"Then, little Bird, this boon confer,
Come, and my requiem sing,
Nor fail to be the harbinger
Of everlasting Spring."
She died as before-mentioned in 1835. Her memorial stone states that she was the beloved sister and faithful friend of mourners, who had caused the stone to be erected, with the earnest wish that their remains might be laid by her side, and a humble hope that through Christ they might together be made partakers of the same blessed resurrection. Twelve years afterwards the sod was again cut, to receive, not yet the aged poet or his wife, but their idolised daughter Dora, the devoted wife of Mr. Quillinan, who, in her forty-third year, after a brief period of wedded happiness, died on the 9th July, 1847. Upon the stone at the head of her grave is chiselled a lamb bearing a cross, and the consolatory words: "Him that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast out."
The poet himself was the next to be added to the group, and the slab, with the simple inscription "William Wordsworth, 1850," has been gazed upon by as many moistened eyes as the elaborate tombs of any of England's greatest heroes.
Mr. Edward Quillinan, who died in July, 1851, rests near the two beloved companions of his life.
The subject of this brief memoir—the most perfect sister the world hath known—after her sunny youth, her strong maturity, and her afflicted age, now sleeps in peace on the right side of the poet, to whom her self-denying life was devoted, her resting-place, to all who have heard her name being sufficiently indicated by the words
Dorothy Wordsworth,
1855."
In a few years more the poet's grave received to its shelter the tried and honoured partner of his long life, and the words were added: "Mary Wordsworth, 1859."