Classic Poem

OF A BEAUTY IN THE COUNTRY ,

'Twas night, and Flavia to her room retir'd,
With ev'ning chat and sober reading tir'd,
There melancholy, pensive, and alone,
She meditates on the forsaken Town;
On her rais'd arm reclin'd her drooping head
She sigh'd, and thus in plaintive accents said:
" Ah! what avails it to be young and fair,
" To move with negligence, to dress with care?
" What worth have all the charms our pride can boast
" If all in envious solitude are lost?
" Where none admire it is useless to excel;
" Where none are beaux it is vain to be a belle:
" Beauty like wit to judges should be shown;
" Both most are valu'd where they best are known.
" With ev'ry grace of Nature or of Art
" We cannot break one stubborn country heart;
" The brutes insensible our pow'r desy:
" To love exceeds a squire's capacity.
" The Town, the Court, is Beauty's proper sphere;
" That is our heav'n, and we are angels there:
" In that gay circle thousand Cupids rove;
" The Court of Britain is the Court of Love.
" How has my conscious heart with triumph glow'd,
" How have my sparkling eyes their transport show'd,
" At each distinguish'd birthnight ball to see
" The homage due to empire paid to me!
" When ev'ry eye was fix'd on me alone,
" And dreaded mine more than the Monarch's frown,
" When rival statesmen for my favour strove,
" Less jealous in their pow'r than in their love.
" Chang'd is the scene, and all my glories die,
" Like flow'rs transplanted to a colder sky;
" Lost is the dear delight of giving pain,
" The tyrant joy of hearing slaves complain.
" In stupid indolence my life is spent,
" Supinely calm and dully innocent:
" Unblest I wear my useless time away,
" Sleep, wretched maid! all night and dream all day,
" Go at set hours to dinner and to pray'r,
" For Dulness ever must be regular:
" Now with mamma at tedious whist I play,
" Now without scandal drink insipid tea,
" Or in the garden breathe the country air,
" Secure from meeting any tempter there.
" From books to work from work to books I rove,
" And am, alas! at leisure to improve. —
" Is this the life a Beauty ought to lead?
" Were eyes so radiant only made to read?
" These fingers, at whose touch ev'n Age would glow,
" Are these of use for nothing but to sew?
" Sure erring Nature never could design
" To form a housewife in a mould like mine!
" O Venus! queen and guardian of the fair,
" Attend propitious to thy vot'ry's pray'r;
" Let me revisit the dear Town again,
" Let me be seen! — Could I that wish obtain
" All other wishes my own pow'r would gain. "