Dentologia:

A Poem on the Diseases of the Teeth and Their Proper Remedies.

by Solyman Brown, A.M.

With NOTES,

Practical, Historical, Illustrative and Explanatory by

Eleazar Parmly, Dentist

Preface

Introduction

Jump To: Canto Second  Canto Third  Canto Fourth  Canto Fifth

CANTO FIRST

Argument

            Invocation to living beauty as seen in the human countenance.- Importance of personal charms to the female sex.- Man a natural physiognomist.- Mental and moral qualities mirrored in the features.- Original beauty of the human race.- Beauty of angelic natures when purified from the stains of morality.- Subject of dentistry proposed.- Universal laws of nature in regard to human teeth.- Importance of good dental practitioners.

CANTO FIRST

No goddess born in blue- eyed Juno’s reign,

Or fair- haired sister of Apollo’s train-

No coy and quivered Dryads of the woods,

Or laughing Naiad of the dashing floods-

Do I invoke;- ye fabled forms- retire!

Let breathing loveliness my notes inspire:-

To thee, my cherished friend! The strains belong,

And LIVING BEAUTY animates my song.

 

This magic spell that mirrors every grace

Of woman’s heart, in lovely woman’s face;

This speaking index of the polished mind,

In virtue pure, by virgin truth refined;-

Is love’s own banner, gracefully unfurled,

To fix affection, and enchant the world.

 

Without its aid, how hard were woman’s lot!

The sigh neglected, and to die forgot;

Though nature’s genial fires unceasing burn,

To live unloved, and love without return!

For well we know that all of human kind,

Read in the face the features of the mind;

The soul’s bright forms forever fresh and fair,

Wit, worth, and modesty, are pictured there.

 

Say not- perverted taste alone descries

An intellectual light in radiant eyes;

In fragrant groves arrayed in emerald green,

Where varying landscapes animate the scene,

Thou, sainted Mother! Find’st that blest repose,

Which sweet celestial innocence bestows,-

To friendship there, thy glowing heart is given;

Thy hands, to all the charities of heaven;

Thy voice, to melody; thine eye, to see

The radiant bow that spans eternity!

 

If nature thus, instructive, deigns to trace

The soul in every feature of the face;

If lovely virtue there displays her charm,

And guilty passions ring the loud alarm;

Arouse, thou slumbering fair! And learn to see

That heaven emits thy destiny to thee.

Is virtuous love thy aim? Deserve the prize :

Or friendship?  Know that here the secret lies:-

To be- and to appear what men approve:-

Their friendship thus is won- and thus their love.

Be mine the pride in measured verse to raise

A plain but lasting monument of praise,

To that distinguished science, know of yore,

Designed departed beauty to restore-

The Dental Art, by Greece and Rome admired,

When a woman to imperial thrones aspired;-

Those mighty states were both to ruin hurls,

But lo! Their art survives to bless the world.

 

Full well I know ‘tis difficult to chime

The laws of science with the rules of rhyme;

Plain vulgar prose, my subject seems to claim,

Did not ambition prompt the higher aim,

The nobler pride, by more laborious care,

To speak in numbers that shall please the fair.

 

To woman, love’s first melodies were sung,

in nature’s prime, when earth and time were young,

And every bard, in each succeeding year,

Has framed his lays for woman’s listening ear:-

Nor let the groveling soil that cleaves to earth

Dare to pretend to comprehend her worth;

When pure- she’s purer than the virgin snow,

On Andes’ top, when summer smiles below;

And more delight o’er life her sweetness breathes,

Than all besides that heaven to man bequeaths.

 

Since beauty thus bestows the kind caress,

and oft audacity secures success,

Be mine the task to join the tuneful throng,

And blend instruction with the charms of song.

 

When man was fashioned by the Power Supreme,

Strange and mysterious as the fact may seem,

And cause of wonder; to his frame was given

Peculiar structure by the hand of heaven:-

Imperious laws distinctively his own,

To other animated forms unknown.

 

Among these laws which science learns to trace,

Through every varying tribe of human race;

From arctic regions, clad in endless snows,

To where the tropical sirocco blows,

As well where elegant refinement smiles,

As far remote, among the ocean isles,

On common destiny awaits our kind;-

‘Tis this, that long before the infant mind

Attains maturity- and ere the sun

Has through the first septennial circle run,

The teeth, deciduous, totter and decay,

And prompt successors hurry them away.

