MYBCO 
 
 , :\P.1
 
 This edition consists of twenty-five sets on 
 Japan paper, one hundred sets on hand-made 
 paper, and two hundred and fifty sets on a 
 specially made paper, all numbered and signed. 
 
 No. lOX
 
 THE VARIORUM AND DEFINITIVE EDITION 
 OF THE POETICAL AND PROSE WRITINGS OF 
 
 EDWARD FITZGERALD
 
 THE VARIORUM AND DEFINITIVE EDITION 
 OF THE POETICAL AND PROSE WRITINGS OF 
 
 EDWARD FITZGERALD 
 
 INCLUDING A COMPLETE BIBLIOGRAPHY AND 
 
 INTERESTING PERSONAL AND LITERARY NOTES 
 
 THE WHOLE COLLECTED AND ARRANGED BY 
 
 GEORGE BENTHAM 
 
 AND WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 
 
 EDMUND GOSSE 
 
 \ 
 
 VOLUME SEVEN 
 
 DOUBLEDAY, PAGE AND COMPANY 
 NEW YORK, MDCCCCIII
 
 Copyright, 19U2, by 
 
 WlLLIA.M PaITEN.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE MEADOWS IN SPRING 1 
 
 TO A LADY SINGING 6 
 
 ON ANNE ALLEN 8 
 
 TO A VIOLET 10 
 
 BREDFIELD HALL 11 
 
 CHRONOMOROS 16 
 
 PROLOGUE 20 
 
 FROM PETRARCH 23 
 
 THE TWO GENERALS 24 
 
 A PARAPHRASE OF THE SPEECH OF PAULLUS 
 
 ^MILIUS 31 
 
 VIRGIL'S GARDEN 34 
 
 WRITTEN BY PETRARCH IN HIS VIRGIL ... 37 
 PERCIVAL STOCKDALE AND BALDOCK BLACK 
 
 HORSE 38 
 
 ON RED BOXES 52 
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON 54 
 
 DEATH OF BERNARD BARTON 91 
 
 FUNERAL OF BERNARD BARTON 96 
 
 THE REV. GEORGE CRABBE 98 
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE ... 102 
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK" 119 
 
 EXTRACTS FROM FITZGERALD'S LETTERS RELAT- 
 ING TO THE "LAMB CALENDAR" 129 
 
 CHARLES LAMB 131 
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY 135 
 
 INDEX 159 
 
 (Note. The original pagination of the works is indicated by itaUc numerals in 
 
 parentheses in the margins, and the various title-pages 
 
 are reproduced in facsimile.)
 
 THE MEADOWS IN SPRING. 
 
 To the Editor of the Athenceum. 
 Sir: 
 
 These verses are something in the old style, but not the 
 worse for that: not that I mean to call them good: hut I 
 am sure they would not have been better, if dressed up in 
 the newest Montgomery fashion, for which I cannot say 
 I have much love. If they are fitted for your paper, you 
 are welcome to them. I send them to you, because I find 
 only in your paper a love of our old literature, which is 
 almost monstrous in the eyes of modern ladies and gen- 
 tlemen. My verses are certainly not in the present fash- 
 ion; but, I must own, though there may not be the same 
 merit in the thoughts, I think the style much better: and 
 this with no credit to myself, but to the merry old writers 
 of more manly times. 
 
 Your humble servant, 
 
 Epsilon. 
 
 (lull 
 
 'T IS a H9ft4 sight 
 
 To see the year dying, 
 
 winter \vinds 
 
 When autumn's la i st wind 
 
 Sets- the yellow woods- sighing : 
 Sighing, oh! sighing. 
 
 Wlien such a time cometh, 
 I do retire 
 
 [ 1 ]
 
 THE MEADOWS IN SPRING. 
 
 Into an old room 
 Beside a bright fire: 
 Oh, pile a bright fire ! 
 
 And there I sit 
 
 Reading old things, 
 
 lorn damsels 
 
 Of knights and ladioo 
 While the wind sings — 
 Oh, drearily sings! 
 
 I never look out 
 
 Nor attend to the blast; 
 For all to be seen 
 
 Is the leaves falling fast: 
 Falling, falling! 
 
 But close at the hearth, 
 
 Ijike a cricket, sit I, 
 Heading of summer 
 
 And cliivalry — 
 Gallant cliivalry! 
 
 Then with an old friend 
 I talk of our youth — 
 How 't was gladsome, but often 
 Foolish, forsooth: 
 
 But gladsome, gladsome! 
 [ 2 ]
 
 THE MEADOWS IN SPRING. 
 Or, to get merry 
 
 some 
 
 We sing ■»»■ old rhyme, 
 That made the wood ring again 
 In summer time — 
 Sweet summer time! 
 
 go 
 
 Then take we to smoking, 
 
 Silent and snug: 
 Nought passes between us, 
 
 Save a brown jug — 
 
 Sometimes ! Somotimoo! 
 
 And sometimes a tear 
 
 Will rise in each eye. 
 Seeing the two old friends 
 
 So merrily — 
 So merrily! 
 
 And ere ^¥e to bed 
 Go we, go we, 
 
 on 
 
 Down hy- the ashes 
 
 We kneel on the knee, 
 
 together 
 
 Praying, praying \* 
 
 * In a copy found in a common-place book belonging to the late Arch- 
 deacon Allen the following lines appear instead of this stanza: — 
 
 So winter passeth 
 
 Like a long sleep 
 From falling autumn 
 
 To primrose-peep. 
 
 [ 3 ]
 
 THE MEADOWS IN SPRING. 
 Thus, then, Uve I, 
 
 'mid all 
 
 Till, breaking the gloom. 
 
 By heaven I 
 
 Of winter; the bold sun 
 Is with me in the room, 
 Shining, shining! 
 
 Then the clouds part. 
 
 Swallows soaring between; 
 
 alive 
 
 The spring is awake, 
 
 And the meadows are green! 
 
 I jump uj), like mad, 
 
 Break the old pipe in twain, 
 
 And away to the meadows. 
 The meadows again! 
 
 This, FitzGerald's earliest known poem, first appeared 
 in Hone's Year Book for April 30, 1831, with the fol- 
 lowing letter to the Editor. 
 
 These I'erses are in the old style; rather homely in ex- 
 jjressiun; hut I honestly profess to stick more to the sim- 
 plicity of the old poets than the moderns, and to love the 
 philosophical good humour of our old writers more than 
 the sickly melancholy of the liyronian wits. If my verses 
 be not good, they are good humoured, and that is some- 
 thing. 
 
 Charles Lamb writing to Moxon in August says — 
 
 [ "• ]
 
 THE MEADOWS IN SPRING. 
 
 The Athencemn has been hoaxed with some exquisite 
 poetry, that was, two or three months ago, in Hone's Book 
 . . . I do not know who wrote it; but 't is a poem I 
 envy — that and Montgomery's " Last Man ": I envy the 
 writers, because I feel I could have done something like 
 them. 
 
 [The cancelled words are from Hone's Year Book, the others from 
 The Athenaum, where the poem appeared on July 9, 1831.] 
 
 [ 5 ]
 
 TO A LADY SINGING. 
 
 Canst thou, my Clora, declare, 
 
 After thy sweet song dieth 
 Into the wild summer air, 
 Whither it falleth or flieth? 
 Soon would my answer be noted, 
 Wert thou but sage as sweet throated. 
 
 JMelody, dying away, 
 
 Into the dark sky closes. 
 Like the good soul from her clay, 
 Like the fair odor of roses: 
 Therefore thou now art behind it. 
 But thou shalt follow, and find it. 
 
 t 
 
 Nothing can utterly die; 
 
 Music, aloft upspringing, 
 Turns to pure atoms of sky 
 
 Each golden note of thy singing: 
 And that to which moniing did listen 
 At eve in a Rainbow may glisten. 
 
