PART SECOND.
REFLECTIONS ON THE MORAL AND RELIGIOUS STATE OF PARISHES, PAST AND PRESENT.
A shower, even while we gaze, steals o'er the scene,
Shrouding it, and the sea-view is shout out,
Save where, beyond the holms, one thread of light
Hangs, and a pale and sunny stream shoots on,
O'er the dim vapours, faint and far away,
Like Hope's still light beyond the storms of Time.
Come, let us rest a while in this rude seat!
I was a child when first I heard the sound
Of the great sea. 'Twas night, and journeying far,
We were belated on our road, 'mid scenes10
New and unknown,—a mother and her child,
Now first in this wide world a wanderer:—
My father came, the pastor of the church[16]
That crowns the high hill crest, above the sea;
When, as the wheels went slow, and the still night
Seemed listening, a low murmur met the ear,
Not of the winds:—my mother softly said,
Listen! it is the sea! With breathless awe,
I heard the sound, and closer pressed her hand.
Much of the sea, in infant wonderment,20
I oft had heard, and of the shipwrecked man,
Who sees, on some lone isle, day after day,
The sun sink o'er the solitude of waves,
Like Crusoe; and the tears would start afresh,
Whene'er my mother kissed my cheek, and told
The story of that desolate wild man,26
And how the speaking bird, when he returned
After long absence to his cave forlorn,
Said, as in tones of human sympathy,
Poor Robin Crusoe!
Thoughts like these arose,
When first I heard, at night, the distant sound,
Great Ocean, "of thy everlasting voice!"[17]
Where the white parsonage, among the trees,
Peeped out, that night I restless passed. The sea
Filled all my thoughts; and when slow morning came,
And the first sunbeam streaked the window-pane,
I rose unnoticed, and with stealthy pace,
Straggling along the village green, explored
Alone my fearful but adventurous way;40
When, having turned the hedgerow, I beheld,
For the first time, thy glorious element,
Old Ocean, glittering in the beams of morn,
Stretching far off, and, westward, without bound,
Amid thy sole dominion, rocking loud!
Shivering I stood, and tearful; and even now,
When gathering years have marked my look,—even now
I feel the deep impression of that hour,
As but of yesterday!
Spirit of Time,50
A moment pause, and I will speak to thee!
Dark clouds are round thee; but, lo! Memory waves
Her wand,—the clouds disperse, as the gray rack
Disperses while we gaze, and light steals out,
While the gaunt phantom almost seems to drop
His scythe! Now shadows of the past, distinct,
Are thronging round; the voices of the dead
Are heard; and, lo! the very smoke goes up—
For so it seems—from yonder tenement,60
Where leads the slender pathway to the door.
Enter that small blue parlour: there sits one,
A female, and a child is in her arms;
A child leans at her side, intent to show
A pictured book, and looks upon her face;
One, from the green, comes with a cowslip ball;[18]
And one,[19] a hero, sits sublime and horsed,
Upon a rocking-steed, from Banwell-fair;
This,[20] drives his tiny wheel-barrow, without,
On the green garden-sward; whilst one,[21] apart,
Sighs o'er his solemn task—the spelling-book—70
Half moody, half in tears. Some lines of thought
Are on that matron's brow; yet placidness,
Such as resigned religion gives, is there,
Mingled with sadness; for who e'er beheld,
Without one stealing sigh, a progeny
Of infants clustering round maternal knees,
Nor felt some boding fears, how they might fare
In the wide world, when they who loved them most
Were silent in their graves!
Nay! pass not on,80
Till thou hast marked a book—the leaf turned down—
Night Thoughts on Death and Immortality!
This book, my mother! in the weary hours
Of life, in every care, in every joy,
Was thy companion: next to God's own Word,
The book that bears this name,[22] thou didst revere,
Leaving a stain of tears upon the page,
Whose lessons, with a more emphatic truth,
Touched thine own heart!
That heart has long been still!90
But who is he, of aspect more severe,
Yet with a manly kindness in his mien,
He, who o'erlooks yon sturdy labourer
Delving the glebe! My father as he lived!
That father, and that mother, "earth to earth,
And dust to dust," the inevitable doom
Hath long consigned! And where is he, the son,
Whose future fate they pondered with a sigh?
Long, nor unprosperous, has been his way
Through life's tumultuous scenes, who, when a child,100
Played in that garden platform in the sun;
Or loitered o'er the common, and pursued
The colts among the sand-hills; or, intent
On hardier enterprise, his pumpkin-ship,
New-rigged, and buoyant, with its tiny sail,
Launched on the garden pond; or stretched his hand,
At once forgetting all this glorious toil,
When the bright butterfly came wandering by.
But never will that day pass from his mind,
When, scarcely breathing for delight, at Wells,110
He saw the horsemen of the clock[23] ride round,
As if for life; and ancient Blandifer,[24]
Seated aloft, like Hermes, in his chair
Complacent as when first he took his seat,
Some hundred years ago; saw him lift up,
As if old Time was cowering at his feet,
Solemn lift up his mace, and strike the bell,
Himself for ever silent in his seat.
