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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=395920" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The Borough. Letter XII: Players</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">These are monarchs none respect,<br>Heroes, yet an humbled crew,<br>Nobles, whom the crowd correct,<br>Wealthy men, whom duns pursue;<br>Beauties shrinking from the view<br>Of the day's detecting eye;<br>Lovers, who with much ado<br>Long-forsaken damsels woo,<br>And heave the ill-feign'd sigh.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">These are misers, craving means<br>Of existence through the day,<br>Famous scholars, conning scenes<br>Of a dull bewildering play;<br>Ragged beaux and misses gray,<br>Whom the rabble praise and blame,<br>Proud and mean, and sad and gay,<br>Toiling after ease, are they,<br>Infamous, and boasting fame.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">DRAWN by the annual call, we now behold<br>Our Troop Dramatic, heroes known of old,<br>And those, since last they march'd, enlisted and </div><div style="margin:10px 0">enrolled:<br>Mounted on hacks or borne in waggons some,<br>The rest on foot (the humbler brethren) come.<br>Three favour'd places, an unequal time,<br>Join to support this company sublime:<br>Ours for the longer period--see how light<br>Yon parties move, their former friends in sight,<br>Whose claims are all allow'd, and friendship glads </div><div style="margin:10px 0">the night.<br>Now public rooms shall sound with words divine,<br>And private lodgings hear how heroes shine;<br>No talk of pay shall yet on pleasure steal,<br>But kindest welcome bless the friendly meal;<br>While o'er the social jug and decent cheer,<br>Shall be described the fortunes of the year.<br>Peruse these bills, and see what each can do, -<br>Behold! the prince, the slave, the monk, the Jew;<br>Change but the garment, and they'll all engage<br>To take each part, and act in every age:<br>Cull'd from all houses, what a house are they!<br>Swept from all barns, our Borough-critics say;<br>But with some portion of a critic's ire,<br>We all endure them; there are some admire:<br>They might have praise, confined to farce alone;<br>Full well they grin, they should not try to groan;<br>But then our servants' and our seamen's wives<br>Love all that rant and rapture as their lives;<br>He who 'Squire Richard's part could well sustain,<br>Finds as King Richard he must roar amain -<br>'My horse! my horse!'--Lo! now to their abodes,<br>Come lords and lovers, empresses and gods.<br>The master-mover of these scenes has made<br>No trifling gain in this adventurous trade;<br>Trade we may term it, for he duly buys<br>Arms out of use and undirected eyes:<br>These he instructs, and guides them as he can,<br>And vends each night the manufactured man:<br>Long as our custom lasts they gladly stay,<br>Then strike their tents, like Tartars! and away!<br>The place grows bare where they too long remain,<br>But grass will rise ere they return again.<br>Children of Thespes, welcome; knights and </div><div style="margin:10px 0">queens!<br>Counts! barons! beauties! when before your scenes,<br>And mighty monarchs thund'ring from your throne;<br>Then step behind, and all your glory's gone:<br>Of crown and palace, throne and guards bereft,<br>The pomp is vanish'd and the care is left.<br>Yet strong and lively is the joy they feel,<br>When the full house secures the plenteous meal;<br>Flatt'ring and flatter'd, each attempts to raise<br>A brother's merits for a brother's praise:<br>For never hero shows a prouder heart,<br>Than he who proudly acts a hero's part;<br>Nor without cause; the boards, we know, can yield<br>Place for fierce contest, like the tented field.<br>Graceful to tread the stage, to be in turn<br>The prince we honour, and the knave we spurn;<br>Bravely to bear the tumult of the crowd,<br>The hiss tremendous, and the censure loud:<br>These are their parts,--and he who these sustains,<br>Deserves some praise and profit for his pains.<br>Heroes at least of gentler kind are they,<br>Against whose swords no weeping widows pray,<br>No blood their fury sheds, nor havoc marks their </div><div style="margin:10px 0">way.<br>Sad happy race! soon raised and soon depress'd,<br>Your days all pass'd in jeopardy and jest;<br>Poor without prudence, with afflictions vain,<br>Not warn'd by misery, not enrich'd by gain;<br>Whom Justice, pitying, chides from place to place,<br>A wandering, careless, wretched, merry race,<br>Whose cheerful looks assume, and play the parts<br>Of happy rovers with repining hearts;<br>Then cast off care, and in the mimic pain<br>Of tragic woe feel spirits light and vain,<br>Distress and hope--the mind's the body's wear,<br>The man's affliction, and the actor's tear:<br>Alternate times of fasting and excess<br>Are yours, ye smiling children of distress.