A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields/The Emigration of Pleasure (Henriette Bourdic-Viot)
THE EMIGRATION OF PLEASURE.
Affrighted by the ills that war
Had drawn upon unhappy France,
Pleasure sought in regions far,
Encouragement and countenance.
Through Germany and Spain to pass
Was weary work for miles and miles,
The Spaniard never jokes, alas!
And the German never smiles.
To Russia next. His hopes are vain:
The killing climate, in a week,
Benumbed and sickened all his train,
And robbed the colours from his cheek.
By Catherine he was begged to take
The halls of snow that flashed like gold;
But could he, even for her sake,
Expose his life to death by cold?
To England now. He wandered wild,
And on the same fool's-errand bent;
The Lord Mayor, fat, grey and mild,
Conducted him to Parliament.
Pleasure is courteous, full of grace,
But from the truth he never shrinks:
'I cannot stay i' this horrid place,
Where each one yawns and no one thinks.'
Once more adrift, on, on to Rome,
Where burned the Muse's altar-fires!
Ah me! it was only the home
Of a sick old man and some friars.
When he asked for Horace's verse,
Doggerel hymns were sung through the nose,
He felt he'd fallen from bad to worse,
And tears in his eyes unbidden rose.
Poor Pleasure! How get back to France?
That was the question for him now,
Without papers or money, small his chance!
A loan, but who would a loan allow?
Heaven-helpt, he reached the country dear,
And there at last saw Liberty;
What has a pet spoilt-child to fear,
Who falls with tears at his mother's knee?