With birchen sceptre there command at will,
Greater than Busby's self, or Doctor Gill;[1]
But who would be to the vile drudgery bound
Where there so small encouragement is found?
Where you, for recompense of all your pains,
Shall hardly reach a common fiddler's gains?
For when you've toiled, and laboured all you can,
To dung and cultivate a barren brain,
A dancing master shall be better paid,
Though he instructs the heels, and you the head.[2]
- ↑ Dr. Busby, the master of Westminster School, equally celebrated for his learning and his severity. He was living when this poem was written. Dr. Gill, the son of the head master of St. Paul's School, was at first usher under his father, and afterwards succeeded him, but was dismissed at the end of five years, it is supposed for his excessive use of corporal punishments. He subsequently set up a school in Aldersgate-street, where he died in 1642. The most memorable incident connected with the career of Gill was that Milton, who entertained high esteem and respect for him, was one of his scholars at St. Paul's.
- ↑ Lloyd, who had passed with equal disgust through these ill-paid drudgeries, describes the situation of the usher in nearly similar terms:—
'Were I at once empowered to show
My utmost vengeance on my foe,
To punish with extremest rigor,
I could inflict no penance bigger
Than using him as learning's tool,
To make him usher of a school.
For, not to dwell upon the toil
Of working on a barren soil,
And labouring with incessant pains
To cultivate a blockhead's brains,
The duties there but ill befit
The love of letters, arts, or wit. . . . .
Oh! 'tis a service irksome more
Than tugging at the slavish oar.
Yet such his task, a dismal truth,
Who watches o'er the bent of youth;
And while, a paltry stipend earning,
He sows the richest seeds of learning,
And tills their minds with proper care,
And sees them their due produce bear,
No joys, alas! his toil beguile,
His own lies fallow all the while.'
The Author’s Apology
