that of the morning, but by a more serious auditory; the lesson from the
New Testament, on those occasions, was accompanied by Burkitt's
Commentaries. These lessons he read with impassioned emphasis,
frequently drawing tears from his hearers, and leaving a lasting
impression upon their minds. His devotional feelings and the powers of
his own mind were further exercised, along with those of his family, in
perusing the Scriptures: not only on the Sunday evenings, but on every
other evening, while the rest of the household were at work, some one of
the children, and in her turn the servant, for the sake of practice in
reading, or for instruction, read the Bible aloud; and in this manner
the whole was repeatedly gone through. That no common importance was
attached to the observance of religious ordinances by his family,
appears from the following memorandum by one of his descendants, which I
am tempted to insert at length, as it is characteristic, and somewhat
curious. "There is a small chapel in the county palatine of Lancaster,
where a certain clergyman has regularly officiated above sixty years,
and a few months ago administered the sacrament of the Lord's Supper in
the same, to a decent number of devout communicants. After the clergyman
had received himself, the first company out of the assembly who
approached the altar, and kneeled down to be partakers of the sacred
elements, consisted of the parson's wife, to whom he had been married
upwards of sixty years; one son and his wife; four daughters, each with
her husband; whose ages, all added together, amount to above 714 years.
The several and respective distances from the place of each of their
abodes, to the chapel where they all communicated, will measure more
than 1000 English miles. Though the narration will appear surprising, it
is without doubt a fact that the same persons, exactly four years
before, met at the same place, and all joined in performance of the same
venerable duty."
He was indeed most zealously attached to the doctrine and frame of the
Established Church. We have seen him congratulating himself that he had
no dissenters in his cure of any denomination. Some allowance must be
made for the state of opinion when his first religious impressions were
received, before the reader will acquit him of bigotry, when I mention,
that at the time of the augmentation of the cure, he refused to invest
part of the money in the purchase of an estate offered to him upon
advantageous terms, because the proprietor was a Quaker;--whether from
scrupulous apprehension that a blessing would not attend a contract
framed for the benefit of the church between persons not in religious
sympathy with each other; or, as a seeker of peace, he was afraid of the
uncomplying disposition which at one time was too frequently conspicuous
in that sect. Of this an instance had fallen under his own notice; for,
while he taught school at Loweswater, certain persons of that
denomination had refused to pay annual interest due[GV] under the title
of Church-stock;[GW] a great hardship upon the incumbent, for the curacy
of Loweswater was then scarcely less poor than that of Seathwaite. To
what degree this prejudice of his was blameable need not be
determined;--certain it is, that he was not only desirous, as he himself
says, to live in peace, but in love, with all men. He was placable, and
charitable in his judgments; and, however correct in conduct and
rigorous to himself, he was ever ready to forgive the trespasses of
others, and to soften the censure that was cast upon their
frailties.--It would be unpardonable to omit that, in the maintenance of
his virtues, he received due support from the partner of his long life.
She was equally strict, in attending to her share of their joint cares,
nor less diligent in her appropriate occupations. A person who had been
some time their servant in the latter part of their lives, concluded the
panegyric of her mistress by saying to me, "She was no less excellent
than her husband; she was good to the poor, she was good to every
thing!" He survived for a short time this virtuous companion. When she
died, he ordered that her body should be borne to the grave by three of
her daughters and one grand-daughter; and, when the corpse was lifted
from the threshold, he insisted upon lending his aid, and feeling
about, for he was then almost blind, took hold of a napkin fixed to the
coffin; and, as a bearer of the body, entered the chapel, a few steps
from the lowly parsonage.
What a contrast does the life of this obscurely-seated, and, in point of
worldly wealth, poorly-repaid Churchman, present to that of a Cardinal
Wolsey!
O, 'tis a burthen, Cromwell, 'tis a burthen
Too heavy for a man that hopes for heaven![GX]
We have been dwelling upon images of peace in the moral world, that have
brought us again to the quiet enclosure of consecrated ground, in which
this venerable pair lie interred. The sounding brook, that rolls close
by the churchyard, without disturbing feeling or meditation, is now
unfortunately laid bare; but not long ago it participated, with the
chapel, the shade of some stately ash-trees, which will not spring
again. While the spectator from this spot is looking round upon the
girdle of stony mountains that encompasses the vale,--masses of rock,
out of which monuments for all men that ever existed might have been
hewn--it would surprise him to be told, as with truth he might be, that
the plain blue slab dedicated to the memory of this aged pair is a
production of a quarry in North Wales. It was sent as a mark of respect
by one of their descendants from the vale of Festiniog, a region almost
as beautiful as that in which it now lies!
