And I have travelled weary miles to see
If aught which he had owned might still remain for me.
The bird and cage they both were his :
Son's bird; and neat and trim
He kept it: many voyages
The singing-bird had gone with him;
When last he sailed, he left the bird behind; From bodings, as might be, that hung upon his mind.
He to a fellow-lodger's care
Had left it, to be watched and fed,
And pipe its song in safety;-there
I found it when my Son was dead;
And now, God help me for my little wit!
I bear it with me, Sir;-he took so much delight in it."
[WRITTEN at Town-end, Grasmere. When I was a child at Cockermouth, no funeral took place without a basin filled with sprigs of boxwood being placed upon a table covered with a white cloth in front of the house. The huntings on foot, in which the old man is supposed to join as here described, were of common, almost habitual, occurrence in our vales when I was a boy; and the people took much delight in them. They are now less frequent.]
"UP, Timothy, up with your staff and away!
Not a soul in the village this morning will stay;
The hare has just started from Hamilton's grounds,
And Skiddaw is glad with the cry of the hounds."
-Of coata and of jackets grey, scarlet, and green,
On the slopes of the pastures all colours were seer;
With their comely blue aprons, and caps white as snow,
The girls on the hills made a holiday show.
Fresh sprigs of green box-wood, not six months before,
Filled the funeral basin* at Timothy's door;
A coffin through Timothy's threshold had past;
One Child did it bear, and that Child was his last.
Now fast up the dell came the noise and the fray,
The horse and the horn, and the hark! hark away!
Old Timothy took up his staff, and he shut
With a leisurely motion the door of his hut.
Perhaps to himself at that moment he said;
The key I must take, for my Ellen is dead.'
But of this in my ears not a word did he speak ; And he went to the chase with a tear on his cheek. 1800.
[SUGGESTED by what I have noticed in more than one French fugitive during the time of the French Revolution. If I am not mistaken, the lines were composed at Sockburn, when I was on a visit to Mrs. Wordsworth and her brother.]
ONCE in a lonely hamlet I sojourned
In which a Lady driven from France did dwell;
The big and lesser griefs with which she mourned,
In friendship she to me would often tell.
* In several parts of the North of England, when a funeral takes place, a basin full of sprigs of box-wood is placed at the door of the house from
This Lady, dwelling upon British ground,
Where she was childless, daily would repair
To a poor neighbouring cottage; as I found,
For sake of a young Child whose home was there.
Once having seen her clasp with fond embrace
This Child, I chanted to myself a lay,
Endeavouring, in our English tongue, to trace
Such things as she unto the Babe might say:
And thus, from what I heard and knew, or guessed,
My song the workings of her heart expressed.
"Dear Babe, thou daughter of another,
One moment let me be thy mother!
An infant's face and looks are thine
And sure a mother's heart is mine:
Thy own dear mother's far away,
At labour in the harvest field:
Thy little sister is at play ;-
What warmth, what comfort would it yield
To my poor heart, if thou wouldst be
One little hour a child to me!
Across the waters I am come,
And I have left a babe at home:
A long, long way of land and sea!
Come to me—
-I'm no enemy:
I am the same who at thy side
which the coffin is taken up, and each person who attends the funeral ordinarily takes a sprig of this box-wood, and throws it into the grave of the deceased.
Sate yesterday, and made a nest
For thee, sweet Baby!-thou hast tried,
Thou know'st the pillow of my breast;
Good, good art thou:-alas! to me
Far more than I can be to thee.
Here, little Darling, dost thou lie;
An infant thou, a mother I!
Mine wilt thou be, thou hast no fears;
Mine art thou-spite of these my tears.
Alas! before I left the spot,
My baby and its dwelling-place;
The nurse said to me, 'Tears should not
Be shed upon an infant's face,
It was unlucky '—no, no, no;
No truth is in them who say so!
My own dear Little-one will sigh,
Sweet Babe! and they will let him die.
'He pines,' they'll say, 'it is his doom,
And you may see his hour is come.'
Oh! had he but thy cheerful smiles,
Limbs stout as thine, and lips as gay,
Thy looks, thy cunning, and thy wiles,
And countenance like a summer's day,
They would have hopes of him ;—and then
I should behold his face again!
'Tis gone-like dreams that we forget; There was a smile or two-yet-yet
I can remember them, I see
The smiles, worth all the world to me.
Dear Baby! I must lay thee down;
Thou troublest me with strange alarms;
Smiles hast thou, bright ones of thy own;
I cannot keep thee in my arms;
For they confound me ;-where-where is
That last, that sweetest smile of his ?
Oh! how I love thee !- -we will stay
Together here this one half day.
My sister's child, who bears my name,
From France to sheltering England came;
She with her mother crossed the sea;
The babe and mother near me dwell:
Yet does my yearning heart to thee
Turn rather, though I love her well :
Rest, little Stranger, rest thee here!
Never was any child more dear!
-I cannot help it; ill intent
I've none, my pretty Innocent!
I weep-I know they do thee wrong,
These tears-and my poor idle tongue.
Oh, what a kiss was that! my cheek
How cold it is! but thou art good;
Thine eyes are on me-they would speak,
I think, to help me if they could.
Blessings upon that soft, warm face,
My heart again is in its place!
|