 

This every mother knows, though not aware,

How precious then the kind maternal care

That holds incessant watch, lest nature’s course

Should meet obstruction from some counter force.

For oft the predecessors, lingering, claim

Undue connection with the vital frame,

And, like a monarch, vindicate alone,

The questioned title to their ivory throne.

So mothers, proud of each surviving charm,

Regard their daughters’ beauty with alarm,

Lest these to admiration should aspire,

Before themselves are ready to retire.

But nature’s course is fixed, and man must yield,

For ‘tis but madness to contest the field

With conquering fate: and holy heaven withdraws

Its smile from all who violate its laws.

 

Be watchful, ye- whose fond maternal arm,

Would shield defenseless infancy from harm,

Mark well the hour when nature’s rights demand,

The skillful practice of the dentist’s hand.

But use discretion:- oft imposture wears

The same external guise that merit bears;

And bold pretenders show consummate wit,

By duping others to abandon it.

 

Beware of this whim science never taught

The hard but useful drudgery of thought,

For while in indolence their years have run,

They ask the wealth that industry has won:-

Can charity for such desire success?

No, let them eat the bread of idleness.

 

On just desert let all success attend,

And patient merit never want a friend.

 

To thee, the companion of my happiest days,

The general voice awards superior praise;

‘Twas nobly won, by sacrifice of ease,

‘Mid raging tempest and through stormy seas.

 

End of Canto First

 

CANTO SECOND

Argument

The first dentition, or the growth and progress of the milk teeth.-  Operation of lancing the gums; fatal consequences of neglect, or of inefficient remedies,- The second dentition, or the formation and arrangement of the permanent teeth- Extraction in case of interference, or mal- arrangement,- Distortion and deformity resulting form negligence,- Perfection of the material of which the teeth are composed.

 

CANTO SECOND

The first dentition asks our earliest care,

For oft, obstructed nature, laboring there,

Demands assistance of experienced art,

And seeks from science her appointed part.

Perhaps ere yet the infant tongue can tell

The seat of anguish that it knows too well,

Some struggling tooth, just bursting into day,

Obtuse and vigorous, urges on its way,

While inflammation, pain, and bitter cries,

And flooding tears, in sad succession rise.

 

The lancet, then, alone can give relief,

And mitigate the helpless sufferer’s grief;

But no unpracticed hand should guide the steel

Whose polished point must carry woe or weal:-

With nicest skill the dentist’s hand can touch,

And neither wound too little nor too much.

 

Be prompt to act;- ‘tis dangerous to delay,

Since life awaits the issue of a day:-

reject the gentler means:- employ the best:-

Let unobstructed, may a smiling form,

With beauty bright, and life blood glowing warm,

Its parents’ pride, a flowered in its bloom,

Descends lamented to an early tomb.

 

Nor less the danger when the first array-

The infant teeth- alternately decay,

Or yield succession to a hardier race

With marked reluctance: for, in either case,

Neglect will bring repentance in its train;

In one, deformity;- the other, pain

Or fell disease;- but timely care may still

Avoid the danger, or repair the ill.

If pain ensue, and neighboring parts inflame,

Extortion is the cure: and ‘tis the same

If nature’s law, obstructed from the opposing force:

For this resisting force howe’er remote,

Meets in the dental art its antidote;

Pain flies its presence; anguish wipes her tear;

To hope’s fond vision rainbow- hues her alarms,

And beaus, admiring, her own added charms.

 

Now mark the contrast in some hideous face,

Fobbed by neglect, of symmetry and grace:-

Behold those organs, formed on nature’s plan,

To serve important purposes the man;

To form the sounds in which his thoughts are dearest,

His wishes uttered, and his live confest;

To fit his solid food of every name,

For healthy action on the general frame;

Behold these organs, wrested by abuse,

From wisest purpose, and from noblest use,

Deranged, displaced, distorted, set awry,

Disgusting objects of deformity!

 

Such mal- formations hardier man perplex,

But, with more grief, afflict the softer sex:-

For when with grace, deformity is joined,

As one base passion desolates the mind,

So one contrasted fault alone disarms

All conquering beauty of a thousand charms.

