The Poems of William Cowper Volume 1 - Tapa blanda

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1905 edition. Excerpt: ...piece--The rural thief--Public-houses--The multitude of them censured--The farmer's daughter; what she was; what she is--The simplicity of country manners almost lost--Causes of the change--Desertion of the country by the rich--Neglect of magistrates--The militia principally in fault--The new recruit and his transformation--Reflection on bodies corporate--The love of rural objects natural to all, and never to be totally extinguished. ARK! 'tis the twanging horn! O'er yonder bridge, That with its wearisome but needful length Bestrides the wintry flood, in which the moon Sees her unwrinkled face reflected bright, He comes, the herald of a noisy world,--With spattered boots, strapped waist, and frozen locks, News from all nations lumbering at his back. True to his charge the close-packed load behind, Yet careless what he brings, his one concern Is to conduct it to the destined inn, 10 And, having dropped the expected bag, pass on. He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch, Cold and yet cheerful: messenger of grief Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some, To him indifferent whether grief or joy. Houses in ashes, and the fall of stocks, r Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles, wet With tears that trickled down the writer's cheeks. Fast as the periods from his fluent quill, Or charged with amorous sighs of absent swains 20 Or nymphs responsive, equally affect His horse and him, unconscious of them all. Hut oh the important budget! ushered in With such heart-shaking music, who can say What are its tidings? have our troops awaked? Or do they still, as if with opium drugged, Snore to the murmurs of the Atlantic wave? Is India free? and does she wear her plumed And jewelled turban with a smile of peace, Or do we grind her still? ' The grand...

William Cowper was a poet and a hymnodist who changed the direction of 18th-century nature poetry by writing on everyday life and scenes of the English countryside. Nick Rhodes is an editor and a poet.