POEMS
BY
JOHN CLARE
PUBLISHER’S NOTICE.
The Publisher desires to express his regret that, owing to an oversight,
the proofs of the Introduction were not submitted to the Editor, who is
in no way responsible for the following
ERRATA (corrected in this etext)
Page xvii., line 6, for “been” read “being”; page xxii., first line, for
“Reynerdson” read “Reynardson”; page xxiv., for “tête-á-tête” read
“tête-à-tête”; page xxviii., 2nd line, for “compliments.” read
“compliments,”; page xxx., line 11, for “Dick Suivelles” read “Dick
Swiveller”; page xxxi., in the last line but two, for “to” read “of”;
page xxxix., in line 6 of second paragraph for “widey” read “widely.”
POEMS _by_ JOHN CLARE
SELECTED AND INTRODUCED BY
NORMAN GALE (AUTHOR OF “A
COUNTRY MUSE,” &C. &C.) WITH A
BIBLIOGRAPHY BY C. ERNEST SMITH
RUGBY: GEORGE E. OVER, 1901
Printed at The Rugby Press
CONTENTS
Page
A Spring Morning 138
A World for Love 120
Address to Plenty 3
Approach of Spring, The 76
Autumn 99
Autumn Robin, The 132
Ballad 42
Crab Tree, The 139
Decay 125
December 70
Effusion 39
Gipsy Camp, The 45
Graves of Infants 144
Harvest Morning, The 18
Home Yearnings 145
I am! Yet what I am 157
June 65
Love 123
Love Lives beyond the Tomb 147
Meeting, The 37
Milton, To John 154
My Early Home 149
My Love, thou art a Nosegay Sweet 36
Nightingale’s Nest, The 114
Noon 14
Pastoral Fancies 129
Patty 32
Patty of the Vale 34
Old Poesy 141
On an Infant’s Grave 22
Rural Evening 55
Rustic Fishing 61
Song 44
Song 122
Summer Evening 25
Summer Images 89
Tell-Tale Flowers, The 150
Thoughts in a Churchyard 112
’Tis Spring, my Love, ’Tis Spring 142
To an April Daisy 23
To P * * * * 118
To the Clouds 47
To the Rural Muse 82
Universal Epitaph, The 17
Vanities of Life, The 105
What is Life? 1
Winter 140
Woodman, The 48
BIOGRAPHY AND COMMENT
In tracing the origin of JOHN CLARE it is not necessary to go very far
back, reference to his grandfather and grandmother being a sufficient
acknowledgement of the claims of genealogy. Following the road at
haphazard, trusting himself entirely to the guidance of fortune, and
relying for provender upon his skill in drawing from a violin tunes of
the battle and the dance, about thirty years before Helpstone heard the
first wail of its infant poet, there arrived at the village the vagabond
and truculent Parker. Born under a wandering star, this man had footed
it through many a country of Europe, careless whether daily necessity
required from him an act of bloodshed or the scraping of a harum-scarum
reel designed to set frolic in the toes of man and maid. At the time of
his reaching Helpstone, a Northamptonshire village, destined to come
into prominence because of the lyrics of its chief son, it happened that
the children were without a schoolmaster. In his time the adventurer
had played many parts. Why should he not add to the list? Effrontery,
backed up by an uncertain amount of superficial attainment, won the day,
and this fiddling Odysseus obtained the vacant position. Of his
boastings, his bowings, his drinkings, there is no need to make history,
but his soft tongue demands a moment of attention. We may take it for
granted that he picked out the fairest flower among the maids of
Helpstone as the target for all the darts at his disposal, each of
which, we may be sure, was polished by use. The daughter of the parish
clerk was a fortress easy to capture. Depicted by himself, the rascal
loomed as a hero; till at last the affair proceeded beyond a mere kiss,
and the poor girl pleaded for the offices of a priest in order to save
her child from the stain of illegitimacy. However, the schoolmaster
proved glib of promises, but fleet of foot, for on the day following his
sweetheart’s revelations he was nowhere to be found. In the course of
time JOHN CLARE’S father was born. In his turn, he grew into the want of
a mate, found her, married her, and begot an honour for England.
JOHN CLARE was born at Helpstone, on the 13th day of July, 1793, and
born into a heritage of handicaps. To say nothing of the fruits of
exposure to rough weathers which were ripening in his father’s system,
the boy had the disadvantage of being one of twins, a sister
accompanying him into the world. His mother suffered from dropsy, and we
may well believe that what life the children sucked from her breast
contained elements threatening their future health. Small and frail, the
lad had the additional misfortune to open his eyes in the cottage of a
pauper, instead of in some abode where his natural weakness could have
been nourished by foods giving inward encouragement, and of a sort sure
to result in the building up of hearty fibre. Despite all these early
rebuffs, JOHN CLARE kept hold of life. When still very young he set out
full of faith to explore the junction of earth and heaven, for on the
horizon he could see the point of their meeting. In this incident, as
well as in many another of his childhood, it is easy to detect signs of
a spirit triumphantly unfitted for residence in a clay hovel at
Helpstone. As luck would have it, a kind of rough-and-ready poetry was
not altogether out of the boy’s reach, for his father’s head was stuffed
with innumerable odds-and-ends of rhyme, some of which he was in the
habit of reciting to his son. Entertainment of the same sort was
obtainable from old Granny Bains, a weather-worn cow-herd, to whom the
future poet was attracted by her store of ditties; whose especial
cronies were the wind and rain. Under such illiterate tutors little JOHN
CLARE moved closer and closer to the soul of poetry, musing while he put
a limit to the vagrancy of the geese and sheep for which he had been
appointed guardian as soon as the main part of his schooling was over.