 

Let azure eyes with coral lips unite,

And health’s vermilion blend with snowy white;

Let auburn tresses float upon the gale,

And flowery farmlands all their sweets exhale;

If once the lips in parting, should display

The teeth discolored or in disarray,

The spell dissolves, and beauty in despair

Beholds her fond pretensions melt in air.

 

But learn the remedy:- the dentist’s skill

Subjects disordered nature to his will:-

As great commanders hear without alarms,

The shouts of battle and the shock of arms,

And, when their troops, in broken ranks, incline

To wild confusion, bring them into line;

So he- the master of the dental art,

Can order, grace, and symmetry impart,

Where anarchy had else sustained alone

The undisputed title to his throne.

 

Such benefits this useful science lends

To earliest youth;- and yet its aid extends

To following years, assuaging mortal pain,

And oft restoring beauty’s flowery reign.

 

The human frame, offspring of heaven’s high will,

Displays throughout inimitable skill;

No part defective: none that perfect love

Could prompt unbounded wisdom to improve.

The eye, the ear, how wondrously designed

To serve as useful allies to the mind.

The heaving lungs, that drink th’ aerial flood,

Imparting vigor to the vital blood;-

The heart, that like a virtuous monarch, reigns,

And spreads delight through all its wide domains:

How wondrous these!- yet see the hand divine

Be equal skill displayed in every line,

In every feature of the perfect whole,

That acts in concert with the moving soul.

 

To this great law, that governs every part,

And rules” as perfect in a hair as hear,”

The teeth conform; and hence it stands confest,

Their substance, form, and structure, are the best

That wisdom could devise for such a use,

And hence, defective, only from abuse.

 

Not polished pearl from Ceylon’s coral eaves,

Or California’s or Cumana’s waves;

From Indian hills, Golconda’s lucid gem

That shines a star in Brama’s diadem;

Nor gold of Ophir, wrought by Aaron’s skill,

To from the idol calf, and worshipped still,

Could act the part in nature’s general plan,

Assigned these organs in the frame of man.

END OF CANTO SECOND

 

CANTO THIRD

Argument.

Apostrophe to Luxury; its effects on general health.-  In temperance in eating and drinking.- - Use of animal food.--Effects of luxury and intemperance of teeth. --Cleanliness, neglect of it punished by gangrene of the teeth, and other diseases.--Fate of Urilla occasioned by her carelessness.--Caries, or decay of teeth.-- The tooth- ache.

 

CANTO THIRD

Oh Luxury!  The eldest born of wealth,

Thou foe to virtue, and thou bane of health;

Insidious nursling in the lap of case,

Whose breath is pertinence, whose smile disease;

May suffering man yet see thee as thou art,

A greedy vampire, feasting in his heart!

 

Of all the ills that ante- date the doom

of erring mortals, and erect the tomb

So near the cradle, shortening to a span

The fleeting life of transitory man,

The worst is luxury:- Infrequent flies

The lightning’s fatal bolt; the lowering skies

Are seldom darkened by the whirlwind’s wrath,

Or loud tornado’s devastating path.

Beneath the ocean wave through some expire,

And others by the fierce volcano’s fire;

Though savage war can boast those thousands slain,

On tented filed, or bosom of the main;

Yet few the victims of these fates malign,

Compared, intemperate luxury! With thine.

 

Wherever wealth and false refinement reign,

The pampered appetites compose their train;

Remotest climes supply the varied feast,

But wisdom never comes a welcome guest;

The gourmand, folly, bids the poison pass,

And drains destruction from the circling glass.

The harmless flock, to cruel slaughter led,

Crowns high the board; for this the herd has bled,

For this, the gay musicians of the grove,

Suspend forever all their songs of love!

Earth, air, and ocean, each its part supplies

Of sentient life, to swell the sacrifice;

As though some fiend had sketched the darkest plan

Of bloody banquet for the monster- man!

 

Though teeming earth bestows on honest toil,

In every climate and in every soil,

Their proper fruits, by nature’s law designed,

The safe and luscious diet of mankind,

Yet, see the race from flowery Eden stray,

To roam the mightiest of the beast’s of prey!

See sensual man still smiling with delight,

While bleeding life is quivering gin his sight!

