31 Yet something he was heard to mutter, How in the park, beneath an old tree, (Without design to hurt the butter, Or any malice to the poultry,) 32 He once or twice had penn'd a sonnet, Yet hoped that he might save his bacon; Numbers would give their oaths upon it, He ne'er was for a conjuror taken. 33 The ghostly prudes, with hagged[7] face, Already had condemn'd the sinner: My Lady rose, and with a grace-- She smiled, and bid him come to dinner, 34 'Jesu-Maria! Madam Bridget, Why, what can the Viscountess mean?' Cried the square hoods, in woeful fidget; 'The times are alter'd quite and clean! 35 'Decorum's turn'd to mere civility! Her air and all her manners show it: Commend me to her affability! Speak to a commoner and poet!' [_Here 500 stanzas are lost._] 36 And so God save our noble king, And guard us from long-winded lubbers, That to eternity would sing, And keep my lady from her rubbers. [Footnote 1: 'Pile of building:' the mansion-house at Stoke-Pogeis, then in the possession of Viscountess Cobham. The style of building which we now call Queen Elizabeth's, is here admirably described, both with regard to its beauties and defects; and the third and fourth stanzas delineate the fantastic manners of her time with equal truth and humour. The house formerly belonged to the Earls of Huntingdon and the family of Hatton.] [Footnote 2: 'Lord-Keeper:' Sir Christopher Hatton, promoted by Queen Elizabeth for his graceful person and fine dancing. Brawls were a sort of a figure-dance then in vogue.] [Footnote 3: 'Styack:' the house-keeper.] [Footnote 4: 'Squib:' the steward.'] [Footnote 5: 'Grooms:' of the chamber.] [Footnote 6: 'Maclean:' a famous highwayman, hanged the week before.] [Footnote 7: 'Hagged:' i. e., the face of a witch or hag.] * * * * * ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD. 1 The curfew tolls the knell of parting day, The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea, The ploughman homeward plods his weary way, And leaves the world to darkness and to me. 2 Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, And all the air a solemn stillness holds, Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight, And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds: 3 Save that, from yonder ivy-mantled tower, The moping owl does to the moon complain Of such as, wandering near her secret bower, Molest her ancient solitary reign. 4 Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade, Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap, Each in his narrow cell for ever laid, The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. 5 The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn, The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed, The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn, No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.