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MAYDAY WITH THE MUSES.
BYROBERT BLOOMFIELD
Author of the Farmer's Boy, Rural Tales, &c.
LONDON:
Printed for the Author: and for Baldwin Chadock, and Joy
1822
LONDON:
Printed by Thomas Davison, Whitefriars.
PREFACE.
I am of opinion that Prefaces are very useless things in cases like thepresent, where the Author must talk of himself, with little amusement tohis readers. I have hesitated whether I should say any thing or nothing;but as it is the fashion to say something, I suppose I must comply. I amwell aware that many readers will exclaim—"It is not the common practiceof English baronets to remit half a year's rent to their tenants forpoetry, or for any thing else." This may be very true; but I have found acharacter in the Rambler, No. 82, who made a very different bargain, andwho says, "And as Alfred received the tribute of the Welsh in wolves'heads, I allowed my tenants to pay their rents in butterflies, till I hadexhausted the papilionaceous tribe. I then directed them to the pursuit ofother animals, and obtained, by this easy method, most of the grubs andinsects which land, air, or water can supply………I have, from my ownground, the longest blade of grass upon record, and once accepted, as ahalf year's rent for a field of wheat, an ear, containing more grains thanhad been seen before upon a single stem."
I hope my old Sir Ambrose stands in no need of defence from me or from anyone; a man has a right to do what he likes with his own estate. Thecharacters I have introduced as candidates may not come off so easily; acluster of poets is not likely to be found in one village, and thefollowing lines, written by my good friend T. Park. Esq. of Hampstead, arenot only true, but beautifully true, and I cannot omit them.
WRITTEN IN THE ISLE OF THANET,
August, 1790.
The bard, who paints from rural plains,
Must oft himself the void supply
Of damsels pure and artless swains,
Of innocence and industry:
For sad experience shows the heart
Of human beings much the same;
Or polish'd by insidious art,
Or rude as from the clod it came.
And he who roams the village round,
Or strays amid the harvest sere,
Will hear, as now, too many a sound
Quiet would never wish to hear.
The wrangling rustics' loud abuse,
The coarse, unfeeling, witless jest,
The threat obscene, the oath profuse,
And all that cultured minds detest.
Hence let those Sylvan poets glean,
Who picture life without a flaw;
Nature may form a perfect scene,
But Fancy must the figures draw.
The word "fancy" connects itself with my very childhood, fifty years back.The fancy of those who wrote the songs which I was obliged to hear ininfancy was a very inanimate and sleepy fancy. I could enumerate a dozensongs at least which all described sleeping shepherds and shepherdesses,and, in one instance, where they both went to sleep: this is not faircertainly; it is not even "watch and watch."
"As Damon and Phillis were keeping of sheep,
Being free from all care they retired to sleep," &c.
I must say, that if I understand any thing at all about keeping sheep,this is not the way to go to work with