 

But nature, sure to vindicate her cause,

Avenges each transgression of her laws;

Beware, rash man!- for every nice offense

Shall meet, in time, a dreadful recompense;

Nor flight can save- nor necromantic art,

Nor dext’rous stratagems elude the smart;

For ,lo, in fearful shapes, a haggard band

Of fell diseases, wait at her command.

 

‘Tis thus derangement, pain, and swift decay,

Obtain in man their desolating away,

Corrupt his blood, infect his vital breath,

And urge him headlong to the shades of death.

No more his cheeks with flushing crimson glow;

No more he feels the sanguine current flow;

Bu quenched and dim his sightless eyeballs roll,

Nor meet one star that gilds the glowing pole!

 

Amid this general wreck of health and case,

Where every folly generates disease,

The teeth, in spite of nature’s guardian care,

In all disorders of the system share,

Besides those ills peculiarly their own,

To other portions of the frame unknown.

 

If sloth or negligence the task forbear

Of making cleanliness a daily care;

Of fresh ablution, with the morning sun,

Be quite forborne of negligently done;

In dark disguise insidious tartar comes

Encrusts the teeth and irritates the gums,

Till vile deformity usurps the seat

Where smiles should play and winning graces meet,

And foul disease pollutes the fair domain,

Where health and purity should ever reign.

 

Behold Urilla, nature’s favored child;-

Bright on her birth indulgent fortune smiled;-

Her honored grandsire, when the field was won,

By warring freeman, led by Washington.

Nobly sustained, on many a glorious day.

The fiercest fervors of the battle- fray;

Survived the strife, and saw at length unfurled

Our union- banner floating round the world;

Then found a grave, as every patriot can,

Inscribed ”Defender of the rights of man.”

 

Her sire, whose freighted ships form every shore

Returned with wealth in unexhausted store,

Was doubly rich;- his gold was less refined

Than the bright treasures of his noble mind.

 

And she herself is fair in form and face;-

Her glance is modesty, her motion grace,

Her smile, a moonbeam on the garden bower,

Her blush, a rainbow on the summer shower,

And she is gentler than the fearful fawn

That drinks the glittering dew drops of the lawn.

 

When first I saw her eyes’ celestial blue,

Her cheeks’ vermilion, and the carmine hue,

That melted on her lips;- her auburn hair

That floated playful on the yielding air;

And then that neck within those graceful curls,

Molten from Cleopatra’s liquid pearls,

I whispered to my heart;- we’ll fondly seek

The means, the hour, to hear the angel speak;

For sure such language from those lips must flow,

As none but pure and seraph natures know.

 

‘Twas said- ‘twas done- the fit occasion came,

As if to quench betimes the kindling flame

of love and admiration;- for she spoke,

And lo, the heavenly spell forever broke;

And fancied angel vanished into air,

And left unfortunate Urilla there:

For when her parted lips disclosed to view,

Those ruined arches, veiled in ebon hue,

Where love had thought to feast the ravished sight

On orient gems reflecting snowy light,

Hope, disappointed, silently retired,

Disgust triumphant came, and love expired!

 

And yet, Urilla’s single fault was small:

If by so harsh a name ‘tis just to call

Her slight neglect:- but ‘tis with beauty’s chain,

As ‘tis with nature’s:- sunder it in twain

At any link, and you dissolve the whole,

As death disparts the body form the soul.

 

Let every fair one shun Urilla’s fate,

And wake to action, ere it be late;-

Let each successive day unfailing bring

The brush, the dentifrice, and, from the spring,

The cleansing flood:- the labor will be small,

And blooming health will soon reward it all.

Or, if her past neglect prelude relief,

By gentle means like these; assuage her grief;

The dental art can remedy the ill,

Restore her hopes, and make her lovelier still.

 

Yet other evils may her care engage,

The offspring of an epicurean age.

Destructive caries come with secret stealth

T’ avenge the violated laws of health:

Dilapidates the teeth by slow decay,

And bears the all successively away.

So, silent Time, with unresisted power,

Labors at midnight in the lonely tower;

Corrodes the granite in the ivied wall,

And smiles to hear the crumbling atoms fall;-

Till all the mighty structure disappears,

A dream forgot, a tale of other years.

When caries, thus, the solid tooth destroys,

That sullen enemy to mortal joys,

The tooth- ache, supervenes:- detested name,

Most justly damned to everlasting fame!