<br>Slaves though ye be, your wandering freedom </div><div style="margin:10px 0">seems,<br>And with your varying views and restless schemes,<br>Your griefs are transient, as your joys are dreams.<br>Yet keen those griefs--ah! what avail thy </div><div style="margin:10px 0">charms,<br>Fair Juliet! what that infant in thine arms;<br>What those heroic lines thy patience learns,<br>What all the aid thy present Romeo earns,<br>Whilst thou art crowded in that lumbering wain<br>With all thy plaintive sisters to complain?<br>Nor is there lack of labour--To rehearse,<br>Day after day, poor scraps of prose and verse;<br>To bear each other's spirit, pride, and spite;<br>To hide in rant the heart ache of the night;<br>To dress in gaudy patchwork, and to force<br>The mind to think on the appointed course; -<br>This is laborious, and may be defined<br>The bootless labour of the thriftless mind.<br>There is a veteran Dame: I see her stand<br>Intent and pensive with her book in hand;<br>Awhile her thoughts she forces on her part,<br>Then dwells on objects nearer to the heart;<br>Across the room she paces, gets her tone,<br>And fits her features for the Danish throne;<br>To-night a queen--I mark her motion slow,<br>I hear her speech, and Hamlet's mother know.<br>Methinks 'tis pitiful to see her try<br>For strength of arms and energy of eye;<br>With vigour lost, and spirits worn away,<br>Her pomp and pride she labours to display;<br>And when awhile she's tried her part to act,<br>To find her thoughts arrested by some fact;<br>When struggles more and more severe are seen,<br>In the plain actress than the Danish queen, -<br>At length she feels her part, she finds delight,<br>And fancies all the plaudits of the night;<br>Old as she is, she smiles at every speech,<br>And thinks no youthful part beyond her reach,<br>But as the mist of vanity again<br>Is blown away, by press of present pain,<br>Sad and in doubt she to her purse applies<br>For cause of comfort, where no comfort lies;<br>Then to her task she sighing turns again -<br>'Oh! Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain!'<br>And who that poor, consumptive, wither'd thing,<br>Who strains her slender throat and strives to sing?<br>Panting for breath and forced her voice to drop,<br>And far unlike the inmate of the shop,<br>Where she, in youth and health, alert and gay,<br>Laugh'd off at night the labours of the day;<br>With novels, verses, fancy's fertile powers,<br>And sister-converse pass'd the evening hours:<br>But Cynthia's soul was soft, her wishes strong,<br>Her judgment weak, and her conclusions wrong;<br>The morning-call and counter were her dread,<br>And her contempt the needle and the thread:<br>But when she read a gentle damsel's part,<br>Her woe, her wish! she had them all by heart.<br>At length the hero of the boards drew nigh,<br>Who spake of love till sigh re-echo'd sigh;<br>He told in honey'd words his deathless flame,<br>And she his own by tender vows became;<br>Nor ring nor licence needed souls so fond,<br>Alfonso's passion was his Cynthia's bond:<br>And thus the simple girl, to shame betray'd,<br>Sinks to the grave forsaken and dismay'd.<br>Sick without pity, sorrowing without hope,<br>See her! the grief and scandal of the troop;<br>A wretched martyr to a childish pride,<br>Her woe insulted, and her praise denied:<br>Her humble talents, though derided, used,<br>Her prospects lost, her confidence abused;<br>All that remains--for she not long can brave<br>Increase of evils--is an early grave.<br>Ye gentle Cynthias of the shop, take heed<br>What dreams you cherish, and what books ye read!<br>A decent sum had Peter Nottage made,<br>By joining bricks--to him a thriving trade:<br>Of his employment master and his wife,<br>This humble tradesman led a lordly life;<br>The house of kings and heroes lack'd repairs,<br>And Peter, though reluctant, served the Players:<br>Connected thus, he heard in way polite, -<br>'Come, Master Nottage, see us play to night,'<br>At first 'twas folly, nonsense, idle stuff,<br>But seen for nothing it grew well enough;<br>And better now--now best, and every night,<br>In this fool's paradise he drank delight;<br>And as he felt the bliss, he wish'd to know<br>Whence all this rapture and these joys could flow;<br>For if the seeing could such pleasure bring,<br>What must the feeling?--feeling like a king?<br>In vain his wife, his uncle, and his friend,<br>Cried--'Peter! Peter! let such follies end;<br>'Tis well enough these vagabonds to see,<br>But would you partner with a showman be?'<br>'Showman!' said Peter, 'did not Quin and Clive,<br>And Roscius-Garrick, by the science thrive?<br>Showman!--'tis scandal; I'm by genius led<br>To join a class who've Shakspeare at their head.'