His departure from the scholastic bench took place when his years had
reached a very unripe total, for with only seven birthdays entered in
his book of life, at an age when a child is usually at the commencement
of historical and geographical perplexities, he was turned out into the
fields as a wage-earner. Instead of feeling elated at his escape from
the scholastic coils of Dame Bullimore, as many a lad would have done,
JOHN CLARE, being aware of his budding wits, although unable to
comprehend the motive force from within, looked round his small district
in search of fresh educational territories to be conquered by his brain.
Having saved a few pence he made overtures to Mr. James Merrishaw, the
schoolmaster of Glinton, and in the duller months of the year, when days
were short, he attended certain evening classes, notwithstanding the
fact that the journeys involved taxed his boot-leather severely; for
Glinton is nearly five miles away from Helpstone. Here he learned well,
but not altogether wisely, if we may agree that the boy’s struggles with
the intricacies of algebra were conspicuous for mis-applied energy. But
something more valuable than baffling equations resulted from JOHN
CLARE’S connection with the sage of Glinton, for Mr. Merrishaw made him
free of his books, thus feeding more and more that desire for knowledge
which sprang up in him not less rapidly than a mushroom grows in a
meadow.
Even in such a loose piece of biography as this--an essay which has no
other aim than to glance in passing at the salient features of CLARE’S
career--a little space must be spared for mention of the boy’s year of
service as factotum at the “Blue Bell” at Helpstone, where he had almost
as much leisure as work, because it was here that his hermitical notions
and moods of dream increased at an extraordinary rate. Served by
travelling pedlars, whose packs let him share in fancy the terror of Red
Riding Hood, the adventures of Valentine and Orson, to say no word of
Sinbad’s amazements, the small student entered for the first time into
the recesses of fairy land, there to lave his hands in its abundant
jewels, while making extortionate demands upon the swiftness of genies.
Little by little, algebra went to the wall, yielding as much to the
boy’s spreading passion for Nature’s feast of grass and flowers, as for
the limitless enchantments born of imagination, since at this period the
list of impulses communicated to him by wayside blossoms, by clouds, by
winds, and by the easy ballads of thrushes, daily grew longer. The boy
began to appreciate the largeness of God’s school as compared with the
limits reigned over by Dame Bullimore and the pedagogue of Glinton; and
his increasing sense of hearing enabled him to receive into his
understanding fragments of those sermons which are preached by stones.
Hunger for expansion lived and lusted in his heart. No better example of
this fury of craving could be adduced than the story of how the young
poet entered into a combat with circumstances in order that he might
obtain a copy of Thomson’s “Seasons.” Mental agony, as well as a
superlative degree of hoarding, went to the purchase of that coveted
volume, the history of which is fully set forth in Mr. Frederick
Martin’s stimulating “Life of John Clare.” During these glowing months
the boy of genius had not ceased from utilising every chance scrap of
paper for the purpose of jotting down his exercises in rhyme. By means
of a forgivable trick he secured the verbal patronage of his father and
mother, who could not see any merit in his verses till he pretended
that they were the compositions of others. As poem after poem was
written their author stored them in a cranny in the wall, a retreat at
last invaded by Mrs. Clare, with the result that she was wont to help
the boiling of the kettle by burning underneath it the early pipings of
her son.
At this point, the youth in whose story the interest lies being sixteen
years old, Cupid, with no loss of his bright qualities after so many
centuries of exercise, comes into the recital. To JOHN CLARE, who was
moving rapidly towards the full worship of all things lovely, Mary Joyce
appeared to be nobody less bewildering and enchanting than a stray from
heaven; and though he was prevented from wearing her, the dice of
Fortune falling adverse from the box, he never ceased to regard her as
his ideal. Of the many pathetic incidents of his life not the least
touching is the fact that in his years of a broken brain he cherished as
a chief delusion the belief that Mary Joyce was indeed his wife. What
the feelings of a nature so intense were when the father of his
sweetheart intervened as the proverbial slip between the cup and the
lip, we can only conjecture, though the tracing of results is easy
enough. After leaving the tankards and the horses of the “Blue Bell,”
JOHN CLARE cast about him for some other form of employment. Escaping
the pains of stone-cutting and cobbling, he succeeded in becoming a
gardener’s apprentice at Burghley Park, the seat of the Marquis of
Exeter. Parker Clare began to think that his son was born with an
invisible silver spoon in his mouth, while to JOHN eight shillings a
week, with lodging free, smacked of the robbers’ cave in the “Arabian
Nights.” In reality, this position was altogether undesirable, for the
head gardener, not content to degrade himself alone by an excessive
swallowing of stimulants, actually devoted his best efforts to make
drunkards of his pupils. Unfortunately temptation loomed large at the
very moment when CLARE was ripe for mischief. Romance was worsted by
swipes (the indignity of the episode may be held to excuse the slang);
by means of such thin nepenthe, regret for the loss of Mary Joyce grew
less and less; and it not infrequently occurred that the new apprentice
slept off his potations by the hedge-side, with no better blanket than a
mist, and with the damp turf for sole mattress, thus unconsciously
taking in a cargo of ague and fever for future unloading. At last CLARE,
in company with another lad who was anxious to show a clean pair of
heels to the abstract and concrete brutalities of his master, fled to
Grantham, and thence to Newark-upon-Trent, where both the runaways
obtained work under a nurseryman. But CLARE was homesick; his mother’s
face was as a magnet pulling him to the familiar hovel at Helpstone; no
longer could he obey that decree of divorce from his native scenes
pronounced against him by the impalpable judge and jury of circumstance.
