“The Poetical Freehold.
“February 4, 1822, was sold at Honington Fox, the old cottage, the natal place of Robert Bloomfield, the Farmer’s Boy.
“My father, a lively little man, precisely five feet high, was a tailor, constantly employed in snapping the cat, that is, he worked for the farmers at their own houses, at a shilling per day and his board. He was a gay knight of the thimble, and as he wore a fashionable coat with a very narrow back, the villagers called him George Narrowback. My mother they called Mrs. Prim. She was a spruce, neat body, and was the village school-dame. Her father found the money, and my father bought the cottage in the year 1754. He died in the year 1766, and, like many other landed men, died intestate. My mother married again. When I came of age she showed me the title-deeds, told me I was heir-at-law, and hoped she should finish her days there. I promised her she should; but time rolled, and at length my wife, after two years of affliction with the dropsy, died, and left me with five infant children, head and ears in debt. To secure the cottage to my mother, I persuaded my brother Robert to buy the title, and give all my brothers and sisters their shares and me mine, and this money paid my debts. The Farmer’s Boy was now the proprietor; but it was a poor freehold, for he did all the repairs, and my mother paid no rent. After my mother’s death, Isaac lived in it upon the same terms,—too poor to pay rent or be turned out. Isaac died, and left nine children. Bob kept the widow in the place, did all the repairs, and she, also, paid nothing. At length the bankruptcies and delays of the London booksellers forced Bob to sell!——
“——The late noble duke of Grafton gave my mother a gravestone. This is all that remains to mark the village as the birth-place of Giles, and all that now remains in it belonging to the Bloomfields.”
G. B.
With a sentence or two, by way of continuation to the appeal already made in behalf of George Bloomfield, it was purposed to conclude the present article; but just as the sheet was ready for the press a packet of his manuscript papers arrived, and extracts from these will exemplify his character and his necessities. The following address to one of his old friends is a fair specimen of his talent for versifying:—
To Mr. Thomas Wisset, of Sapiston,
Psalm Singer, Parish Clerk, and
Sexton, &c. &c.
Respectfully I would impart,
In language most befitting,
The sorrows of an aching heart,
With care and trouble smitten.
I’ve lost the best of wives, d’ye see,
That e’er to man was given;
Alas! she was too good for me,
So she’s remov’d to heaven.
But while her happiness I trace,
Fell poverty pursuing,
Unless another takes her place,
’Twill be my utter ruin.
My children’s clothes to rags are worn,
Nor have we wit to mend ’em;
Their tatters flying all forlorn—
Kind Providence, defend ’em.
Dear Tom, thou art St. Andrew’s clerk,
And glad I am to know it;
Thou art a witty rhyming spark,
The merry village poet.
Make some fond woman to me fly.
No matter what her form be;
If she has lost a leg or eye,
She still with love may charm me.
If she loves work, Oh! what delight,
What joy it will afford her,
To darn our clothes from morn to night,
And keep us all in order.
Would some kind dame but hear my plaint,
And would thou to me give her,
St. Andrew!—he shall be my saint,
And thou his clerk for ever.
Dear Tom, may all thy joys increase,
And to thee be it given,
When singing here on earth shall cease,
To pitch the key in Heaven.
George Bloomfield.
Nov. 3, 1803.
Prefixed to some MS. verses, written by George Bloomfield in 1808, is the subjoined account of the occasion that awakened his muse.