 Beauty, when laid in the grave, 
 Fecdetli the lily beside her, 
 [ « ]
 
 TO A LADY SINGING. 
 
 Therefore the soul caiinot have 
 Station or honour denied her; 
 She will not better her essence, 
 But wear a crown in God's presence. 
 
 [The last two stanzas of this poem were sent by FitzGerald to 
 Archdeacon Allen on Dec. 7, 1832, and were printed in the 'Letters 
 and Literary Remains,' London, 1889 (p. 16). The first two were 
 not printed until Mr. W. Aldis Wright received them and the two 
 following poems from the late Mr. Thomas Allen, and printed 
 twenty-five copies of the three, for private distribution, in February, 
 1891.] 
 
 [ 7 ]
 
 [ON ANNE ALLEN.] 
 
 I. 
 The wind blew keenly from the Western sea, 
 And drove the dead leaves slanting from the tree- 
 Vanity of vanities, the Preacher saith — 
 Heaping them up before her Father's door 
 AAlien I saw her whom I shall see no more — 
 We camiot bribe thee, Death. 
 
 II. 
 She went abroad the falling leaves among. 
 She saw the merry season fade, and smig 
 
 Vanity of vanities, the Preacher saith — 
 Freely she wandered in the leafless wood, 
 And said that all was fresh, and fair, and good. 
 
 She knew thee not, O Death. 
 
 III. 
 She bound her shining hair across her brow. 
 She went into the garden fading now; 
 
 Vanity of vanities, the Preacher saith — 
 And if one sighed to think that it was sere. 
 She smiled to think that it would bloom next year: 
 
 She feared thee not, O Death. 
 
 [ 8 ]
 
 [ON ANNE ALLEN.] 
 IV, 
 Blooming she came back to the cheerful room 
 With all the fairer flowers yet in bloom, 
 
 Vanity of vanities, the Preacher saith — 
 A fragrant knot for each of us she tied, 
 And placed the fairest at her Father's side — 
 She cannot charm thee. Death. 
 
 V. 
 
 Her pleasant smile spread sunshine upon all ; 
 We heard her sweet clear laughter in the Hall; — 
 
 Vanity of vanities, the Preacher saith — 
 We heard her sometimes after evening prayer. 
 As she went singing softly up the stair — 
 
 No voice can charm thee. Death. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Where is the pleasant smile, the laughter kind. 
 That made sweet music of the winter wind? 
 
 Vanity of vanities, the Preacher saith — 
 Idly they gaze upon her empty place. 
 Her kiss hath faded from her Father's face: — 
 
 She is with thee, O Death. 
 
 [Anne Allen died in the autumn of 1833, the year after FitzGerald 
 had seen her at Tenby.] 
 
 [ 9 ]
 
 [TO A VIOLET.] 
 
 Fair violet! sweet saint! 
 
 Answer us — Whither art thou gone? 
 Ever thou wert so still, and faint, 
 And fearing to be look'd upon. 
 We cannot say that one hath died, 
 Who wont to live so unespied, 
 But crept away unto a stiller spot. 
 Where men may stir the grass, and find thee not. 
 
 [ 10 ]
 
 BREDFIELD HALL. 
 
 Mr. W. Aldis Wright says, "These verses on his old 
 home were written originally by FitzGerald as early as 
 1839, and communicated to Bernard Barton. They were 
 circulated in slightly differing forms among his friends, 
 and probably never received the final touches of his hand, 
 but they contain what. Professor Cowell informs me, 
 were in his own judgment the best lines he had ever writ- 
 ten, as shewing real imagination, and it seems better to 
 print them though imperfect. In reply to an old friend 
 who had heard some of the lines quoted and supposed 
 them to he from Tennyson, he wrote: 'I was astonisht 
 to find I had three sheets to fold up; and now one half 
 "cheer" more, only to prevent you wasting any more trou- 
 ble in looking through Tennyson for those verses — / my- 
 self having been puzzled at first to what you alluded by 
 that single line. No: I wrote them along with many 
 others about my old home more than forty years ago, and 
 they recur to me also as I wander about the Garden or the 
 Lawn. Therefore I suppose there is some native force 
 about them, though your referring them to A. T. proves 
 that I was echoing him.' " 
 
 [Bredfield Hall was FitzGerald's birthplace, and only about two miles 
 distant from his house, " Little Grange."] 
 
 Lo, an English mansion founded 
 In the elder James's reign, 
 [ " ]
 
 BREDFIELD KALL. 
 
 Quaint and stately, and surrounded 
 
 With a pastoral domain. 
 With well-timber'd lawn and gardens 
 
 And with many a pleasant mead, 
 Skirted by the lofty coverts 
 
 Where the hare and pheasant feed. 
 
 Flank'd it is with goodly stables, 
 
 Shelter'd by coeval trees : 
 So it lifts its honest gables 
 
 Toward the distant German seas; 
 Where it once discern'd the smoke 
 
 Of old sea-battles far away : 
 Saw victorious Nelson's topmasts 
 
 Anchoring in Hollesley Bay. 
 
 But whatever storm might riot, 
 
 Cannon roar, and tnimpet ring, 
 Still amid these meadows quiet 
 
 Did the yearly violet spring; 
 Still Heaven's starry hand suspended 
 
 That light balance of the dew. 
 That each night on earth descended, 
 
 And each morning rose anew. 
 
 And the ancient house stood rearing 
 Undisturb'd her chimneys high, 
 
 [ 12 ]
 
 BREDFIELD HALL. 
 
 And her gilded vanes still veering 
 Toward each quarter of the sky : 
 
 While like wave to wave succeeding 
 Through the world of joy and strife, 
 
 Household after household speeding 
 Handed on the torch of life. 
 
 First, sir Knight in i-uif and doublet. 
 
 Arm in arm with stately dame ; 
 Then the Cavaliers indignant 
 
 For their Monarch brought to shame : 
 Languid beauties limn'd by Lely ; 
 
 Full-wigg'd Justice of Queen Anne: 
 Tory squires who tippled freely; 
 
 And the modern Gentleman: 
 
 Here they lived, and here they greeted. 
 
 Maids and matrons, sons and sires. 
 Wandering in its walks, or seated 
 
 Round its hospitable fires: 
 Oft their silken dresses floated 
 
 Gleaming through the pleasure ground: 
 Oft dash'd by the scarlet-coated 
 
 Hunter, horse, and dappled hound. 
 
 Till the Bell that not in vain 
 
 Had summon'd them to weekly prayer, 
 
 [ 13 ]
 
 BREDFIELD HALL. 
 
 Call'd them one by one again 
 
 To the church — and left them there! 
 
 They with all their loves and passions, 
 Compliment, and song, and jest, 
 
 Politics, and sports, and fashions. 
 Merged m everlasting rest! 
 
 So they pass — while thou, old INIansion, 
 
 Markest with unalter'd face 
 How hke the foliage of thy simmiers 
 
 Race of man succeeds to race. 
 To most thou stand'st a record sad, 
 
 But all the sunshine of the year 
 Could not make thine aspect glad 
 
 To one whose youth is buried here. 
 
 In thine ancient rooms and gardens 
 
 Buried — and his own no more 
 Than the youth of those old owners. 
 
 Dead two centuries before. 
 Unto him the fields around thee 
 
 Darken with the days gone by: 
 O'er the solemn woods that bound thee 
 
 Ancient sunsets seem to die. 
 
 Sighs the selfsame breeze of morning 
 Through tlie cypress as of old ; 
 
 [ II' ]
 
 BREDFIELD HALL. 
 