One day, after a terrible journey on foot, he burst into the hut of his
parents, weeping for joy to gain for his body the residence which his
spirit had occupied so long.
No sooner had CLARE returned his muscles to the various tasks of a farm
labourer than he harked back with a love greater than ever to Thomson’s
“Seasons,” reading it as he went to and from his work. The chief part of
his leisure he used for the composition of verses, an occupation which
served to fix upon him habits of timidity and shyness, especially as he
was without a single sympathiser. Because of his strange manners, his
fits of abstraction as well as of uttered enthusiasm, his appetite for
solitude, the neighbours passed from mere mockery to whispers of a mind
diseased, and even of a nature beset by the black ministers of magic.
The fact that about this time his mother, for the purposes of fuel, made
a clean sweep of his poetic accumulations did its share to loosen his
moral control; and when his attempts at gaining encouragement from Mr.
Thomas Porter, and patronage from Lord Milton, to whom the parish clerk
of Helpstone displayed the rustic poet, failed, he betook himself, this
time of his own accord, to the drunken company of the worst livers in
the village. Much of CLARE’S future misery proceeded from this lapse.
Before bad example had done its utmost to ruin him, Providence, in the
somewhat unusual disguise of a recruiting sergeant, came to the rescue.
JOHN’S period of military service was brief, for after being instructed
at Oundle in the goose-step--that foundation of a glorious career under
arms--the corps of which he was a member was disbanded, and he was
enabled once more to assume the civilian smock at Helpstone. For all
booty he had a second-rate copy of “Paradise Lost” and “The Tempest.” A
matter of more importance, however, was the fact that he had departed
from the pernicious influence of the roysterers who were leading him to
destruction. A number of small adventures were not slow to follow his
short intimacy with the clothes and tools of war, what with his trial of
a gipsy’s life, and his courting of several girls, one of whom,
Elizabeth Newton by name, drove him into a fit of melancholy by playing
the part of a jilt. In this state of mind nothing could have suited him
better than change of scene, and his departure to Bridge Casterton,
there to learn the details of a lime-burner’s trade, happened at a
moment fortunate for heart and head alike. It was while he resided in
this neighbourhood that he confided to Mr. Henson, a bookseller of
Market Deeping, the fact of his colloquy with the Muse, following the
avowal by a display of his powers. This confession was the germ of a
wide circulation.
And now we are arrived at a fresh, and, as far as matrimony is
concerned, a final love. CLARE being now twenty-four years of age, it
was high time for him to nurse an established affection, and he was
lucky to win the heart of Martha Turner, the “Patty” of several poems to
be found in the collected works of the poet. To him Martha was another
waif from the skies, even though she tortured her poetical admirer by
the time-honoured practice of appearing to waver between two suitors.
The conduct of this episode was made up of petty events prosaic enough
to the onlooker, but sufficiently lethal for the parties most
interested. Tiffs, sour looks from parents, despairs, showers, rainbows,
were the constituents of CLARE’S courtship. A flat and always fortunate
wooing would doubtless have been hostile to poetry. Because of his
longing to supply two mouths with the necessaries of life, and because
it was clearly proved that Cupid would not even be able to munch a
satisfactory portion of crust if the lovers founded their faith solely
on the wage of a lime-burner, CLARE conceived the idea of publishing a
volume of song, his mind appointing Mr. Henson, of Market Deeping, a
comrade for his project. A month devoted to the base uses of the
treadmill would not have cost the poet more labour than did the
composition of his prospectus, three hundred copies of which the
bookseller agreed to print, as well as a specimen sonnet, for one pound.