How little thought I then, the hour would come,
When the loved prelate of that beauteous fane,120
At whose command I write, might placidly
Smile on this picture, in my future verse,122
When Blandifer had struck so many hours
For me, his poet, in this vale of years,
Himself unchanged and solemn as of yore!
My father was the pastor, and the friend
Of all who, living then—the scene is closed—
Now silent in that rocky churchyard sleep,
The aged and the young! A village then
Was not as villages are now. The hind,130
Who delved, or "jocund drove his team a-field,"
Had then an independence in his look
And heart; and, plodding on his lowly path,
Disdained a parish dole, content, though poor.
He was the village monitor: he taught
His children to be good, and read their book,
And in the gallery took his Sunday place,—
To-morrow, with the bee, to work.
So passed
His days of cheerful, independent toil;140
And when the pastor came that way, at eve,
He had a ready present for the child
Who read his book the best; and that poor child
Remembered it, when, treading the same path
In which his father trod, he so grew up
Contented, till old Time had blanched his locks,
And he was borne—whilst the bell tolled—to sleep
In the same churchyard where his father slept!
His daughter walked content, and innocent
As lovely, in her lowly path. She turned150
The hour-glass, while the humming wheel went round,
Or went "a-Maying" o'er the fields in spring,
Leading her little brother by the hand,
Along the village lane, and o'er the stile,
To gather cowslips; and then home again,
To turn her wheel, contented, through the day.156
Or, singing low, bend where her brother slept,
Rocking the cradle, to "sweet William's grave!"[25]
No lure could tempt her from the woodbine shed,
Where she grew up, and folded first her hands160
In infant prayer: yet oft a tear would steal
Down her young cheek, to think how desolate
That home would be when her poor mother died;
Still praying that she ne'er might cause a pain,
Undutiful, to "bring down her gray hairs
With sorrow to the grave!"
Now mark this scene!
The fuming factory's polluted air
Has stained the country! See that rural nymph,
An infant in her arms! She claims the dole170
From the cold parish, which her faithless swain
Denies: he stands aloof, with clownish leer;
The constable behind—and mark his brow—
Beckons the nimble clerk; the justice, grave,
Turns from his book a moment, with a look
Of pity, signs the warrant for her pay,
A weekly eighteen pence; she, unabashed,
Slides from the room, and not a transient blush,
Far less the accusing tear, is on her cheek!
A different scene comes next: That village maid180
Approaches timidly, yet beautiful;
A tear is on her lids, when she looks down
Upon her sleeping child. Her heart was won,
The wedding-day was fixed, the ring was bought!
'Tis the same story—Colin was untrue!
He ruined, and then left her to her fate.
Pity her, she has not a friend on earth,
And that still tear speaks to all human hearts
But his, whose cruelty and treachery189
Caused it to flow! So crime still follows crime.
Ask we the cause? See, where those engines heave,
That spread their giant arms o'er all the land!
The wheel is silent in the vale! Old age
And youth are levelled by one parish law!
Ask why that maid, all day, toils in the field,
Associate with the rude and ribald clown,
Even in the shrinking April of her youth?
To earn her loaf, and eat it by herself.
Parental love is smitten to the dust;
Over a little smoke the aged sire200
Holds his pale hands—and the deserted hearth
Is cheerless as his heart: but Piety
Points to the Bible! Shut the book again:
The ranter is the roving gospel now,
And each his own apostle! Shut the book:
A locust-swarm of tracts darken its light,
And choke its utterance; while a Babel-rout
Of mock-religionists, turn where we will,
Have drowned the small still voice, till Piety,
Sick of the din, retires to pray alone.210
But though abused Religion, and the dole
Of pauper-pay, and vomitories huge
Of smoke, are each a steam-engine of crime,
Polluting, far and wide, the wholesome air,
And withering life's green verdure underneath,
Full many a poor and lowly flower of want
Has Education nursed, like a pure rill,
Winding through desert glens, and bade it live
To grace the cottage with its mantling sweets.
There was a village girl, I knew her well,220
From five years old and upwards; all her friends
Were dead, and she was to the workhouse left,
And there a witness to such sounds profane223
As might turn virtue pale! When Sunday came,
Assembled with the children of the poor,
Upon the lawn of my own parsonage,
She stood among them: they were taught to read
In companies and groups, upon the green,
Each with its little book; her lighted eyes
Shone beautiful where'er they turned; her form230
Was graceful; but her book her sole delight![26]
Instructed thus she went a serving-maid
Into the neighbouring town,—ah! who shall guide
A friendless maid, so beautiful and young,
From life's contagions! But she had been taught
The duties of her humble lot, to pray
To God, and that one heavenly Father's eye
Was over rich and poor! On Sunday night,
She read her Bible, turning still away
From those who flocked, inflaming and inflamed,240
To nightly meetings; but she never closed
Her eyes, or raised them to the light of morn,
Without a prayer to Him who "bade the sun
Go forth," a giant, from his eastern gate!