 Ever at the Spring's returning 
 
 One same crocus breaks the mould. 
 
 Still though 'scaping Time's more savage 
 Handywork this pile appears, 
 
 It has not escaped the ravage 
 Of the undermining years. 
 
 And though each succeeding master, 
 
 GiTunbling at the cost to pay, 
 Did with coat of paint and plaster 
 
 Hide the wrinkles of decay; 
 Yet the secret worm ne'er ceases. 
 
 Nor the mouse behind the wall; 
 Heart of oak will come to pieces, 
 
 And farewell to Bredfield Hall. 
 
 [Printed and circulated among his friends in 1839.] 
 
 [ 15 ]
 
 CHRONOMOROS. 
 
 In all the actions that a Man performs, some part of his 
 life passcth. We die tcith doing that, for rchich only our 
 sliding life was granted. Nay, though we do nothing. 
 Time keeps his constant pace, and flies as fast in idleness, 
 as in employment. Whether we play or labour, or sleep, 
 or dance, or study, THE SUNNE POSTETH, AND 
 THE SAND RUNNES.—OyvT^^ Felltham. 
 
 Wearied with hearing folks cry, 
 
 That Time would incessantly fly, 
 
 Said I to myself, " I don't see 
 
 Why Time should not wait upon me; 
 
 I will not be carried away. 
 
 Whether I like it, or nay: " — 
 But ere I go on with my strain, 
 Pray turn me that hour-glass again! 
 
 I said, " I will read, and will write, 
 And labour all day, and all night. 
 And Time will so heavily load, 
 That he cannot but wait on tlie road ; " — 
 But I found, that, balloon-like in size, 
 The more fill'd, the faster he flies; 
 And I could not the trial maintain. 
 Without turning the hour-glass again 1 
 [ 16 ]
 
 CHRONOMOROS. 
 
 Then said I, " If Time has so flown 
 When laden, I '11 leave him alone; 
 And I think that he cannot but stay, 
 When he 's nothing to carry away! " 
 So I sat, folding my hands. 
 Watching the mystical sands. 
 As they fell, grain after grain. 
 Till I turn'd up the hour-glass again! 
 
 Then I cried, in a rage, " Time shall stand ! " 
 The hour-glass I smash'd with my hand, 
 ^My watch into atoms I broke 
 And the sun-dial hid with a cloak! 
 " Now," I shouted aloud, " Time is done! " 
 When suddenly, down went the Sun ; 
 And I found to my cost and my pain, 
 I might buy a new hour-glass again ! 
 
 Whether we wake, or we sleep, 
 
 Whether we carol, or weep. 
 
 The Sun, with his Planets in chmie, 
 
 Marketh the going of Time; 
 
 But Time, in a still better trim, 
 
 Marketh the going of him: 
 One link in an infinite chain. 
 Is this turning the hour-glass again ! 
 [ 17 ]
 
 CHRONOMOROS. 
 
 The robes of the Day and the Night, 
 Are not wove of mere darkness and light ; 
 We read that, at Joshua's will, 
 The Sun for a Time once stood still ! 
 So that Time by his measure to try, 
 Is Petitio Principii! 
 
 Time's Scythe is going amain, 
 
 Though he turn not his hour-glass again! 
 
 And yet, after all, what is Time? 
 Renowned in Reason, and Rhyme, 
 A Phantom, a Name, a Notion, 
 That measures Duration or IMotion? 
 Or but an apt term in the lease 
 Of Beings, who know they must cease? 
 The hand utters more than the brain. 
 When turning the hour-glass again! 
 
 The King in a carriage may ride, 
 And the Beggar may crawl at his side; 
 But, in the general race. 
 They are travelling all the same pace. 
 And houses, and trees, and higli-way, 
 Are in the same gallop as they : 
 We mai'k our steps in the train, 
 When turning the hour-glass again! 
 
 [ 18 ]
 
 CHRONOMOROS. 
 
 People complain, with a sigh, 
 How terribly Chroniclers he; 
 But there is one pretty right. 
 Heard in the dead of the night, 
 Calling aloud to the people. 
 Out of St. Dunstan's Steeple, 
 Telling them under the vane. 
 To turn their hour-glasses again! 
 
 MORAL. 
 
 Masters! we hve here for ever, 
 Like so many fish in a river; 
 We may mope, tumble, or glide, 
 And eat one another beside; 
 But, whithersoever we go. 
 The River will flow, flow, flow ! 
 
 And now, that I 've ended my strain. 
 Pray turn me that houi'-glass again ! 
 
 [Printed in Fulcher's Poetical Miscellany, published by G. W. 
 Fulcher, Sudbury, and Suttaby & Co., London, 1841.] 
 
 [ 19 ]
 
 PROLOGUE. 
 
 Spoken by E. W. Clarke at some private Theatricals 
 in Downing College, Cambridge. Mrs. Siddons look- 
 ing on. 
 
 When dirty Jacobs, tliirty years of age, 
 With greasj' gladness trod the early stage, 
 Astonished Gurlow caught the grace he bore. 
 And so transplanted it to Albion's shore: 
 Charmed the fair daughters of our sunny isle 
 With Sorrow's tear and Joj^'s Celestial smile. 
 As dirty Jacobs wreath'd his laurelled brow. 
 So we presmne upon your patience now. 
 When moral James gave way to thumbless Shoots: 
 When gory Pritchard seiz'd the proffered boots; 
 When Berdmore bawl'd his sacrilegious verse, 
 And heedless Phipps upset his Uncle's hearse: 
 With liiccupped murmurs see their spirits rise. 
 In fleecy sinews mellowing the skies. 
 And can they die? Ah no! their transient sway 
 Still glimmers through tlie mist of Freedom's day : 
 The sword revengeful severs and forgets, 
 And murderer's wrongs are fresh in female threats. 
 He spits! he bleeds! with anguisli slaked he reels! 
 
 [ 20 ]
 
 PROLOGUE. 
 
 JNIay Fortune's adverse whirlwind blast his heels! 
 
 May the same fii'e that prompted Isaac Huggans 
 
 To kill his wife, and then to eat Ms yoimg ones, 
 
 Purge the dark brotherhood with sorrow's fill — 
 
 The dastard fiends that wrought a woman ill. 
 
 Pardon expression, gentles — Time may bring 
 
 Her calmer hour on circumambient wing : 
 
 Fair gales may blow again; but if they slight ye. 
 
 Then seek the advised track Fallentis Vitce, 
 
 And then in rure manifestly beato 
 
 Cull the fair rose, and dig the brown potatoe : 
 
 Or watch at eve beneath the favourite tree 
 
 The wily worm, or more industrious bee: 
 
 And if on loftier themes you 're bent than this, 
 
 The beetle's silken metamorphosis — 
 
 Joys by which fond simplicity and Truth 
 
 Amuse the elder and excite the youth. 
 
 Here in your lone retreat with wife and daughter. 
 
 Cold loin of mutton and your rum and water, 
 
 Wlien conversation deadens, and the mind 
 
 Unconscious casts one fleeting look behind. 
 
 Remember Jacobs — and 'mid seas of strife. 
 
 Be he the beacon of your future life: 
 
 And if a second could increase your hope. 
 
 Behold in me an enemy to soap. 
 
 E. W. C. 
 
 [ 21 ]
 
 PROLOGUE. 
 
 There, Pollock, don't you think I 'm a gentleman? Did 
 you expect such treatment from me? Luckily for you, 
 my farming is a good deal hindered by these demnition 
 snozos and frosts; in fact, we can only thresh in the barn, 
 and hedge and ditch a little — all which, you know, when 
 you have set your men to work, reqiiires but little super- 
 vision — so that I have time on my hands to write out Pro- 
 logues. 
 
