Our hopes such harvest of affliction reap,
That we the mercy of the waves should rue.
We reach'd the Western World, a poor, devoted crew.
The pains and plagues that on our heads came down,
Disease and famine, agony and fear,
In wood or wilderness, in camp or town,
It would thy brain unsettle, even to hear.
All perish'd-all, in one remorseless year,
Husband and children! one by one, by sword
And ravenous plague, all perish'd: every tear
Dried up, despairing, desolate, on board
A British ship I waked, as from a trance restored.
Peaceful as some immeasurable plain
By the first beams of dawning light impress'd,
In the calm sunshine slept the glittering main :
The very ocean has its hour of rest.
I too was calm, though heavily distress'd!
how quiet sky and ocean were !
My heart was hush'd within me, I was bless'd,
And look'd, and look'd along the silent air,
Until it seem'd to bring a joy to my despair.
Ah! how unlike those late terrific sleeps!
And
groans, that rage of racking famine spoko :
The unburied dead that lay in festering heaps !
The breathing pestilence that rose like smoke;
The shriek that from the distant battle broke!
The mine's dire earthquake, and the pallid host,
Driven by the bomb's incessant thunder-stroke
To loathsome vaults, where heart-sick anguish toss'd,
Hope died, and fear itself in agony was lost!
At midnight once the storming army came,--
Yet do I see the miserable sight,
The bayonet, the soldier, and the flame
That follow'd us and taced us in our flight:
When rape and murder by the ghastly light
Seized their joint prey, the mother and the child!
But I must leave these thoughts.-From night to night,
From day to day, the air breathed soft and mild;
And on the gliding vessel Heaven and ocean smiled.
Some mighty gulf of separation past,
I seem'd transported to another world:
A thought resign'd with pain, when from the mast
The impatient mariner the sail unfurl'd,
And whistling, call'd the wind that hardly curl'd
The silent sea. From the sweet thoughts of home,
And from all hope I was for ever hurl'd.
For me-farthest from earthly port to roam
Was best, could I but shun the spot where man might come
And oft I thought (my fancy was so strong)
That I at last a resting-place had found;
Here will 1 dwell, said I, my whole life long.
Roaming the illimitable waters round:
Here will I live:-of every friend disown'd,
And end my days upon the ocean flood.-
To break my dream the vessel reach'd its bound:
And homeless near a thousand homes I stood,
And near a thousand tables pined, and wanted food.
By grief enfeebled was I turn'd adrift,
Helpless as sailor cast on desert rock;
Nor morsel to my mouth that day did lift,
Nor dared my hand at any door to knock.
I lay, where with his drowsy mates, the cock,
From the cross timber of an out-house hung;
Dismally toll'd, that night, the city clock !
At morn my sick heart hunger scarcely stung,
Nor to the beggar's language could I frame my tongue.
So pass'd another day, and so the third;
Then did I try in vain the crowd's resort.
-In deep despair by frightful wishes stirr'd,
Near the sea-side I reach'd a ruin'd fort:
There, pains which nature could no more support,
With blindness link'd, did on my vitals fall,
And I had many interruptions short
Of hideous sense; I sank, nor step could crawl,
And thence was carried to a neighbouring hospital.
Recovery came with food; but still, my brain
Was weak, nor of the past had memory.
I heard my neighbours, in their beds, complain
Of many things which never troubled me:
Of feet still bustling round with busy glee;
Of looks where common kindness had no part;
Of service done with careless cruelty,
Fretting the fever round the languid heart;
And groans, which, as they said, might make a dead man start.
These things just served to stir the torpid sense,
Nor pain nor pity in my bosom raised."
My memory and my strength return'd; and thence
Dismiss'd, again on open day I gazed
At houses, men, and common light, amazed,
The lanes I sought, and as the sun retired,
Came, where beneath the trees a fagot plazed;
The travellers saw me weep, my fate inquired,
And gave me food, and rest, more welcome, more desired.
My heart is touch'd to think that men like these,
Wild houseless wanderers, were my first relief:
How kindly did they paint their vagrant ease!
And their long holiday that fear'd not grief!
For all belong'd to all, and each was chief.
No plough their sinews strain'd; on grating road
No wain they drove; and yet the yellow sheaf
In every vale for their delight was stow'd;
In every field, with milk their dairy overflow'd.
They with their pannier'd asses semblance made
Of potters wandering on from door to door:
But life of happier sort to me portray'd,
And other joys my fancy to allure;
The bagpipe dinning on the midnight moo
In barn uplighted, and companions boon
Well met from far, with revelry secure,
Among the forest glades, when jocund June
Roll'd fast along the sky his warm and genial moon.
But ill they suited me; those journeys dark
O'er moor and mountain, midnight theft to hatch!
To charm the surly house-dog's faithful bark,
Or hang on tip-toe at the lifted latch;
The gloomy lantern, and the dim blue match,
The black disguise, the warning whistle shrill,
And ear still busy on its nightly watch,
Were not for me, brought up in nothing ill:
Besides, on griefs so fresh my thoughts were brooding still
What could I do, unaided and unblest?