But this trap for subscribers was baited with too much candour. If ever
a poet met with a crushing response to his first appeal for a hearing,
surely JOHN CLARE was that man. Seven patrons came forward, more, we may
guess, in kindness than in hope of literary luxury. CLARE, of course,
experienced the superlatives of disgust; and when the printer of the
artless prospectus wrote to inform him that the adventure must drop
unless fifteen pounds appeared to back it up, he could not withhold
himself from replying in a strain to the last degree impolitic. To add
to his griefs, a rather wide gulf was at this time yawning between
Martha Turner and himself, the bridging of which was a feat of
engineering extremely hard to accomplish. Moreover, and here is an
illustration of the proverb that it never rains but it pours, the owner
of the limekilns discharged his lyrical servant on the score of his
inattention to business. The whole neighbourhood being somewhat
scandalised at what was considered presumption, for labourers of CLARE’S
type were not required to assert themselves in prose, much less in
poetry, the disappointed lime-burner, with a heart given up to aching,
returned once more to Helpstone, where he would have starved but for
parochial relief. So genius sat down to eat the parish loaf.
However tightly twisted the rosebud may be, windy and sunny fingers will
unpack it at last. At the very moment when CLARE was reading himself as
the peculiar prey of disaster, he was destined to behold the bright back
of the cloud which had confronted him with such ominous persistence. By
strange approaches the news of _Clare’s_ devotion to and production of
poetry arrived at Mr. Drury, a bookseller who was on the point of taking
over a business at Stamford from Mr. Thompson, of that town. In company
with a friend, Mr. Drury proceeded to Helpstone, interviewed the
astonished poet, glanced through some rhymed samples, and finally
declared his intention to publish a volume at his own risk, hearing
which intelligence CLARE once more rose heavenward in the balloon of
hope, forgetting how certain it was that impediments to free flight
would make themselves manifest. Owing to the offices of Mr. Drury, CLARE
became acquainted with Mr. Gilchrist, of Stamford, a gentlemen with an
Oxford education and a grocer’s shop, who played the part of a true
friend to the poet, if we except his action in making public some verses
of CLARE’S which had more wine than inspiration in them. It has been
contended that Mr. Gilchrist filled the post of patron with a want of
reserve which made CLARE feel his position acutely; for the eating of
humble-pie has never been a really popular amusement. Be this as it may,
lovers of “Poems descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery” have a great
deal for which to thank Mr. Gilchrist. After promising CLARE to
undertake the publication of his first book, Mr. Drury experienced a few
bad hours. To begin with, the ill-spelt, rope-tied, unpunctuated mass of
manuscript entrusted to him by its author had a most unpromising aspect.
He tested it as best he could, but, as the glow of the adventure had
already faded a little, found no particular reasons for comfort. In this
strait he enlisted the acumen of an acquaintance, a clergyman, whose
name was, somewhat appropriately, Twopenny, in order to see how the
verses might strike a contemporary. The prophetic Twopenny, with brutal
candour, described CLARE’S bundle of reeds to be so much twaddle. When
Mr. Drury delivered this oracle, the grief of the poet was such that the
bookseller was shocked. Had it not been for the anguish of the singer,
it is quite possible that the bookseller of Stamford would have
departed, with decent circuity, from his bargain; as it was, he
determined to procure yet another opinion. He happened to be a relative
of Mr. John Taylor, the London publisher, to whom he despatched the
uncouth manuscript in question. Mr. Taylor’s were not as Mr. Twopenny’s
eyes. He knew diamonds when he saw them, even though a polisher had not
exerted his craft upon them.
Before proceeding to describe the effect made on the public by the
appearance of “Poems descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery,” it will be
necessary to revert for a moment to the affairs of love. No sooner was
the first quarrel between the sweethearts swept away by the broom of
reconciliation than the flame of passion, burning to a conquering
height, made a bonfire out of the broken materials of virtue. This
disaster was followed by fresh bickerings. Martha Turner found it
impossible to be for ever displaying a cheerful front. Her tears, her
reproaches, her simple tricks to make CLARE jealous, resulted in a
serious breach. CLARE, listening far too readily to glib and evil
persuasions from within, appears to have convinced himself that he was
the injured party; whereupon he began to wound Martha by flirting
outrageously with Betty Sell, the daughter of a Southorp labourer. This
inglorious behaviour received a sudden check, just after the publication
of CLARE’S book, by reason of a letter from Martha Turner, in which she
spoke of her coming motherhood, and implored the author of her shame to
cleanse her in so far as he was able. Truth to tell, CLARE was by this
time wellnigh assured that Betty was his favourite, but he had the
manliness to follow the right star, and on the 16th of March, 1820, was
united to Martha at Great Casterton Church. A month after the wedding
Anna Maria Clare was born to him. As this marriage would hardly have
been possible but for the stir occasioned by the poems, we may now give
a short history of the events immediately following their issue.
Although the art of preliminary puffing was as yet in swaddling clothes,
so to speak, Mr. Taylor contrived to interest a large number of his
acquaintances, some of whom had access to the columns of certain
periodicals. Moreover, Mr. Gilchrist’s magazine article had proved a
useful forerunner. The book itself was born into a golden clime. The
reading world happening to be sick of Metropolitan and modish fare,
CLARE’S birds and mayblossoms came as a tonic to all who were desirous
of a change. The triumph of the country over the town was of the
completest sort; customers poured into Mr. Taylor’s shop in their
anxiety to purchase copies of the labourer’s poems; for once the critics
and the public were agreed. Journals of fine stature joined with
insignificant prints in praising CLARE to the skies, and when this new
writer actually succeeded in carrying the defences of the “Quarterly,”
it was allowed on all sides that lion-hunters were in luck’s way. CLARE
was fortunate in some of his advertisers. Rossini and Madame Vestris
brought him into further prominence by means of a musical setting and of
recitations at Covent Garden. Genius in hobnailed boots and a
smock-frock shouldered aside the more usual figures of literary London.