 

They say who most have felt, and best should know

The power of this most execrable woe,

That when Pandora’s box of mortal pains,

Was first unlocked among the wondering swains,

To every vice its kindred grief was sent,

And every crime received its punishment,

Except intemperance;- no single ill

Could heaven’s irrevocable law fulfill,

The fixed resolve, th’ omnipotent decree,

That each offense should meet its penalty;

Then all these mortal woes in one were joined,

And tooth- ache came, the terror of mankind!

 

Thou haggard fiend!  Of hellish imps the worst,

To mercy deaf, by sorrowing man accurst;

Though cheerless days made desolate by thee,

And long, long nights of sleepless agony,

Have marked thy fearful reign in days of yore,

Thy power is crushed,- thy scorpion-sting no more

Affrights the helpless, for the dental art

Commands they gloomy terrors to depart,

Then wipes from beauty’s cheek the tears that burn,

And bids her roses and her smiles return.

End of Canto Third

 

CANTO FOURTH

Argument

            Remedies for the various disorders of the teeth,- Filing away carious portions.- Stopping carious cavities with gold foil.- Loss of the teeth occasioning the necessity of substituting others- Of artificial teeth.- Eulogium on those who labor for the benefit of mankind.

CANTO FOURTH

Auspicious art! Before whose magic spell,

Disease and pain shrink shuddering back to hell,

Whose touch, like that mysterious gem of old,

That changed all baser metals into gold,

Restores the faded floweret to its bloom,

And saves the victim from the threatening tomb:-

Direct my song and teach me to rehearse

in the smooth numbers of enchanting verse,

Those varied stratagems employed by thee,

To soothe the pangs of frail humanity.

 

In nature’s vast domain, with curious eye,

Search through the earth, the ocean, and the sky;

Ask of the beast that crops the flowery plain,

And fish that threads the billows of the main;

Ask of the bird that journeys on the wind,

And reasoning man for nobler flights designed;-

If any link in wide creation’s chain

Of golden harmony, produces pain;

Or, in the general frame, is found a flaw,

But from resistance to wise nature’s law?

 

And this resistance comes from man alone,

Who vainly thinks to shake th’ Eternal’s throne;

Who spurns the good to humble virtue given,

And madly builds himself another heaven.

Folly with wisdom holds unequal strife,

 In bold infraction of the laws of life.

 

If then the teeth, designed for various use,

Decay and ache, ‘tis only from abase;

And lo, triumphant art can well ensure,

At least a remedy, if not a cure.

 

Whene’er among the ivory disks, are seen,

The filthy footsteps of the dark gangrene;

When Caries comes, with stealthy pace to throw

Corrosive ink spots on those banks of snow-

Brook no delay, ye trembling, suffering fair,

But fly for refuge to the dentist’s care.

His practiced hand, obedient to his will,

Employs the slender file with nicest skill;

Just sweeps the vermin of disease away,

And stops the fearful progress of decay.

 

Fair science, thus, with timely care combined,

Becomes the faithful friend of human kind;

Reverses, oft man’s miserable fate,

And serves his cureless ills to mitigate:

Extracts the poison from his tainted breath,

And plucks the feather from the shaft of death.

 

From long neglect which nothing can atone,

Should caries excavate the solid bone,

Destroy the bright enamel in its way,

And lay the nerve quite naked to the day;

Still dental science, subject of my song,

Invents expedients to redress the wrong.

 

‘Tis then the world’s bright god, so highly prized,

That earth and heaven are daily sacrificed

Upon its altar, wrested from abuse,

Performs in nature one substantial use:-

Unlike the sacrilegious part it bore

At thundering Sinai’s trembling base of yore,

When Usrael’s blooming daughters gave their gold,

That Aaron, frail and impious priest, might mould

The idol calf- unlike its task assigned,

To bribe, and buy, and subjugate mankind;

To purchase love and friendship; and descend

A heritage where noble virtues end;

To be, with those who basely covet it,

The villain’s honor, and the dance’s wit;

The shining claim that elevates the clown

To all the stupid mummery of the gown;

The lure by which the genious of tis led

To give the termagant his bridal bed;

The current bribe to hireling virtue given;

The bartered substitute for truth and heaven!