No art, no bribe, could lure her steps astray
From the plain path, and lessons she had learned,
A village child. She is a mother now,
And lives to prove the blessings and the fruits
Of moral duty, on the poorest child,
When duty, and when sober piety,250
Impressing the young heart, go hand in hand.
No villager was then a disputant
In Calvinistic and contentious creeds;
No pale mechanic, from a neighbouring sink
Of steam and rank debauchery and smoke,255
Crawled forth upon a Sunday morn, with looks
Saddening the very sunshine, to instruct
The parish poor in evangelic lore;
To teach them to cast off, "as filthy rags,"
Good works! and listen to such ministers,260
Who all (be sure) "are worthy of their hire;"
Who only preach for good of their poor souls,
That they may turn "from darkness unto light,"
And, above all, fly, as the gates of hell,
Morality![27] and Baal's steeple house,
Where, without "heart-work," Doctor Littlegrace
Drones his dull requiem to the snoring clerk!"[28]
True; he who drawls his heartless homily
For one day's work, and plods, on wading stilts,
Through prosing paragraphs, with inference,270
Methodically dull, as orthodox,
Enforcing sagely that we all must die
When God shall call—oh, what a pulpit drone
Is he! The blue fly might as well preach "Hum,"
And "so conclude!"
But save me from the sight
Of curate fop, half jockey and half clerk,
The tandem-driving Tommy of a town,
Disdaining books, omniscient of a horse,
Impatient till September comes again,280
Eloquent only of "the pretty girl
With whom he danced last night!" Oh! such a thing
Is worse than the dull doctor, who performs
Duly his stinted task, and then to sleep,
Till Sunday asks another homily
Against all innovations of the age,
Mad missionary zeal, and Bible clubs,287
And Calvinists and Evangelicals!
Yes! Evangelicals! Oh, glorious word!
But who deserves that awful name? Not he
Who spits his puny Puritanic spite
On harmless recreation; who reviles
All who, majestic in their distant scorn,
Bear on in silence their calm Christian course.
He only is the Evangelical
Who holds in equal scorn dogmas and dreams,
The Shibboleth of saintly magazines,
Decked with most grim and godly visages;
The cobweb sophistry, or the dark code
Of commentators, who, with loathsome track,300
Crawl o'er a text, or on the lucid page,
Beaming with heavenly love and God's own light,
Sit like a nightmare![29] Soon a deadly mist
Creeps o'er our eyes and heart, till angel forms
Turn into hideous phantoms, mocking us,
Even when we look for comfort at the spring
And well of life, while dismal voices cry,
Death! Reprobation! Woe! Eternal woe!
He only is the Evangelical
Who from the human commentary turns310
With tranquil scorn, and nearer to his heart
Presses the Bible, till repentant tears,
In silence, wet his cheek, and new-born faith,
And hope, and charity, with radiant smile,
Visit his heart,—all pointing to the cross!
He only is the Evangelical,316
Who, with eyes fixed upon that spectacle,
Christ and him crucified, with ardent hope,
And holier feelings, lifts his thoughts from earth,
And cries, My Father! Meantime, his whole heart320
Is on God's Word: he preaches Faith, and Hope,
And Charity,—these three, and not that one!
And Charity, the greatest of these three![30]
Give me an Evangelical like this! But now
The blackest crimes in tract-religion's code
Are moral virtues! Spare the prodigal,—
He may awake when God shall "call;" but, hell,
Roll thy avenging flames, to swallow up
The son who never left his father's home
Lest he should trust to morals when he dies!330
Let him not lay the unction to his soul,
That his upbraiding conscience tells no tale
At that dread hour; bid him confess his sin,
The greater that, with humble hope, he looks
Back on a well-spent life! Bid him confess
That he hath broken all God's holy laws,—
In vain hath he done justly,—loved, in vain,
Mercy, and hath walked humbly with his God!
These are mere works; but faith is everything,
And all in all! The Christian code contains340
No "if" or "but!"[31] Let tabernacles ring,
And churches too,[32] with sanctimonious strains
Baneful as these; and let such strains be heard
Through half the land; and can we shut our eyes,
And, sadly wondering, ask the cause of crimes,345
When infidelity stands lowering here,
With open scorn, and such a code as this,
So baneful, withers half the charities
Of human hearts! Oh! dear is Mercy's voice
To man, a mourner in the vale of sin350
And death: how dear the still small voice of Faith,
That bids him raise his look beyond the clouds
That hang o'er this dim earth; but he who tears
Faith from her heavenly sisterhood, denies
The gospel, and turns traitor to the cause
He has engaged to plead. Come, Faith, and Hope,
And Charity! how dear to the sad heart,
The consolations and the glorious views
That animate the Christian in his course!
But save, oh! save me from the tract-led Miss,360
Who trots to every Bethel club, and broods
O'er some black missionary's monstrous tale,
Reckless of want around her!
