At the wall's base the fiery nettle springs,
With fruit globose and fierce with poison'd stings;
Above (the growth of many a year) is spread
The yellow level of the stone-crop's bed;
In every chink delights the fern to grow,
With glossy leaf and tawny bloom below:
These, with our sea-weeds, rolling up and down,
Form the contracted Flora of the town.
Say, wilt thou more of scenes so sordid know?
Then will I lead thee down the dusty Row ;
By the warm alley and the long close lane,—
There mark the fractured door and paper'd pane,
Where flags the noontide air, and, as we pass,
We fear to breathe the putrefying mass:
But fearless yonder matron; she disdains
To sigh for zephyrs from ambrosial plains;
But mends her meshes torn, and pours her lay
All in the stifling fervour of the day.
Her naked children round the alley run,
And roll'd in dust, are bronzed beneath the sun;
Or gambol round the dame, who, loosely dress'd,
Woos the coy breeze to fan the open breast:
She, once a handmaid, strove by decent art
To charm her sailor's eye and touch his heart;
Her bosom then was veil'd in kerchief clean,
And fancy left to form the charms unseen.
But when a wife, she lost her former care,
Nor thought on charms, nor time for dress could
Careless she found her friends who dwelt beside,
No rival beauty kept alive her pride:
Still in her bosom virtue keeps her place,
But decency is gone, the virtues' guard and grace.
See that long boarded Building!-By these stairs Each humble tenant to that home repairs— By one large window lighted-it was made For some bold project, some design in trade : This fail'd,—and one, a humourist in his way, (Ill was the humour,) bought it in decay; Nor will he sell, repair, or take it down; 'Tis his,—what cares he for the talk of town? "No! he will let it to the poor;—a home “Where he delights to see the creatures come :” "They may be thieves;"-"Well, so are richer
“Or idlers, cheats, or prostitutes; -“What then?” "Outcasts pursued by justice, vile and base; "“They need the more his pity and the place."
In this vast room, each place by habit fix'd,
Are sexes, families, and ages mix’d—
To union forced by crime, by fear, by need,
And all in morals and in modes agreed;
Some ruin'd men, who from mankind remove ;
Some ruin'd females, who yet talk of love;
And some grown old in idleness-the prey
To vicious spleen, still railing through the day;
And need and misery, vice and danger bind
In sad alliance each degraded mind.
That window view!-oil'd paper and old glass Stain the strong rays, which, though impeded, pass,
And give a dusty warmth to that huge room,
The conquer'd sunshine's melancholy gloom;
When all those western rays, without so bright,
Within become a ghastly glimmering light,
As pale and faint upon the floor they fall,
Or feebly gleam on the opposing wall:
That floor, once oak, now pieced with fir unplaned,
Or, where not pieced, in places bored and stain'd;
That wall once whiten'd, now an odious sight,
Stain'd with all hues, except its ancient white;
The only door is fasten'd by a pin,
Or stubborn bar, that none may hurry in:
For this poor room, like rooms of greater pride,
At times contains what prudent men would hide.
Where'er the floor allows an even space, Chalking and marks of various games have place; Boys, without foresight, pleased in halters swing; On a fix'd hook men cast a flying ring;
While gin and snuff their female neighbours share, And the black beverage in the fractured ware.
On swinging shelf are things incongruous stored,-Scraps of their food, the cards and cribbageboard,
With pipes and pouches; while on peg below,
Hang a lost member's fiddle and its bow:
That still reminds them how he'd dance and play,
Ere sent untimely to the Convicts' Bay.
Here by a curtain, by a blanket there,
Are various beds conceal'd, but none with care;
Where some by day and some by night, as best
Suit their employments, seek uncertain rest;
The drowsy children at their pleasure creep
To the known crib, and there securely sleep.
Each end contains a grate, and these beside
Are hung utensils for their boil'd and fried—
All used at any hour, by night, by day,
As suit the purse, the person, or the prey.
Above the fire, the mantel-shelf contains
Of china-ware some poor unmatch'd remains ;
There many a tea-cup's gaudy fragment stands,
All placed by vanity's unwearied hands;
For here she lives, e'en here she looks about,
To find some small consoling objects out:
Nor heed these Spartan dames their house, nor sit
'Mid cares domestic,-they nor sew nor knit ;
But of their fate discourse, their ways, their wars
With arm'd authorities, their 'scapes and scars:
These lead to present evils, and a cup,
If fortune grant it, winds description up.
High hung at either end, and next the wall,
Two ancient mirrors show the forms of all,
In all their force ;—these aid them in their dress, But with the good, the evils too express,
Doubling each look of care, each token of distress.
OBSERVE yon tenement, apart and small,
Where the wet pebbles shine upon the wall;
Where the low benches lean beside the door,
And the red paling bounds the space before;
Where thrift and lavender, and lad's-love* bloom,—
That humble dwelling is the widow's home;
There live a pair, for various fortunes known,
But the blind Ellen will relate her own ;—
"My father died—again my mother wed, "And found the comforts of her life were fled; "Her angry husband, vex'd through half his years "By loss and troubles, fill'd her soul with fears: "Their children many, and 'twas my poor place "To nurse and wait on all the infant race; "Labour and hunger were indeed my part, "And should have strengthen'd an erroneous heart.
"So, amid sorrow much and little cheer"A common case-I pass'd my twentieth year; "Then in my days of bloom, of health and youth, "One, much above me, vow'd his love and truth:
* The lad's or boy's love, of some counties, is the plant southernwood, the Artemisia abrotanum of botanists.
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