth, as youth is apt, I know, Some harshness show,
All vain asperities I day by day
Would wear away,
Till the smooth temper of my age should be
Like the high leaves upon the holly tree.
And as when all the summer trees are seen
So bright and green
The holly leaves their fadeless hues display
Less bright than they,
But when the bare and wintry woods we see
What then so cheerful as the holly tree?
So serious should my youth appear among
The thoughtless throng,
So would I seem amid the young and gay
More grave than they,
That in my age as cheerful I might be
As the green winter of the holly tree.
Scene, the house of COLLATINE.
WELCOME, my father! good Valerius,
Welcome! and thou too, Brutus! ye were both
My wedding guests, and fitly ye are come.
My husband-Collatine-alas! no more
Lucretia's husband, for thou shalt not clasp
Pollution to thy bosom,-hear me on!
For I will tell thee all.
I sate at eve
Spinning amid my maidens as I wont,
When from the camp at Ardea Sextus came.
Curb down thy swelling feelings, Collatine!
I little liked the man; yet, for he came
From Ardea, for he brought me news of thee,
I gladly gave him welcome, gladly listen'd,
Thou canst not tell how gladly! to his tåles
Of battles, and the long and perilous siege,
And when I laid me down at night to sleep,
'Twas with a lighten'd heart,-I knew thee safe.
My visions were of thee.
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