Upon the Seathwaite Brook, at a small distance from the parsonage, has
been erected a mill for spinning yarn; it is a mean and disagreeable
object, though not unimportant to the spectator, as calling to mind the
momentous changes wrought by such inventions in the frame of
society--changes which have proved especially unfavourable to these
mountain solitudes. So much had been effected by those new powers,
before the subject of the preceding biographical sketch closed his life,
that their operation could not escape his notice, and doubtless excited
touching reflections upon the comparatively insignificant results of his
own manual industry. But Robert Walker was not a man of times and
circumstances: had he lived at a later period, the principle of duty
would have produced application as unremitting; the same energy of
character would have been displayed, though in many instances with
widely different effects.
With pleasure I annex, as illustrative and confirmatory of the above
account, extracts from a paper in the _Christian Remembrancer_, October
1819: it bears an assumed signature, but is known to be the work of the
Rev. Robert Bamford, vicar of Bishopton, in the county of Durham; a
great-grandson of Mr. Walker, whose worth it commemorates, by a record
not the less valuable for being written in very early youth.
"His house was a nursery of virtue. All the inmates were industrious,
and cleanly, and happy. Sobriety, neatness, quietness, characterised the
whole family. No railings, no idleness, no indulgence of passion were
permitted. Every child, however young, had its appointed engagements;
every hand was busy. Knitting, spinning, reading, writing, mending
clothes, making shoes, were by the different children constantly
performing. The father himself sitting amongst them, and guiding their
thoughts, was engaged in the same occupations....
"He sate up late, and rose early; when the family were at rest, he
retired to a little room which he had built on the roof of his house. He
had slated it, and fitted it up with shelves for his books, his stock of
cloth, wearing apparel, and his utensils. There many a cold winter's
night, without fire, while the roof was glazed with ice, did he remain
reading or writing, till the day dawned. He taught the children in the
chapel, for there was no schoolhouse. Yet in that cold, damp place he
never had a fire. He used to send the children in parties either to his
own fire at home, or make them run up the mountain side.
* * * * *
"It may be further mentioned, that he was a passionate admirer of
Nature; she was his mother, and he was a dutiful child. While engaged on
the mountains, it was his greatest pleasure to view the rising sun; and
in tranquil evenings, as it slided behind the hills, he blessed its
departure. He was skilled in fossils and plants; a constant observer of
the stars and winds: the atmosphere was his delight. He made many
experiments on its nature and properties. In summer he used to gather a
multitude of flies and insects, and, by his entertaining description,
amuse and instruct his children. They shared all his daily employments,
and derived many sentiments of love and benevolence from his
observations on the works and productions of nature. Whether they were
following him in the field, or surrounding him in school, he took every
opportunity of storing their minds with useful information.--Nor was
the circle of his influence confined to Seathwaite. Many a distant
mother has told her child of Mr. Walker, and begged him to be as good a
man.
* * * * *
"Once, when I was very young, I had the pleasure of seeing and hearing
that venerable old man in his 90th year, and even then, the calmness,
the force, the perspicuity of his sermon, sanctified and adorned by the
wisdom of grey hairs, and the authority of virtue, had such an effect
upon my mind, that I never see a hoary-headed clergyman, without
thinking of Mr. Walker.... He allowed no dissenter or methodist to
interfere in the instruction of the souls committed to his cure: and so
successful were his exertions, that he had not one dissenter of any
denomination whatever in the whole parish. Though he avoided all
religious controversies, yet when age had silvered his head, and
virtuous piety had secured to his appearance reverence and silent
honour, no one, however determined in his hatred of apostolic descent,
could have listened to his discourse on ecclesiastical history and
ancient times, without thinking, that one of the beloved apostles had
returned to mortality, and in that vale of peace had come to exemplify
the beauty of holiness in the life and character of Mr. Walker.
* * * * *
"Until the sickness of his wife, a few months previous to her death, his
health and spirits and faculties were unimpaired. But this misfortune
gave him such a shock, that his constitution gradually decayed. His
senses, except sight, still preserved their powers. He never preached
with steadiness after his wife's death. His voice faltered: he always
looked at the seat she had used. He could not pass her tomb without
tears. He became, when alone, sad and melancholy, though still among his
friends kind and good-humoured. He went to bed about twelve o'clock the
night before his death. As his custom was, he went, tottering and
leaning upon his daughter's arm, to examine the heavens, and meditate a
few moments in the open air. 'How clear the moon shines to-night!' He
said these words, sighed, and laid down. At six next morning he was
found a corpse. Many a tear, and many a heavy heart, and many a grateful
blessing followed him to the grave."[GY]
Having mentioned in this narrative the vale of Loweswater as a place
where Mr. Walker taught school, I will add a few memoranda from its
parish register, respecting a person apparently of desires as moderate,
with whom he must have been intimate during his residence there.