 Boulge Hall, Feb. 10, 'U. 
 
 [FitzGerald to W. F. Pollock.] 
 
 [ 22 ]
 
 FROM PETRARCH. 
 
 (Se la mta vita daW aspro tormento.) 
 
 If it be destined that my Life, from thine 
 
 Divided, yet with thine shall hnger on 
 Till, in the later twilight of Decline, 
 
 I may behold those Eyes, their lustre gone ; 
 When the gold tresses that enrich thy brow 
 
 Shall all be faded into silver-gray. 
 From which the wreaths that well bedeck them now 
 
 For many a Summer shall have fali'n away: 
 Then should I dare to whisper in your ears 
 
 The pent-up Passion of so long ago, 
 That Love which hath survived the wreck of years 
 
 Hath little else to pray for, or bestow. 
 Thou wilt not to the broken heart deny 
 The boon of one too-late relenting Sigh. 
 
 [ 23 ]
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 
 
 I, 
 
 Lucius ^milius Paullus. 
 
 His Speech to the Roman People offer his Triumph 
 over Perseus, King of Macedonia, u. c. 585. Livy, xlv. 
 41. (And iinfaithful to the few and simple words re- 
 corded in. the Original.) 
 
 With what success, Quirites, I have served 
 The Commonwealth, and, in the very Iiour 
 Of Glory, what a double Thunderbolt 
 From Heav'n has struck upon my private roof, 
 Rome needs not to be told, who lately saw 
 So close together treading through her streets 
 Mj^ Triumph and the Fimeral of my Sons. 
 Yet bear with me while, in a few brief words. 
 And uninvidious spirit, I com])are 
 Beside the fulness of the general Joy 
 My single Destitution. 
 
 When the time 
 For leaving Italy was come, the Sliips 
 With all their Armament, and men complete, 
 As the Sun rose I left Rrundusiiiin: 
 
 [ ^1' J
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 
 
 With all my Ships before that Sun was down 
 
 I made Corcyra: thence, within five days 
 
 To Delphi : where, Lustration to the God 
 
 Made for myself, the Army, and the Fleet, 
 
 In five days more I reach'd the Roman Camp; 
 
 Took the Command ; redress'd what was amiss : 
 
 And, for King Perseus would not forth to fight, 
 
 And, for his Camp's strength, forth could not be forced, 
 
 I slipp'd beside him through the Mountain-pass 
 
 To Pydna: whither when himself forced back. 
 
 And fight he must, I fought, I routed him : 
 
 And all the War that, swelling for four years, 
 
 Consul to Consul handed over worse 
 
 Than from his Predecessor he took up. 
 
 In fifteen days victoriously I closed. 
 
 Nor stay'd my Fortune here. Upon Success 
 
 Success came rolling: with their Ai'my lost. 
 
 The Macedonian Cities all gave in ; 
 
 Into my hands the Royal Treasure then — 
 
 And, by and by, the King's self and his Sons, 
 
 As by the very finger of the Gods 
 
 Betray'd, whose Temple they had fled to — fell. 
 
 And now my swollen Fortune to myself 
 
 Became suspicious: I began to dread 
 
 The seas that were to carry such a freight 
 
 Of Conquest, and of Conquerors. But when 
 
 [ 25 ]
 
 THE TWO GENER.\LS. 
 
 With all-propitious Wind and Wave we reach'd 
 
 Italian Earth again, and all was done 
 
 That was to be, and nothing furthermore 
 
 To deprecate or pray for — still I pray'd ; 
 
 That, whereas human Fortune, having touch'd 
 
 The destined height it may not rise beyond, 
 
 Forthwith begins as fatal a dechne. 
 
 Its Fall might but myself and mine involve, 
 
 Swerving beside my Comitry. Be it so! 
 
 By mj'^ sole sacrifice may jealous Fate 
 
 Absolve the Public ; and by such a Triumph 
 
 As, in derision of all Human Glory, 
 
 Began and closed with those two Fmierals. 
 
 Yes, at that hour were Perseus and myself 
 
 Together two notorious monuments 
 
 Standing of Human Instability : 
 
 He that was late so absolute a King, 
 
 Now Bondsman, and his Sons along with him 
 
 Still living Trophies of my Conquest led ; 
 
 While I, the Conqueror, scarce had turn'il my face 
 
 From one still unextinguisht Finieral, 
 
 And from my Triumph to the Capitol 
 
 Return — return to close the dying Eyes 
 
 Of the last Son I yet might call my own, 
 
 Last of all those who should have borne my name 
 
 To after Ages down. For ev'n as one 
 
 [ 26 ]
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 
 
 Presuming on a rich Posterity, 
 
 And blind to Fate, my two surviving Sons 
 
 Into two noble Families of Rome 
 
 I had adopted— 
 
 And PauUus is the last of all his Name. 
 
 n. 
 
 Sir Charles Napier. 
 
 Writing home after the Battle of Meanee. 
 (See Ms Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 4-29.) 
 
 [Leaving the Battle to be fought again 
 Over the wine with all our friends at home, 
 I needs must tell, before my letter close. 
 Of one result that you will like to hear.] 
 
 The Officers who under my command 
 
 Headed and led the British Troops engaged 
 
 In this last Battle that decides the War, 
 
 Resolved to celebrate the Victory 
 
 With those substantial Honours that, you know. 
 
 So much good English work begins and ends with. 
 
 Resolved by one and all, the day was named ; 
 
 One mighty Tent, with ' room and verge enough' 
 
 To hold us all, of many Tents made up 
 
 Under the veiy walls of Hydrabad, 
 
 [ 27 ]
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 
 
 And then and there were they to do me honour. 
 
 Some of them grizzled Veterans like myself: 
 
 Some scorcht with Indian Sun and Service; some 
 
 With unrecover'd womid or sickness pale; 
 
 And some upon whose boyish cheek the rose 
 
 They brought with them from England scarce had faded. 
 
 Imagine these in all varieties 
 
 Of Uniform, Horse, Foot, Artillery, 
 
 Ranged down the gaily decorated Tent, 
 
 Each with an Indian servant at his back, 
 
 Whose dusky feature, Oriental garb. 
 
 And still, but supple, posture of respect 
 
 Served as a foil of contrast to the lines 
 
 Of animated Enghsh Officers. 
 
 Over our heads our own victorious Colours 
 
 Festoon'd with those wrencht from the Indian hung, 
 
 While through the openings of the tent were seen 
 
 Darkling the castle walls of Ilydrabad; 
 
 And, further yet, the moniunental Towers 
 
 Of the Kalloras and Tal poors; and yet 
 
 Beyond, and last, — the Field of Meanee. 
 
 Yes, there in Triumph as upon the tombs 
 
 Of two extinguisht Dynasties we sate. 
 
 Beside the field of blood we quench'd them in. 
 
 And I, chief Actor in that Scene of Death, 
 
 And foremost in the passing Triumph — I, 
 
 [ 28 ]
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 
 
 Veteran in Service as in years, though now 
 
 First call'd to play the General — I myself 
 
 So swiftly disappearing from the stage 
 
 Of all this world's transaction! — As I sate, 
 
 ]My thoughts reverted to that setting Sun 
 
 That was to rise on our victorious march ; 
 
 When from a hillock by my tent alone 
 
 I look'd down over twenty thousand Men 
 
 Husht in the field before me, like a Fire 
 
 Prepared, and waiting but my breath to blaze. 
 