But the priest,
Who deems the Almighty frowns upon his throne,
Because two pair of harmless dowagers,
Whose life has passed without a stain, beguile
An evening hour with cards; who deems that hell
Burns fiercer for a saraband; that thou—
Thou, my sweet Shakspeare—thou, whose touch awakes
The inmost heart of virtuous sympathy,—371
Thou, O divinest poet! at whose voice
Sad Pity weeps, or guilty Terror drops
The blood-stained dagger from his palsied hand,—
That thou art pander to the criminal!
He who thus edifies his Christian flock,
Moves, more than even the Bethel-trotting Miss,
My pity, my aversion, and my scorn.
Cry aloud!—Oh, speak in thunder to the soul379
That sleeps in sin! Harrow the inmost heart
Of murderous intent, till dew-drops stand
Upon his haggard brow! Call conscience up,
Like a stern spectre, whose dim finger points
To dark misdeeds of yore! Wither the arm
Of the oppressor, at whose feet the slave
Crouches, and pleading lifts his fettered hands!
Thou violator of the innocent
Hide thee! Hence! hide thee in the deepest cave,
From man's indignant sight! Thou hypocrite!
Trample in dust thy mask, nor cry faith, faith,390
Making it but a hollow tinkling sound,
That stirs not the foul heart! Horrible wretch!
Look not upon the face of that sweet child,
With thoughts which hell would tremble to conceive!
Oh, shallow, and oh, senseless! In a world
Where rank offences turn the good man pale,
Who leave the Christian's sternest code, to vent
Their petty ire on petty trespasses,
If trespasses they are;—when the wide world
Groans with the burthen of offence; when crimes400
Stalk on, with front defying, o'er the land,
Whilst, her own cause betraying, Christian zeal
Thus swallows camels, straining at a gnat!
Therefore, without a comment, or a note,
We love the Bible; and we prize the more
The spirit of its pure unspotted page,
As pure from the infectious breath that stains,
Like a foul fume, its hallowed light, we hail
The radiant car of heaven, amidst the clouds
Of mortal darkness, and of human mist,410
Sole, as the sun in heaven![33]
Oh! whilst the car412
Of God's own glory rolls along in light,
We join the loud song of the Christian host,
(All puny systems shrinking from the blaze),
Hosannah to the car of light! Roll on!
Saldanna's[34] rocks have echoed to the hymns
Of Faith, and Hope, and Charity! Roll on!
Till the wild wastes of inmost Africa,
Where the long Niger's track is lost, respond,420
Hosannah to the car of light! Roll on!
From realm to realm, from shore to farthest shore,
O'er dark pagodas, and huge idol-fanes,
That frown along the Ganges' utmost stream,
Till the poor widow, from the burning pile
Starting, shall lift her hands to heaven, and weep
That she has found a Saviour, and has heard
The sounds of Christian love! Oh, horrible!
The pile is smoking!—the bamboos lie there,
That held her down when the last struggle shook430
The blazing pile![35] Hasten, O car of light!
Alas for suffering nature! Juggernaut,
Armed, in his giant car goes also forth,
Goes forth amid his red and reeling priests,
While thousands gasp and die beneath the wheels,
As they go groaning on, 'mid cries, and drums,
And flashing cymbals, and delirious songs
Of tinkling dancing girls, and all the rout
Of frantic superstition! Turn away!
And is not Juggernaut himself with us?440
Not only cold insidious sophistry
Comes, blinking with its taper-fume, to light,
If so he may, the sun in the mid heaven!
Not only blind and hideous blasphemy
Scowls in his cloak, and mocks the glorious orb,
Ascending, in its silence, o'er a world
Of sin and sorrow; but a hellish brood
Of imps, and fiends, and phantoms, ape the form
Of godliness, till godliness itself
Seems but a painted monster, and a name450
For darker crimes, at which the shuddering heart
Shrinks; while the ranting rout, as they march on,
Mock Heaven with hymns, till, see! pale Belial
Sighs o'er a filthy tract, and Moloch marks,
With gouts of blood, his brandished magazine!
Start, monster, from the dismal dream! Look up!
Oh! listen to the apostolic voice,
That, like a voice from heaven, proclaims, To faith
Add virtue! There is no mistaking here;
Whilst moral education by the hand460
Shall lead the children to the house of God,
Nor sever Christian faith from Christian love.
If we would see the fruits of charity,
Look at that village group, and paint the scene!
Surrounded by a clear and silent stream,
Where the swift trout shoots from the sudden ray,
A rural mansion on the level lawn
Uplifts its ancient gables, whose slant shade
Is drawn, as with a line, from roof to porch,
Whilst all the rest is sunshine. O'er the trees470
In front, the village church, with pinnacles
And light gray tower, appears; whilst to the right,
An amphitheatre of oaks extends
Its sweep, till, more abrupt, a wooded knoll,474
Where once a castle frowned, closes the scene.
And see! an infant troop, with flags and drum,
Are marching o'er that bridge, beneath the woods,
On to the table spread upon the lawn,
Raising their little hands when grace is said;
Whilst she who taught them to lift up their hearts480
In prayer, and to "remember, in their youth,"
God, "their Creator," mistress of the scene
(Whom I remember once as young), looks on,
Blessing them in the silence of her heart.
