The Country Life: To the Honoured Mr Endymion Porter, Groom of the Bed-Chamber to His Majesty

Sweet country life, to such unknown,Whose lives are others', not their own!But serving courts and cities, beLess happy, less enjoying thee.Thou never plough'st the ocean's foam5To seek and bring rough pepper home:Nor to the Eastern Ind dost roveTo bring from thence the scorched clove:Nor, with the loss of thy loved rest,Bring'st home the ingot from the West.10No, thy ambition's master-pieceFlies no thought higher than a fleece:Or how to pay thy hinds, and clearAll scores: and so to end the year:But walk'st about thine own dear bounds,15Not envying others' larger grounds:For well thou know'st, 'tis not th' extentOf land makes life, but sweet content.When now the cock (the ploughman's horn)Calls forth the lily-wristed morn;20Then to thy corn-fields thou dost go,Which though well soil'd, yet thou dost knowThat the best compost for the landsIs the wise master's feet, and hands.There at the plough thou find'st thy team,25With a hind whistling there to them:And cheer'st them up, by singing howThe kingdom's portion is the plough.This done, then to th' enamell'd meadsThou go'st; and as thy foot there treads,30Thou seest a present God-like powerImprinted in each herb and flower:And smell'st the breath of great-eyed kine,Sweet as the blossoms of the vine.Here thou behold'st thy large sleek neat35Unto the dew-laps up in meat:And, as thou look'st, the wanton steer,The heifer, cow, and ox draw near,To make a pleasing pastime there.These seen, thou go'st to view thy flocks40Of sheep, safe from the wolf and fox,And find'st their bellies there as fullOf short sweet grass, as backs with wool:And leav'st them, as they feed and fill,A shepherd piping on a hill.45

For sports, for pageantry, and plays,Thou hast thy eves, and holydays:On which the young men and maids meet,To exercise their dancing feet:Tripping the comely country Round,50With daffadils and daisies crown'd.Thy wakes, thy quintels, here thou hast,Thy May-poles too with garlands graced;Thy Morris-dance; thy Whitsun-ale;Thy shearing-feast, which never fail.55Thy harvest home; thy wassail bowl,That's toss'd up after Fox i' th' hole:Thy mummeries; thy Twelve-tide kingsAnd queens; thy Christmas revellings:Thy nut-brown mirth, thy russet wit,60And no man pays too dear for it.--To these, thou hast thy times to goAnd trace the hare i' th' treacherous snow:Thy witty wiles to draw, and getThe lark into the trammel net:65Thou hast thy cockrood, and thy gladeTo take the precious pheasant made:Thy lime-twigs, snares, and pit-falls thenTo catch the pilfering birds, not men.

--O happy life! if that their good70The husbandmen but understood!Who all the day themselves do please,And younglings, with such sports as these:And lying down, have nought t' affrightSweet Sleep, that makes more short the night.75CAETERA DESUNT--