Who so distraught could ramble here,
From gentle beech to simple gorse,
From glen to moor, nor cease to fear
The world's impetuous bigot force,
Which drives the young before they will,
And when they will not drives them still.
Come hither, thou that would'st forget
The gamester's smile, the trader's vaunt,
The statesman actor's face hard set,
The kennel cry that cheers his taunt,
Come where pure winds and rills combine
To murmur peace round virtue's shrine.
Virtue--men thrust her back, when these
Rode down for Charles and right divine,
And those with dogma Genevese
Restored in faith their wavering line.
No virtue in religious camps,
No heathen oil in Gideon's lamps.
And now, when forcing seasons bud
With prophet, hero, saint, and quack,
When creeds and fashions heat the blood,
And transcendental tonguelets clack,
Sweet Virtue's lyre we hardly know,
And think her odes quite rococo.
Well, be it Roman, be it worse,
When Pelhams reigned in George's name
Poets were safe from sneer or curse
Who gave a patriot classic fame,
And goodness, void of passion, knit
The hearts of Lyttelton and Pitt.
That age was as a neutral vale
'Twixt uplands of tumultuous strife,
And turning from the sects to hail
Composure and a graceful life,
Here, where the fern-clad streamlet flows,
Boconnoc's guests ensured repose.
That charm remains; and he who knows
The root and stock of freedom's laws,
Unscared by frenzied nations' throes,
And hugging yet the good old cause,
Finds in the shade these beeches cast
The wit, the fragrance of the past.
Octave of St. Bartholomew, 1862.