<br>Poor Peter thus by easy steps became<br>A dreaming candidate for scenic fame,<br>And, after years consumed, infirm and poor,<br>He sits and takes the tickets at the door.<br>Of various men these marching troops are made, -<br>Pen-spurning clerks, and lads contemning trade;<br>Waiters and servants by confinement teased,<br>And youths of wealth by dissipation eased;<br>With feeling nymphs, who, such resource at hand,<br>Scorn to obey the rigour of command;<br>Some, who from higher views by vice are won,<br>And some of either sex by love undone;<br>The greater part lamenting as their fall,<br>What some an honour and advancement call.<br>There are who names in shame or fear assume,<br>And hence our Bevilles and our Savilles come;<br>It honours him, from tailor's board kick'd down,<br>As Mister Dormer to amuse the town;<br>Falling, he rises: but a kind there are<br>Who dwell on former prospects, and despair;<br>Justly but vainly they their fate deplore,<br>And mourn their fall, who fell to rise no more.<br>Our merchant Thompson, with his sons around,<br>Most mind and talent in his Frederick found:<br>He was so lively, that his mother knew,<br>If he were taught, that honour must ensue;<br>The father's views were in a different line, -<br>But if at college he were sure to shine.<br>Then should he go--to prosper who could doubt?<br>When schoolboy stigmas would be all wash'd out,<br>For there were marks upon his youthful face,<br>'Twixt vice and error--a neglected case -<br>These would submit to skill; a little time,<br>And none could trace the error or the crime;<br>Then let him go, and once at college, he<br>Might choose his station--what would Frederick be.<br>'Twas soon determined--He could not descend<br>To pedant-laws and lectures without end;<br>And then the chapel--night and morn to pray,<br>Or mulct and threaten'd if he kept away;<br>No! not to be a bishop--so he swore,<br>And at his college he was seen no more.<br>His debts all paid, the father, with a sigh,<br>Placed him in office--'Do, my Frederick, try:<br>Confine thyself a few short months and then -'<br>He tried a fortnight, and threw down the pen.<br>Again demands were hush'd: 'My son, you're free,<br>But you're unsettled; take your chance at sea:'<br>So in few days the midshipman, equipp'd<br>Received the mother's blessing, and was shipp'd.<br>Hard was her fortune! soon compell'd to meet<br>The wretched stripling staggering through the </div><div style="margin:10px 0">street;<br>For, rash, impetuous, insolent, and vain,<br>The Captain sent him to his friends again:<br>About the Borough roved th' unnappy boy,<br>And ate the bread of every chance-employ!<br>Of friends he borrow'd, and the parents yet<br>In secret fondness authorized the debt;<br>The younger sister, still a child, was taught<br>To give with feign'd affright the pittance sought;<br>For now the father cried--'It is too late<br>For trial more--I leave him to his fate,' -<br>Yet left him not: and with a kind of joy,<br>The mother heard of her desponding boy;<br>At length he sicken'd, and he found, when sick,<br>All aid was ready, all attendance quick;<br>A fever seized him, and at once was lost<br>The thought of trespass, error, crime, and cost:<br>Th' indulgent parents, knelt beside the youth,<br>They heard his promise and believed his truth;<br>And when the danger lessen'd on their view,<br>They cast off doubt, and hope assurance grew; -<br>Nursed by his sisters, cherish'd by his sire,<br>Begg'd to be glad, encouraged to aspire,<br>His life, they said, would now all care repay,<br>And he might date his prospects from that day;<br>A son, a brother to his home received,<br>They hoped for all things, and in all believed.<br>And now will pardon, comfort, kindness draw<br>The youth from vice? will honour, duty, law?<br>Alas! not all: the more the trials lent,<br>The less he seem'd to ponder and repent;<br>Headstrong, determined in his own career,<br>He thought reproof unjust and truth severe;<br>The soul's disease was to its crisis come,<br>He first abused and then abjured his home;<br>And when he chose a vagabond to be,<br>He made his shame his glory--'I'll be free.'<br>Friends, parents, relatives, hope, reason, love,<br>With anxious ardour for that empire strove;<br>In vain their strife, in vain the means applied,<br>They had no comfort, but that all were tried;<br>One strong vain trial made, the mind to move,<br>Was the last effort of parental love.<br>E'en then he watch'd his father from his home,<br>And to his mother would for pity come,<br>Where, as he made her tender terrors rise,<br>He talk'd of death, and threaten'd for supplies.<br>Against a youth so vicious and undone,<br>All hearts were closed, and every door but one:<br>The Players received him; they with open heart<br>Gave him his portion and assign'd his part;<br>And ere three days were added to his life,<br>He found a home, a duty, and a wife.