With antique armour hung, his trophied rooms
Descend to Gamesters, Prostitutes, and Grooms.
He sees his steel-clad Sires, and Mothers mild,
Who bravely shook the lance, or sweetly smiled,
All the fair series of the whisker'd race,
Whose pictured forms the stately gallery grace;
Debased, abused, the price of ill-got gold,
To deck some tavern vile, at auctions sold.
The parish wonders at th' unopening door,
The chimneys blaze, the tables groan, no more.
Thick weeds around th' untrodden courts arise,
And all the social scene in silence lies.
Himself, the loss politely to repair,

Turns Atheist, Fiddler, Highwayman, or Player:
At length, the scorn, the shame of man and God,
Is doom'd to rub the steeds that once he rode.

Ye rival youths, your golden hopes how vain,
Your dreams of thousands on the listed plain!
Not more fantastic Sancho's airy course,
When madly mounted on the magic horse,1

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He pierced heaven's opening spheres with dazzled eyes, And seem'd to soar in visionary skies.

Nor less, I ween, precarious is the meed

Of young adventurers on the Muse's steed

For Poets have, like you, their destined round,
And ours is but a race on classic ground.

Long time, the child of patrimonial ease,
Hippolitus had carved sirloins in peace ;
Had quaff'd secure, unvex'd by toil or wife,
The mild October of a private life;

Long lived with calm domestic conquests crown'd,
And kill'd his game on safe paternal ground;

'The magic horse:' Clavileno. See 'Don Quixote,' b. ii. chap. 41

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And, deaf to Honour's or Ambition's call,
With rural spoils adorn'd his hoary hall.

As bland he puff'd the pipe o'er weekly news,
His bosom kindles with sublimer views.

Lo there, thy triumphs, Taaffe, thy palms, Portmore!
Tempt him to stake his lands and treasured store.
Like a new bruiser on Broughtonic sand,
Amidst the lists our Hero takes his stand;
Suck'd by the Sharper, to the Peer a prey,
He rolls his eyes, that witness huge dismay ;
When lo! the chance of one inglorious heat
Strips him of genial cheer and snug retreat.
How awkward now he bears disgrace and dirt,
Nor knows the poor's last refuge, to be pert!-
The shiftless beggar bears of ills the worst,
At once with dulness and with hunger curst.
And feels the tasteless breast equestrian fires?
And dwells such mighty rage in graver Squires?

In all attempts, but for their country, bold,
Britain, thy Conscript Counsellors behold;
(For some, perhaps, by Fortune favour'd yet,
May gain a borough, from a lucky bet,)
Smit with the love of the laconic boot,
The cap, and wig succinct, the silken suit,
Mere modern Phaetons, usurp the rein,
And scour in rival race the tempting plain.
See, side by side, his Jockey and Sir John
Discuss th' important point-of six to one.
For oh! the boasted privilege how dear,
How great the pride, to gain a Jockey's ear!-
See, like a routed host, with headlong pace,
Thy members pour amid the mingling race!
All ask, what crowds the tumult could produce-
Is Bedlam or the Commons all broke loose?

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Their way nor reason guides, nor caution checks,
Proud on a high-bred thing to risk their necks.—
Thy sages hoar, amid th' admiring crowd,
Adjudge the stakes, most eloquently loud:
With critic skill o'er dubious bets preside,
The low dispute, or kindle, or decide:
All empty wisdom, and judicious prate,
Of distanced horses gravely fix the fate :
And with paternal care unwearied watch
O'er the nice conduct of a daring match.

Meantime, no more the mimic patriots rise,
To guard Britannia's honour, warm and wise:
No more in senates dare assert her laws,
Nor pour the bold debate in Freedom's cause:
Neglect the councils of a sinking land,
And know no rostrum, but Newmarket's stand.
Is this the band of civil Chiefs design'd
On England's weal to fix the pondering mind,
Who, while their country's rights are set to sale,
Quit Europe's balance for the Jockey's scale?
O say, when least their sapient schemes are crost,
Or when a nation or a match is lost?
Who Dams and Sires with more exactness trace,
Than of their country's Kings the sacred race:
Think London journeys are the worst of ills;
Subscribe to articles, instead of bills:
Strangers to all our annalists relate,

Theirs are the memoirs of th' equestrian state:
Who, lost to Albion's past and present views,
Heber,1 thy chronicles alone peruse.

Go on, brave youths, till in some future age
Whips shall become the senatorial badge ;

1 'Heber:' author of an Historical List of the Running Horses, &c.

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Till England see her thronging senators

Meet all at Westminster, in boots and spurs ;
See the whole House, with mutual frenzy mad,
Her patriots all in leathern breeches clad :
Of bets, not taxes, learnedly debate,
And guide with equal reins a steed or state.
How would a virtuous Houhnhym neigh disdain,
To see his brethren brook th' imperious rein;
Bear slavery's wanton whip, or galling goad,

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Smoke through the glebe, or trace the destined road; 160
And, robb'd of manhood by the murderous knife,
Sustain each sordid toil of servile life!

Yet, oh! what rage would touch his generous mind,
To see his sons of more than human kind;

A kind, with each exalted virtue blest,
Each gentler feeling of the liberal breast,
Afford diversion to that monster base,

That meanest spawn of man's half-monkey race;
In whom pride, avarice, ignorance, conspire,
That hated animal, a Yahoo Squire !

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How are the Therons of these modern days Changed from those Chiefs who toil'd for Grecian bays; Who, fired with genuine glory's sacred lust,

Whirl'd the swift axle through the Pythian dust!

Theirs was the Pisan olive's blooming spray,

Theirs was the Theban bard's recording lay.

What though the Grooms of Greece ne'er took the odds? They won no bets, but then they soar'd to gods;

And more an Hiero's palm, a Pindar's ode,

Than all th' united plates of George bestow'd.

Greece how I kindle at thy magic name,

Feel all thy warmth, and catch the kindred flame!
Thy scenes sublime and awful visions rise

In ancient pride before my musing eyes.

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Here Sparta's sons in mute attention hang,
While just Lycurgus pours the mild harangue;
There Xerxes' hosts, all pale with deadly fear,
Shrink at her fated Hero's1 flashing spear.
Here hung with many a lyre of silver string,
The laureate alleys of Ilissus spring;

And lo, where rapt in beauty's heavenly dream
Hoar Plato walks his olived Academe.-

Yet, ah! no more the land of arts and arms
Delights with wisdom, or with virtue warms.
Lo! the stern Turk, with more than Vandal rage,
Has blasted all the wreaths of ancient age:
No more her groves by Fancy's feet are trod,
Each Attic grace has left the loved abode.
Fallen is fair Greece! by Luxury's pleasing bane
Seduced, she drags a barbarous foreign chain.

Britannia, watch! O trim thy withering bays,
Remember thou hast rivall'd Græcia's praise,
Great Nurse of works divine! Yet oh! beware
Lest thou the fate of Greece, my country, share.
Recall thy wonted worth with conscious pride,
Thou too hast seen a Solon in a Hyde ;
Hast bade thine Edwards and thine Henrys rear
With Spartan fortitude the British spear;
Alike hast seen thy sons deserve the meed
Or of the moral or the martial deed.

1 'Fated Hero:' Leonidas.

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