The following Eclogues, I believe, bear no resemblance to any poems in our language. This species of composition has become popular in Germany, and I was induced to attempt it by what was told me of the German Idyls by my friend Mr. William Taylor of Norwich. So far, therefore, these pieces may be deemed imitations, though I am not acquainted with the German language at present, and have never seen any translations or specimens in this kind. With bad Eclogues I am sufficiently acquainted, from Tityrus and Corydon down to our English Strephons and Thirsisses. No kind of poetry can boast of more illustrious names, or is more distinguished by the ters, "more silly than their sheep," have, like their sheep, gone on in the same track one after another. Gay struck into a new path. His eclogues were the only ones which interested me when I was a boy, and did not know they were burlesque. The subject would furnish matter for an essay, but this is not the
servile dulness of imitated nonsense. Pastoral wri
OLD friend! why, you seem bent on parish duty, Breaking the highway stones,-and 'tis a task Somewhat too hard, methinks, for age like yours!
Why, yes! for one with such a weight of years
Upon his back!-I've lived here, man and boy,
In this same parish, well nigh the full age
Of man, being hard upon threescore and ten.
I can remember, sixty years ago,
The beautifying of this mansion here,
When my late Lady's father, the old Squire,
Came to the estate.
Why, then you have outlasted All his improvements, for you see they're making Great alterations here.
My poor old lady many a time would come
And tell me where to clip, for she had play'd
In childhood under them, and 'twas her pride
To keep them in their beauty. Plague, I say,
On their new-fangled whimseys! we shall have
A modern shrubbery here stuck full of firs
And your pert poplar-trees;-I could as soon
Have plough'd my father's grave as cut them
But 'twill be lighter and more cheerful now;
A fine smooth turf, and with a carriage road
That sweeps conveniently from gate to gate.
I like a shrubbery too, for it looks fresh ;
And then there's some variety about it.
In spring the lilac, and the snow-ball flower,
And the laburnum with its golden strings
Waving in the wind; and when the autumn comes,
The bright red berries of the mountain-ash,
With pines enough in winter to look green,
And show that something lives. Sure this is better
Than a great hedge of yew, making it look
All the year round like winter, and forever
Dropping its poisonous leaves from the under
Wither'd and bare.
[boughs,
Ay! so the new Squire thinks. And pretty work he makes of it! What 'tis To have a stranger come to an old house!
It seems you know him not?
No, Sir, not I,
They tell me he's expected daily now;
But in my Lady's time he never came
But once,
for they were very distant kin.
If he had play'd about here when a child
In that fore court, and eat the yew-berries,
And sate in the porch threading the jessamine
flowers,
Which fell so thick, he had not had the heart
To mar all thus!
Come! come! all is not wrong;
And slept in the sun; 'twas an old favourite dog,-
She did not love him less that he was old
And feeble, and he always had a place
By the fire-side: and when he died at last,
She made me dig a grave in the garden for him.
For she was good to all! a woful day
Well! well! you've one friend more than you're aware of.
If the Squire's taste don't suit with yours, I
That's all you'll quarrel with: walk in and taste
'Twas for the poor when to her grave she went! His beer, old friend! and see if your old Lady
You're a stranger here, Or you wouldn't ask that question. Were they sick?
She had rare cordial waters, and for herbs
She could have taught the Doctors. Then at
When weekly she distributed the bread
In the poor old porch, to see her and to hear
The blessings on her! and I warrant them
They were a blessing to her when her wealth
Had been no comfort else. At Christmas, Sir!
It would have warmed your heart if you had seen
Her Christmas kitchen,-how the blazing fire
Made her fine pewter shine, and holly boughs
So cheerful red,-and as for mistletoe,-
The finest bush that grew in the country round
Was mark'd for Madam. Then her old ale went
So bountiful about! a Christmas cask,
And 'twas a noble one,-God help me, Sir!
But I shall never see such days again.
Things may be better yet than you suppose,
And you should hope the best.
It don't look well,-
These alterations, Sir! I'm an old man,
And love the good old fashions; we don't find
Old bounty in new houses. They've destroy'd
All that my Lady loved; her favourite walk
Grubb'd up, and they do say that the great row
Of elms behind the house, which meet a-top,
They must fall too. Well! well! I did not think
To live to see all this, and 'tis perhaps
A comfort I shan't live to see it long.
But sure all changes are not needs for the worse,
My friend?
E'er broach'd a better cask. You did not know me,
But we're acquainted now. 'Twould not be easy
To make you like the outside; but within,
That is not changed, my friend! you'll always find
The same old bounty and old welcome there.
Westbury, 1798.
HARRY! I'm tired of playing. We'll draw round
The fire, and Grandmamma, perhaps, will tell us
One of her stories.
Ay-dear Gradmamma!
A pretty story! something dismal now;
A bloody murder.
Nay, nay, I should but frighten ye. You know
The other night, when I was telling ye [bled
About the light in the churchyard, how you trem-
Because the screech-owl hooted at the window.
And would not go to bed.
