The fame of Bloomfield was further increased by the subsequent publication of “Rural Tales, Ballads, and Songs,” “Good Tidings, or News from the Farm,” “Wild Flowers,” and “Banks of the Wye.” He was kindly noticed by the duke of Grafton, by whom he was appointed to a situation in the seal office; but suffering from constitutional ill-health, he returned to his trade of ladies’ shoemaker, to which, being an amateur in music, he added the employment of making Æolian harps. A pension of a shilling a day was still allowed him by the duke, yet having now, besides a wife and children, undertaken to support several other members of his family, he became involved in difficulties, and being habitually in bad health, he retired to Shefford in Bedfordshire, where, in 1816, a subscription, headed by the duke of Norfolk, and other noblemen, was instituted by the friendship of Sir Edgerton Brydges, for the relief of his embarrassments. Great anxiety of mind, occasioned by accumulated misfortunes and losses, with violent incessant headaches, a morbid nervous irritability, and loss of memory, reduced him at last to a condition little short of insanity. He died at Shefford, August 19, 1823, at the age of fifty-seven, leaving a widow and four children, and debts to the amount of two hundred pounds sterling, which sum was raised by subscription among his benevolent friends and admirers.
The works of Bloomfield have been published in two volumes duodecimo. The author’s amiable disposition and benevolence pervade the whole of his compositions. There is an artless simplicity, a virtuous rectitude of sentiment, an exquisite sensibility to the beautiful, which can not fail to gratify every one who respects moral excellence, and loves the delightful scenes of English country life.
NATHANIEL BLOOMFIELD.
Nathaniel Bloomfield, brother of the foregoing, was likewise a shoemaker and a poet; and although “Nathan’s” name does not sound the most poetical in Lord Byron’s line, yet we believe many of our readers would admire some of his pieces before some of the noble poet’s, for reasons extrinsic of execution or subject. His stanzas on the Enclosure of Honnington Green, quoted by Kirke White in his essays, would be admired by most readers. We transcribe some of the remarks of the amiable critic, including a quotation that will give an idea of Mr. Bloomfield’s poetic abilities, whose writings are not so generally known as those of his brother.
“Had Mr. N. Bloomfield,” says Henry Kirke White, “made his appearance in the horizon of letters prior to his brother, he would undoubtedly have been considered as a meteor of uncommon attraction; the critics would have admired, because it was the fashion to admire. But it is to be apprehended that our countrymen become inured to phenomena—it is to be apprehended that the frivolity of the age can not endure a repetition of the uncommon—that it will no longer be the rage to patronize indigent merit—that the beau monde will therefore neglect, and that, by a necessary consequence, the critics will sneer!
“Nevertheless, sooner or later, merit will meet with its reward; and though the popularity of Mr. Bloomfield may be delayed, he must, at one time or other, receive the meed due to its deserts. Posterity will judge impartially; and if bold and vivid images, and original conceptions, luminously displayed, and judiciously apposed, have any claim to the regard of mankind, the name of Nathaniel Bloomfield will not be without its high and appropriate honors.
“That Mr. N. Bloomfield’s poems display acuteness of remark, and delicacy of sentiment, combined with much strength, and considerable selection of diction, few will deny. The Pæan to Gunpowder would alone prove both his power of language, and the fertility of his imagination; and the following extract presents him to us in the still higher character of a bold and vivid painter. Describing the field after a battle, he says,
‘Now here and there, about the horrid field,
Striding across the dying and the dead,
Stalks up a man, by strength superior,
Or skill and prowess in the arduous fight,
Preserved alive:—fainting he looks around;
Fearing pursuit—not caring to pursue.
The supplicating voice of bitterest moans,
Contortions of excruciating pain,
The shriek of torture, and the groan of death,
Surround him;—and as night her mantle spreads,
To veil the horrors of the mourning field,
With cautious step shaping his devious way,
He seeks a covert where to hide and rest:
At every leaf that rustles in the breeze
Starting, he grasps his sword; and every nerve
Is ready strained for combat or for flight.’
“If Mr. Bloomfield had written nothing besides the Elegy on the Enclosure of Honnington Green, he would have had a right to be considered as a poet of no mean excellence. There is a sweet and tender melancholy pervading the elegiac ballad efforts of Mr. Bloomfield, which has the most indescribable effects on the heart. Were the versification a little more polished, in some instances, they would be read with unmixed delight.”