To the Recruiting Officer

TO THE RECRUITING OFFICER

Spoken at Shrewsbury, where Mr. Farquhar is said to have written that Comedy.

From the fair mansions of illustrious shades,
From groves of bliss, poetic painted meads,
Should Farquhar, deck'd with deathless laurels, come,
Obedient to his own recruiting drum;
Conscious to-night of the superior grace,
The nobler beauties, that adorn this place,
Here would he fix — enraptur'd, here abide,
And change Elysium for the Severn's side.

Let boasting Rome of one Maecenas tell,
Countless are those that by the Severn dwell;
Parnassus' Mount let future bards disclaim,
Hark! how the Wrekin's hospitable name
Swells in the voice of Farquhar and of Fame.

Sabrina! softest nymph that glides along,
Winding and various as her Farquhar's song,
Indulgent smil'd, to bless the poet's toil,
And straight his bays bloom'd fresh, and own'd the gen'rous soil.

Here — Beauty beams, with social sweetness max'd!
Here — true politeness has her standard fix'd!
Here — let the Muse her sacred numbers swell,
And here let sportive wit and gay-drest humour dwell?

O, may our secondary labours find
The brave propitious, and the beauteous kind!
So may Salopian plains, that bloom so gay,
Ne'er know a blast, but wear perpetual May!