 And now, methought, the Work is done ; is done, 
 
 And well ; for those who died, and those who live 
 
 To celebrate our common Glory, well ; 
 
 And, looking round, I whisper'd to myself — 
 
 " These are my Children — these whom I have led 
 
 Safe through the Vale of Death to Victory, 
 
 And in a righteous cause ; righteous, I say, 
 
 As for our Country's welfare, so for this, 
 
 Where from henceforth Peace, Order, Industry, 
 
 Blasted and trampled under heretofore 
 
 By every lawless Ruffian of the Soil, 
 
 Shall now strike root, and — " I was running on 
 
 With all that was to be, when suddenly 
 
 My Name was call'd ; the glass was fill'd ; all rose ; 
 
 And, as they pledged me cheer on cheer, the Cannon 
 
 Roar'd it abroad, with each successive burst 
 
 [ 29 ]
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. 
 
 Of Thimder lighting up the banks now dark 
 Of Indus, which at Inundation-height, 
 Beside the Tent we revell'd in roll'd down 
 Audibly growling — " But a hand -breadth higher, 
 And whose the Land you boast as all your own! " 
 
 [ •''0 ]
 
 A PARAPHRASE OF THE SPEECH OF 
 PAULLUS ^MILIUS, IN LIVY, 
 
 LIB. XLV. C. 41. 
 
 "How prosperously I have served the State, 
 
 And how in the Midsummer of Success 
 
 A double Thunderbolt from heav'n has struck 
 
 On mine own roof, Rome needs not to be told, 
 
 ^Vho has so lately witness'd through her Streets, 
 
 Together, moving with unequal March, 
 
 My Triumph and the Funeral of my Sons. 
 
 Yet bear with me if in a few brief words, 
 
 And no invidious Spirit, I compare 
 
 With the full measure of the general Joy 
 
 My private Destitution. When the Fleet 
 
 Was all equipp'd, 't was at the break of day 
 
 That I weigh'd anchor from Brundusium; 
 
 Before the day went down, with all my Ships 
 
 I made Corcyra; thence, upon the fifth. 
 
 To Delphi ; where to the presiding God 
 
 A lustratory Sacrifice I made. 
 
 As for myself, so for the Fleet and Army. 
 
 Thence in five days I reach'd the Roman camp ; 
 
 Took the command; re-organis'd the War; 
 
 And, for King Perseus would not forth to fight, 
 
 [ 31 ]
 
 A PARAPHRASE OF THE SPEECH OF 
 
 And for his camp's strength could not forth be forced, 
 I shpped between his Outposts by the woods 
 At Petra, thence I follow'd him, when he 
 Fight me must needs, I fought and routed him, 
 Into the all-constraining Arms of Rome 
 Reduced all ]\Iacedonia. 
 
 And this grave War that, gro^^ing year by j'^ear. 
 Four Consuls each to each made over worse 
 Than from his predecessor he took up, 
 In fifteen days victoriously I closed. 
 With that the Flood of Fortune, setting in 
 RoU'd wave on wave upon us. Macedon 
 Once fall'n, her States and Cities all gave in. 
 The roj^al Treasure dropt into my Hands ; 
 And then the King himself, he and his Sons, 
 As by the fijiger of the Gods betray'd, 
 Trapp'd in the Temple they took refuge in. 
 And now began my over-swelling Fortune 
 To look suspicious in mine eyes. I f ear'd 
 The dangerous Seas that were to carry back 
 The fruit of such a Conquest and the Host 
 Whose arms had reap'd it all. My fear was vain: 
 The Seas were laid, the Wind was fair, we touch 'd 
 Our own Italian Earth once more. iVnd then 
 When nothing seem'd to pray for, yet I pray'd ; 
 That because Fortune, having reach 'd lier height. 
 Forthwith begins as fatal a decline, 
 
 [ ••''■^ ]
 
 PAULLUS iEMILIUS, IN LIVY. 
 
 Her fall might but involve myself alone, 
 And glance beside my Country. Be it so! 
 By my sole ruin may the jealous Gods 
 Absolve the Common-weal — by mine — by me, 
 Of whose triumphal Pomp the front and rear — 
 
 scorn of human Glory — was begun 
 
 And closed with the dead bodies of my Sons. 
 
 Yes, I the Conqueror, and conquer'd Perseus, 
 
 Before you two notorious JNIonuments 
 
 Stand here of human Instability. 
 
 He that was late so absolute a King 
 
 Now, captive led before my Chariot, sees 
 
 His sons led with him captive — but alive; 
 
 While I, the Conqueror, scarce had turn'd my face 
 
 From one lost son's still smoking Funeral, 
 
 And from my Triumph to the Capitol 
 
 Return — return in time to catch the last 
 
 Sigh of the last that I might call my Son, 
 
 Last of so many Children that should bear 
 
 My name to Aftertime. For blind to Fate, 
 
 And over-affluent of Posterity, 
 
 The two surviving Scions of my Blood 
 
 1 had engrafted in an alien Stock, 
 And now, beside myself, no one survives 
 Of the old House of PauUus." 
 
 [This version of tlie speech of Paullus iEmilius was found in a MS. 
 book of the late Arclideacon Groome ; and printed in ' Two Suffolk 
 Friends,' by Francis Hindes Groome, London, Blackwood, 1895.] 
 
 [ 33 ]
 
 VIRGIL'S GARDEN. 
 
 Laid out a la Delllle. 
 
 " There is more pleasantness in the little platform of 
 a Garden •which he gives us about the middle of this 
 Book " ('Georgich ' IV. 115-148) "than in all the spa- 
 cious Walks and Waterfalls of Monsieur Bapin." — Dry- 
 den; two of tchose lines are here marked hij inverted com- 
 mas. 
 
 But that, my destined voyage almost done, 
 
 I think to slacken sail and shoreward run, 
 
 I would enlarge on that peculiar care 
 
 Which makes the Garden bloom, the Orchard bear, 
 
 Pampers the ISIelon into girth, and blows 
 
 Twice to one siunmer the Calabrian Rose; 
 
 Nor many a shrub with flower and berries hung, 
 
 Nor IVIyrtle of the seashore* leave unsung. 
 
 " For where the Tower of old Tarentum stands, 
 And dark Galesus soaks the yellow sands," 
 I mind inc of an old Corycian swain. 
 Who from ;i plot of disregarded plain, 
 
 ' Mil ford XIII/.1 tlidl it iiIxiiiikIs iin the coaxl of Cnlnhria. 
 
 [ 31. ]
 
 VIRGIL'S GARDEN. 
 
 That neither Corn, nor Vine, nor Ohve grew. 
 Yet such a store of garden-produce drew 
 That made him rich in heart as Kings with all 
 Their wealth, when he returned at even-fall. 
 And from the conquest of the barren ground 
 His table with unpurchased plenty crown'd. 
 For him the Rose first open'd ; his, somehow, 
 The first ripe Apple redden'd on the bough; 
 Nay, even when melancholy Winter still 
 Congeal'd the glebe, and check'd the wandering rill. 
 The sturdy veteran might abroad be seen, 
 With some first slip of unexpected green, 
 Upbraiding Nature with her tardy Spring, 
 And those south winds so late upon the wing. 
 He sow'd the seed ; and, under Sun and Shower, 
 Up came the Leaf, and after it the Flower, 
 From which no busier bees than his derived 
 More, or more honey for their Master hived: 
 Under his skilful hand no savage root 
 But sure to thrive with its adopted shoot; 
 No sapling but, transplanted, sure to grow, 
 Sizable standards set in even row; 
 Some for their annual crop of fruit, and some 
 For longer service in the years to come; 
 While his young Plane already welcome made 
 The guest who came to drink beneath the shade. 
 
 [ 35 ]
 
 VIRGIL'S GARDEN. 
 
 But, by the stern conditions of my song 
 Compell'd to leave where I would linger long, 
 To other bards the Garden I resign 
 Who with more leisure step shall follow mine. 
 
