CLOSE OF LIFE.
Cowper says there could not have been a happier trio on earth than Lady
Hesketh, Mrs. Unwin, and himself. Nevertheless, after his removal to
Weston, he again went mad, and once more attempted self-destruction.
His malady was constitutional, and it settled down upon him as his
years increased, and his strength failed. He was now sixty. The Olney
physicians, instead of husbanding his vital power, had wasted it away
_secundum artem_ by purging, bleeding, and emetics. He had overworked
himself on his fatal translation of Homer, under the burden of which he
moved, as he says himself, like an ass over-laden with sand-bags. He
had been getting up to work at six, and not breakfasting till eleven.
And now the life from which his had for so many years been fed, itself
began to fail. Mrs. Unwin was stricken with paralysis; the stroke was
slight, but of its nature there was no doubt. Her days of bodily life
were numbered; of mental life there remained to her a still shorter
span. Her excellent son, William Unwin, had died of a fever soon after
the removal of the pair to Weston. He had been engaged in the work of
his profession as a clergyman, and we do not hear of his being often at
Olney. But he was in constant correspondence with Cowper, in whose
heart as well as in that of Mrs. Unwin his death must have left a great
void, and his support was withdrawn just at the moment when it was
about to become most necessary.
Happily just at this juncture a new and a good friend appeared. Hayley
was a mediocre poet, who had for a time obtained distinction above his
merits. Afterwards his star had declined, but having an excellent
heart, he had not been in the least soured by the downfall of his
reputation. He was addicted to a pompous rotundity of style, perhaps
he was rather absurd; but he was thoroughly good-natured, very anxious
to make himself useful, and devoted to Cowper, to whom, as a poet, he
looked up with an admiration unalloyed by any other feeling. Both of
them, as it happened, were engaged on Milton, and an attempt had been
made to set them by the ears; but Hayley took advantage of it to
introduce himself to Cowper with an effusion of the warmest esteem. He
was at Weston when Mrs. Unwin was attacked with paralysis, and
displayed his resource by trying to cure her with an electric-machine.
At Eartham, on the coast of Sussex, he had, by an expenditure beyond
his means, made for himself a little paradise, where it was his delight
to gather a distinguished circle. To this place he gave the pair a
pressing invitation, which was accepted in the vain hope that a change
might do Mrs. Unwin good.
From Weston to Eartham was a three days' journey, an enterprise not
undertaken without much trepidation and earnest prayer. It was safely
accomplished, however, the enthusiastic Mr. Rose walking to meet his
poet and philosopher on the way. Hayley had tried to get Thurlow to
meet Cowper. A sojourn in a country house with the tremendous Thurlow,
the only talker for whom Johnson condescended to prepare himself, would
have been rather an overpowering pleasure; and perhaps, after all, it
was as well that Hayley could only get Cowper's disciple, Hurdis,
afterwards professor of poetry at Oxford, and Charlotte Smith.
At Eartham, Cowper's portrait was painted by Romney.
Romney, expert infallibly to trace
On chart or canvas not the form alone
And semblance, but, however faintly shown
The mind's impression too on every face,
With strokes that time ought never to erase,
Thou hast so pencilled mine that though I own
The subject worthless, I have never known
The artist shining with superior grace;
But this I mark, that symptoms none of woe
In thy incomparable work appear:
Well: I am satisfied it should be so
Since on maturer thought the cause is clear;
For in my looks what sorrow could'st thou see
When I was Hayley's guest and sat to thee.
Southey observes that it was likely enough there would be no melancholy
in the portrait, but that Hayley and Romney fell into a singular error
in mistaking for "the light of genius" what Leigh Hunt calls "a fire
fiercer than that either of intellect or fancy, gleaming from the
raised and protruded eye."
Hayley evidently did his utmost to make his guest happy. They spent
the hours in literary chat, and compared notes about Milton. The first
days were days of enjoyment. But soon the recluse began to long for
his nook at Weston. Even the extensiveness of the view at Eartham made
his mind ache, and increased his melancholy. To Weston the pair
returned; the paralytic, of course, none the better for her journey.