 

This idol god, that thus usurps the skies,

The artist now to noblest use applies;

Transmutes its form with Caesar’s head impressed,

Or in Napoleon’s robes imperial dressed,

To soft and yielding lamina;- with skill

The practiced dental surgeon learns to fill

Each morbid cavity, by caries made,

With pliant gold:- when thus the parts decayed

Are well supplied, corrosion, forced to yield

To conquering art the long contested field,

Resigns its victim to the smiles of peace,

And all decay and irritation cease.

 

Yet oft, through ignorance or negligence,

‘Twere hard to say, through lack of common sense,

The fatal spoiler works his secret way,

With noiseless industry from day to day,

All undisturbed, till, lo, the work is done

That leaves to art new conquests to be won.

‘Tis thus the solid teeth, from year to year,

By folly or misfortune disappear,

Announcing man’s inevitable doom,

And pointing to the portal of the tomb.

 

But mark the triumphs of victorious art,

When sighing fair ones see their hopes depart;

When speech unsyllabled offends, and when

The lisping notes of childhood come again;

When vicious chyle from undigested food,

Abates the vital vigor of the blood;

Then- ever prompt to dry misfortune’s tears,

Again the artist’s magic skill appears.

 

In climes remote, where sacred Ganges flows

From Thibet’s mountains of eternal snows,

Or far beyond the golden Gambia’s source,

Where Lander sought the Niger’s mystic course;

The lordly elephant, in hoary pride,

Toils through successive ages to provide

The ivory tusk; the fertilizing Nile

Breeds the huge Hippopotamus, whose spoil

Supplies new treasures;- and the ocean wave

Nurtures the sea- calf in his rocky cave,

To furnish fit materials to impart

Increased importance to the favorite art.

 

And now, while every sister art aspires

To light her torch at more celestial fires,

The Dentist, e’en, too proud to lag behind

The bold aeronaut who rides the wind,

Or the adventurous mariner that braves,

With bellowing steam, the fury of the waves,

O’erleaps the bounds to ancient science known,

And to all past experience adds his own.

Thus, strange to tell, is daring genius led

By truth and heaven, exultingly to tread

Untrodden files in nature’s realms afar,

Beyond the milky way or polar star.

 

Behold the dental artist’s brights array

Of magic wonders glittering to the day;-

The white stalactite from the mountain cave;

The branching coral from the ocean wave;

The crystal from the rock; the gem that shines

With decompounded light from Indian mines;

And alabaster; and that yellow stone

That graces jealous beauty’s virgin zone;

The brightest gifts of every varying clime,

Resplendent spoils of nature and of time;-

And see, obedient to his ruling will,

Their forms transmuted by his plastic skill,

Till, as when Cadmus, coveting to reign,

With teeth of dragons sowed the Theban plain

A Marshalled host sprang vigorous from the glade,

In blazoned arms and towering plumes arrayed;

So spring to light, while love her flag unfurls,

A shining panoply of orient pearls.

 

With aids like these, from nature’s store supplied,

And following nature man’s unerring guide,

The artist bodily ventures to restore

The dental arch, till, perfect as before,

The teeth in order greet the wondering sight,

A theme of admiration and delight!

 

Let servile tongues applaud the glittering state

That decks the vain, hereditary great;

The circumventive arts of dark chicane,

That mark the general game of loss and gain;

The statesman’s tricks, in search of sordid pelf,

to prove that none are patriots but himself;

The feats of arms that strew th’ embattles plain

With mangled limbs, and crimson all the main;

Be mine the task to render just applause

To those who toil in virtue’s nobler cause;

Whose serious thoughts and labors are designed

To mitigate the woes of usefulness and love employ,

Like Him who fills unnumbered worlds with joy.

End of Canto Fourth

 

CANTO FIFTH

Argument

            Apostrophe to health.- Sympathetic action of disease on the system .- Destructive influence of disordered teeth on the lungs, digestive organs, and nervous structure.- Influence of the teeth on health and longevity, arising from their relation to the solid aliments of man.- Importance of the teeth to the arts of eloquence and vocal music.- The commander addressing his troops on the eve of battle.- The advocate at the bar of justice, pleading the cause of injured innocence.- The venerable pastor exhorting his flock to pursue the path to heaven.- The fate of Seraphina.

