The Deserted Farm-House[36]

This antique dome the insatiate tooth of time Now level with the dust has almost laid;-- Yet ere 'tis gone, I seize my humble theme From these low ruins, that his years have made.

Behold the unsocial hearth!--where once the fires Blazed high, and soothed the storm-stay'd traveller's woes; See! the weak roof, that abler props requires, Admits the winds, and swift descending snows.

Here, to forget the labours of the day, No more the swains at evening hours repair, But wandering flocks assume the well known way To shun the rigours of the midnight air.

In yonder chamber, half to ruin gone, Once stood the ancient housewife's curtained bed-- Timely the prudent matron has withdrawn, And each domestic comfort with her fled.

The trees, the flowers that her own hands had reared, The plants, the vines, that were so verdant seen,-- The trees, the flowers, the vines have disappear'd, And every plant has vanish'd from the green.

So sits in tears on wide Campania's plain Rome, once the mistress of a world enslaved; That triumph'd o'er the land, subdued the main, And Time himself, in her wild transports, braved.

So sits in tears on Palestina's shore The Hebrew town, of splendour once divine-- Her kings, her lords, her triumphs are no more; Slain are her priests, and ruin'd every shrine.

Once, in the bounds of this deserted room, Perhaps some swain nocturnal courtship made, Perhaps some Sherlock mused amidst the gloom; Since Love and Death forever seek the shade.

Perhaps some miser, doom'd to discontent, Here counted o'er the heaps acquired with pain; He to the dust--his gold, on traffick sent, Shall ne'er disgrace these mouldering walls again.

Nor shall the glow-worm fopling, sunshine bred, Seek, at the evening hour this wonted dome-- Time has reduced the fabrick to a shed, Scarce fit to be the wandering beggar's home.

And none but I its dismal case lament-- None, none but I o'er its cold relics mourn, Sent by the muse--(the time perhaps misspent)-- To write dull stanzas on this dome forlorn.

The first trace that I can find of this poem is in the Freeman's Journal of May 18, 1785. I have little doubt that it is the "Stanzas on an Ancient Dutch House on Long Island," mentioned in 1773 in a letter to Madison as forming a part of Freneau's publication, "The American Village," now lost. After its appearance in the Freeman's Journal, it was widely copied. The Independent Gazetteer printed it in 1787, introduced as follows: "The following is copied from Perryman's London Morning Herald of July 22, 1787: 'The Deserted Farm House,' written in America by Mr. Freneau, whose political productions tended considerably to keep alive the spirit of independence during the late civil war." I have followed the text of 1809. The poet constantly emended this poem; he seldom reprinted it without minor changes, usually for the better.