How far poems requiring almost a colloquial plainness of language may accord with the public taste I am doubtful. They have been subjected to able criticism and revised with care. I have endeavoured to make them true to nature.
Eclogue I The Old Mansion House
Stranger.
Old friend! why you seem bent on parish duty,
Breaking the highway stones,—and ’tis a task
Somewhat too hard methinks for age like yours.
Old Man.
Why yes! for one with such a weight of years
Upon his back. I’ve lived here, man and boy,
In this same parish, near the age of man
For I am hard upon threescore and ten.
I can remember sixty years ago
The beautifying of this mansion here
When my late Lady’s father, the old Squire
Came to the estate.
Stranger.
Why then you have outlasted
All his improvements, for you see they’re making
Great alterations here.
Old Man.
Aye-great indeed!
And if my poor old Lady could rise up—
God rest her soul! ’twould grieve her to behold
The wicked work is here.
Stranger.
They’ve set about it
In right good earnest. All the front is gone,
Here’s to be turf they tell me, and a road
Round to the door. There were some yew trees too
Stood in the court.
Old Man.
Aye Master! fine old trees!
My grandfather could just remember back
When they were planted there. It was my task
To keep them trimm’d, and ’twas a pleasure to me!
All strait and smooth, and like a great green wall!
My poor old Lady many a time would come
And tell me where to shear, for she had played
In childhood under them, and ’twas her pride
To keep them in their beauty. Plague I say
On their new-fangled whimsies! we shall have
A modern shrubbery here stuck full of firs
And your pert poplar trees;—I could as soon
Have plough’d my father’s grave as cut them down!
Stranger.
But ’twill be lighter and more chearful now,
A fine smooth turf, and with a gravel road
Round for the carriage,—now it suits my taste.
I like a shrubbery too, it looks so fresh,
And then there’s some variety about it.
In spring the lilac and the gueldres rose,
And the laburnum with its golden flowers
Waving in the wind. And when the autumn comes
The bright red berries of the mountain ash,
With firs enough in winter to look green,
And show that something lives. Sure this is better
Than a great hedge of yew that makes it look
All the year round like winter, and for ever
Dropping its poisonous leaves from the under boughs
So dry and bare!
Old Man.
Ah! so the new Squire thinks
And pretty work he makes of it! what ’tis
To have a stranger come to an old house!
Stranger.
It seems you know him not?
Old Man.
No Sir, not I.
They tell me he’s expected daily now,
But in my Lady’s time he never came
But once, for they were very distant kin.
If he had played about here when a child
In that fore court, and eat the yew-berries,
And sat in the porch threading the jessamine flowers,
That fell so thick, he had not had the heart
To mar all thus.
Stranger.
Come—come! all a not wrong.
Those old dark windows—
Old Man.
They’re demolish’d too—
As if he could not see thro’ casement glass!
The very red-breasts that so regular
Came to my Lady for her morning crumbs,
Won’t know the window now!
Stranger.
Nay they were high
And then so darken’d up with jessamine,
Harbouring the vermine;—that was a fine tree
However. Did it not grow in and line
The porch?
Old Man.
All over it: it did one good
To pass within ten yards when ’twas in blossom.
There was a sweet-briar too that grew beside.
My Lady loved at evening to sit there
And knit; and her old dog lay at her feet
And slept in the sun; ’twas an old favourite dog
She did not love him less that he was old
And feeble, and he always had a place
By the fire-side, and when he died at last
She made me dig a grave in the garden for him.
Ah I she was good to all! a woful day
’Twas for the poor when to her grave she went!
Stranger.
They lost a friend then?
Old Man.
You’re a stranger here
Or would not ask that question. Were they sick?
She had rare cordial waters, and for herbs
She could have taught the Doctors. Then at winter
When weekly she distributed the bread
In the poor old porch, to see her and to hear
The blessings on her! and I warrant them
They were a blessing to her when her wealth
Had been no comfort else. At Christmas, Sir!
It would have warm’d your heart if you had seen
Her Christmas kitchen,—how the blazing fire
Made her fine pewter shine, and holly boughs
So chearful red,—and as for misseltoe,
The finest bough that grew in the country round
Was mark’d for Madam. Then her old ale went
So bountiful about! a Christmas cask,
And ’twas a noble one! God help me Sir!
But I shall never see such days again.
Stranger.
Things may be better yet than you suppose
And you should hope the best.
Old Man.
It don’t look well
These alterations Sir! I’m an old man
And love the good old fashions; we don’t find
Old bounty in new houses. They’ve destroyed
All that my Lady loved; her favourite walk
Grubb’d up, and they do say that the great row
Of elms behind the house, that meet a-top
They must fall too. Well! well! I did not think
To live to see all this, and ’tis perhaps
A comfort I shan’t live to see it long.
Stranger.
But sure all changes are not needs for the worse
My friend.
Old Man.
May-hap they mayn’t Sir;—for all that
I like what I’ve been us’d to. I remember
All this from a child up, and now to lose it,
’Tis losing an old friend. There’s nothing left
As ’twas;—I go abroad and only meet
With men whose fathers I remember boys;
The brook that used to run before my door
That’s gone to the great pond; the trees I learnt
To climb are down; and I see nothing now
That tells me of old times, except the stones
In the church-yard. You are young Sir and I hope
Have many years in store,—but pray to God
You mayn’t be left the last of all your friends.