 [First printed in Temple Bar, April, 1882.] 
 
 Woodhridge, June 9, '82. 
 . . . . And yet I tdll enclose some pretty Verses, 
 some twenty years old, xdiich I sent to ' Temple Bar' 
 •which imid me (as I deserved) with a dozen copies. 
 
 [FitzGerald to Professor Norton.] 
 
 [ 36 ]
 
 WRITTEN BY PETRARCH IN HIS VIRGIL. 
 
 Laura, illustrious in herself, and long celebrated in my 
 verse, first dawned upon my eyes, when I was yet a youth, 
 at the Church of St. Clara in Avignon, in the year of our 
 Lord 1327, on the 6th of April, at daybreak. And in 
 that same City, in that same month of April, and that 
 same morning hour, of the year 13418, was that fairer 
 light from the light of day withdrawn, I being then at 
 Verona, alas! unconscious of my loss. 
 
 Her most fair and chaste body was deposited on the 
 evening of the day of her death in the cemetery of the 
 Minor Brothers. For her soul, I am persuaded (as 
 Seneca was of Africanus) that it is returned to the 
 Heaven whence it came. 
 
 I have been constrained by a kind of sad satisfaction 
 to inscribe this memorial in a book which the most fre- 
 quently comes under my eyes ; to warn me there is nothing 
 more to engross me in this world, and that, the one great 
 tie being broken, it is time to think of quitting Babylon 
 for ever. And this, I trust, with the Grace of God, will 
 not be difficult to one who constantly and manfully con- 
 templates the vain anxieties, empty hopes, and unex- 
 pected issues of his foregone life. 
 
 [ 37 ]
 
 PERCIVAL STOCKDALE AND BALDOCK 
 BLACK HORSE. 
 
 In the year 1809 Percival Stockdale published two octavo 
 volumes of autobiography, in which he called on posterity 
 to do him the justice that had been denied him by his con- 
 temporaries. These two volumes might be met with some 
 thirty years ago upon the bookstalls, at the price of half a 
 crown. And they were ahnost worth it; telling, as they 
 did, the story of one among so many who mistake common 
 talent for genius, and common feeling for rare sensibilitj' ; 
 and who, failing to convince the public of the justice of 
 their claim, impute their ill-success to ill-luck or envy. The 
 book is written in that exalted style of sentiment and dic- 
 tion not unusual at the close of last century — the " Sew- 
 " ardesque," it might be called ; written too when old age 
 and infii'mity, instead of abating vanity, simply made it 
 more incapable of self-restraint. I ])ropose to give a brief 
 accoimt of these INTcmoirs by way of introduction to one 
 rather pleasant episode which thej' contain, and to which 
 the title of this paper refers. 
 
 Percival Stockdale was born, he tells us, in the year 
 1736, the son of a clergyman in Northumberland, and in 
 due time was sent to the university of St. Andrews, in or- 
 der to become a clergyman himself. But, inflamed by the 
 martial ardour then generally prevailing against France, 
 and slill more by what he calls the " irresistible fair of St. 
 
 [ 38 1
 
 PERCIVAL STOCKDALE. 
 
 Andrews," he suddenly resolved to become a soldier, ob- 
 tained a lieutenancy in the 23rd Welsh Fusiliers, and with 
 them sailed to the Mediterranean — after Byng's disas- 
 trous failure, I think. He soon wearied, however, of sol- 
 diering — especially of the drill, in which he cut an awk- 
 ward figure; his brother officers foolishly wondering, he 
 says, that " one capable of the finer sallies and energies of 
 " the mind should not easily be an adept in the inferior 
 " and grosser arts of personal and local movement." So, 
 throwing up his commission in 1759, he got himself or- 
 dained deacon of the Church, with a salary of £40. a year. 
 This appointment, however, being insufficient both for his 
 pride and his pocket, he resolved on trying his fortune as 
 a man of letters in London, for which his genius and ac- 
 quirements evidently predestined him. So to London he 
 went: London, he says, " where I have often sunk to the 
 " lowest propensities, and risen to the sublimest delights 
 " of my nature." He wrote sermons, essays, and poems 
 of all sorts and sizes, from addresses to the Supreme Being 
 down to Churchill ; made many enemies by his satire " The 
 Poet," but also many friends and admirers. Garrick made 
 him free of his theatre, on jiayment of an occasional de- 
 mand of " Well, Mr. Stockdale, and how did they like 
 " me to-night?" But, above all, there was Johnson, by 
 whose very den in Bolt Court Stockdale pitched his tent ; 
 the redoubtable Lion, " whose ruggedness," says Stock- 
 dale, " as the insolence of Achilles and the sternness of 
 " Telamonian Ajax, was subdued by a Briseis or a Tec- 
 " messa, was often softened to smiles and caresses by his 
 
 [ 39 ]
 
 PERCIVAL STOCKDALE AND 
 
 " favorite (cat) Hodge, whose epitaph I had the honour 
 " to write, and pubhsh in my JMiscellanies in 1778." John- 
 son, humane and generous to all poor creatures, did all he 
 could in behalf of poor " Stocky " — a kind of nickname 
 which the owner thought Johnson only used to those he 
 loved, though at the same tune he (Johnson) seemed un- 
 accoimtably " divided between a benevolence to my mter- 
 " est and a coldness to my fame." " He did not even 
 " mention my Life of Waller in Ids; and thought my 
 " translation of Quintus Curtius ' rather encumbered with 
 " 'Latin idiom ' ; a fault that after the most impartial 
 " examination I own I could not find," and of which the 
 public will one day decide whether such be the case or not. 
 But Jolinson, with all his good will for the poor author, 
 and all his influence with publishers, could not prevail with 
 any of them to undertake a History of Spain, or join in 
 other such enterprises as his poor friend proposed: and 
 Stockdale gradually subsided into becoming " bookseller's 
 " hack," to su])ply them with any occasional verse or prose 
 which they might Avant, or the writer need to subsist by. 
 And " subsistence " with Stockdale was not so simple a 
 concern; his bodily ambitions were not more easily satis- 
 fied than his mental : in the matter of eating and drinking, 
 for instance, " though so early," he says, " a worshiper of 
 " Flora,of Vertumnus,and Pomona" — (whatever all that 
 may mean) — " yet was I also given to exalt and stimulate 
 " the olive of Minerva with the grape of T?acchus," which 
 is quite intelligible. But, Minerva not being sufficiently 
 stinmlated to pay the cost of Bacchus, and no brighter 
 
 [ <io ]
 
 BALDOCK BLACK HORSE. 
 
 prospect opening before her in London, poor Stockdale 
 was half tempted to join the hterati who were invited by 
 the Empress Catherine to Russia. But then she offered 
 only £100. a year! And that at St. Petersburg! And in 
 the service of one whom Johnson, he says, called " a fool- 
 " ish woman, who had read Voltaire and D'Alembert, and 
 " those childish authors! " 
 
 Things growing desperate, however, so far as subsist- 
 ence by literatui'e was concerned, Stockdale resolved to 
 fall back on the bosom of Mother Church ; and Johnson, 
 on his promising to be " conscientiously attentive " to his 
 clerical duties, gave him a letter of recommendation to 
 Burke; who, with one wry face at some hint about " po- 
 " litical heresies " in Johnson's letter, received the bearer 
 with courtesy and kindness. Nothing came of it, however, 
 and Stockdale was " sinking very fast," he tells us, " in 
 " folly, dissipation, and distress," when Garrick (the play- 
 er's patronage being at that time more efficacious than the 
 orator's) got Lord Sandwich to appoint him to the Reso- 
 lution man-of-war, in which he cruised about England for 
 three years, writing sermons, and otherwise " worshiping 
 " the muses." Once again on shore, and wearied of the 
 sea, he accepted the post of tutor to Lord Craven's sons; 
 an office where, Johnson told him, he must expect to meet 
 with insolence, and where Stockdale says he found it. 
 When this engagement (for whatever reasons) came to 
 an end, we find him upon the town again, oppressed by 
 " straitened circumstances, by bad fortune, by impru- 
 " dencies, by extravagancies," till, one lucky day, he be- 
 