"Let him that would, ascend the tottering seat
Of courtly grandeur, and become as great
As are his mounting wishes; but for me,
Let sweet repose and rest my portion be.
HENRY FOREST, Curate."
"Honour, the idol which the most adore,
Receives no homage from my knee;
Content in privacy I value more
Than all uneasy dignity."
"Henry Forest came to Loweswater, 1708, being twenty-five years of age."
"This curacy was twice augmented by Queen Anne's Bounty. The first
payment, with great difficulty, was paid to Mr. John Curwen of London,
on the 9th of May, 1724, deposited by me, Henry Forest, curate of
Loweswater. Yᵉ said 9th of May, yᵉ said Mr. Curwen went to the office,
and saw my name registered there, etc. This, by the Providence of God,
came by lot to this poor place.
"Hæc testor H. FOREST."
In another place he records, that the sycamore trees were planted in the
churchyard in 1710.
He died in 1741, having been curate thirty-four years. It is not
improbable that H. Forest was the gentleman who assisted Robert Walker
in his classical studies at Loweswater.
To this parish register is prefixed a motto, of which the following
verses are a part:--
Invigilate viri, tacito nam tempora gressu
Diffugiunt, nulloque sono convertitur annus;
Utendum est ætate, cito pede præterit ætas.
W. W. 1820.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote GT: Many archaic spellings, in this and other papers, are
retained.--ED.]
[Footnote GU: The last sentence first appeared in the edition of
1837.--ED.]
[Footnote GV: To pay, or be distrained upon, for the accustomed annual
interest due from them, among others.--W. W. 1820.]
[Footnote GW: Mr. Walker's charity being of that kind which "seeketh not
her own," he would rather forego his rights than distrain for dues which
the parties liable refused to pay as a point of conscience.--W. W.
1827.]
[Footnote GX: See _King Henry VIII._, act III. scene 2, ll. 384,
385.--ED.]
[Footnote GY: The paragraphs from "With pleasure" (p. 282) to "to the
grave" (p. 283) were first printed in the edition of 1832.--ED.]
MEMORIALS OF A TOUR ON THE CONTINENT
1820
Composed 1821-2.--Published 1822
[I set out in company with my wife and sister, and Mr. and Mrs.
Monkhouse, then just married, and Miss Horrocks. These two ladies,
sisters, we left at Berne, while Mr. Monkhouse took the opportunity of
making an excursion with us among the Alps as far as Milan. Mr. H. C.
Robinson joined us at Lucerne, and when this ramble was completed we
rejoined at Geneva the two ladies we had left at Berne and proceeded to
Paris, where Mr. Monkhouse and H. C. R. left us, and where we spent five
weeks, of which there is not a record in these poems.--I. F.]
See Dorothy Wordsworth's itinerary (Note A) of this tour, and Henry
Crabb Robinson's account of it in his _Diary and Correspondence_, vol.
ii. pp. 166-192 (Note B to this volume).--ED.
DEDICATION
(SENT WITH THESE POEMS, IN MS., TO ----)[467]
Dear Fellow-travellers![GZ] think not that the Muse,
To You presenting these memorial Lays,
Can hope the general eye thereon would gaze,[468]
As on a mirror that gives back the hues
Of living Nature; no--though free to choose 5
The greenest bowers, the most inviting ways,
The fairest landscapes and the brightest days--
Her skill she tried with less ambitious views.[469]
For You she wrought: Ye only can supply
The life, the truth, the beauty: she confides 10
In that enjoyment which with You abides,
Trusts to your love and vivid memory;
Thus far contented, that for You her verse
Shall lack not power the "meeting soul to pierce!"[HA]
W. WORDSWORTH.
RYDAL MOUNT, _Nov._ 1821[470]
VARIANTS:
[Footnote 467: Not in the editions of 1822-1832.]
[Footnote 468: 1837.
Presents to notice these memorial Lays,
Hoping the general eye thereon will gaze, 1822.
]
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote GZ: The Fellow-travellers were Mrs. Wordsworth, Dorothy
Wordsworth, Mr. and Mrs. Monkhouse, Miss Horrocks, and Henry Crabb
Robinson.--ED.]
