And all its stately trees, are passed away,
This little niche, unconscious of decay,
Perchance may still survive.-And be it known
That it was scooped within the living stone,-
Not by the sluggish and ungrateful pains
Of labourer plodding for his daily gains;
But by an industry that wrought in love,
With help from female hands, that proudly strove
To shape the work, what time these walks and bowers
Were framed, to cheer dark Winter's lonely hours.
WRITTEN AT THE REQUEST OF SIR GEORGE BEAUMONT, BART.,
AND IN HIS NAME, FOR AN URN, PLACED BY HIM AT THE
TERMINATION OF A NEWLY-PLANTED AVENUE IN THE SAME
GROUNDS.
YE lime-trees, ranged before this hallowed urn,
Shoot forth with lively power at Spring's return;
And be not slow a stately growth to rear
Of pillars, branching off from year to year,
Till they at length have framed a darksome aisle ;-
Like a recess within that awful pile
Where Reynolds, 'mid our country's noblest dead,
In the last sanctity of fame is laid.
-There, though by right the excelling painter sleep
Where death and glory a joint sabbath keep,
Yet not the less his spirit would hold dear
Self-hidden praise, and friendship's private tear:
Hence, on my patrimonial grounds, have I
Raised this frail tribute to his memory,
From youth a zealous follower of the Art
That he professed, attached to him in heart;
Admiring, loving, and with grief and pride
Feeling what England lost when Reynolds died.
FOR A SEAT IN THE GROVES OF COLEORTON.
BENEATH yon eastern ridge, the craggy bound,
Rugged and high, of Charnwood's forest ground,
Stand yet, but, stranger! hidden from thy view,
The ivied ruins of forlorn GRACE DIEU;
Erst a religious house, that day and night
With hymns resounded, and the chanted rite:
And when those rites had ceased, the spot gave birth
To honourable men of various worth:
There, on the margin of a streamlet wild,
Did Francis Beaumont sport, an eager child;
There, under shadow of the neighbouring rocks,
Sang youthful tales of shepherds and their flocks;
Unconscious prelude to heroic themes,
Heart-breaking tears, and melancholy dreams
Of slighted love, and scorn, and jealous rage,
With which his genius shook the buskined stage.
Communities are lost, and empires die,-
And things of holy use unhallowed lie;
They perish; but the intellect can raise,
From airy words alone, a pile that ne'er decays.
WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL UPON A STONE IN THE WALL OF THE
HOUSE (AN OUT-HOUSE) ON THE ISLAND AT GRASMERE.
RUDE is this edifice, and thou hast seen
Buildings, albeit rude, that have maintained
Proportions more harmonious, and approached
To somewhat of a closer fellowship
With the ideal grace. Yet as it is
Do take it in good part:-alas the poor
Vitruvius of our village, had no help
From the great city; never, on the leaves
Of red morocco folio, saw displayed
The skeletons and pre-existing ghosts
Of beauties yet unborn, the rustic box,
Snug cot, with coach-house, shed, and hermitage.
Thou seest a homely pile, yet to these walls
The heifer comes in the snow-storm, and here
The new-dropped lamb finds shelter from the wind.
And hither does one Poet sometimes row
His pinnace, a small vagrant barge, up-piled
With plenteous store of heath and withered fern,
(A lading which he with his sickle cuts
Among the mountains) and beneath this roof
He makes his summer couch, and here at noon
Spreads out his limbs, while, yet unshorn, the sheep,
Panting beneath the burthen of their wool,
Lie round him, even as if they were a part
Of his own household: nor, while from his bed
He through that door-place looks toward the lake
And to the stirring breezes, does he want
Creations lovely as the work of sleep,
Fair sights-and visions of romantic joy!
WRITTEN WITH A SLATE-PENCIL, ON A STONE, ON THE SIDE OF
THE MOUNTAIN OF BLACK COMB, CUMBERLAND.
STAY, bold adventurer; rest awhile thy limbs
On this commodious seat! for much remains
Of hard ascent before tnou reach the top
Of this huge eminence,- -from blackness named,
And, to far-travelled storms of sea and land,
A favourite spot of tournament and war!
But thee may no such boisterous visitants
Molest; may gentle breezes fan thy brow;
And neither cloud conceal, nor misty air
Bedim, the grand terraqueous spectacle,
From centre to circumference, unveiled!
Know, if thou grudge not to prolong thy rest,
That, on the summit whether thou art bound,
A geographic labourer pitched his tent,
With books supplied and instruments of art,
To measure height and distance; lonely task,
Week after week pursued!-To him was given
Full many a glimpse (but sparingly bestowed
On timid man) of Nature's processes
Upon the exalted hills. He made report
That once, while there he plied his studious work
Within that canvass dwelling, suddenly
The many-coloured map before his eyes
Became invisible: for all around
Had darkness fallen-unthreatened, unproclaimed-
As if the golden day itself had been
Extinguished in a moment; total gloom,
In which he sate alone, with unclosed eyes,
Upon the blinded mountain's silent top!
