POEMS
COMPOSED OR SUGGESTED DURING A TOUR IN THE SUMMER OF 1833
POEMS
III THEY called Thee MERRY ENGLAND, in old time; A happy people won for thee that name With envy heard in many a distant clime; And, spite of change, for me thou keep’st the same Endearing title, a responsive chime To the heart’s fond belief; though some there are Whose sterner judgments deem that word a snare For inattentive Fancy, like the lime Which foolish birds are caught with. Can, I ask, This face of rural beauty be a mask 10 For discontent, and poverty, and crime; These spreading towns a cloak for lawless will? Forbid it, Heaven!–and MERRY ENGLAND still Shall be thy rightful name, in prose and rhyme!