(BY WILLIAM COWPER.)
There is a bird, who by his coat,
And by the hoarseness of his note,
Might be supposed a crow;
A great frequenter of the church,
Where bishop-like he finds a perch,
And dormitory too.
Above the steeple shines a plate,
That turns and turns, to indicate
From what point blows the weather;
Look up--your brains begin to swim,
'Tis in the clouds; that pleases him,
He chooses it the rather.
Fond of the speculative height,
Thither he wings his airy flight,
And thence securely sees
The bustle and the raree-show
That occupy mankind below,
Secure and at his ease.
You think, no doubt, he sits and muses
Of future broken bones and bruises,
If he should chance to fall;
No! not a single thought like that
Employs his philosophic pate,
Or troubles it at all.
He sees that this great roundabout
The world, with all its motley rout,
Church, army, physic, law,
Its customs and its businesses
Is no concern at all of his,
And says--what says he?--Caw.
Thrice happy bird! I too have seen
Much of the vanities of men,
And sick of having seen 'em,
Would cheerfully these limbs resign
For such a pair of wings as thine,
And such a head between 'em.
* * *
Of fowls with black and glossy coat,
One dear familiar bird I note;
In towers and ancient piles he dwells,
Above the din of sacred bells;
High fanes he seeks; with daring flight
Aspires, despising aught but height;
He sits where mortals mount with pain
Of reeling pulse and dizzy brain;
And where you shudder with alarm,
He's perched aloft, and free from harm.
The vane that on the steeple shows
Whither and whence the free wind blows,
He choosing, owns no care at all,
Much less is careful lest he fall;
And thence in lofty ease surveys
Mankind's inexplicable ways.
He sees the streets, the concourse dim,
They hold no interest for him;
And if some murmur upward floats
He heeds not, but with pensive notes
Beguiles the hour. Blest bird, I'd be
A winged and airy thing, like thee!
From human things I'd sit aloof
Like thee, above the minster-roof.
Next shall come Lamb's favourite, the Epitaph on the Beggar's Dog.
Lamb's rendering is very fairly exact.
Pauperis hic Iri requiesco Lyciscus, herilis,
Dum vixi, tutela vigil columenque senectae,
Dux caeco fidus; nec, me ducente, solebat,
Praetenso hinc atque hinc baculo, per iniqua locorum
Incertam explorare viam; sed fila secutus,
Quae dubios regerent passus, vestigia tuta
Fixit inoffenso gressu; gelidumque sedile
In nudo nactus saxo, qua praetereuntium
Unda frequens confluxit, ibi miserisque tenebras
Lamentis, noctemque oculis ploravit obortam.
Ploravit nec frustra; obolum dedit alter et alter,
Queis corda et mentem indiderat natura benignam.
Ad latus interea jacui sopitus herile,
Vel mediis vigil in somnis; ad herilia jussa
Auresque atque animum arrectus, seu frustuia amice
Porrexit sociasque dapes, seu longa diei
Taedia perpessus, reditum sub nocte parabat.
Hi mores, haec vita fuit, dum fata sinebant,
Dum neque languebam morbis, nec inerte senecta,
Quae tandem obrepsit, veterique satellite caecum
Orbavit dominum: prisci sed gratia facti
Ne tota intereat, longos deleta per annos,
Exiguum hunc Irus tumulum de cespite fecit,
Et si inopis, non ingratae munuscula dextrae;
Carmine signavitque brevi, dominumque canemque
Quod memoret, fidumque canem dominumque benignum.
* * *
Poor Irus' faithful wolf-dog here I lie,
That wont to tend my old blind master's steps,
His guide and guard; nor, while my service lasted,
Had he occasion for that staff, with which
He now goes picking out his path in fear
Over the highways and crossings, but would plant,
Safe in the conduct of my friendly string,
A firm foot forward still, till he had reach'd
His poor seat on some stone, nigh where the tide
Of passers-by in thickest confluence flow'd:
To whom with loud and passionate laments
From morn to eve his dark estate he wail'd.
Nor wail'd to all in vain: some here and there,
The well-disposed and good, their pennies gave;
I meantime at his feet obsequious slept;
Not all-asleep in sleep, but heart and ear
Prick'd up at his least motion: to receive
At his kind hand my customary crumbs,
And common portion in his feast of scraps;
Or when night warned us homeward, tired and spent
With our long day and tedious beggary.
These were my manners, this my way of life,
Till age and slow disease me overtook,
And sever'd from my sightless master's side.
But, lest the grace of so good deeds should die,
Through tract of years in mute oblivion lost,
This slender tomb of turf hath Irus rear'd,
Cheap monument of no ungrudging hand,
And with short verse inscribed it, to attest,
In long and lasting union to attest,
The virtues of the Beggar and the Dog.
It may be noted that Lamb treats Lyciscus, which was evidently intended
merely as a name, as referring to the species of dog; Virgil uses
Lycisca as a dog's name in the third Eclogue. Probably Bourne was
thinking of a fox-terrier, and the term wolf-dog is pompous and
incongruous. Lamb's last line but three is a very lame one; it is a
difficult point to determine, but did not he mean "no ungrateful hand"?
The true sense of the original line is, "the slender gift of a hand
which although poor is not ungrateful."
Bourne shows also a remarkable observation of street life, the quaint
water-side manners, the odd obscure life that eddied near the river
highway and round about the smoky towers of Wren. Absent-minded he may
have been, but observant he was to a peculiar degree, and that not of
broad poetical effects, but of the minute detail and circumstance of
every-day life. It would be easy to multiply instances, but this extract
from the "Iter per Tamisin," of the bargeman lighting his pipe, will
serve to show what I mean. Why does he call tobacco _poetum_, it may
be asked? The only solution that I can suggest is that Pink-eye, or
Squint-eye, was a cant term for some species of the weed at the time.
It can hardly be, I think, the word _peat_ Latinised. The version, as in
the case of those which follow, is my own.
His ita dispositis, tubulum cum pyxide magna
Depromit, nigrum longus quem fecerat usus.
Hunc postquam implerat paeto, silicemque pararat,
Excussit scintillam; ubi copia ponitur atri
Fomitis, hinc ignem sibi multum exugit, et haustu
Accendens crebro, surgentes deprimit herbas
Extremo digito: in cineres albescere paetum
Incipit et naso gratos emittit odores.
* * *
This thus disposed, a pipe with ample bowl
He handles, blackened with familiar use;
Stuffs with the fragrant herb, and flint prepares
To strike the spark: and thence from fuel stored,
Black provender, he spouts a plenteous flame,
Kindling with frequent gusts of breath indrawn:
Meanwhile he tends with cautions finger-tip
The rising fibres; into lightest ash
Whitening, they pour the aromatic fumes.
Vincent Bourne had that passionate sympathy with and delight in youth
that is the surest testimony to a heart that does not grow old. The
pretty ways and natural gestures of childhood pleased him. He was fond
of his boys, and allowed that fondness to be evident, at a time when
brow-beating and insolent severity were too much the fashion. In his
epitaphs it is curious to note how many deal with the young, and touch
on the immemorial fragrance of early death with a peculiar pathos. There
is an epitaph on a Westminster boy of twelve years old, where he most
touchingly alludes to the thought that he died both beautiful and
innocent; and an epitaph on a little girl who, he said in quaint phrase,
had the modest red of roses and the pure whiteness of lilies in her
face. Again the inscription to the memory of the young Earl of Warwick,
who died at the age of twenty-four, is full of delicate beauty; but I
will give in full what seems to me the sweetest of all. It is printed
among the authentic epitaphs, but it is, I imagine, purely fanciful.