Lyr. Add: A Song for the Plough Boy
'Rusticus'

All nature now blooms under soft vernal showers,
The trees are all clad in their gay-coloured green,
The fields they are deck'd with sweet opening flowers,
The lambs in their frolics, enliven the scene.
See, see, in yon field,
How the fresh furrows yield
To the plow, 'tis the noblest of human employ:
Come, see rural felicity,
Which the true-hearted Plough Boy will ever enjoy.
2
The clear gushing stream, from the foot of yon mountain,
Meandering flows through the valley below;
The cowslip blooms fresh at the head of the fountain,
While on its green borders sweet wild flowers blow.
Hark, hark, the wild song
Of the gay feather'd throng,
Who revel in pleasures that never can cloy.
Come, see rural felicity,
Which the true-hearted Plough Boy will ever enjoy.
3
While day is departing, and night is advancing,
The Plough Boy enjoys the cool breeze at the door:
The children around him are singing and dancing,
O these were the sports of the children of yore!
Say, say can you feel,
Joy's innocent peal,
Which springs from the heart that ne'er sigh'd for a toy.
Say, why, do you not sigh
For pleasures the Plough Boy alone can enjoy.

(Snort!)

Note at beginning:
"The author of the following song, will excuse a few alterations which we have taken the liberty of making. It was evidently the spontaneous effusion of an uncultivated muse, and we trust our alterations have improved it."

"The Plough boy, and journal of the Board of Agriculture, Volume 1 By New York (State) Board of Agriculture." Google Books online.


The Plough Boy by Henry Homespun Jr.
from June 5, 1819 to May 27, 1820
Volume 1, No. 3. Albany (NY)