And Books were bought and Harpsichords were hir’d; So high was Hope:--the Failure touch’d his Brain, And _Robin_ never was himself again: Yet he no wrath, no angry wish express’d, But tried in vain, to labour or to rest; Then cast his Bundle on his back, and went He knew not whither nor for what Intent. Years fled;--of _Robin_ all Remembrance past, When home he wander’d in his Rags at last: A Sailor’s Jacket on his Limbs was thrown, A Sailor’s Story he had made his own; Had suffer’d Battles, Prisons, Tempests, Storms, Encountering Death in all his ugliest forms; His Cheeks were haggard, hollow was his Eye, Where Madness lurk’d, conceal’d in Misery; Want, and th’ ungentle World, had taught a part, And prompted Cunning to that simple Heart: “He now bethought him, he would roam no more, “But live at Home and labour as before.” Here cloth’d and fed, no sooner he began To round and redden, than away he ran: His Wife was dead, their Children past his aid; So, unmolested from his Home he stray’d: Six Years elasp’d, when, worn with Want and Pain, Came _Robin_, wrapt in all his Rags, again:-- We chide, we pity;--plac’d among our Poor, He fed again and was a Man once more. As when a gaunt and hungry Fox is found, Entrapp’d alive in some rich Hunter’s ground; Fed for the Field, although each Day’s a Feast, _Fatten_ you may, but never _tame_ the Beast; An House protects him, savoury Viands sustain; But loose his neck and off he goes again: So stole our Vagrant from his warm Retreat, To rove a Prowler and be deem’d a Cheat. Hard was his Fare: for, him at length we saw, In Cart convey’d and laid supine on Straw: His feeble Voice now spoke a sinking Heart; His Groans now told the Motions of the Cart: And thus he rose, but tried in vain to stand; Clos’d was his Eye and clench’d his clammy Hand; Life ebb’d apace and our best Aid, no more, Could his weak Sense or dying Heart restore:-- But now he fell, a Victim to the Snare, That vile Attorneys for the Weak prepare;-- They who, when Profit or Resentment call, Heed not the groaning Victim they enthrall.