Stranger.
Well! well! you’ve one friend more than you’re aware of.
If the Squire’s taste don’t suit with your’s, I warrant
That’s all you’ll quarrel with: walk in and taste
His beer, old friend! and see if your old Lady
E’er broached a better cask. You did not know me,
But we’re acquainted now. ’Twould not be easy
To make you like the outside; but within—
That is not changed my friend! you’ll always find
The same old bounty and old welcome there.
Eclogue II The Grandmother’s Tale
Jane.
Harry! I’m tired of playing. We’ll draw round
The fire, and Grandmamma perhaps will tell us
One of her stories.
Harry.
Aye—dear Grandmamma!
A pretty story! something dismal now;
A bloody murder.
Jane.
Or about a ghost.
Grandmother.
Nay, nay, I should but frighten you. You know
The other night when I was telling you
About the light in the church-yard, how you trembled
Because the screech-owl hooted at the window,
And would not go to bed.
Jane.
Why Grandmamma
You said yourself you did not like to hear him.
Pray now! we wo’nt be frightened.
Grandmother.
Well, well, children!
But you’ve heard all my stories. Let me see,—
Did I never tell you how the smuggler murdered
The woman down at Pill?
Harry.
No—never! never!
Grandmother.
Not how he cut her head off in the stable?
Harry.
Oh—now! do tell us that!
Grandmother.
You must have heard
Your Mother, children! often tell of her.
Sheused to weed in the garden here, and worm
Your uncle’s dogs,[[12]] and serve the house with coal;
And glad enough she was in winter time
To drive her asses here! it was cold work
To follow the slow beasts thro’ sleet and snow,
And here she found a comfortable meal
And a brave fire to thaw her, for poor Moll
Was always welcome.
Harry.
Oh—’twas blear-eyed Moll
The collier woman,—a great ugly woman,
I’ve heard of her.
Grandmother.
Ugly enough poor soul!
At ten yards distance you could hardly tell
If it were man or woman, for her voice
Was rough as our old mastiff’s, and she wore
A man’s old coat and hat,—and then her face!
There was a merry story told of her,
How when the press-gang came to take her husband
As they were both in bed, she heard them coming,
Drest John up in her night-cap, and herself
Put on his clothes and went before the Captain.
Jane.
And so they prest a woman!
Grandmother.
’Twas a trick
She dearly loved to tell, and all the country
Soon knew the jest, for she was used to travel
For miles around. All weathers and all hours
She crossed the hill, as hardy as her beasts,
Bearing the wind and rain and winter frosts,
And if she did not reach her home at night
She laid her down in the stable with her asses
And slept as sound as they did.
Harry.
With her asses!
Grandmother.
Yes, and she loved her beasts. For tho’ poor wretch
She was a terrible reprobate and swore
Like any trooper, she was always good
To the dumb creatures, never loaded them
Beyond their strength, and rather I believe
Would stint herself than let the poor beasts want,
Because, she said, they could not ask for food.
I never saw her stick fall heavier on them
Than just with its own weight. She little thought
This tender-heartedness would be her death!
There was a fellow who had oftentimes,
As if he took delight in cruelty.
Ill-used her Asses. He was one who lived
By smuggling, and, for she had often met him
Crossing the down at night, she threatened him,
If he tormented them again, to inform
Of his unlawful ways. Well—so it was—
’Twas what they both were born to, he provoked her,
She laid an information, and one morn
They found her in the stable, her throat cut
From ear to ear, till the head only hung
Just by a bit of skin.
Jane.
Oh dear! oh dear!
Harry.
I hope they hung the man!
Grandmother.
They took him up;
There was no proof, no one had seen the deed,
And he was set at liberty. But God
Whoss eye beholdeth all things, he had seen
The murder, and the murderer knew that God
Was witness to his crime. He fled the place,
But nowhere could he fly the avenging hand
Of heaven, but nowhere could the murderer rest,
A guilty conscience haunted him, by day,
By night, in company, in solitude,
Restless and wretched, did he bear upon him
The weight of blood; her cries were in his ears,
Her stifled groans as when he knelt upon her
Always he heard; always he saw her stand
Before his eyes; even in the dead of night
Distinctly seen as tho’ in the broad sun,
She stood beside the murderer’s bed and yawn’d
Her ghastly wound; till life itself became
A punishment at last he could not bear,
And he confess’d[[13]] it all, and gave himself
To death, so terrible, he said, it was
To have a guilty conscience!
Harry.
Was he hung then?
Grandmother.
Hung and anatomized. Poor wretched man,
Your uncles went to see him on his trial,
He was so pale, so thin, so hollow-eyed,
And such a horror in his meagre face,
They said he look’d like one who never slept.
He begg’d the prayers of all who saw his end
And met his death with fears that well might warn
From guilt, tho’ not without a hope in Christ.
[12] I know not whether this cruel and stupid custom is common in other parts of England. It is supposed to prevent the dogs from doing any mischief should they afterwards become mad.
[13] There must be many persons living who remember these circumstances. They happened two or three and twenty years ago, in the neighbourhood of Bristol. The woman’s name was Bees. The stratagem by which she preserved her husband from the press-gang, is also true.