While all this was taking place in Fleet Street, as well as in the
aristocratic sections of the capital, rumours of CLARE’S amazing success
reached the county residences in the neighbourhood of Helpstone.
General Birch Reynardson gave him to eat with his lackeys, and Viscount
Milton flung seventeen guineas into his lap with as much feeling as he
might have thrown seventeen crumbs to a cur. In great contrast to
blue-blooded vulgarity of this stamp was the Marquis of Exeter’s
treatment of the poet, although a more liberal display of tact upon his
part would have enabled CLARE to leave his mansion with a heart given
over completely to joy and gratitude. Friends of _Clare_ are not likely
to forget the generosity of the Marquis. An annuity of fifteen guineas
for life was indeed a handsome backing of the Muse. Because of this gift
Anna Maria Clare was born in wedlock; without it her parents would not
have been able to marry as soon as they did. Foolish folk spared the
poet none of the customary agonies. He was pestered by inquisitive
visitors; collectors of autographs bullied him for his signature, and
the owners of albums plagued him to encourage them in their whim. Some
persons of the goody-goody type improved the shining hour by sending him
an assortment of tracts, the fate of which is wrapped in impenetrable
mystery. CLARE was a simple child of nature, certainly, but we may
almost take it for granted that he left these precious effusions
undigested.
The news that CLARE was about to trust his bones to London almost
paralysed his rustic intimates. Generations of romancers had made
strange impressions upon the provincial mind. Particularly full of
odious vaticinations was James Burridge, an old farm labourer whose head
was stuffed to the bursting point with stories horrifying enough to make
CLARE’S flesh creep. According to this authority, London thoroughly
deserved the doubtful compliment of being compared with Babylon. He
declared that there were trap-doors in the streets, down which wayfarers
flopped into cauldrons of boiling water amid the plaudits of ministering
cut-throats! CLARE quailed, his parents wept, and his wife approached
within measurable distance of hysterics. But even the prospect of being
cooked in this casual manner did not suffice to deter the poet from
visiting Mr. Taylor, of Fleet Street. That he set some value upon the
legends of James Burridge is proved by his adoption of a small device to
baffle the trapdoor operators. Believing safety to be resident in a
smock-frock and in boots the soles of which sustained grinning rows of
hobnails, he set forth upon his journey thus attired. He was not long in
regretting his precautions, for he soon perceived that his costume
evoked from onlookers merry comments and derisive glances. In the end,
Mr. Taylor supplied him with an overcoat which covered the defects of
his attire. Whatever the heat of theatre or drawing-room, whether among
lords or commoners, JOHN CLARE clung to this garment with the courage of
despair. What his agonies were, because of his raiment, when driven into
a corner by a countess for a _tête-à-tête_, we can do no more than dimly
conjecture. In the course of this visit CLARE was introduced to Admiral
Lord Radstock, who took a great fancy to him and remained a firm friend,
and to Mrs. Emmerson, a lady who, seeing that her purse and sympathies
were always ready to alleviate the mischances of young poets and
artists, might be described as a female Maecenas. To this rather gushing
and sentimental patroness of the arts CLARE from time to time addressed
letters which were not devoid of the elements of wildness and Platonic
passion. At last his emphasis became so absurd that Mrs. Emmerson
requested him to send back her portrait. Had a jug of cold water been
poured down the poet’s neck he could not have been more cooled than he
was by this piece of diplomacy. The shrine was despoiled. The picture
was despatched by the next carrier; and doubtless Martha, who must have
hated the sight of Mrs. Emmerson’s face, congratulated herself in
secret. There is no need to say more about CLARE’S first visit to
London, if we except mention of the fact that the mighty city’s chief
effect upon him was to fill his breast with yearning for the oaks and
rivulets round about his native village. A week in the Metropolis had
been more than enough for the countryman. As he rumbled homeward in the
coach, he had dreams of unsullied waters and unsmoked rainbows; and he
counted over his country joys as a miser adds up the total of his
various coins. At the top of his treasures stood his wife and baby, for,
with all his Platonic declensions from the state most comfortable to
Martha, he was an affectionate husband and father. About this time
several hearty friends strove with might and main to secure a competence
for the poet. A sum of four hundred and twenty pounds was the result of
their earnestness; but when it is remembered that Earl Fitzwilliam and
CLARE’S publishers were between them responsible for no less than two
hundred of this amount, the harvest of solicitation is not notable for
bounteousness. Dr. Bell--a friend of the right complexion--extracted an
annual ten pounds from Earl Spencer, so that, what with this gift, the
Marquis of Exeter’s donation, and the fund, the genius of Helpstone was
possessed of an income of forty-five pounds per annum. CLARE felt a
very mendicant throughout all these transactions, and even went so far
as to disavow them in letters despatched to his noble helpers. Had it
not been for the persuasions of Mr. Gilchrist and the amusing invectives
of Dr. Bell, he would have kicked with greater persistence against the
pricks of charity.
