{Music score: p133.jpg}
"_Lord_, _have mercy_."
1. LORD, who wast content to die,
That poor sinners may draw nigh
_cres._ To the throne of grace on high,
_p_ _Miserere_, _Domine_.
2. Who dost hear my every groan,
Intercedest at the throne,
_cres._ Making my poor prayers Thine own,
_p_ _Miserere_, _Domine_.
3. When some sorrow, pressing sore,
Tells me, that life nevermore
_cres._ Can be, as it was of yore,
_p_ _Miserere_, _Domine_.
4. Let me hear the Voice, that said,
"It is I, be not afraid";
_cres._ So the sorrow shall be stay'd,
_p_ _Miserere_, _Domine_.
5. When the hour of death is nigh,
And the watchers, standing by,
_cres._ Raise the supplicating cry,
_p_ _Miserere_, _Domine_.
6. Take me to Thy promised rest,
Number me among the blest,
_p_ Poor, and yet a welcomed guest.
_f_ _Alleluia_, _Domine_.
Footnotes:
{5} I remember once walking from Alton to Petersfield, and passing
unwittingly through Selborne.
{8} This was the Samuel Henley, D.D., that translated Beckford's
'Vathek' from the French.
{11} She was hanged on 26th June 1815, for attempting to poison her
master's family; and her story, reprinted from 'Maga,' forms a chapter in
Paget's 'Paradoxes and Puzzles' (1874). That chapter I read to my father
the summer before his death. It disappointed him, for he had always
cherished the popular belief in her innocence.
{12} I am reminded of a case, long afterwards, where a clergyman had
obtained a wealthy living on the condition that the retiring rector
should, so long as he lived, receive nearly half the tithes. An aged man
at the time the bargain was struck, that rector lived on and on for close
upon twenty years; and his successor would ever and again come over to
see my father, and ask his "advice." "What could I advise him?" said my
father; "for we live in Suffolk, not Venice, so a bravo is out of the
question."
{17} A writer in the 'Athenaeum' (I could make a shrewd guess at his
name), after quoting the whist story, goes on: "Dr Belman was the country
doctor who, on being asked what he thought of Phrenology, answered with
equal promptitude and gravity, 'I never keep it and never use it. But I
have heard that, given every three hours in large doses, it has been very
efficacious in certain cases of gout.'"
{20} In 1881 the population was exactly 400. Ten years before it had
been 470, ten years later had sunk to 315.
{22} I don't think it was Tom who employed that truly Suffolk simile--"I
look upon this here chapel as the biler, yeou togither as the dumplins,
and I'm the spoon that stars yeou up."
{31} Nicknames are very common--"Wedgy," "Shadder," "Stumpy," "Buskins,"
"Colly," &c.
{33} Seemed.
{39} Amazed.
{42} Word forgotten.
{43a} Something.
{43b} Thrandeston.
{43c} Heard.
{43d} Flung.
{43e} Amazingly.
{43f} Loins.
{44a} Heat.
{44b} Do you two.
{44c} Head.
{44d} Do you always keep.
{44e} _Dutfen_, bridle in cart harness.
{52a} This story is less unknown than its fellows, for in 1878 Mr
FitzGerald got some copies of it reprinted at Woodbridge to give to his
friends. I may well, however, republish it, for since the appearance of
FitzGerald's '_Letters_,' in which it is referred to (pp. 427, 428), I
have had many requests for copies,--requests with which I was unable to
comply, myself having only one copy.
{52b} _Mawther_, girl.
{52c} Word.
{52d} Do.
{53} Quiet.
{55} Halesworth.
{56a} Something.
{56b} Fr. _journee_, one day's work without halt, ending about 3 P.M.
{57} Query, would not the burning of 'Pickwick' and 'Bleak House' by the
common hangman do more to appease Nonconformist susceptibility than even
Disestablishment? 'Salem Chapel,' again, and 'Adam Bede.' Fancy 'Adam
Bede '_without_ Mr Irwine, who yet is not held up for a model parson.
{58a} "Robin Cook's wife" evidently refers to some well-known character,
and is doubtless intended to personify "England."
{58b} The "old mare" is some old institution, and probably embodies the
"Established Church."
{58c} The mare was not perfect. What institution is, that has its alloy
of humanity? Lookers-on see _these_ failings and _stare_.
{58d} But the "sore back"! It evidently alludes to some special
ailment, one which would make it difficult for any one to _ride_ her.
{58e} So an "old sack" was thrown over her. Some such measures have
from earliest times been found necessary to enable each occupant of the
different _sees_ to keep his _seat_ and maintain order. In older times
"Canons" were made; of late other measures have been taken--_e.g._, "An
Act for the Regulation of Divine Service." The sack was then "hullt
on,"--thrown on,--but roughly, not gently. This is noteworthy.