WRITTEN WITH A SLATE-PENCIL, UPON A STONE, THE LARGEST OF A HEAP LYING NEAR A DESERTED QUARRY, UPON ONE OF THE ISLANDS AT RYDALE.
STRANGER! this hillock of misshapen stones
Is not a ruin of the ancient time,
Nor, as perchance thou rashly deem'st, the cairn
Of some old British chief: 'tis nothing more
Than the rude embryo of a little dome
Or pleasure-house, once destined to be built
Among the birch-trees of this rocky isle.
But, as it chanced, Sir William having learned
That from the shore a full grown man might wade,
And make himself a freeman of this spot
At any hour he choose, the knight forthwith
Desisted, and the quarry and the mound
Are monuments of his unfinished task.
The block on which these lines are traced, perhaps,
Was once selected as the corner-stone
Of the intended pile, which would have been
Some quaint odd play-thing of elaborate skill,
So that, I guess, the linnet and the thrush,
And other little builders who dwell here,
Had wondered at the work. But blame him not,
For old Sir William was a gentle knight
Bred in this vale, to which he appertained
With all his ancestry. Then peace to him,
And for the outrage which he had devised
Entire forgiveness!But if thou art one
On fire with thy impatience to become
An inmate of these mountains,-if, disturbed
By beautiful conceptions, thou hast hewn
Out of the quiet rock the elements
Of thy trim mansion destined soon to blaze
In snow-white splendour,-think again, and, taught
By old Sir William and his quarry, leave
Thy fragments to the bramble and the rose;
There let the vernal slow-worm sun himself,
And let the red-breast hop from stone to stone.
FOR THE SPOT WHERE THE HERMITAGE STOOD ON ST
HERBERT'S ISLAND, DERWENT-WATER.
THIS island, guarded from profane approach
By mountains high and waters widely spread,
Is that recess to which St Herbert came
In life's decline: a self-secluded man,
After long exercise in social cares
And offices humane, intent to adore
The Deity, with undistracted mind,
And meditate on everlasting things.
-Stranger! this shapeless heap of stones and earth (Long be its mossy covering undisturbed!)
Is reverenced as a vestige of the abode
In which, through many seasons, from the world
Removed, and the affections of the world,
He dwelt in solitude.-But he had left
A fellow-labourer, whom the good man loved
As his own soul. And when within his cave
Alone he knelt before the crucifix
While o'er the Lake the cataract of Lodore
Pealed to his orisons, and when he paced
Along the beach of this small isle and thought
Of his companion, he would pray that both,
(Now that their earthly duties were fulfilled)
Might die in the same moment. Nor in vain
So prayed he:-as our chronicles report,
Though here the Hermit numbered his last day,
Far from St Cuthbert his beloved friend,
Those holy men both died in the same hour.
POEMS FOUNDED ON THE AFFECTIONS.
"THESE tourists, heaven preserve us! needs must live
A profitable life: some glance along,
Rapid and gay, as if the earth were air,
And they were butterflies to wheel about
Long as the summer lasted: some, as wise,
Upon the forehead of a jutting crag
Sit perched, with book and pencil on their knee,
And look and scribble, scribble on and look,
Until a man might travel twelve stout miles,
Or reap an acre of his neighbour's corn.
But, for that moping son of idleness,
Why can he tarry yonder ?-In our churchyard
Is neither epitaph nor monument,
Tombstone nor name-only the turf we tread
And a few natural graves." To Jane, his wife,
Thus spake the homely Priest of Ennerdale.
It was a July evening; and he sate
Upon the long stone-seat beneath the eaves
Of his old cottage, as it chanced, that day,
Employed in winter's work. Upon the stone
His wife sat near him, teasing matted wool,
While, from the twin cards toothed with glittering wira
He fed the spindle of the youngest child,
Who turned her large round wheel in the open air
With back and forward steps. Towards the field
In which the parish chapel stood alone,
Girt round with a bare ring of mossy wall,
While half an hour went by, the Priest had sent
Many a long look of wonder: and at last,
Risen from his seat, beside the snow-white ridge
Of carded wool which the old man had piled
He laid his implements with gentle care,
Each in the other locked; and, down the path
Which from his cottage to the churchyard led,
This poem was intended to conclude a series of pastorals, the scene of which was laid among the mountains of Cumberland and Westmoreland. I mention this to apologize for the abruptness with which the poem begins.
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