 [ 41 ]
 
 PERCIVAL STOCKDALE AND 
 
 thought liimself of leaving seventeen sermons and a 
 pamphlet of poems at Lord Thurlow's door. " He 
 " marked and rewarded my literary merit," and, after 
 some further solicitation, presented me with two livings 
 in my native countj^ of Northimiberland. These two liv- 
 ings the Archbishop of Canterbury licensed Stockdale to 
 hold together, but " in so gross and rude a manner," he 
 says, " that if I entertained any gratitude, I should re- 
 " linquish every atom of that manly spirit by which I have 
 " hitherto been supported and elevated." He took the 
 two livings, however, and kept them to the day of his 
 death, but soon wearied of the clerical duty which he had 
 promised Joluison so punctually to discharge, and once 
 more took to roving about, still " worshi])ing tlie muses," 
 and dedicating to Lord Thurlow (from whose character 
 he drew the hero) that tragedy of ' Ximenes ' which ]Miss 
 Pope found only " too sublime for the stage." Nor was it 
 till after twelve years that he returned to his livings in the 
 north ; an old, nervous, querulous, discontented man. And 
 then it was that he compiled these INIemoirs with the help 
 of INIiss Jane Porter (to whom they are dedicated), who, 
 he says, left her own "genial scenes of Surrey for the 
 " bleak and dreary wilds of Northuml)erland," to soothe 
 " an aged and unfortunate poet," and to arrange his de- 
 sultory memoranda for the press. These, as 1 jiremiscd, 
 were published in the year T809; and I have somewhere — 
 but where I know not — read that the writer died some two 
 years after. That any one sliould liavc any sucli uncer- 
 tainty as to such an event! Tlie INIcnioirs include a few 
 stories relating to Garrick and the players; some good 
 
 [ ^'2 ]
 
 BALDOCK BLACK HORSE. 
 
 things of Johnson; and a few brief glimpses of Burke, 
 Goldsmith, and Gibbon. With these exceptions, there is 
 little in these two volumes worth repeating, unless the 
 present reader, for want of anything better, may care to 
 accompany poor Stockdale in a little adventure which he 
 met with in his early and brief military career, and which 
 he calls " an elegant interlude " of his otherwise absurdly 
 tragical life. 
 
 He was just twenty years of age in 1756, when, after 
 wintering in Leicester with his Fusiliers, he set out on foot 
 with a party of them, and just half a guinea in his pocket, 
 to recruit in Bedfordshire. Through alternate frost and 
 thaw they tnidged along, till they reached that uncouthly- 
 named town, or village, of Biggleswade, where their quar- 
 ters were to be, and put up at the Swan, still floating in 
 air over the door, I believe, but then under the sway of 
 " honest Jerry Bryant." There they succeeded in raising 
 thirty recniits for King George, and by that means put- 
 ting fifty guineas in Stockdale's pocket; and there, he 
 says, passed some of the few " luminous and halcyon days 
 " which have diversified and contrasted the gloomy and 
 " painful tenour of my life." 
 
 " My studies " — and Homer and Cicero were among 
 them — "received a zest from agreeable and varied society. 
 " I enjoyed the hospitality and cheerfulness of plain, 
 " honest yeomen, and of well-educated and polite gentle- 
 " men." 
 
 Among these latter were the HayTvoods, " in whose 
 " house I always met with a friendly and kind reception, 
 " passed many social and pleasant hours in lively and in- 
 
 [ 43 ]
 
 PERCIVAL STOCKDALE AND 
 
 " forming conversation, or over an easy and disinterested 
 "poule of quadrille." He fell in love ^\'ith the daughter, 
 and managed always to keep on jovial terms with the son, 
 who was otherwise apt to quarrel in his cups, insomuch 
 that he one day collared and ahnost strangled IMr. Phil- 
 lips, " a Avorthy attorney of Hitchin," and, " perhaps 
 " rather fortimately," died himself not long after. Then 
 there were the Fields of Campton, with a daughter also, 
 " to whom I paid one of my poetical tributes," and a son 
 who was also a little given to " unsteddiness," in spite of 
 all advice I gave him to fix his mind on real good. And 
 there was John Harvey of Ickwall, an old and jovial 
 bachelor with £2000 a year, and a house full of nephews, 
 with whom, though turned of sixty, and weighing twenty 
 stone, he hunted of a morning, and at night, or in what 
 Stockdale calls " his rosy hours," drank with them out of 
 " an elegant crystal tun which held two bottles of claret, 
 " and was svu'mounted by a silver Bacchus." " From this 
 " transparent cask and silver cock we drew the ruby nectar 
 " of Bordeaux," while the jovial host, " pipe in hand, 
 " with his rosy and jolly face, beaming liospitality and 
 " transport, which were enforced by a large, white, and 
 " venerable, yet comic, wig, enjoyed the rapture of one 
 " of his own songs ; " whether it were, 
 
 " Our joys know no bounds, 
 " When after the hounds," 
 
 or Dr. Arne's, 
 
 " ]iy (liniplcii Ijrook and I'oiinialn-hrini ; " 
 [ 4.1 ]
 
 BALDOCK BLACK HORSE. 
 
 which latter he trolled out with " a strong, yet musical 
 " voice, and natural expression," superior to all the 
 " gaudy and meretricious embellishments of the theatre." 
 Nor must we leave out the very central figure in the town 
 of Biggleswade itself; with his " old withered house- 
 " keeper," his " singed yellow cat," and his " blind dog," 
 all inliabiting " his ruinous and shapeless parsonage, 
 " shrouded in damp and tangled trees," in the middle of 
 the place — John Gibson, the vicar ; round, rosy, orthodox, 
 ever smiling, with a few old jokes, but so perfectlj' self- 
 satisfied withal as frequently to declare that " Stockdale 
 " is just the same lively, entertaining creature that I was 
 " at his age." 
 
 Amid all these jolly companions, and with that jolly 
 young Haywood in particular, who almost strangled the 
 poor attorney, Stockdale enacted that " elegant inter- 
 " lude " of his to which we have been thus long com- 
 ing, and which we wiU now leave him to tell in his own 
 words. 
 
 " During my recruiting station at Biggleswade, I 
 passed a very agreeable day with that unfortunate man 
 Haywood, and with some other gentlemen at Stevenage 
 in Hertfordshire. But I mention this day on account of 
 an elegant interlude with which it was actuated and 
 brightened. Baldock is a market-town about eight miles 
 south of Biggleswade ; it is on the high north road, and in 
 the way to Stevenage. A miller lived on the skirts of 
 Baldock; he kept a little publick house; himself, and his 
 rural abode, had been rendered famous by verse and 
 
 [ 45 ]
 
 PERCIVAL STOCKDALE AND 
 
 beauty. He had a charming daughter ; though at my time 
 she had arrived at 'womanliood, where youth ended.' Her 
 attractions had been celebrated by the curate of the place, 
 who had written a song in her praise, which was marked 
 with viA'acity and taste; and indeed, with a degree of 
 genius. It had its very popular and flourishing day ; and 
 I remember when it was constantly sung in London : and 
 all over the kingdom. I think that I remember it ; and I 
 shall give it to the reader, when I have told my story. I 
 had frequently expressed to Haywood my great desire to 
 see this rustic Diana; but he assured me that it was im- 
 practicable; for her family had been so long teized with 
 the same curiosity, and were so disgusted with the rude- 
 ness which the girl had suffered from some people, that 
 they had determined never again to expose her to the risk 
 of such indignities. I told Haywood that I was resolved 
 to see her; and that I thought it would be very possible 
 to see her, as I should manage my introduction. He was 
 eager to lay me a wager on tlie subject; I took him at his 
 proposal; and our bett was a dozen of the best poi-t (to be 
 payed by me, if I saw her not, and by Mm if I saw her), 
 and to be drank, with some of our select friends, at honest 
 John Bryant's, my host of the garter. 
 