And we too bless them. Oh! away, away!
Cant, heartless cant, and that economy,
Cold, and miscalled "political," away!
Let the bells ring—a Puritan turns pale
To hear the festive sound: let the bells ring—
A Christian loves them; and this holiday490
Remembers him, while sighs unbidden steal,
Of life's departing and departed days,
When he himself was young, and heard the bells,
In unison with feelings of his heart—
His first pure Christian feelings, hallowing
The harmonious sound!
And, children, now rejoice,—
Now, for the holidays of life are few;
Nor let the rustic minstrel tune, in vain,
The cracked church-viol, resonant to-day500
Of mirth, though humble! Let the fiddle scrape
Its merriment, and let the joyous group
Dance in a round, for soon the ills of life
Will come! Enough, if one day in the year,
If one brief day, of this brief life, be given
To mirth as innocent as yours! But, lo!
That ancient woman, leaning on her staff!507
Pale, on her crutch she rests one withered hand;
One withered hand, which Gerard Dow might paint,
Even its blue veins! And who is she? The nurse
Of the fair mistress of the scene: she led
Her tottering steps in infancy—she spelt
Her earliest lesson to her; and she now
Leans from that open window, while she thinks—
When summer comes again, the turf will lie
On my cold breast; but I rejoice to see
My child thus leading on the progeny
Of her poor neighbours in the peaceful path
Of humble virtue! I shall be at rest,
Perhaps, when next they meet; but my last prayer520
Is with them, and the mistress of this home.
"The innocent are gay,"[36] gay as the lark
That sings in morn's first sunshine; and why not?
But may they ne'er forget, as life steals on,
In age, the lessons they have learned in youth!
How false the charge, how foul the calumny
On England's generous aristocracy,
That, wrapped in sordid, selfish apathy,
They feel not for the poor!
Ask, is it true?530
Lord of the whirling wheels, the charge is false![37]
Ten thousand charities adorn the land,
Beyond thy cold conception, from this source.
What cottage child but has been neatly clad,
And taught its earliest lesson, from their care?
Witness that schoolhouse, mantled with festoon
Of various plants, which fancifully wreath537
Its window-mullions, and that rustic porch,
Whence the low hum of infant voices blend
With airs of spring, without. Now, all alive,
The green sward rings with play, among the shrubs—
Hushed the long murmur of the morning task,
Before the pensive matron's desk!
But turn,
And mark that aged widow! By her side
Is God's own Word; and, lo! the spectacles
Are yet upon the page. Her daughter kneels
And prays beside her! Many years have shed
Their snow so silently and softly down
Upon her head, that Time, as if to gaze,550
Seems for a moment to suspend his flight
Onward, in reverence to those few gray hairs,
That steal beneath her cap, white as its snow.
Whilst the expiring lamp is kept alive,
Thus feebly, by a duteous daughter's love,
Her last faint prayer, ere all is dark on earth,
Will to the God of heaven ascend, for those
Whose comforts smoothed her silent bed.
And thou,
Witness Elysian Tempe of Stourhead!560
Oh, not because, with bland and gentle smile,
Adding a radiance to the look of age,
Like eve's still light, thy liberal master spreads
His lettered treasures;—not because his search
Has dived the Druid mound, illustrating
His country's annals, and the monuments
Of darkest ages;—not because his woods
Wave o'er the dripping cavern of Old Stour,
Where classic temples gleam along the edge
Of the clear waters, winding beautiful;—570
Oh! not because the works of breathing art,571
Of Poussin, Rubens, Rembrandt, Gainsborough,
Start, like creations, from the silent walls;
To thee, this tribute of respect and love,
Beloved, benevolent, and generous Hoare,
Grateful I pay;—but that, when thou art dead
(Late may it be!) the poor man's tear will fall,
And his voice falter, when he speaks of thee.[38]
And witness thou, magnificent abode,
Where virtuous Ken,[39] with his gray hairs and shroud,580
Came, for a shelter from the world's rude storm,
In his old age, leaving his palace-throne,
Having no spot where he might lay his head,
In all the earth! Oh, witness thou, the seat
Of his first friend, his friend from schoolboy days!
Oh! witness thou, if one who wanted bread
Has not found shelter there; if one poor man
Has been deserted in his hour of need;
Or one poor child been left without a guide,
A father, an instructor, and a friend;590
In him, the pastor, and distributor[40]
Of bounties large, yet falling silently
As dews on the cold turf! And witness thou,
Marston,[41] the seat of my kind, honoured friend—
My kind and honoured friend, from youthful days.
Then wandering on the banks of Rhine, we saw
Cities and spires, beneath the mountains blue,
Gleaming; or vineyards creep from rock to rock;599
Or unknown castles hang, as if in clouds:
Or heard the roaring of the cataract,
Far off, beneath the dark defile or gloom
Of ancient forests; till behold, in light,
Foaming and flashing, with enormous sweep,
Through the rent rocks—where, o'er the mist of spray
The rainbow, like a fairy in her bower,
Is sleeping, while it roars—that volume vast,
White, and with thunder's deafening roar, comes down.