As soon as the harvest was over, CLARE made an end of labouring in the
fields. He was under agreement to hand over another volume of poetry to
Messrs. Taylor and Hessey for publication early in 1821. It was now his
earnest endeavour to fulfil his share of the bargain, and he bared his
forehead to inspiration. CLARE always felt himself cheated and empty of
ideas when shut up within four walls. The Muse would not follow him to
his fireside, but she would frolic with him the live-long day in the
open air, filling him with buoyancy, kissing his lips, and smoothing out
his wrinkles. Seated inside an old oak, whose heart had gradually passed
into the atmosphere, CLARE was wont to pour his soul in song, and so
fruitful were the hints of his unseen companion that he soon had a great
collection of new verses. All that he approved he desired to publish,
but Mr. Taylor spoke a few strong words in favour of weeding,
suggesting to CLARE that he should play the part of Herod toward some of
the children of his imagination. A deadlock ensued. For a time the poet
was adamant, the publishers marble. In this difficulty CLARE bethought
himself of Mr. Gilchrist as an excellent agent for the casting of oil on
the troubled waters. This gentleman, however, was thick in a squabble of
his own, and when CLARE appeared unsympathetic he displayed a spirit
very much huffed. At last the tension between poet and publishers became
less, with the result that in the middle of September “The Village
Minstrel” was ready for purchasers. The two volumes were handsomely
presented; the type was beautiful, and a couple of steel engravings made
a brave show. Despite the attractions of genius, despite the various
ornaments, “The Village Minstrel” met with rather an icy greeting. Among
the several explanations of this coldness put forward by the publishers
and by certain friends, the likeliest is that the season of issue was
not wisely chosen. In this year such gods of the pen as Scott, Byron,
Shelley, Wordsworth, Keats, and Lamb distributed joy to many a reader,
so that poor JOHN CLARE naturally ran a great risk of being overlooked.
It was now proved how dangerous had been the heat of his first welcome.
Superlatives had been done to death; the lion-hunters had exhausted
their treacly compliments, and were now eagerly scanning the literary
horizon in the hope of seeing approach a fresh victim. Moreover, some
injudicious persons had descanted more upon CLARE’S poverty than upon
his remarkable powers. It was the general opinion, as Mr. Martin points
out in his biography, that a really capable poet should be able to
support himself. If he did not succeed in so doing, then he was but a
dabbler while pretending to be a priest. The logic was of the sort to
shrink from scrutiny, but it contented the shallow sufficiently well. To
my thinking, the charge of twelve shillings for these two volumes was a
factor in the neglect which overtook them. Be this as it may, a
collection of verse containing some exquisite and lovely pieces, and
marking in some respects an advance upon the forerunning book, fell upon
the stony patch of indifference, there to remain while verse of fifty
times less merit enjoyed a vogue out of proportion to its worth. In a
word, CLARE’S second luck was the exact opposite of his first. In days
saddened by the reflection that he had failed to hold by the glory which
he obtained at his first venture, it was balm to CLARE to know that
Robert Bloomfield at least warmly approved of what lukewarm triflers
failed to appreciate.
In the summer of 1821, not long after the meteoric appearance at
Helpstone of a minor poet, who presented CLARE with a sonnet and a
one-pound note in a glorious burst of bounty and condescension, Mr. John
Taylor passed a few hours in the little Northamptonshire village. Under
the guidance of CLARE he reviewed many of the spots which the poet had
celebrated in song, and, in some cases, he was amazed to find how CLARE
had compelled dull localities to yield strains both abundant and
beautiful. But to gather roses in a desert is child’s play for a genius.
Upon taking leave, Mr. Taylor invited CLARE to spend a few weeks in
Fleet Street. Luckily the poet decided to avail himself of this offer,
for about this time he was far too frequent a visitor at the “Blue
Bell,” where he had his corner reserved, and passed for the chief of the
assembly. This meant more than sufficient exercise for the gullet. The
bad habit contracted at Burghley Hall was strengthened at these
sittings, and CLARE, deplorably unstable in some mental particulars,
approached nearer and nearer to that abyss which has engulfed so many
great wits. The winter being over, CLARE departed for London. He was
something of a bolt from the blue to Mr. Taylor, but that gentleman was
not slow in welcoming his client, though he looked askance at the gay
pocket handkerchief in which was contained the whole of his friend’s
luggage. As the publisher was very busy, he delivered CLARE into the
keeping of Thomas Hood, who, in turn, handed him over to the head porter
of the firm. The poet was not long in finding his way to the house of
Mrs. Emmerson, whose hospitality was as frank and unstinted as ever.
