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hir'd at each call of business, lust, or rage,
that prompts the traveller on from stage to stage.
Still on his strength depends his boasted speed;
for them his limbs grow weak, his bare ribs bleed;
and tho' he groaning, quickens at command,
their extra shilling in the driver's hand
becomes his bitter scourge; 'tis he must feel
the double efforts of the lash and steel;
'til when, up hill, the destin'd inn he gains,
and, trembling under complicated pains,
prone from his nostrils, darting on the ground,
his breath emitted floats in clouds around:
drops chase each other down his chested sides,
and spatter'd mud his native colour hides;
through his swoln veins the boiling torrent flows,
and every nerve a separate torture knows.
His harness loos'd, he welcomes, eager-eyed,
the pails full draught that quivers by his side,
and joys to see the well-known stable door,
as the starv'd mariner the friendly shore.
Ah! well it were, if here his sufferings ceas'd,
and ample hours of rest his pains appeas'd;
but rous'd again, and sternly bade to rise,
and shake refreshing slumber from his eyes,
ere his exhauted spirits can return,
or through his frame reviving ardour burn,
come forth he must, tho' limping, maim'd and sore,
he hears the whip: the chaise is at the door;
the collar lightens and again he feels
his half-heal'd wounds inflam'd; again the wheels,
with tiresome sameness, in his ears resound,
o'er blinding dust, or miles of flinty ground.
Thus nightly robbed, and injur'd day by day,
his piece-meal murderers wear his life away.
What sayest thou, Dobbin? what tho' bounds await