My father! gone was every friend of thine :
And kindred of dead husband are at best
Small help; and, after marriage such as mine,
With little kindness would to me incline.
Ill was I then for toil or service fit:
With tears whose course no effort could confine,
By the road-side forgetful would I sit
Whole hours, my idle arms in moping sorrow knit.
I led a wandering life among the fields;
Contentedly, yet sometimes self-accused,
I lived upon what casual bounty yields,
Now coldly given, now utterly refused.
The ground I for my bed have often used:
But, what afflicts my peace with keenest ruth
Is, that I have my inner self abused,
Foregone the home delight of constant truth,
And clear and open soul, so prized in fearless youth.
Three years thus wandering, often have I view'd,
In tears, the sun towards that country tend
Where my poor heart lost all its fortitude:
And now across this moor my steps I bend-
Oh! tell me whither for no earthly friend
Have I. She ceased, and weeping turn'd away,
As if because her tale was at an end
She wept; because she had no more to say
Of that perpetual weight which on her spirit lay.
Poems founded on the Affections.
"THESE tourists, heaven preserve us! needs must live
A profitable life: some glance along,
Rapid and gay, as if the earth were air,
And they were butterflies to wheel about
Long as the summer lasted: some, as wise,
Upon the forehead of a jutting crag
Sit perch'd, with book and pencil on their knee,
And look and scribble, scribble on and look,
Until a man might travel twelve stout miles,
Or reap an acre of his neighbour's corn.
But, for that moping son of idleness-
Why can he tarry yonder?-In our churchyard
Is neither epitah nor monument,
Tombstone nor name-only the turf we tread
And a few natural graves." To Jane, his wife,
Thus spake the homely priest of Ennerdale.
It was a July evening; and he sate
Upon the long stone seat beneath the eaves
Of his old cottage,-as it chanced, that day,
Employ'd in winter's work. Upon the stone
His wife sat near him, teasing matted wool,
While, from the twin cards, tooth'd with glittering wire,
He fed the spindle of his youngest child,
Who turn'd her large round wheel in the open air
With back and forward steps. Towards the field
In which the parish chapel stood alone,
Girt round with a bare ring of mossy wall,
While half an hour went by, the Priest had sent
Many a long look of wonder; and at last,
Risen from his seat, beside the snow-white ridge
Of carded wool which the old man had piled,
He laid his implements with gentle care,
Each in the other lock'd; and, down the path
Which from his cottage to the churchyard led,
He took his way, impatient to accost
The stranger, whom he saw still lingering there.
'Twas one well known to him in former days,
A shepherd-lad ;-who ere his sixteenth year,
Had left that calling, tempted to intrust
His expectations to the fickle winds
And perilous waters,-with the mariners
A fellow-mariner,-and so had fared
• This poem was intended to conclude a series of pastorals, the scene of which was laid among the mountains of Cumberland and Westmoreland. I mention this to apologize for the abruptness with which the poem begins.
Through twenty seasons; but he had been rear'd
Among the mountains, and he in his heart
Was half a shepherd on the stormy seas.
Oft in the piping shrouds had Leonard heard
The tones of waterfalls, and inland sounds
Of caves and trees :-and when the regular wind
Between the tropics fill'd the steady sail,
And blew with the same breath through days and weeks,
Lengthening invisibly its weary line
Along the cloudless main, he in those hours
Of tiresome indolence, would often hang
Over the vessel's side, and gaze and
And, while the broad green wave and sparkling foam
Flash'd round him images and hues that wrought
In union with the employment of his heart,
He, thus by feverish passion overcome,
Even with the organs of his bodily eye,
Below him in the bosom of the deep,
Saw mountains,-saw the forms of sheep that grazed
On verdant hills-with dwellings among trees,
And shepherds clad in the same country grey
Which he himself had worn.
And now at last
From perils manifold, with some small wealth,
Acquired by traffic in the Indian isles,
To his parental home he is return'd,
With a determined purpose to resume
The life which he lived there; both for the sake
Of many darling pleasures, and the love
Which to an only brother he has borne
In all his hardships, since that happy time
When, whether it blew foul or fair, they two
Were brother shepherds on their native hills.
-They were the last of all their race: and now,
When Leonard had approach'd his home, his heart
Fail'd in him; and, not venturing to inquire
Tidings of one whom he so dearly loved,
Towards the churchyard he had turn'd aside,-
That as he knew in what particular spot
His family were laid, he thence might learn
If still his brother lived, or to the file
Another grave was added. He had found
Another grave,-near which a full half-hour
He had remain'd: but, as he gazed, there grew
Such a confusion in his memory,
That he began to doubt; and he had hopes
That he had seen this heap of turf before,-
That it was not another grave; but one
He had forgotten. He had lost his path,
As up the vale, that afternoon, he walk'd
Through fields which once had been well known to him:
And oh! what joy, the recollection now
This description of the Calenture is sketched from an imperfect recollection of an simirable one in prose, by Mr. Gilbert, author of "The Hurricane."
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