Here CLARE met Mr. Rippingille, a young artist with a dash of Dick
Swiveller in him, who had a strong appetite for noisy pranks. In company
with this unreflective spirit the peasant from the Midlands attended
some very dubious functions, penetrating to quarters of the Metropolis
which were famous for the topmost achievements of rascality, where he
ran riot among various intoxicants. After besieging a certain beauteous
actress with all the languishing glances at their command, these foolish
comrades would pledge her in pale ale till, like Byron, they seemed to
walk upon the ceiling. Thus were buttresses added to CLARE’S unfortunate
predilection. Those who revel by gaslight are not fond of returning home
before midnight, and CLARE was no exception to the rule. But the hours
of his choice were not grateful to Mr. Taylor, whose sense of the
fitness of things was offended by his visitor’s conduct. Therefore,
Thomas Hood was deputed to inform CLARE that he was vexing his host, an
intimation which resulted in the poet carrying his handkerchief full of
belongings to Mrs. Emmerson’s house, where his manners did not improve.
Under the accomplished tuition of Mr. Rippingille he found how easy the
descent of Avernus was. His next move was to Chiswick, where the Rev. H.
T. Cary entertained him. His stay here was brief, owing to an amusing
episode. Strangely enough CLARE was ignorant of the fact that his
elderly host had a young and handsome wife. In the belief that he was
doing homage to the charms of one of Mr. Cary’s grown-up daughters, he
addressed several poems, which were not without the quality of ardour,
to the wife of the translator’s bosom. After this, although his
explanation was accepted and understood, CLARE thought he had better
depart from Chiswick. During this stay in London the Northamptonshire
poet was introduced to William Gifford and Charles Lamb, the latter of
whom, if report may be trusted, was guilty of a rather coarse jape at
his expense. Not long after this, CLARE returned to Helpstone. It is
worthy to note that, whereas his first visit to London had only
accentuated his country raptures, the village minstrel now actually
pined for the fatted calves, the theatres, the glitter, and the merry
companions of the city. The taint of Rippingille was upon him. Reaction
came in time; the meadows captured him again; but this small piece of
history is significant of much.
As soon as he was once more in possession of his best self, CLARE began
to face his troubles--most of which sprang from insufficient means at
this time--with as much courage as he could summon. He was rather slow
in being convinced that he could not derive a steady income from the
composition of poetry; but when this truth was driven home his mind at
once became agile in devising numberless plans for the betterment of his
state, for he suffered from a torturing anxiety when he remembered for
how many his fate had appointed him the bread-winner. He was now
fighting hand to hand with poverty, valorous in behalf of his aged
mother, his wife, and his little children, who enjoyed the fruits of
whatsoever victories were gained far more than did their defender--since
he secretly starved himself in order to increase the tale of loaves
presided over by Patty. In the year 1823, worn out by his failures to
extract a supporting flow of guineas from either poetry or agriculture,
he fell very ill, just after the shock occasioned by the death of Mr.
Gilchrist. His recovery was of the slowest, and it was not till he was
put by Mr. Taylor under the care of Dr. Darling, in London, that the
poet mended in a manner to satisfy his friends. It was during this third
visit to the Metropolis that CLARE came in contact with De Quincey,
Coleridge, William Hazlitt, and Allan Cunningham, to mention only four
of the prominent men whom Mr. Taylor delighted to make members of his
evening parties. CLARE found his imaginary portraits to be very
deceptive, especially so in the case of De Quincey. The bulk and dull
appearance of Coleridge also surprised, as well as disappointed, him,
for he had pictured the great man in a guise completely opposite to
reality. There is little need to say that in Mr. Taylor’s house nothing
of a bacchanalian tinge was likely to occur; but even the moderate
pleasures of the publisher’s entertainments threatened to destroy the
good brought about by the skill and care of Dr. Darling, and therefore
Clare was induced to return to Helpstone, where he once more renewed his
search for employment, encountered thoughtless snubs from the high and
mighty of the district, and gradually approached the line which
separates mental health from mental disease. He was for ever engaged in
keeping the wolf from the door. He did not eat a due share of what his
means supplied, denying himself from day to day with a rigidity which
could not fail to injure both body and brain. At the end of the year
1825, after working in the cornfields throughout the harvest, CLARE
turned to the composition of poetry, and produced “The Shepherd’s
Calendar,” a volume in which he used the file to excellent purpose.
Already bruised and wounded by the rough edges of life, the poet found
an additional hardship in the fact that Mr. Taylor long delayed to
publish this third book of verse; for to make both ends meet was now a
miracle beyond his accomplishing. Although several editors of those
elegant annuals which were then so much in favour had asked CLARE to
assist in making their sugary volumes attractive, they were by no means
quick to send him the money he had earned. He had only his annuity and a
few shillings gained by doing odd jobs for the farmers of the
neighbourhood. At this juncture Patty bore him a third child.
In 1828 CLARE went to London again at the invitation of Mrs. Emmerson,
and it was then that he discovered how completely the “Shepherd’s
Calendar” had failed to stir the interest of the public. It was during
this visit that Mr. Taylor, doubtless believing the open-air exercise
would be most beneficial to the poet, suggested to CLARE the
advisability of his attempting to dispose of his works by carrying them
from house to house in Northamptonshire and the adjoining counties.
