"I might have observed that something was amiss in our small household; that Sarah answered the bell, and that the hemmer of flounces, when she did appear, seemed flurried and fatigued. But I was thinking of Sir Philip Sydney, of the Defence of Poetry, of the Arcadia, and of my own resolution to proceed to the green lane, and to dissect that famous pastoral, and select from the mass, which even to myself I hardly confessed to be ponderous, such pages as might suit an age that by no means partakes of my taste for folios. So I said to her, 'That the afternoon being cool, and I less lame than usual, I thought we should not need Sam and the pony-chaise, but that I could manage by the help of my stick.'
"At that word out burst the terrible tidings. My stick, my poor old stick, my life-long friend, the faithful companion of so many walks, was missing, was gone, was lost! Last night, on our return from the lane, the place in the pony-chaise where Sam and I had carefully deposited it was found vacant. Already hue and cry had everywhere been made. 'And really, ma'am,' quoth she, 'there is some comfort in the interest people take in the stick. If it were anything alive, the pony or Fanchon, or little Henry, or we ourselves, they could not be more sorry. Master Brent, ma'am, at the top of the street, he promises to speak to everybody; so does William Wheeler, who goes everywhere; and Mrs Bromley at the shop; and the carrier; and the postman. I dare say the whole parish knows it by this time! I have not been outside the gate to-day, but a dozen people have asked me if we had heard of our stick. It must turn up soon. If one had but the slightest notion where it was lost!'
"Well! we at last sate down on our old turf seats, not far from the entrance of a field, where an accident (in the wheat-carrying, which was then in full activity) had evidently taken place; a loaded waggon must have knocked against the gate, and spilt some of its topmost sheaves. The sheaves were taken away, but the place was strewed with relics of the upset, and a little harvest of the long yellow straw and the rich brown ears remained to tempt the gleaners. As we were talking over this misfortune, and our own, and I was detailing my reasons for believing that my poor stick had found a watery grave, we became aware of two little girls, who stole timidly and quietly up to the place, and began gladly and thankfully to pick up the scattered corn.
"Poor little things, we knew them well! We had known their father died of consumption scarcely a month ago; and affecting it was to see these poor children, delicate girls of seven and five years old, already at work to help their widowed mother, and rejoicing over the discovery of these few ears of fallen wheat, as if it were the gold mines of California. A drove of pigs was looming in the distance; and my little damsel flung down her work, and sprang up at once to help the poor children. She has a taste for helping people, has my little maid, and puts her whole heart and soul into such kindnesses. It was worth something to see how she pounced upon every straggling straw, clearing away all round the outside, and leaving the space within for the little girls. The ground was cleared before the drove came near.
"Pleasant it was to see her zealous activity, and the joy and surprise of the little creatures, who, weak, timid, and lonely, had till then only collected about a dozen ears, when they found themselves loaded with more than they could carry. Their faded frocks were by her contrivance pinned up about them, filled with the golden wheat-ears, and the children went home happy.... Many a rich mother might be proud of the two gleaners that we have seen this afternoon. They so pleased and so thankful to carry their poor store to that poor home; they carried thither better things than wheat."
But for the fate of the stick, and how it was found, and what was done that day with Sir Philip Sydney's Arcadia, we must refer the reader to the book itself. We must now proceed to take some general survey of the far larger portion of the work, which consists of extracts, with some biographical and critical notices.
The series of quotations does not open very auspiciously: we are presented with some Irish ballads of Mr Thomas Davis, which we do not think will excite in many readers the same amount of admiration they appear to have done in Miss Mitford. We must prefer the song she has given, as by Mr Banim, the author of the Tales of the O'Hara Family. It is simple and graceful:—
"'Tis not for love of gold I go,
'Tis not for love of fame;
Though Fortune may her smile bestow,
And I may win a name,
Ailleen;
And I may win a name.
"And yet it is for gold I go,
And yet it is for fame—
That they may deck another brow,
And bless another name,
Ailleen;
And bless another name.
. . . . . .
"Oh! when the bays are all my own,
I know a heart will care!
Oh! when the gold is sought and won,
I know a brow will wear,
Ailleen;
I know a brow will wear.
"And when with both returned again,
My native land I see,
I know a smile will meet me then,
And a hand will welcome me,
Ailleen;
And a hand will welcome me."
There is a brief notice of another writer, a countryman of Mr Banim's, which is very touching. Gerald Griffin seems to have sounded every note of that gay and sad and mournful destiny which the young poet has to endure, who, with a proud, aspiring, sensitive nature, fronts the terrible commonplace of human life—who out of dreams and imagery and sentiment has to coin the means of subsistence. We see him starting from some place near Limerick, with his pocket full of plays. Alas! we see him labouring in London, almost friendless and alone, at mere literary toils, some hopeless love added to his other despondencies, till, broken down in health and courage, and despairing of success, he quits the field, and "joins the Society of Christian Brethren at Cork." No need to go back to the middle ages for romance, if the romance of life consists in suffering and the alternation of hope and despondency, or of hopes transplanted from this world to the next. The soldier and the monastery; the dramatic poet and the "Christian Brethren at Cork"—there is the same tale in both.
We have another contemporary instance brought before us, where the poetic fervour or ambition led to a far sadder retreat than this Society, whatever it may be, of Christian Brethren. John Clare, while following the plough, had looked on nature with the eye of a poet. Pity that he could not have written his poetry, and still clung to his plough. But he left the fields for life in cities, and, instead of singing for the song's sake, commenced singing for the support of wife and family. Hence came madness—in this instance, that actual insanity which the physician can catalogue and describe.