Live long, live happy, till thy journey close,
Calm as the light of day! Yet witness thou,610
The seat of noble ancestry, the seat
Of science, honoured by the name of Boyle,
Though many sorrows, since we met in youth,
Have pressed thy generous master's manly heart,
Witness, the partner of his joys and griefs;
Witness the grateful tenantry, the home
Of the poor man, the children of that school—
Still warm benevolence sits smiling there.
And witness, the fair mansion, on the edge
Of those chalk hills, which, from my garden walk,620
Daily I see, whose gentle mistress droops[42]
With her own griefs, yet never turns her look
From others' sorrows; on whose lids the tear
Shines yet more lovely than the light of youth.
And many a cottage-garden smiles, whose flowers
Invite the music of the morning bee.
And many a fireside has shot out, at eve,
Its light upon the old man's withered hand
And pallid cheek from their benevolence—
Sad as is still the parish-pauper's home—630
Who shed around their patrimonial seats
The light of heaven-descending Charity.632
And every feeling of the Christian heart
Would rise accusing, could I pass unsung,
Thee,[43] fair as Charity's own form, who late
Didst stand beneath the porch of that gray fane,
Soliciting[44] a mite from all who passed,
With such a smile, as to refuse would seem
To do a wrong to Charity herself.
How many blessings, silent and unheard,640
The mistress of the lonely parsonage
Dispenses, when she takes her daily round
Among the aged and the sick, whose prayers
And blessings are her only recompense!
How many pastors, by cold obloquy
And senseless hate reviled, tread the same path
Of charity in silence, taught by Him
Who was reviled not to revile again;
And leaving to a righteous God their cause!
Come, let us, with the pencil in our hand,650
Portray a character. What book is this?
Rector of Overton![45] I know him not;
But well I know the Vicar, and a man
More worthy of that name, and worthier still
To grace a higher station of our Church,
None knows;—a friend and father to the poor,
A scholar, unobtrusive, yet profound,
"As e'er my conversation coped withal;"
His piety unvarnished, but sincere.[46]
Killarney's lake,[47] and Scotia's hills,[48] have heard660
His summer-wandering reed; nor on the themes
Of hallowed inspiration[49] has his harp662
Been silent, though ten thousand jangling strings—
When all are poets in this land of song,
And every field chinks with its grasshopper—
Have well-nigh drowned the tones; but poesy
Mingles, at eventide, with many a mood
Of stirring fancy, on his silent heart
When o'er those bleak and barren downs, in rain
Or sunshine, where the giant Wansdeck sweeps,670
Homewards he bends his solitary way.
Live long; and late may the old villager
Look on thy stone, amid the churchyard grass,
Remembering years of kindness, and the tongue,
Eloquent of his Maker, when he sat
At church, and heard the undivided code
Of apostolic truth—of hope, of faith,
Of charity—the end and test of all.
Live long; and though I proudly might recall
The names of many friends—like thee, sincere680
And pious, and in solitude adorned
With rare accomplishments—this grateful praise
Accept, congenial to the poet's theme;
For well I know, haply when I am dead,
And in my shroud, whene'er thy homeward path
Lies o'er those hills, and thou shalt cast a look
Back on our garden-slope, and Bremhill tower,
Thou wilt remember me, and many a day
There passed in converse and sweet harmony.
A truce to satire, and to harsh reproof,690
Severer arguments, that have detained
The unwilling Muse too long:—come, while the clouds
Work heavy and the winds at intervals,
Pipe, and at intervals sink in a sigh,
As breathed o'er sounds and shadows of the past—695
Change we our style and measure, to relate
A village tale of a poor Cornish maid,
And of her prayer-book. It is sad, but true;
And simply told, though not in lady phrase
Of modish song, may touch some gentle heart,700
And wake an interest, when description fails.
PART THIRD.
THE MAIDEN'S CURSE.
