Now strewn abroad by many an impious hand, Scarce mark the spot of honour's late command, Scarce tell the pitying stranger where to sigh. Yet 'midst the wrecks and ravages of Time, Soft verdure crowns the undulating ground, Sonnet to the River Tweed. BY THE REV. W. L. BOWLES. TWEED! a stranger that, with wandering feet, The waving branches, that romantic bend Delightful stream! though now along thy shore, 1 Shute Barrington, Bishop of Durham, appropriated the site of Stockton castle, with other parts of his demesne lands there, for the purpose of forming a milk-farm for the use of the poor of that place. BETTY CARR, WHO DIED AT THE AGE OF 104: AND A BRIEF NOTICE OF JOE DAWSON, WHO LIVED TO BE 101. BY JOSEPH RIDLEY. T was my singular fortune in the earlier portion of my life, to live between two neighbours who both survived beyond a century. Old Betty Carr on the one hand next door, and in the house immediately adjoining ours on the other hand, Old Joe Dawson. We look with admiration on a monument of a hundred years standing, and regard as partaking of comparative antiquity the events which occurred, and the persons who figured in the world a century ago. How much more deserving of our admiration is such a living monument of the Creator's skill, as has been walking the earth during the whole of that period. The subject of monarchs whose dynasty has become extinct-the eyes that have gazed on myriads now no more-the tongue that has talked till its local dialect has been imperceptibly changed-a frail body sustained by 150,000 meals, which a morsel might have choked- a bosom containing a heart which has beat 55 millions of pulsations, and propelled the vital fluid during a hundred years, through a frame which might have been strangled in the birth. This-this is the monument to be looked upon with admiration. Strange that a harp of thousand strings Such a monument of the Creator's skill, was Old Betty Carr. She was our next-door neighbour during a quarter of a century, but was Old Betty Carr before I was born. It is pleasant when those whose extreme age makes them objects of wonder, are also by their virtues entitled to our esteem; but such I fear, was not the subject of this memoir. She has been dead these twenty years, but I have a vived recollection of her feeble frame-wrinkled skin-toothless head-forbidding physiognomy-dirty habits, and vicious practices. What her maiden name had been, I never heard; for nobody living in the town at the time of her death, knew her unmarried. She had however, been twice wedded. Her first husband's name was Carr, which she always retained; the second was Lambert, who hanged himself on a tree in the eastern boundary of Hexham parish. The old woman had a saying, which was associated with this event, to the end of her life, "Ah Hinneys, its a fine thing for a body to dee their own fair death.” The house she lived in was her own, but she had little income beyond the rent of a spare room, and the produce of a small garden at the back door, where, besides a solitary apple tree, old and decayed like its owner, she grew mint and marigolds which she sold chiefly on Sundays, to young folks for nosegays. Old Ned Holms the piper was her tenant for some years, and his music drew youngsters about the house. Occasionally Tansy cakes and other merry-makings were held, for the old woman's benefit and pleasure; for she delighted in vain amusements-had card parties at her house on holidays, and practised playing the old year out and the new one in. A huge old stone formed her seat at the front door, where she often sunned herself on summer evenings; whilst she smoked her black cutty which she never abandoned but to die. There, I imagine I see her, crawling along by the wall to an adjoining shop, for the few articles of daily consumption-her arms black and withered-her face often sooty-her toothless jaws in ruminating motion, and the expression of her countenance fierce and repulsive. "There," she would say, as she laid down. a plain shilling, "ye need not look at it, for I got it of one who would not take a bad one if they knew." Her stick was often raised to beat "unlucky bairns," the more mischievous of whom sometimes drew down her imprecations; and often has the complaint been made to our mother-" Betty Carr says bad-words." When in her hundredth year, some heartless wretch robbed her house, carrying off her feather bed and pillows; on which occasion a kind neighbour wrote her a brief, which is now before me. At the period of her death, which was in 1823, she was reputed to be one hundred and four years old; having been a subject of all the four Georges, one of whom reigned about threescore years: and she looked as old as she was-had her share of the common infirmities of her very uncommon age, with but few of its redeeming qualities. It was her ambition though poor, to keep her own house over her head till the last; and it was inherited by a man who bore the family name, but with scarcely any other claim to the property. OLD JOE DAWSON came originally from Allendale, and never laid aside his native dialect, though he lived in Hexham during the lifetime of nearly all the people inhabiting it on his settling there. How wonderfully diversified is Language, when places only ten miles asunder have dialects so different! Not only the grand divisions of the Earth-its Continents and larger Islands, not only the quarters of the Globe, with their Empires-Kingdoms-States-Provinces and considerable districts, have their Languages and Dialects; but adjoining parishes-nay different parts of the same parish have their various tongues; as is plainly audible in the conversation of a native of Hexhamshire, with an inhabitant of the town. Joe Dawson's Obituary found a place in the Newcastle Chronicle, at the time of his death, which, as it affords data in proof of his age, I shall here republish. "1829. Died on the 8th inst., (June) at Hexham, aged 101, Mr. Joseph Dawson. Like many old people he could not satisfactorily state his exact age; but it might be inferred pretty nearly, from facts which he often repeated-he was old enough to be engaged in ploughing, during the Rebellion of 1745; and was on one occasion driven, with his companions, from that employment, by the appearance of a supposed troop of horse, on Whitfield fell, which however, turned out to be Ore Galloways.*" Old Joe lived with the "twee lads," as he continued to call his sons, though far advanced in life; who made a tolerable livelihood by keeping a horse and cart; though poor in appearance, and uncomfortable in their habits, as all men become who dispense with the services of females, and abandon the decencies of life. Unaided by A drove of poneys, carrying bags of ore upon their backs, from the Lead Mines to the Smelting Mills. 6 book-learning, though in nowise deficient in natural capacity, his knowledge was limited, and his conversation uninteresting. His manners, like those of his family, were sufficiently heathenish; though not designed to be offensive to his neighbours. He had indeed, two married daughters, still the lasses,' though now old women; and when the old man died, it was resolved to bury him at the place which he came from. So having procured a coffin, the lads laid it, enclosing their Father's remains, upon their own cart. The lasses, having first lighted their pipes, took their seats upon it; and young Joe, as the eldest son had always been called till now-though blinder than the father at the end of his days-considering it was a long way to Allendale, made the nag quicken his pace. Joe Dawson's name was long since connected with a story about the laying of a ghost; but the materials are too slender to warrant attempting a sketch. THE WIZARD'S CAVE. A Northumbrian Legend. BY ROBERT OWEN, ESQ. HE Wizard's Cave" is from the pen of Robert Owen, Esq., a native of North Shields. Like a true Northumbrian, Mr. Owen was passionately fond of the Tales and Legends of the Border, and made an extensive collection of them, towards a work which he planned and intended to publish, under the name of "The Minstrelsy of the English Border." Owing to ill health and other causes, the design was abandoned, and Mr. Owen, during the progress of Hone's Table Book, placed at the disposal of the editor of that work, a considerable portion of the materiel he had collected and written. Such was the origin of "the Wizard's Cave," a very pleasing ballad in true minstrel strain. The author of it is now a resident in a distant clime; should our work ever come to his hands, we doubt not that he will be gratified at finding that his idea as to an English Border Minstrelsy, has, to a certain extent, been carried out by other hands, and that in the pages of the present publication, an attempt-and we trust not an unsuc |