<br>His present friends, though they were nothing </div><div style="margin:10px 0">nice,<br>Nor ask'd how vicious he, or what his vice,<br>Still they expected he should now attend<br>To the joint duty as a useful friend;<br>The leader too declared, with frown severe,<br>That none should pawn a robe that kings might wear;<br>And much it moved him, when he Hamlet play'd,<br>To see his Father's Ghost so drunken made:<br>Then too the temper, the unbending pride<br>Of this ally, would no reproof abide: -<br>So leaving these, he march'd away and join'd<br>Another troop, and other goods purloin'd;<br>And other characters, both gay and sage,<br>Sober and sad, made stagger on the stage.<br>Then to rebuke with arrogant disdain,<br>He gave abuse, and sought a home again.<br>Thus changing scenes, but with unchanging vice,<br>Engaged by many, but with no one twice:<br>Of this, a last and poor resource, bereft,<br>He to himself, unhappy guide! was left -<br>And who shall say where guided? to what seats<br>Of starving villany? of thieves and cheats?<br>In that sad time of many a dismal scene<br>Had he a witness, not inactive, been;<br>Had leagued with petty pilferers, and had crept<br>Where of each sex degraded numbers slept:<br>With such associates he was long allied,<br>Where his capacity for ill was tried,<br>And that once lost, the wretch was cast aside,<br>For now, though willing with the worst to act,<br>He wanted powers for an important fact;<br>And while he felt as lawless spirits feel,<br>His hand was palsied, and he couldn't steal.<br>By these rejected, is their lot so strange,<br>So low! that he could suffer by the change?<br>Yes! the new station as a fall we judge, -<br>He now became the harlots' humble drudge,<br>Their drudge in common; they combined to save<br>Awhile from starving their submissive slave;<br>For now his spirit left him, and his pride,<br>His scorn, his rancour, and resentment died;<br>Few were his feelings--but the keenest these,<br>The rage of hunger, and the sigh for ease;<br>He who abused indulgence, now became<br>By want subservient, and by misery tame;<br>A slave, he begg'd forbearance; bent with pain,<br>He shunn'd the blow,--'Ah! strike me not again,'<br>Thus was he found: the master of a hoy<br>Saw the sad wretch whom he had known a boy;<br>At first in doubt, but Frederick laid aside<br>All shame, and humbly for his aid applied:<br>He, tamed and smitten with the storms gone by,<br>Look'd for compassion through one living eye,<br>And stretch'd th' unpalsied hand: the seaman felt<br>His honest heart with gentle pity melt,<br>And his small boon with cheerful frankness dealt;<br>Then made inquiries of th' unhappy youth,<br>Who told, nor shame forbade him, all the truth.<br>'Young Frederick Thompson, to a chandler's shop<br>By harlots order'd, and afraid to stop! -<br>What! our good merchant's favourite to be seen<br>In state so loathsome and in dress so mean?' -<br>So thought the seaman as he bade adieu,<br>And, when in port, related all he knew.<br>But time was lost, inquiry came too late,<br>Those whom he served knew nothing of his fate;<br>No! they had seized on what the sailor gave,<br>Nor bore resistance from their abject slave.<br>The spoil obtain'd they cast him from the door,<br>Robb'd, beaten, hungry, pain'd, diseas'd, and poor.<br>Then nature, pointing to the only spot<br>Which still had comfort for so dire a lot,<br>Although so feeble, led him on the way,<br>And hope look'd forward to a happier day:<br>He thought, poor prodigal! a father yet<br>His woes would pity and his crimes forget;<br>Nor had he brother who with speech severe<br>Would check the pity or refrain the tear:<br>A lighter spirit in his bosom rose,<br>As near the road he sought an hour's repose.<br>And there he found it: he had left the town,<br>But buildings yet were scatter'd up and down;<br>To one of these, half-ruin'd and half-built,<br>Was traced this child of wretchedness and guilt;<br>There, on the remnant of a beggar's vest,<br>Thrown by in scorn, the sufferer sought for rest;<br>There was this scene of vice and woe to close,<br>And there the wretched body found repose.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=George+Crabbe">George Crabbe</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=395920" data-title="The Borough. Letter XII: Players de George Crabbe" data-description="These are monarchs none respect,
Heroes, yet an humbled crew,
Nobles, whom the crowd correct,
Wealthy men, whom duns pursue;
Beauties shrinking from the view
Of the day's detecting eye;
Lovers, who with much ado
Long-forsaken damsels woo,
And heav..."></div>
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