Classic Poem

Too Much Moisture

Happy are you, whom Quantock overlooks,
Blessed with keen healthy air, and crystal brooks;
While wretched we the baneful influence mourn
Of cold Aquarius, and his weeping urn.
Eternal mists their dropping curse distill
And drizzly vapours all the ditches fill:
The swampy land's a bog, the fields are seas
And too much moisture is the grand disease.
Here every eye with brackish rheum o'erflows
And a fresh drop still hangs at every nose.
Here the winds rule with uncontested right,
The wanton Gods at pleasure take their flight;
No sheltering hedge, no tree, or spreading bough
Obstruct their course, but unconfined they blow;
With dewy wings they sweep the wat'ry meads
And proudly trample o'er the bending reeds.
We are to north, and southern blasts exposed,
Still drowned by one, or by the other frozed.
Though Venice boast, Brent is as famed a seat,
For here we live in seas, and sail through every street;
And this great privilege we farther gain,
We never are obliged to pray for rain.
And 'tis as fond to wish for sunny days,
For though the God of light condense his rays
And try his pow'r, we must in water lie;
The marsh will still be such, and Brent will ne'er be dry.

Sure this is nature's gaol for rogues designed;
Whoever lives in Brent, must live confined.
Moated around, the water is our fence;
None comes to us, and none can go from hence;
But should a milder day invite abroad
To wade through mire, and wallow in the mud,
Some envious rhine will quickly thwart the road;
And then a small round twig is all your hopes,
You pass not bridges, but you dance on ropes.

All dogs here take the water, and we find
No creature but of an amphibious kind:
Rabbits with ducks, and geese here sail with hens,
And all for food must paddle in the fens;
Nay when provision fails, the hungry mouse
Will fear no pool to reach a neighb'ring house.
The good old hen clucks boldly through the stream
And chicken newly hatched assay to swim.
All have a moorish taste, cow, sheep, and swine,
Eat all like frog, and savour of the rhine.
Bread is our only sauce, a barley cake
Hard as your cheese, and as your trencher black.
Our choicest drink (and that's the greatest curse)
Is but bad water made by brewing worse;
Better to taste the ditch, pure, and unmixed,
Than when to more unwholsome ale bewitched.

To him that hath is alway given more
And a new stock supplies the rising store.
Not only rain from bounteous heaven descends,
But th'ocean with an after-flood befriends;
For nature this as a relief designs
To salt the stinking water of the rhines;
As when of late enraged Neptune sware
Brent was his own, part of his lawful share;
He said, and held his trident o'er the plain,
And soon the waves assert their ancient claim,
They scorn the shore, and o'er the marshes sound,
And mudwall cotts are levelled with the ground;
Though the coarse buildings are so humbly low
That when the house is fall'n, you hardly know.
Buried we are alive; the spacious dome
Has like the grave but one poor scanty room,
Neither so large, or lofty as a tomb.
Thus, as in th'Ark, here in one common sty
Men and their fellow-brutes with equal honour lie.

Thomas Palmer Esq.

Happy are you, whom Quantock overlooks,
Blessed with keen healthy air and crystal brooks;
While wretched we the baneful influence mourn
Of cold Aquarius and his weeping urn.
Eternal mists their dropping curse distil
And drizzly vapours all the ditches fill:
The swampy land's a bog, the fields are seas
And too much moisture is the grand disease.
Here every eye with brackish rheum o'erflows
And a fresh drop still hangs at every nose.
Here the winds rule with uncontested right,
The wanton gods at pleasure take their flight;
No sheltering hedge, no tree or spreading bough
Obstruct their course, but unconfined they blow;
With dewy wings they sweep the watry meads
And proudly trample o'er the bending reeds.
We are to north and southern blasts exposed,
Still drowned by one, or by the other frozed.
Though Venice boast, Brent is as famed a seat,
For here we live in seas, and sail through every street;
And this great privilege we farther gain,
We never are obliged to pray for rain.
And 'tis as fond to wish for sunny days,
For though the god of light condense his rays
And try his pow'r, we must in water lie;
The marsh will still be such, and Brent will ne'er be dry.
Sure this is nature's gaol for rogues designed;
Whoever lives in Brent must live confined.
Moated around, the water is our fence;
None comes to us, and none can go from hence:
But should a milder day invite abroad
To wade through mire, and wallow in the mud,
Some envious rhine will quickly thwart the road;
And then a small round twig is all your hopes,
You pass not bridges, but you dance on ropes.
All dogs here take the water, and we find
No creature but of an amphibious kind:
Rabbits with ducks, and geese here sail with hens,
And all for food must paddle in the fens;
Nay, when provision fails, the hungry mouse
Will fear no pool to reach a neighb'ring house.
The good old hen clucks boldly through the stream
And chicken newly hatched assay to swim.
All have a moorish taste, cow, sheep and swine,
Eat all like frog, and savour of the rhine.
Bread is our only sauce, a barley-cake
Hard as your cheese, and as your trencher black.
Our choicest drink (and that's the greatest curse)
Is but bad water made by brewing worse;
Better to taste the ditch pure and unmixed
Than when to more unwholesome ale bewitched.