Her mind as well as her body was now rapidly giving way. We quote as
biography that which is too well known to be quoted as poetry.
TO MARY.
The twentieth year is well nigh past.
Since first our sky was overcast:--
Ah, would that this might be the last!
My Mary!
Thy spirits have a fainter flow,
I see thee daily weaker grow:--
'Twas my distress that brought thee low,
My Mary!
Thy needles, once a shining store,
For my sake restless heretofore,
Now rust disused, and shine no more,
My Mary!
For though thou gladly wouldst fulfil
The same kind office for me still,
Thy sight now seconds not thy will,
My Mary!
But well thou play'dst the housewife's part,
And all thy threads with magic art,
Have wound themselves about this heart,
My Mary!
Thy indistinct expressions seem
Like language utter'd in a dream:
Yet me they charm, whate'er the theme,
My Mary!
Thy silver locks, once auburn bright,
Are still more lovely in my sight
Than golden, beams of orient light,
My Mary!
For could I view nor them nor thee,
What sight worth seeing could I see P
The sun would rise in vain for me,
My Mary!
Partakers of thy sad decline,
Thy hands their little force resign;
Yet gently press'd, press gently mine,
My Mary!
Such feebleness of limbs thou provest,
That now at every step thou movest,
Upheld by two; yet still thou lovest,
My Mary!
And still to love, though press'd with ill,
In wintry age to feel no chill,
With me is to be lovely still,
My Mary!
But ah! by constant heed I know,
How oft the sadness that I show
Transforms thy smiles to looks of woe,
My Mary!
And should my future lot be cast
With much resemblance of the past,
Thy worn-out heart will break at last,
My Mary!
Even love, at least the power of manifesting love, began to betray its
mortality. She who had been so devoted, became, as her mind failed,
exacting, and instead of supporting her partner, drew him down. He
sank again into the depth of hypochondria. As usual, his malady took
the form of religious horrors, and he fancied that he was ordained to
undergo severe penance for his sins. Six days he sat motionless and
silent, almost refusing to take food. His physician suggested, as the
only chance of arousing him, that Mrs. Unwin should be induced, if
possible, to invite him to go out with her; with difficulty she was
made to understand what they wanted her to do; at last she said that it
was a fine morning, and she should like a walk. Her partner at once
rose and placed her arm in his. Almost unconsciously, she had rescued
him from the evil spirit for the last time. The pair were in doleful
plight. When their minds failed they had fallen in a miserable manner
under the influence of a man named Teedon, a schoolmaster crazed with
self-conceit, at whom Cowper in his saner mood had laughed, but whom he
now treated as a spiritual oracle, and a sort of medium of
communication with the spirit-world, writing down the nonsense which
the charlatan talked. Mrs. Unwin, being no longer in a condition to
control the expenditure, the housekeeping, of course, went wrong; and
at the same time her partner lost the protection of the love-inspired
tact by which she had always contrived to shield his weakness and to
secure for him, in spite of his eccentricities, respectful treatment
from his neighbours. Lady Hesketh's health had failed, and she had
been obliged to go to Bath. Hayley now proved himself no mere
lion-hunter, but a true friend. In conjunction with Cowper's
relatives, he managed the removal of the pair from Weston to Mundsley,
on the coast of Norfolk, where Cowper seemed to be soothed by the sound
of the sea, then to Dunham Lodge, near Swaffham, and finally (in 1796)
to East Dereham, where, two months after their arrival, Mrs. Unwin
died. Her partner was barely conscious of his loss. On the morning of
her death he asked the servant "whether there was life above stairs?"
