Sleep seems their only refuge. For alas DRAWN BY RICHARD WESTALLR.A. ENGRAVED BY J HROBINSON; PUBLISHED BY JOHN SHARPE PICCADILLY. THE TASK. BOOK IV. THE WINTER EVENING. The post comes in.-The newspaper is read.-The World contemplated at a distance.-Address to Winter.-The rural amusements of a winter evening compared with the fashionable ones.-Address to evening.— A brown study.-Fall of snow in the evening.-The waggoner.-A poor family piece. The rural thief.-Public houses.-The multitude of them censured. The farmer's daughter: what she was-what she is.-The simplicity of country manners almost lost.-Causes of the change.Desertion of the country by the rich.-Neglect of magistrates.-The militia principally in fault.-The new recruit and his transformation.Reflection on bodies corporate.-The love of rural objects natural to all, and never to be totally extinguished. HARK! 'tis the twanging horn o'er yonder bridge, With spatter'd boots, strapp'd waist, and frozen locks; True to his charge, the close pack'd load behind, Yet careless what he brings, his one concern And, having dropp'd the' expected bag, pass on. Or charged with amorous sighs of absent swains, His horse and him, unconscious of them all. Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast, |