You would the flower of all your audience lose, And spend your crackers on their empty pews, "The father dead, the son has found a wife, 120 And lives a formal, proud, unsocial life;-- The lands are now enclosed; the tenants all, Save at a rent-day, never see the hall; No lass is suffer'd o'er the walks to come, And, if there's love, they have it all at home. "Oh! could the ghost of our good 'squire arise, And see such change, would it believe its eyes? Would it not glide about from place to place, And mourn the manners of a feebler race? At that long table, where the servants found 130 Mirth and abundance while the year went round; Where a huge pollard on the winter-fire At a huge distance made them all retire; Where not a measure in the room was kept, And but one rule--they tippled till they slept: There would it see a pale old hag preside, A thing made up of stinginess and pride; Who carves the meat, as if the flesh could feel, Careless whose flesh must miss the plenteous meal. Here would the ghost a small coal-fire behold, 140 Not fit to keep one body from the cold; Then would it flit to higher rooms, and stay To view a dull, dress'd company at play; All the old comfort, all the genial fare For ever gone! how sternly would it stare; And, though it might not to their view appear, 'Twould cause among them lassitude and fear; Then wait to see--where he delight has seen-- The dire effect of fretfulness and spleen. "Such were the worthies of these better days; 150 We had their blessings--they shall have our praise.-- "Of Captain Dowling would you hear me speak? I'd sit and sing his praises for a week: He was a man, and man-like all his joy,-- I'm led to question, was he ever boy? Beef was his breakfast;--if from sea and salt, It relish'd better with his wine of malt; Then, till he dined, if walking in or out, Whether the gravel teased him or the gout, Though short in wind and flannel'd every limb, 160 He drank with all who had concerns with him: Whatever trader, agent, merchant, came, They found him ready, every hour the same; Whatever liquors might between them pass, He took them all, and never balk'd his glass; Nay, with the seamen working in the ship, At their request, he'd share the grog and flip. But in the club-room was his chief delight, And punch the favourite liquor of the night; Man after man they from the trial shrank, 170 And Dowling ever was the last who drank. Arrived at home, he, ere he sought his bed, With pipe and brandy would compose his head; Then half an hour was o'er the news beguiled, When he retired as harmless as a child. Set but aside the gravel and the gout, And breathing short--his sand ran fairly out. "At fifty-five we lost him--after that