CANTO FIFTH

Come, rosy health!  Thou pretty sun- burnt maid,

And laugh with Labor in the noon- day shade;

Awake with Temperance at the peep of dawn,

And brush the dews that deck the fragrant lawn.

 

Enchanting nymph!  How often have I seen

Thy quick elastic footstep on the green,

At summer eve among the reaper train,

The favorite belle of many a rustic swain;

The village minstrel on the turf reclined,

To melting music all his soul resigned;-

The hills, the dales, the fields, and woods around

Seem wrapped in silence, listening to the sound,

Save that one hoary rock across the plain,

Returned in echo every silver strain.

 

Gay, blushing Health!  Without thy freshening glow

Protracted life were only conscious woe;

And earth’s unnumbered joys would end in pain,

If thou were banished from the fair domain.

Be thou the blithe companion of my way,

Through cheerful years, to life’s remotest day;

Though babbling fame should eulogize me not,

Nor fortune gild my solitary cot.

 

Ye lovely fair, who deprecate the doom

Assigned be general taste to tarnished bloom,

Be wise in time- ‘tis folly to delay;

Cast all your vile cosmetic drugs away;

Exchange the shallow artifice of dress

For nature’s more enchanting loveliness;

And know that blooming health alone abides

Where chaste and temperate cleanliness resides.

 

As, when the sun from burning Cancer throws

His radiant fires till all the ether glows,

The spotted plague and fever’s frantic train

In pop’lous cities hold their ghastly reign,

By filth engendered- by intemperance fed,

Till half the living sink among the dead,

While pale affright, with desolating brand,

Spreads consternation though the trembling land;

So, in the breathing macrocosm of man,

Each slight derangement of the general plan,

Each local malady of every name,

Disturbs throughout the sympathizing frame.

 

But most the teeth, for various use employed,

Disturb the system when themselves destroyed;

For when these organs yielding to decay,

In morbid exhalations waste away,

The vital air, from heaven’s aerial flood,

That warms with life the circulating blood,

Bears to the heaving lungs the deadly bane,

Where all its noxious qualities remain,

While every breath the poisonous draught repeats,

And spreads disease with every pulse that beats

 

Nor less the nervous sympathy conveys

Each dental malady a thousand ways,

For, as the witching music of the lyre,

Is heard along each vibratory wire,

What time the heaven- instructed minstrel flings

His hurried hand among the magic strings:-

So when disease invades the dental arch,

And strides in anguish on his angry march,

His burning touch, like the electric flame,

Finishes through every fibre of the frame;

Fever ensues, with all its raging fires,

And oft the maniac sufferer expires.

 

And yet of all the evils that accrue

From loss of teeth through neither small nor few;

The chief is this;- ‘tis nature’s general plan,

That all the solid aliments of man,

Before admission to the secret divine,

Transforms the cruder mass to milky chime,

By nature’s metamorphosis sublime,-

Should suffer comminution:- hence we find

The dental organs formed to cut, and grind,

And masticate the food :- this rightly done,

The process of digestion, well begun,

results in health to each dependent part,

That feels the living impulse of the heart.

 

But when, from loss of teeth, the food must pass,

A crude, and rigid, and unbroken mass.

To the digestive organs: who can know,

What various forms of complicated woe,

May rise terrific from that single source?

For nature, once resisted in her course,

Breeds frightful things- a monstrous progeny!

Consumption, fevers, palsy, leprosy,

The hobbling gout, that chides, at every breath,

The lingering pace of all- destroying death;

And apoplexy, dragging to his doom

The half surviving victim to the tomb

 

See thus the mortal life of erring man,

Reduced by vice and folly to a span;

And years of joy allotted him below,

Exchanged for fleeting months of bitter woe

 

The Power Supreme, who gave all being birth,

And fashioned man the sovereign lord of earth,

Free- will and understanding both bestowed,

The likeness and the image of his God;

And gave what beast, bird, fish, could never reach,

The all- controlling tribute of speech.

Transcendent gift!  That elevates our kind

To all the lofty pleasures of the mind;

To social joy;- to all the polished arts,

That spring from sympathy of kindred hearts

 

This power of speech, in which are nicely wrought,

All shades of feeling, and all forms of thought;

The silver cord that binds all human kind;

The circulating medium of the mind;-

Results from organs formed with heavenly art,

To act in concert their appointed part.