{59a} "Corn in the sieve" evidently refers to some more _palatable_
measure than the "old sack." "Give her some oats, do not give her the
sack only." Perhaps the Ecclesiastical Commissioners may represent the
present givers of corn.
{59b} But all in vain, whether to enable the riders to mount on the
"sore back," or for prolonging her life. "She chanced for to die." _The
Church disestablished_.
{59c} And lies in the highroad, a prize for all comers.
{59d} But by "dead as a nit" evidently is meant more than
_disestablished_; it means also _disendowed_. Else, what of "all the
dogs in the town," each craving and clamouring for his bone? It was so
three hundred years ago. Each dog "_spook_ for a bone," and _got it_.
{59e} "All but the Parson's dog." The poor vicars never got back a bit
of the impropriate tithes; the seats of learning got comparatively
little. The "dogs about town" got most. Then, in the last touching
words, "the Parson's dog he went wi' none," yet still singing, "Folderol
diddledol, hidum humpf."
{62} Something.
{63} Quiet.
{68} A copy of his will lies before me; it opens:--"In the name of God,
Amen. I, Robinson Groome, of Aldeburgh, Suffolk, mariner, being of sound
mind and disposing disposition, and considering the perils and dangers of
the seas and other uncertainties of this transitory world, do, for the
sake of avoiding controversies after my decease, make this my Will," &c.
{69} Years before, FitzGerald and my father called together at Ufford.
The drawing-room there had been newly refurnished, and FitzGerald sat
himself down on an amber satin couch. Presently a black stream was seen
trickling over it. It came from a penny bottle of ink, which FitzGerald
had bought in Woodbridge and put in a tail-pocket.
{70} Letters and Literary Remains of Edward FitzGerald. (3 vols.
Macmillan, 1889; 2d ed. of Letters, 2 vols. 1894.) Reference may also be
made to Mr Wright's article in the 'Dictionary of National Biography'; to
another, of special charm and interest, by Professor Cowell, in the new
edition of Chambers's Encyclopaedia; to Sir Frederick Pollock's Personal
Reminiscences; to the Life of Lord Houghton; to an article by Edward
Clodd in the 'English Illustrated Magazine' (1894); to the 'Edinburgh
Review' (1895); and to FitzGerald's Letters to Fanny Kemble in 'Temple
Bar' (1895).
{76} This was the hymn--its words, like the music, by my father--that is
printed at the end of this volume.
{81} Reprinted in vol. ii. of the American edition of FitzGerald's
Works.
{87} That letter is one item in the printed and manuscript, prose and
verse, contents of four big Commonplace Books, formed by the late Master
of Trinity, and given at his death by Mrs Thompson to my father. They
included a good many unpublished poems by Lord Tennyson, Frederic
Tennyson, Archbishop Trench, Thackeray, Sir F. Doyle, &c. My father gave
up the _Tennysoniana_ to Lord Tennyson.
{90} Suffolk for "I daresay."
{94} So I wrote six years since, and now a rose tree does grow over it,
a rose tree raised in Kew Gardens from hips brought by William Simpson,
the veteran artist traveller, from Omar's grave at Naishapur, and planted
here by my brother members of the Omar Khayyam Club on 7th October 1893
('Concerning a Pilgrimage to the Grave of Edward FitzGerald.' By Edward
Clodd Privately printed, 1894).
{98} I append throughout the page of the published letters that comes
nearest in date.
{101} Mr Dove was the builder of Little Grange.
{103} His voice was unforgetable. Mr Mowbray Donne quotes in a letter
this passage from FitzGerald's published Letters: "What bothered me in
London was--all the Clever People going wrong with such clever Reasons
for so doing which I couldn't confute." And he adds: "How good that is.
I can hear him saying 'which I couldn't confute' with a break on his tone
of voice at the end of 'couldn't.' You remember how he used to
speak--like a cricket-ball, with a break on it, or like his own favourite
image of the wave falling over. A Suffolk wave--that was a point."
{104} _Posh_ was the nickname of a favourite sailor, the lugger's
skipper, as _Bassey_ was Newson's. _Posser_, mentioned presently, was,
Mr Spalding thinks, Posh's brother, at any rate a fisherman and boatman,
with whom Mr FitzGerald used to sail in Posh's absence.
{105} A second-hand boat that Posh bought at Southwold before the
building of the "Meum and Tuum."
{108} This Levi it was, the proprietor of a fish-shop at Lowestoft, that
used always to ask FitzGerald of the welfare of his brother John: "And
how is the General, bless him?"
"How many times, Mr Levi, must I tell you my brother is no General, and
never was in the army?"
"Ah, well, it is my mistake, no doubt. But anyhow, bless him."
{113} An extra large mackerel.--Sea Words and Phrases.
{121} An odd contrast all this to the calmness with which your ordinary
Christian discharges (his duty and) a drunken servant, or shakes off a
disreputable friend.
{122} Compare the old folk rhyme--
"A whistling woman and a crowing hen
Are hateful alike to God and men."