Odes on Several Subjects (Akenside)/Ode 8

by Mark Akenside

ODE VIII.
On leaving Holland.

 

ADIEU to Leyden's lonely bound,
The Belgian Muse's sober seat;
Where shedding frugal gifts around
On all the fav'rites at her feet,
She feeds the body's bulky frame
For passive, persevering toils;
And lest, for some ambitious aim,
The daring mind should scorn her homely spoils,
She breathes maternal foggs to damp its restless flame.

Adieu the grave, pacific air,
Safe from the flitting mountain-breeze;
The marshy levels lank and bare,
Sacred from furrows, hills, or trees:

Adieu each mantling, fragrant flood,
Untaught to murmur or to flow:
Adieu the ^[1]music of the mud,
That sooths at eve the patient lover's woe,
And wakes to sprighther thoughts the painful poet's blood.

With looks so frosty, and with steps so tame,
Ye careful nymphs, ye household things, adieu;
Not once ye taught me love's or friendship's flame,
And where is he that ever taught it you?
And ye, the sloe-ey'd fathers of the land,
With whom dominion lurks from hand to hand,
Unown'd, undignify'd by public choice,
I go where freedom in the streets is known,
And tells a monarch on his throne,
Tells him he reigns, he lives but by her voice.

O native Albion, when to thee
Shall I return to part no more?
Far from this pale, discolour'd sea,
That sleeps upon the reedy shore,

When shall I plow thy azure tides,
And, as thy fleece-white hills aspire,
Bless the fair shade that on their sides
Imbow'rs the village and the sacred spire,
While the green hedge, below, the golden slope divides?

Ye nymphs who guard the pathless grove,
Ye blue-ey'd sisters of the streams,
With whom I wont at morn to rove,
With whom at noon I talk'd in dreams;
O take me to your haunts again,
The rocky spring, the greenwood glade;
To prompt my slumbers in the murm'ring shade,
And sooth my vacant ear with many an airy strain.

And thou, my faithful harp, no longer mourn
Thy drooping master's unpropitious hand;
Now brighter skies and fresher gales return,
Now fairer maids thy melody demand.
Daughters of Albion, guard your votive lyre!
O blooming god of Thespia's laurell'd quire,

Why sounds not mine harmonious as thy own,
When all the virgin-deities above
With Venus and with Juno move
In concert round thy list'ning father's throne?

Thee too, protectress of my lays,
Elate with whose majestic call
Above the soft Italian's praise,
Above the slavish wreaths of Gaul,
I dare from impious thrones reclaim,
And wanton sloth's luxurious charms,
The honours of a poet's name
To ^[2]Ashley's wisdom, or to Hamden's arms,
Thee, Freedom, I rejoin, and bless thy genuine flame,

Great citizen of Albion! Thee
Heroic Valour still attends,
And useful Science pleas'd to see
How Art her studious toil extends.

While Truth, diffusing from on high
A lustre unconfin'd as day,
Fills and commands the public eye,
Till, pierc'd and sinking by her pow'rful ray,
Tame Sloth and monkish Awe, like nightly Dæmons, fly.

Hence all the land the Patriot's ardour shares;
Hence dread Religion smiles with social joy;
Hence the free bosom's softest, loveliest cares,
Each graceful scene of private life imploy.
O fair Britannia, hail!——With partial love
The tribes of men their native seats approve,
Unjust and hostile to each foreign fame;
But when from gen'rous minds and manly laws
A nation holds her prime applause,
There public zeal defies the test of blame.

 

1. The Frogs.
2. The Earl of Shaftesbury.