I
FISH-WOMEN--ON LANDING AT CALAIS
'Tis said, fantastic ocean doth enfold
The likeness of whate'er on land is seen;
But, if the Nereid Sisters and their Queen,[HB]
Above whose heads the tide so long hath rolled,
The Dames resemble whom we here behold, 5
How fearful were it down through opening waves[471]
To sink, and meet them in their fretted caves,
Withered, grotesque, immeasurably old,
And shrill and fierce in accent!--Fear it not:
For they Earth's fairest daughters do excel;[472] 10
Pure undecaying[473] beauty is their lot;
Their voices into liquid music swell,
Thrilling each pearly cleft and sparry grot,
The undisturbed abodes where Sea-nymphs dwell!
"If in this Sonnet I should seem to have borne a little too hard upon
the personal appearance of the worthy Poissardes of Calais, let me take
shelter under the authority of my lamented friend, the late Sir George
Beaumont. He, a most accurate observer, used to say of them, that their
features and countenances seemed to have conformed to those of the
creatures they dealt in; at all events the resemblance was
striking."--W. W. 1822.
In Mrs. Wordsworth's Journal of this Tour on the Continent,--which, in
a letter to her daughter Dorothy (dated 20th February 1821), she calls
"hasty notes made by snatches during our journey,"--the following
occurs:--"Passing through the gates of the city, we had before us a
line of white-capped Fish-women, with thin brown faces. The fish very
foul, yet at dinner the same sort proved excellent."
In Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal of the same Tour, the following
occurs:--"Tuesday, 11th July. Calais.--With one consent we stopped to
gaze at a group--rather a _line_ of women and girls, seated beside
dirty fish baskets under the old gate-way and ramparts--their white
night caps, brown and puckered faces, bright eyes, etc. etc., very
striking. The arrangements--how unlike those of a fish-market in the
South of England!...
"Every one is struck with the excessive ugliness (if I may apply the
word to any _human_ creatures) of the fish-women of Calais, and _that_
no one can forget."--ED.
Henry Crabb Robinson wrote of this sonnet:--"Of the sonnets there is
one remarkable and _unique_; the humour and naïveté, and the
exquisitely refined sentiment of the Calais fish-women, are a
combination of excellencies quite novel." (_Diary, etc._, vol. ii. p.
224.)--ED.
VARIANTS:
[Footnote 469: 1827.
She felt too deeply what her skill must lose. 1822.
]
[Footnote 470: 1837.
Rydal Mount, January 1822. 1822.
]
[Footnote 471: 1837.
How terrible beneath the opening waves 1822.
]
[Footnote 472: 1822.
In grace Earth's fairest Daughters they excel; 1837.
The text of 1840 returns to that of 1822.
]
[Footnote 473: 1827.
Pure unmolested ... 1822.
]
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote HA: Compare _L'Allegro_, l. 138.--ED.]
[Footnote HB: Amphitrite, herself a daughter of Nereus, was married to
Posidon, and was therefore Queen of the Sea. The name Amphitrite is
probably derived from the noise of waters pouring through the rifts of
rocks, and there may be an allusion to this in the concluding lines of
the sonnet.--ED.]
II
BRUGÈS
Brugès I saw attired with golden light
(Streamed from the west) as with a robe of power:
The splendour fled; and now the sunless hour,
That, slowly making way for peaceful night,[474]
Best suits with fallen grandeur, to my sight 5
Offers the beauty, the magnificence,[475]
And sober graces,[476] left her for defence
Against the injuries of time, the spite
Of fortune, and the desolating storms
Of future war. Advance not--spare to hide, 10
O gentle Power of darkness! these mild hues;
Obscure not yet these silent avenues
Of stateliest architecture, where the Forms
Of nun-like females, with soft motion, glide!
This is not the first poetical tribute which in our times has been paid
to this beautiful City. Mr. Southey, in the _Poet's Pilgrimage_, speaks
of it in lines which I cannot deny myself the pleasure of connecting
with my own.
"Time hath not wronged her, nor hath Ruin sought
Rudely her splendid Structures to destroy,
Save in those recent days, with evil fraught,
When Mutability, in drunken joy
Triumphant, and from all restraint released,
Let loose her fierce and many-headed beast.
"But for the scars in that unhappy rage
Inflicted, firm she stands and undecayed;
Like our first Sires, a beautiful old age
Is hers in venerable years arrayed;
And yet, to her, benignant stars may bring,
What fate denies to man,--a second spring.
"When I may read of tilts in days of old,
And tourneys graced by Chieftains of renown,
Fair dames, grave citizens, and warriors bold,
If fancy would pourtray some stately town,
Which for such pomp fit theatre should be,
Fair Bruges, I shall then remember thee."
