But when those charms are past, for charms are frail, Where, then, ah! where shall poverty reside, If to the city sped—What waits him there? To see profusion that he must not share; To see ten thousand baneful arts combin'd To pamper luxury, and thin mankind; To see each joy the sons of pleasure know, display, eyes Where the poor houseless shiv'ring female lies : She once, perhaps, in village plenty blest, Has wept at tales of innocence distrest; Her modest looks the cottage might adorn, Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn; Now lost to all; her friends, her virtue, fled, Near her betrayer's door she lays her head, telnd woull: her fienos, her virtue flod. :: Nrar her betrayrrs door he lays her headı. The Deserted lille L And, pinch'd with cold, and shrinking from the show'r, With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour, When idly first, ambitious of the town, She left her wheel and robes of country brown. Do thine, sweet AUBURN, thine, the loveliest train, Do thy fair tribes participate her pain ? E’en now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led, At proud men's doors they ask a little bread! Ah, no. To distant climes, a dreary scene, Where half the convex world intrudes between, Through torrid tracts with fainting steps they go, Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe. Far diff'rent there from all that charm'd before, The various terrors of that horrid shore; Those blazing suns that dart a downward ray, And fiercely shed intolerable day; Those matted woods where birds forget to sing, But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling; . . Those pois'nous fields with rank luxuriance crown'd, Where the dark scorpion gathers death around: |