The Prose Fragments are of minor literary importance, but they help to a knowledge and an understanding of the man. The Old Ballads have an interest of their own, apart from their association with Clare. The majority are no doubt what they purport to be, but in two or three instances Clare's hand is discernible.
J. L. C.
Havelock-place, Hanley,
December, 1872.
CONTENTS
LIFE, LETTERS, ETC.
ASYLUM POEMS:
'T is Spring, My Love, 't is Spring
Love of Nature
The Invitation
To the Lark
Graves of Infants
Bonny Lassie O!
Phoebe of the Scottish Glen
Maid of the Wilderness
Mary Bateman
When Shall We Meet Again?
The Lover's Invitation
Nature's Darling
I'll Dream Upon the Days to Come
To Isobel
The Shepherd's Daughter
Lassie, I Love Thee
The Gipsy Lass
At the Foot of Clifford Hill
To My Wife—A Valentine
My True Love is a Sailor
The Sailor's Return
Birds, Why Are Ye Silent?
Meet Me Tonight
Young Jenny
Adieu
My Bonny Alice and Her Pitcher
The Maiden I Love
To Jenny Lind
Little Trotty Wagtail
The Forest Maid
Bonnny Mary O!
Love's Emblem
The Morning Walk
To Miss C….
I Pluck Summer Blossoms
The March Nosegay
Left Alone
To Mary
The Nightingale
The Dying Child
Mary
Clock-a Clay
Spring
Evening
The Swallow
Jockey and Jenny
The Face I Love So Dearly
The Beanfield
Where She Told Her Love
Milking O' the Kye
A Lover's Vows
The Fall of the Year
Autumn
Early Love
Evening
A Valentine
To Liberty
Approach of Winter
Mary Dove
Spring's Nosegay
The Lost One
The Tell-Tale Flowers
The Skylark
Poets Love Nature—A Fragment
Home Yearnings
My Schoolboy Days
Love Lives Beyond the Tomb
My Early Home
Mary Appleby
Among the Green Bushes
To Jane
The Old Year
MISCELLANEOUS POEMS:
Maying; or, A Love of Flowers
Two Sonnets to Mary
The Vanities of Life
March
The Old Man's Lament
Spring Flowers
Poem on Death
The Wanton Chloe
The Old Shepherd
To a Rosebud in Humble Life
The Triumphs of Time
To John Milton
The Birds and St. Valentine
Farewell and Defiance to Love
The Gipsy's Song
Peggy Band
To a Brook