W. W. 1822.
"In this city are many vestiges of the splendour of the Burgundian
Dukedom, and the long black mantle universally worn by the females is
probably a remnant of the old Spanish connection, which, if I do not
much deceive myself, is traceable in the grave deportment of its
inhabitants. Bruges is comparatively little disturbed by that curious
contest, or rather conflict, of Flemish with French propensities in
matters of taste, so conspicuous through other parts of Flanders. The
hotel to which we drove at Ghent furnished an odd instance. In the
passages were paintings and statues, after the antique, of Hebe and
Apollo; and in the garden, a little pond, about a yard and a half in
diameter, with a weeping willow bending over it, and under the shade of
that tree, in the centre of the pond a wooden painted statue of a Dutch
or Flemish boor, looking ineffably tender upon his mistress, and
embracing her. A living duck, tethered at the feet of the sculptured
lovers, alternately tormented a miserable eel and itself with endeavours
to escape from its bonds and prison. Had we chanced to espy the hostess
of the hotel in this quaint rural retreat, the exhibition would have
been complete. She was a true Flemish figure, in the dress of the days
of Holbein; her symbol of office, a weighty bunch of keys, pendent from
her portly waist. In Brussels, the modern taste in costume,
architecture, etc., has got the mastery; in Ghent there is a struggle:
but in Bruges old images are still paramount, and an air of monastic
life among the quiet goings-on of a thinly-peopled city is inexpressibly
soothing; a pensive grace seems to be cast over all, even the very
children." (Extract from Journal.)--W. W. 1822.
From Mrs. Wordsworth's Journal:--"Thursday, 13th July....--Bruges. What
a place. D. and I walked out as soon as we could after our arrival....
Went into the old church. The nuns, the different worshippers, the
pictures, the place, the quiet stately streets, grand buildings,
graceful nun-like women in their long cloaks, treading with swan-like
motions those silent avenues of majestic architecture, I must leave to
D. to describe. My own mind was uplifted by a sort of devotional
elevation as if striving to fit itself to become worthy of what these
temples would lead to."
"... Friday, 14th.--At Bruges all is silence, grace, and unmixed
dignity.... You felt a sort of veneration for everything you looked
upon. Nothing of this here" [_i.e._ at Ghent]; "yet what a splendid
place! The evening too suited its character, for the sun went down in
brightness. Yesterday was not a sunny day, and Bruges wanted no
sunshine, its own outline in the gloom of evening needed no golden
lustre. Yet _this_ William witnessed, when D. and I were not with him,
the great Tower of the Market House bathed in gold!"
The following is from Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal:--"Thursday, 13th
July. Dunkirk.--We entered Bruges by a long gently-winding street, and
were so animated with pleasure in our hasty course that it seemed we too
soon reached the inn. W. and Mr. M. walked out immediately, eager to
view the city in the warm light of the setting sun....
"Continued to walk through the silent town till ten o'clock--no
carts--no chaises--a cloistral silence felt in every corner and every
open space, yet the large square was scattered over with groups of
people; or passengers walking to and fro, no lights in the houses!"--ED.
VARIANTS:
[Footnote 474: 1837.
'Tis passed away;--and now the sunless hour,
That slowly introducing peaceful night 1822.
'Tis past; and now the grave and sunless hour,
That, slowly making way for peaceful night, 1832.
]
[Footnote 475: 1827.
Offers her beauty, her magnificence, 1822.
]
[Footnote 476: 1827.
And all the graces ... 1822.
]
III
BRUGÈS
The Spirit of Antiquity--enshrined
In sumptuous buildings, vocal in sweet song,
In picture, speaking with heroic tongue,[477]
And with devout solemnities entwined--
Mounts to[478] the seat of grace within the mind: 5
Hence Forms that glide[479] with swan-like ease along,
Hence motions, even amid the vulgar throng,
To an harmonious decency confined:
As if the streets were consecrated ground,
The city one vast temple, dedicate 10
To mutual respect in thought and deed;
To leisure, to forbearances sedate;
To social cares from jarring passions freed;
A deeper[480] peace than that in deserts found!
See the note to the last sonnet. The following is from Mrs. Wordsworth's
Journal:--"Friday, 14th. Bruges.--Rose at five o'clock, paced the town
again, and visited, but with disturbed mind (for I had left William in
bed hurting himself with a sonnet), the churches of St. Salvador and
Notre Dame.... I joined W. in our carriage, and have here written down
the sonnet, Jones' Parsonage, so I hope he will be at rest."