With these the dentals hold the foremost place,

Since, to their loss or injury, we trace

The greater part of those imperfect sounds

With which the general speech of and abounds.

 

Behold the orator, in church or state,

When warm persuasion, or when cool debate

Impels the common mind to daring deeds,

While virtue triumphs, or a nation bleeds.

His vocal organs, trained in patient skill,

Perform their part, obedience to his will.

If rampant war, with all its dire alarms,

Employ his eloquence ; the shock of arms,

The shouts of armies, and their dying groans,

Roll on his quivering lips in silver tones,

While murmuring crowds, impatient still to go,

Rush to the pathway leading to the foe!

 

If lovely innocence, when fair and young,

Fall by the seducer’s lying tongue,

And seek redress where justice holds her throne,

The trembling wretch, unfriended and alone,

And bathed in bitter tears, invokes the laws,

and calls on heaven to vindicate her cause:-

The orator appears:- his searching glance,

a moment, eyes the culprit wretch askance,

That crushed the bleeding flower:- words follow next,

And as the foaming mountain torrent, vext,

By the projecting cliff , in angry bound,

Descends in cataracts, with thundering sound,

Till all the desert wild, and savage rock ,

And hoary mountain, tremble at the shock,

So does the stream of eloquence impart

A palsied shuddering to the villain’s heart!

The listening crowd reply with loud acclaim,

While Emet lives- immortal of fame.

 

 On yonder hill, which freshening shades invest,

Beneath whose spreading boughs forever rest

The moldering gashes of the son and sire,

The village church erects its modest spire.

Behold, each Sabbath morn, with measured place,

And mark, how meek devotion worships there,

With heart uplifted in the hour of prayer.

 

The morning song of love is sweetly sung,

While heaven’s own flame inspires each tuneful tongue;

And see- the venerable man appears,

White with the hoary frosts of threescore years;-

The good old man, whose useful hours have flown,

To soothe all other’s sorrows but his own;-

Whose daily labors to mankind are given,

 In charity, but all his heart to heaven.

So pure the life this virtuous man has passed,

That all his powers are perfect to the last;

No borrowed lock to grace his brow aspires;

No optic glass his vigorous eye requires ;

He lacks no single tooth that nature gave,

Nor asks a staff to guide him to the grave.

 

With voice subdued, and unobtrusive mind,

He speaks of heaven,- he paints the flowery scene,

Where angel- natures—forms of purest love,

Meet in the bowers of innocence above,

To drink at living fountains, and be fed

On fruits immortal, and the living bread,

Till gushing tears fall fast from every eye,

And faith and hope look smiling to the sky.

 

Yet, in that choir that sung th morning song,

One vacant seat afflicts the listening throng;

One well known bodice, admired so oft before,

For sweetest melody, is heard no more.

 

Is Seraphina dead, whose melting strains

Had won the hearts of all the neighboring swains?

Or does she now forsake the house of prayer,

And spurn her venerable pastor’s care?

Unjust suspicion!  Tarnish not her fame,

Nor let reproach attain her spotless name;

For while her mellow voice obeyed her will,

She fondly lingered our musician still;

And though be cruel fate compelled to part,

She leaves us all the homage of her heart.

To lonely solitude she gives hew hours,

In shady copse, of shadier garden- bowers:-

In silent grief, and unconsoled, she pines,

And scarce to heaven’s high will her soul resigns.

For, lo, the heavenly music of her lip-

So sweet, the laboring bees might stop to sip,

Has passed away; discordant notes succeed,

And Seraphina’s bosom loves to bleed.

 

Ye ask the cause ;- by premature decay,

Two of her dental pearls have passed assay;

The two essential to those perfect strains,

That charm the soul when heavenly music reigns.

But fly, ye swains, to Seraphina fly,

And bid her fastly flowing tears be dry;

Haste to her cottage, where in vain she seeks

To wipe the burning deluge from her cheeks;

And when you find her, soothe her frantic mind,

And bid her cast her sorrows to the wind;

In secret whisper this kind truth impart;-

There is a remedy:- the dental art

Can every varying tone with ease restore,

And give thee music sweeter than before!-

Thus, to desponding man in life’s dark way,

The angel, mercy, points the opening day;

And through the tea that trembles in his eye,

Reveals the glories of her kindred sky.(49)

 

END OF CANTO FIFTH