I subjoin the plain narrative of the singular event on which this tale is founded, from Mr Polwhele, that the reader may see how far, poetically, I have departed from plain facts, and what I have thought it best to add for the sake of moral, picturesque, and poetical effect. The narrative is as follows:—
"October, 1780. Thomas Thomas, aged 37. This man died of mental anguish, or what is called a broken heart. He lived in the village of Drannock, in the parish of Gwinnear, till an unhappy event occurred, which proved fatal to his peace of mind for more than eight years, and finally occasioned his death. He courted Elizabeth Thomas, of the same village, who was his first-cousin; and it was understood that they were under a matrimonial engagement. But in May 1772, some little disagreement having happened between them, he, out of resentment, or from some other motive, paid great attention to another girl; and on Sunday the 31st of that month, in the afternoon, accompanied her to the Methodist meeting at Wall. During their absence, the slighted female, who was very beautiful in her person, but of an extremely irritable temper, took a rope and a common prayer-book, in which she had folded down the 109th Psalm, and, going into an adjacent field, hanged herself. Thomas, on his return from the preaching, inquired for Betsy; and being told she had not been seen for two or three hours, he exclaimed, 'Good God! she has destroyed herself!' which apprehension seems to show, either that she had threatened to commit suicide in consequence of his desertion, or that he dreaded it from a knowledge of the violence of her disposition. But when he saw that his fears were realised, and had read the psalm, so full of execrations, which she had pointed out to him, he cried out, 'I am ruined for ever and ever!' The very sight of this village and neighbourhood was now become insupportable, and he went to live at Marazion, hoping that a change of scene and social intercourse might expel those excruciating reflections which harrowed up his very soul, or at least render them less acute; but in this he appeared to be mistaken, for he found himself closely pursued by the evil demon
'Despair, whose torments no man, sure,
But lovers and the damned endure.'"To hear the 109th Psalm would petrify him with horror, and therefore he would not attend divine service on the 22d day of the month; he dreaded to go near a reading school, lest he should hear the dreaded lesson. Whatever misfortunes befel him (and these were not a few, for he was several times hurt, and even maimed, in the mines in which he laboured), he still attributed them all to the malevolent agency of the deceased, and thought he could find allusions to the whole in the calamitous legacy which she had bequeathed him. When he slumbered, for he knew nothing of sound sleep, the injured girl appeared to his imagination, with such a countenance as she retained after the rash action, and the prayer-book in her hand, open at the hateful psalm; and he was frequently heard to cry out, 'Oh, my dear Betsy, shut the book, shut the book!' etc. With a mind so disturbed and deranged, though he could not reasonably expect much consolation from matrimony, yet imagining that the cares of a family might distract his thoughts from the miserable subject by which he was harassed both by day and night, he successively paid his addresses to many girls of Marazion; but they indignantly flew from him, and with a sneer asked him, whether he was desirous of bringing all the curses in the 109th Psalm on their heads? At length, however, he succeeded with one who had less superstition and more fortitude than the rest, and he led her to St Hilary church, to be married, January 21, 1778; but on the road thither, they were overtaken by a sudden and violent hurricane, such as those which not unfrequently happen in the vicinity of Mount's Bay; and he, suspecting that poor Betsy rode the whirlwind and directed the storm, was convulsed with terror, and was literally 'coupled with fear.' Such is the power of conscious guilt to impute accidental occurrences to the hand of vindictive justice, and so true is the observation of the poet,
'Judicium metuit sibi mens mali conscia justum.'
"He lived long enough to have a son and a daughter; but the corrosive worm within his breast preyed upon his vitals, and at length consumed all the powers of his body, as it had long before destroyed the tranquillity of his mind, and he was released from all his pangs, both mental and corporeal, on Friday, October 20, 1780, and buried at St Hilary, the Sunday following, during evening service."
Oh! shut the book, dear Mary, shut the book!
So William cried, with wild and frantic look.
She whom he loved was in her shroud, nor pain
Nor grief can visit her sad heart again.
There is no sculptured tombstone at her head;5
No rude memorial marks her lowly bed:
The village children, every holiday,
Round the green turf, in summer sunshine play;
And none, but those now bending to the tomb,
Remember Mary, lovely in her bloom!10
Yet oft the hoary swain, when autumn sighs
Through the long grass, sees a dim form arise,
That hies in glimmering moonlight to the brook,
Its wan lips moving, in its hand a book.
So, like a bruised flower, and in the pride
Of youth and beauty, injured Mary died.
William some years survived, but years no trace
Of his sick heart's deep anguish could erase.
Still the dread spectre seemed to rise, and, worse,
Still in his ears rang the appalling curse!20
While loud he cries, despair upon his look,
Oh! shut the book, my Mary, shut the book!
The sun is slowly westering now, and lo,
How beautiful steals out the humid bow,
A radiant arch! Listen, whilst I relate
William's dread judgment, and poor Mary's fate.
I think I see the pine, that, heavily
Swaying, yet seems as for the dead to sigh.
How many generations, since the day
Of its green pride, have passed, like leaves, away!30
How many children of the hamlet played
Round its hoar trunk, who at its feet were laid,
Withered and gray old men! In life's first bloom
How many has it seen borne to the tomb!
But never one so sunk in hopeless woe
As she who lies in the cold grave below.
Her Sabbath-book, from which at church she prayed,
Was her poor father's, in that churchyard laid:
For Mary grew as beautiful in youth,39
As taught at church the lore of heavenly truth.
What different passions in her bosom strove,
When first she heard the tale of village love!
The youth whose voice then won her partial ear,
A yeoman's son, had passed his twentieth year;
She scarce eighteen: her mother, with the care
Of boding age, oft whispered, Oh, beware!
For William was a thoughtless youth, and wild,
And like a colt unbroken, from a child:
At length, if not to serious thoughts awake,
He came to church, at least for Mary's sake.50
Young Mary, while her father was alive,
Saw all things round the humble dwelling thrive;
Her widowed mother now was growing old,
And bit by bit their worldly goods were sold:
Mary remained, her mother's hope and pride!
