"Give! am I rich? This hatchet take, and try
Thy proper strength, nor give those limbs the lie;
Work, feed thyself, to thine own powers appeal,
Nor whine out woes thine own right-hand can heal;
And while that hand is thine, and thine a leg,
Scorn of the proud or of the base to beg."
"Come, surly John, thy wealthy kinsman view,"
Old Roger said;--"thy words are brave and true;
Come, live with me: we'll vex those scoundrel-boys,
And that prim shrew shall, envying, hear our joys. -
Tobacco's glorious fume all day we'll share,
With beef and brandy kill all kinds of care;
We'll beer and biscuit on our table heap,
And rail at rascals, till we fall asleep."
Such was their life; but when the woodman died,
His grieving kin for Roger's smiles applied -
In vain; he shut, with stern rebuke, the door,
And dying, built a refuge for the poor,
With this restriction, That no Cuff should share
One meal, or shelter for one moment there.
My Record ends:- But hark! e'en now I hear
The bell of death, and know not whose to fear:
Our farmers all, and all our hinds were well;
In no man's cottage danger seem'd to dwell: -
Yet death of man proclaim these heavy chimes,
For thrice they sound, with pausing space, three times,
"Go; of my Sexton seek, Whose days are sped? -
What! he, himself!- and is old Dibble dead?"
His eightieth year he reach'd, still undecay d,
And rectors five to one close vault convey'd:-