Why, Grandmamma, You said yourself you did not like to hear him. Pray now!-we won't be frightened.
Well, well, children But you've heard all my stories.-Let me see,Did I never tell you how the smuggler murder'd The woman down at Pill?
Not how he cut her head off in the stable?
Mayhap they mayn't, Sir;—for all that, Oh-now!-do tell us that!
I like what I've been used to. I remember
All this from a child up; and now to lose it,
'Tis losing an old friend. There's nothing left
As 'twas;-I go abroad, and only meet
With men whose fathers I remember boys;
The brook that used to run before my door,
That's gone to the great pond; the trees I learnt
To climb are down; and I see nothing now
That tells me of old times, except the stones
In the churchyard. You are young, Sir, and I
hope
Have many years in store, but pray to God
You mayn't be left the last of all your friends.
You must have heard
Your mother, children! often tell of her.
She used to weed in the garden here, and worm
Your uncle's dogs, and serve the house with
And glad enough she was in winter time
coal;
To drive her asses here! It was cold work
* I know not whether this cruel and stupid custom is common in other parts of England. It is supposed to prevent the dogs from doing any mischief, should they afterwards become mad.
To follow the slow beasts through sleet and snow;
And here she found a comfortable meal,
And a brave fire to thaw her; for poor Moll
Was always welcome.
Oh! 'twas blear-eyed Moll,
The collier woman, a great, ugly woman;
I've heard of her.
GRANDMOTHER.
Ugly enough, poor soul!
They took him up;
There was no proof; no one had seen the deed;
And he was set at liberty. But God,
Whose eye beholdeth all things, He had seen
The murder; and the murderer knew that God
Was witness to his crime. He fled the place,-
But nowhere could he fly the avenging hand
Of Heaven, but nowhere could the murderer
rest;-
A guilty conscience haunted him; by day,
By night, in company, in solitude,
Restless and wretched, did he bear upon him
The weight of blood. Her cries were in his ears;
Her stifled groans, as when he knelt upon her,
Always he heard; always he saw her stand
At ten yard's distance, you could hardly tell
If it were man or woman, for her voice
Was rough as our old mastiff's, and she wore
A man's old coat and hat:-and then her face!
There was a merry story told of her,
How, when the press-gang came to take her Before his eyes; even in the dead of night,
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She was a terrible reprobate, and swore
Like any trooper, she was always good
To the dumb creatures; never loaded them
Beyond their strength; and rather, I believe,
Would stint herself than let the poor beasts want,
Because, she said, they could not ask for food.
I never saw her stick fall heavier on them
Than just with its own weight. She little thought
This tender-heartedness would cause her death!
There was a fellow who had oftentimes,
As if he took delight in cruelty,
Ill used her beasts. He was a man who lived
By smuggling, and, for she had often met him,
Crossing the down at night, she threaten'd him,
If ever he abused them more, to inform
Of his unlawful ways. Well-so it was-
'Twas what they both were born to! he provoked
Distinctly seen as though in the broad sun,
She stood beside the murderer's bed, and yawn'd
Her ghastly wound; till life itself became
A punishment at last he could not bear,
And he confess'd it all, and gave himself
To death; so terrible, he said, it was
To have a guilty conscience!
Hung and anatomized. Poor wretched man!
Your uncles went to see him on his trial;
He was so pale, so thin, so hollow-eyed,
And such a horror in his meager face,
They said he look'd like one who never slept,
He begged the prayers of all who saw his end,
And met his death with fears that well might warn
From guilt, though not without a hope in Christ.
Westbury, 1798.
PASSING across a green and lonely lane,
A funeral met our view. It was not here
A sight of every day, as in the streets
Of some great city, and we stopp'd and ask'd
Whom they were bearing to the grave. A girl,
They answer'd, of the village, who had pined
Through the long course of eighteen painful
months,
With such slow wasting, that the hour of death
Came welcome to her. We pursued our way
To the house of mirth, and with that idle talk
Which passes o'er the mind and is forgot,
We wore away the time. But it was eve
When homewardly I went, and in the air
Was that cool freshness, that discolouring shade
Which makes the eye turn inward: hearing then
Over the vale the heavy toll of death
Sound slow, it made me think upon the dead;
I question'd more, and learnt her mournful tale.
She bore unhusbanded a mother's pains,
And he who should have cherish'd her, far off
Sail'd on the seas. Left thus a wretched one,
Scorn made a mock of her, and evil tongues
Were busy with her name. She had to bear
The sharper sorrow of neglect from him
Whom she had loved too dearly. Once he wrote;
But only once that drop of comfort came
To mingle with her cup of wretchedness;
And when his parents had some tidings from him,
There was no mention of poor Hannah there,
Or 'twas the cold enquiry, more unkind
Than silence. So she pined and pined away,
And for herself and baby toil'd and toil'd;
Nor did she, even on her death-bed, rest
From labour, knitting there with lifted arms,
Till she sunk with very weakness. Her old mother
Omitted no kind office, working for her,
Albeit her hardest labour barely earn'd
Enough to keep life struggling, and prolong
The pains of grief and sickness. Thus she lay
On the sick bed of poverty, worn out
With her long suffering and those painful thoughts
Which at her heart were rankling, and so weak,
That she could make no effort to express
Affection for her infant; and the child,
Whose lisping love perhaps had solaced her,
Shunn'd her as one indifferent. But she too
Had grown indifferent to all things of earth,
Finding her only comfort in the thought
Of that cold bed wherein the wretched rest.