On being taken to see the corpse, he gazed at it for a moment, uttered
one passionate cry of grief, and never spoke of Mrs. Unwin more. He
had the misfortune to survive her three years and a half, during which
relatives and friends were kind, and Miss Perowne partly filled, the
place of Mrs. Unwin. Now and then, there was a gleam of reason and
faint revival of literary faculty, but composition was confined to
Latin verse or translation, with one memorable and almost awful
exception. The last original poem written by Cowper was _The
Castaway_, founded on an incident in Anson's Voyage.
Obscurest night involved the sky,
The Atlantic billows roared,
When such a destined, wretch as I,
Wash'd headlong from on board,
Of friends, of hope, of all bereft,
His floating home for ever left.
No braver chief could Albion boast;
Than he with whom he went,
Nor ever ship left Albion's coast
With warmer wishes sent.
He loved them both, but both in vain;
Nor him beheld, nor her again.
Not long beneath the whelming brine
Expert to swim, he lay,
Nor soon he felt his strength decline,
Or courage die away;
But waged with death a lasting strife,
Supported by despair of life.
He shouted; nor his friends had fail'd
To check the vessel's course,
But so the furious blast prevail'd,
That pitiless perforce
They left their outcast mate behind,
And scudded still before the wind.
Some succour yet they could afford,
And, such as storms allow,
The cask, the coop, the floated cord,
Delay'd not to bestow;
But he, they knew, nor ship nor shore,
Whate'er they gave, should visit more.
Nor, cruel as it seem'd, could he
Their haste himself condemn,
Aware that flight, in such a sea,
Alone could rescue them;
Yet bitter felt it still to die
Deserted, and his friends so nigh.
He long survives, who lives an hour
In ocean, self-upheld;
And so long he, with unspent power,
His destiny repelled:
And ever, as the minutes flew,
Entreated help, or cried--"Adieu!"
At length, his transient respite past,
His comrades, who before
Had heard his voice in every blast,
Could catch the sound no more:
For then by toil subdued, he drank
The stifling wave, and then he sank.
No poet wept him; but the page
Of narrative sincere,
That tells his name, his worth, his age,
Is wet with Anson's tear;
And tears by bards or heroes shed
Alike immortalize the dead.
I therefore purpose not, or dream,
Descanting on his fate,
To give the melancholy theme
A more enduring date:
But misery still delights to trace
Its semblance in another's case.
No voice divine the storm allay'd,
No light propitious shone,
When, snatch'd from all effectual aid,
We perish'd, each alone:
But I beneath a rougher sea,
And whelm'd in deeper gulfs than he.
The despair which finds vent in verse is hardly despair. Poetry can
never be the direct expression of emotion; it must be the product of
reflection combined with an exercise of the faculty of composition
which in itself is pleasant. Still _The Castaway_ ought to be an
antidote to religious depression, since it is the work of a man of whom
it would be absurdity to think as realty estranged from the spirit of
good, who had himself done good to the utmost of his powers.
Cowper died very peacefully on the morning of April 25, 1800, and was
buried in Dereham Church, where there is a monument to him with an
inscription by Hayley, which, if it is not good poetry, is a tribute of
sincere affection.
Any one whose lot it is to write upon the life and works of Cowper must
feel that there is an immense difference between the interest which
attaches to him, and that which attaches to any one among the far
greater poets of the succeeding age. Still there is something about
him so attractive, his voice has such a silver tone, he retains, even
in his ashes, such a faculty of winning friends that his biographer and
critic may be easily beguiled into giving him too high a place. He
belongs to a particular religious movement, with the vitality of which
the interest of a great part of his works has departed or is departing.
Still more emphatically and in a still more important sense does he
belong to Christianity. In no natural struggle for existence would he
have been the survivor, by no natural process of selection would he
ever have been picked out as a vessel of honour. If the shield which
for eighteen centuries Christ by His teaching and His death has spread
over the weak things of this world should fail, and might should again
become the title to existence and the measure of worth, Cowper will be
cast aside as a specimen of despicable infirmity, and all who have said
anything in his praise will be treated with the same scorn.