The bridge across the Merrimac at this point was a covered and gloomy structure at the time this poem was written. It has since been partially remodeled, and many of the houses of the "stranded village," then brown and paintless, have received modern improvements. But there is enough of antiquity still clinging to the place to make it recognizable from Whittier's lines. This was the market to which the Whittiers brought much of the produce of their farm to barter for household supplies. This was the home of Dr. Elias Weld, the "wise old doctor" of "Snow-Bound," and it was to him "The Countess" was inscribed—the poem which every year brings many visitors hither, for the grave of the Countess is near.
ROCKS VILLAGE AND BRIDGE
Home of the Countess was at further end of the bridge, in house now standing, afterward occupied by Whittier's benefactor, Dr. Weld.
Whittier was still in his teens when this eccentric physician left Rocks Village and removed to Hallowell, Maine, and almost half a century had intervened before he wrote that remarkable tribute to the friend and benefactor of his youth, which is found in the prelude to "The Countess." The good old man died at Hudson, Ohio, a few months after the publication of the lines that meant so much to his fame, and it is pleasant to know that they consoled the last hours of his long life. Whittier did not know whether or not the benefactor of his boyhood was living in 1863, when he wrote the poem, as is shown in the lines:—
"I know not, Time and Space so intervene,
Whether, still waiting with a trust serene,
Thou bearest up thy fourscore years and ten,
Or, called at last, art now Heaven's citizen."
RIVER VALLEY, NEAR GRAVE OF COUNTESS
"For, from us, ere the day was done
The wooded hills shut out the sun.
But on the river's further side
We saw the hill-tops glorified."
The River Path