Allan Cunningham was furious at the idea, but in the end CLARE embraced
it, though it had been better for him had he held the same opinion as
his friend, for the adventure was prolific of more kicks than halfpence.
The history of this part of CLARE’S career makes very sad reading.
Hungry and footsore he tramped from rebuff to rebuff, pondering misery
and dreading the workhouse. But though the record of his travels is, for
the most part, a document of disaster, there are a few proofs of
kindliness contained in its pages. For example, when he returned to
Helpstone from Boston, where certain of the leading inhabitants had done
their best to render him extremely uncomfortable, he found ten
sovereigns in his wallet. A few young men had treated him as Joseph
treated his brethren. For three months after his experiences at Boston,
CLARE was exceedingly ill, and it looked as if there was to be no ebbing
of that tide of misfortune which had flowed in his direction for so
long. Better luck, however, was in store. CLARE got some regular work to
do, and was thus prevented from poring over foolscap. Little by little
he reduced his debts; his body throve in the sunshine of content; and he
was able to comfort himself with the belief that, after all, he would
escape the degradation of becoming a pauper. Unfortunately a hard winter
followed the summer and autumn during which he had been so happy, and
illness once more caused him to renew acquaintance with those bitter
familiars of his--want and despair. About this time he chanced to have a
conversation with Earl Fitzwilliam, with the result that his patron
promised to build him a cottage somewhere near Helpstone. The exact
place decided upon by his lordship was Northborough, a hamlet three
miles distant from Helpstone. This situation was chosen in a spirit of
kindness, the earl believing that the many natural beauties to be found
almost at the door of the cottage would please the eye as well as
stimulate the genius of the poet. But the prospect of being severed from
the bleak surroundings of his native place filled CLARE with sensations
of terror acute enough to make a severe effect upon his mind. For days
before the final wrench came he strode about the lanes and fields,
outwardly exhibiting symptoms of a deranged intellect; but when the hour
for departure struck he allowed himself to be led to his new home as
placidly as a tired horse to the pasture. So far from proving a blessing
to CLARE, the cottage at Northborough was the immediate cause of fresh
perplexities. Expenditure was necessary to furnish it and to keep it in
repair; debts were quickly piled one upon the other; among strangers it
was harder to obtain employment than it had been at Helpstone; and in
the January of 1833 Patty bore her seventh child. At the thought that he
could scarcely provide his dear ones with bread enough to keep body and
soul together, CLARE, shortly after hearing the news of his boy’s birth,
rushed out into the fields to give his sorrow vent. Late in the evening
his eldest daughter found him lying insensible on an embankment. A month
of bed followed this collapse. In the spring, although his vital forces
were now sufficient to carry him in search of the early flowers, he
showed no inclination to leave the little room where he kept his books
and papers. The irresistible magnets of former years--blossoms, birds,
greenery and sunshine--had all lost their pulling power. CLARE himself
perceived that he was in danger of ceasing to be his own master, and
accordingly wrote to Mr. Taylor begging him to secure Dr. Darling’s
help. In reply, his old publisher invited him to London. But the poet
neither had money in his purse nor a single chance of raising the amount
necessary to defray the costs of the journey. Messrs. Whittaker & Co.,
who were responsible for the appearance of the “Rural Muse,” declined
to send him even a small sum on account, so that he was tied fast to
Northborough, where his mental malady had everything in its favour. Had
it not been for the untiring exertions of Dr. Smith, of Peterborough,
who mingled poetry and pills in his advice to patients, thus obtaining a
goodly list of subscribers, it is doubtful whether the “Rural Muse”
would have made its appearance before CLARE was overcome by permanent
imbecility. In the summer of 1835 this beautiful collection of rustic
reeds was put forward as a candidate for the affection of those
professing a love for music and wholesomeness in verse. The reception
accorded to the book proved conclusively what important parts fashion
and hypocrisy play in the concerns of the lyre. CLARE was out of vogue;
he was a stale lion; the parasites upon genius could no longer hope to
gain a temporary notoriety by displaying his peculiarities in their
saloons. The idea of reading poetry for the sake of poetry appears never
to have occurred to the members of a society as ponderable, in the
matter of intellect, as thistledown, and as variable as the sheen of an
opal. It is a moot point whether or no the reviewers wrote notices of
the “Rural Muse.” If they did their duty, the editors certainly did not
back them up by granting space for the criticisms, for scarcely a
paragraph of commendation saw the light. If CLARE did not fall among
thieves, he at least fell among blind bats. Literary England blotted her
own escutcheon in this respect, but Scotland was saved from a similar
disgrace by a noble outburst of praise for the poet, and scorn for his
frigid countrymen, from the pen of Professor Wilson, in the course of
which he adjured the Southrons to hold their tongues about the fate of
Burns. Let them remember Bloomfield. Had he but known all the evil
circumstances which were combining to push JOHN CLARE in the direction
of a lunatic asylum, his retort would have been strengthened to a degree
melancholy to contemplate.