There had she now, in that last home, been laid,
And all was over now,-sickneзs and grief,
Her shame, her suffering, and her penitence,-
Their work was done. The school-boys, as they
In the churchyard, for awhile might turn away From the fresh grave till grass should cover it; Nature would do that office soon; and none Who trod upon the senseless turf would think Of what a world of woes lay buried there!
Burton, near Christ Church, 1797.
SIR, for the love of God, some small relief To a poor woman.
Whither are you bound? 'Tis a late hour to travel o'er these downs, No house for miles around us, and the way Dreary and wild. The evening wind already Makes one's teeth chatter; and the very Sun, Setting so pale behind those thin white clouds, Looks cold. 'Twill be a bitter night!
Ay, Sir, 'Tis cutting keen. I smart at every breath; Heaven knows how I shall reach my journey's end,
For the way is long before me, and my feet, God help me! sore with travelling. I would gladly,
If it pleased God, at once lie down and die.
God reward them! God bless them! It will help me in my age,Bu. Sir, it will not pay me for my child.
TRAVELLER.
Was he your only child?
The stay and comfort of my widowhood,
A dear, good boy !-When first he went to sea,
I felt what it would come to,-something told me
I should be childless soon. But tell me, Sir,
If it be true that for a hurt like his
There is no cure. Please God to spare his life,
Though he be blind, yet I should be so thankful!
I can remember there was a blind man
Lived in our village, one from his youth up
Quite dark, and yet he was a merry man;
And he had none to tend on him so well
As I would tend my boy.
His hurts are look'd to well, and the best help
The land affords, as rightly is his due,
Ever at hand. How happen'd it he left you?
Was a seafaring life his early choice?
No, Sir! poor fellow,-he was wise enough
To be content at home, and 'twas a home
As comfortable, Sir, even though I say it,
As any in the country. He was left
A little boy when his poor father died,
Just old enough to totter by himself,
To see the boy so handy. You may guess
What follow'd, Sir, from this unlucky skill.
He did what he should not when he was older:
I warn'd him oft enough; but he was caught
In wiring hares at last, and had his choice,
The prison or the ship.
The choice at least Was kindly left him; and for broken laws This was, methinks, no heavy punishment.
So I was told, Sir. And I tried to think so;
But 'twas a sad blow to me! I was used
To sleep at nights as sweetly as a child ;-
Now, if the wind blew rough, it made me start,
And think of my poor boy tossing about
Upon the roaring seas. And then I seem'd
To feel that it was hard to take him from me
For such a little fauit. But he was wrong,
Oh, very wrong,-a murrain on his traps!
See what they've brought him to!
TRAVELLER.
Well! well! take comfort
He will be taken care of, if he lives;
And should you lose your child, this is a country
Where the brave Sailor never leaves a parent
To weep for him in want.
No succour long. In the common course of
I soon must be at rest; and 'tis a comfort,
When grief is hard upon me, to reflect
And call his mother's name. We two were all, It only leads me to that rest the sooner.
And as we were not left quite destitute,
We bore up well. In the summer time I work'd
Sometimes a-field. Then I was famed for knitting;
And in long winter nights my spinning-wheel
Seldom stood still. We had kind neighbours too,
And never felt distress. So he grew up
A comely lad, and wondrous well disposed.
I taught him well; there was not in the parish
A child who said his prayers more regular,
Or answered readier through his Catechism.
If I had foreseen this! but 'tis a blessing
We don't know what we're born to!
FATHER! here, father! I have found a horse-shoe!
Faith, it was just in time; for t'other night
I laid two straws across at Margery's door;
And ever since I fear'd that she might do me
But how came it A mischief for't. There was the Miller's boy,
Who set his dog at that black cat of hers,-
I met him upon crutches, and he told me
'Twas all her evil eye,
WOMAN.
You shall hear, Sir.
As he grew up he used to watch the birds
In the corn, child's work, you know, and easily
done.
'Tis an idle sort of task; so he built up
A little hut of wicker-work and clay
Under the hedge, to shelter him in rain;
And then he took, for very idleness,
To making traps to catch the plunderers;
All sorts of cunning traps that boys can make,-
Propping a stone to fall and shut them in,
I would have gladly given a crown for one,
If 'twould have done as well. But where didst
find it?
Down on the common; I was going a-field, And neighbour Saunders pass'd me on his mare; He had hardly said "Good day," before I saw Or crush them with its weight, or else a springe The shoe drop off. 'Twas just upon my tongue Swung on a bough. He made them cleverly-To call him back ;-it makes no difference, does it, And I, poor foolish woman! I was pleased
Because I know whose 'twas?
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