How oft when she was sleeping by her side,
That mother waked, and kissed her cheek, with tears
Praying for blessings on her future years,—
When she, her mother, earthly trials o'er,
Should rest in the cold grave, to grieve no more!60
But Mary to love's dream her heart resigned,
And gave to fancy all her youthful mind.
Shall I describe her! Didst thou never mark
A soft blue light, beneath eye-lashes dark?
Such was her eye's soft light;—her chestnut hair,
Light as she tripped, waved lighter to the air;
And, with her prayer-book, when on Sunday dressed,
Her looks a sweet but lowly grace expressed,
As modest as the violet at her breast.
Sometimes all day by her lone mother's side70
She sat, and oft would turn, a tear to hide.
Where winds the brook, by yonder bordering wood,72
Her mother's solitary cottage stood:
A few white pales in front, fenced from the road
The garden-plot, and poor but neat abode.
Before the window, 'mid the flowers of spring
A bee-hive hummed, whose bees were murmuring;
Beneath an ivied bank, abrupt and high,
A small clear well reflected bank and sky,
In whose translucent mirror, smooth and still,80
From time to time, a small bird dipped its bill.
Here the first bluebell, and, of livelier hue,
The daffodil and polyanthus grew.
'Twas Mary's care a jessamine to train.
With small white blossoms, round the window-pane:
A rustic wicket opened to the meads,
Where a scant pathway to the hamlet leads:
And near, a water-wheel toiled round and round,
Dashing the o'ershot stream, with long continuous sound.
Beyond, when the brief shower had sailed away,90
The tapering spire shone out in sunlight gray;
And o'er that mountain's northern point, to sight
Stretching far on, the main-sea rolled in light.
Enter: within, see everything how neat!
One book lies open on the window-seat,
The spectacles are on a leaf of Job:
There, mark, a map of the terrestrial globe;
And opposite, with its prolific stem,
The Christian's tree, and New Jerusalem;[50]
Here, see a printed paper, to record100
A veritable letter from our Lord:[51]
Two books are on the window-ledge beneath,—
The Book of Prayer, and Drelincourt on Death:
Some cowslips, in a cup of china placed,104
A painted shelf above the chimney graced:
Grown like its mistress old, with half-shut eyes,
Save when, at times, awaked by wandering flies,
Tib[52] in the sunshine of the casement lies.
'Twas spring time now, with birds the garden rung,
And Mary's linnet at the window sung.110
Whilst in the air the vernal music floats,
The cuckoo only joins his two sweet notes:[53]
But those—oh! listen, for he sings more near—
So musical, so mellow, and so clear!
Not sweeter, where thy mighty waters sweep,
Missouri, through the night of forests deep,
Resounds, from glade to glade, from rock to hill,
While fervent harmonies the wild wood fill,
The solitary note of "whip-poor-will;"[54]
Mary's old mother stops her wheel to say,120
The cuckoo! hark! how sweet he sings to-day!
It is not long, not long to Whitsuntide,
And Mary then shall be a happy bride.
On Sunday morn, when a slant light was flung
Upon the tower, and the first peal was rung,
William and Mary smiling would repair,
Arm linked in arm, to the same house of prayer.
The bells will sound more merrily, he cried,
And gently pressed her hand, at Whitsuntide:
She checked the rising thoughts, and hung her head;130
And Mary, ere one year had passed—was dead!
'Twas said, and many would the tale believe,
Her shrouded form was seen upon that eve,[55]
When, gliding through the churchyard, they appear—134
They who shall die within the coming year.
All pale, and strangely piteous, was her look,
Her right hand was stretched out, and held a book;
O'er it her wet hair dripped, while the moon cast
A cold wan light, as in her shroud she passed!
I cannot say if this were so, but late,140
She went to Madern-stone,[56] to learn her fate,
What there she heard ne'er came to human ears—
But from that hour she oft was seen in tears.
Mild zephyr breathes, the butterfly more bright
Strays, wavering, o'er the pales, in rainbow light;
The lamb, the colt, the blackbird in the brake,
Seem all the vernal feeling to partake;
The lark sings high in air, itself unseen,
The hasty swallow skims the village-green;
And all things seem, to the full heart, to bring150
The blissful breathings of the world's first spring.
How lovely is the sunshine of May-morn!
The garden bee has wound his earliest horn,
Busied from flower to flower, as he would say,
Up! Mary! up this merry morn of May!
Now lads and lasses of the hamlet bore
Branches of blossomed thorn or sycamore;[57]
And at her mother's porch a garland hung,
While thus their rural roundelay they sung:—
And we were up as soon as day,[58]160
To fetch the summer home,
The summer and the radiant May,162
For summer now is come.
In Madern vale the bell-flowers bloom,[59]
And wave to Zephyr's breath:
The cuckoo sings in Morval Coombe,
Where nods the purple heath.[60]