 " On our road to Stevenage, we stopped at tlic mill; and 
 went into the house. Tlie house seemeil inauspicious; for 
 several people sat there drinking; and they were ratlier 
 obstreperous. Haywood smiled, and predicted the defeat 
 of our scheme; but I told him I was sure that it would 
 take effect, on our return, in tlio evening. I felt a tremu- 
 
 [ 'Ki ]
 
 BALDOCK BLACK HORSE. 
 
 lous kind of anxiety for the event : I always revered vir- 
 tuous beauty, however low the class of life was which it 
 adorned; and I thought that I would acquit myself bet- 
 ter; that I would atchieve my exploit with more spirit 
 and decision under the benign and generous, not under 
 the violent and maddening, auspices of Bacchus. We 
 rode to Stevenage ; dined merrily there ; I drank but a pint 
 of wine ; for an enterprize of ' great pith and moment ' 
 was to be executed. A moderate glass animates us to any 
 heroic deed ; excess unfits us for it. We lighted once more 
 at the honest miller's, on a delightful vernal evening; it 
 was worthy of the object of my generalship. I was 
 alarmed at seeing again several people, who were drinking 
 in the house; but wine and honour were at stake; and no 
 time was to be lost. I desired to speak privately with the 
 father of this daughter of Ceres ; — he very civilly accom- 
 panied me into a little field which was behind his house; 
 the adjacent trees, and the beautiful grounds of Hert- 
 fordshire, seemed to consecrate the scene, and my wishes ; 
 and we ' spoke almost in whispers lest a Greek should 
 ' hear.' I told him that I would take it as a great favour, 
 if he would permit me to see his fair daughter, for a few 
 minutes: I highly commended his truly paternal resolu- 
 tion, not to expose her to ill-manners, after the very im- 
 proper treatment that she had experienced; I mentioned 
 the wager that was to be decided between me, and the gen- 
 tleman who was with me; and I gave him my word and 
 honour, that if he would indulge me with a short inter- 
 view with his daughter, I would treat her with all possible 
 
 [ 47 ]
 
 PERCIVAL STOCKDALE AND 
 
 civilitj' and respect. The man looked stedfastly at me for 
 a while; and at length he gave me a favourable an- 
 swer. He said, that to oblige me, he would break his 
 resolution ; for he was certain that I would behave like a 
 gentleman. He showed ]\Ir. Hapvood and me into a par- 
 lour ; and as proof of his confidence in me, he retired. In 
 a minute or two, the goddess of the grove entered, in attire 
 of elegant, though of Arcadian simplicity ; and ' blushing 
 'hke the morn.' She was not young; perhaps above thirty; 
 but yet lively, fair, and blooming. The vivacity of her 
 appearance was tempered with that reserve, which was her 
 proper and respectable guard in the company of stran- 
 gers. There was great gentility and symmetrj' in her 
 person; her features were fine, and expressive; her eyes 
 were black; and of piercing eloquence. There was a 
 natural ease, politeness, and grace, in her manner; which, 
 where they are originally wanting, can never be equalled 
 by all the elaborate ingenuity of art. In our short con- 
 versation, her language was proper, and pertinent; she 
 permitted me respectfully to salute her : I assiu-ed her of 
 the high sense which I had of the obligation that she had 
 conferred on me. Haywood was I'ather too ardent in his 
 advances; I checked his indiscretion peremptorily, and 
 severely. We bade adieu to the fair one ; and I returned 
 victorious to Biggleswade. A libation of the dozen of 
 ])ort Avas soon made at the Swan, in a society who were 
 worthy of the sacred and social rite, to the lass of the mill ; 
 to many other Bedfordshire beauties; and to those great 
 
 [ 48 ]
 
 BALDOCK BLACK HORSE. 
 
 men, who were the defenders of our country, and at a 
 very glorious period of our history, by their eloquence, or 
 by their sword." 
 
 Well, has the reader accompanied Percival Stockdale 
 thus far, and seen him in the " elegant interlude," which 
 he helped to enact in Hertfordshire more than a hundred 
 years ago? Our actors are all vanished; the theatre they 
 played in remains, with its pleasant country annually re- 
 decorated by the hand of nature; its pleasant country 
 town; and, a little way out of it, at the foot of the hill 
 which Stockdale and young Haywood descended that 
 spring morning, the mill, with its scanty stream, but with- 
 out that sign of a Black Horse which invited the traveller 
 to rest and refresh himself along the dusty road.^ And 
 for its long departed heroine — if any reader of this pres- 
 ent paper cares to follow her behind the scenes, he may 
 still perhaps decipher the date of her last exit among other 
 such almost obliterated inscriptions in Baldock church- 
 yard : " In memory of Mary, the wife of Henry Leonard, 
 " who died April 26, 1769, aged 43 years," — about twelve 
 years after Stockdale saw and saluted her, rightly guess- 
 ing that she was then " perhaps above thirty, but yet 
 " lively, fair, and blooming." A little further westward 
 lies her husband, Henry Leonard, " who died April 28, 
 " 1802, aged 78 years," buried not by her side, but by that 
 
 ' There is a tradition that no less distinguished a performer than Dick 
 Tiirpin once put up there in the course of one of his "elegant inter- 
 ludes " along the "Great North Road," as it was called before the 
 time of railways. 
 
 [ 49 ]
 
 PERCrV'AL STOCKDALE AND 
 
 of a second wife, who may have been as good, but whom 
 we wll not believe to have been such a beauty, as his 
 first.^ 
 
 However this may be, that first IMary of his was cele- 
 brated, not only by recruiting officers in the country, and 
 by ballad-singers in town ; there are, moreover, two aqua- 
 tint engravings of Baldock still extant to attest that she 
 was its most celebrated ornament. One of these prints 
 represents the town and the fields adjoining, and " Mr. 
 " FitzJohn " on his horse, looking at the country people 
 making hay; the other print is the mill itself, with its 
 Black Horse over the gable, and genteel companj'^ in hoop 
 and ruffle and cocked hat, politelj'^ conversing along the 
 road, or fishing in the mill-stream. Under each of these 
 engravings is a stanza from that ballad written " with a 
 " degree of genius " by that nameless curate — fancy 
 curates doing such things nowadays ! — and sung about the 
 London streets more tlian a hundred years ago, perhaps 
 to the delightful air which afterwards accompanied 
 O'Keefe's song of " How happy the Soldier who lives 
 " on his Pay." 
 
 " Who has e'er been at Baldock, must needs know the mill. 
 With the sign of the horse, at the foot of the hill; 
 Where the grave, and the gay, the clown, and the beau, 
 Without all distinction promiscuously go. 
 
 * These notes concerning Baldock Mill and Churchyard were taken 
 during a visit there in the spring of 1857, just one hundred years 
 after poor "Stockey's" visit, perhaps even to a day, for a large oak- 
 apple hough li"<l ./"■''• f remember, been hoisted on the steeple in an- 
 nual memory of King Charles. 
 
 [ 50 ]
 
 BALDOCK BLACK HORSE. 
 
 " This man of the mill has a daughter so fair ; 
 Of so pleasing a shape, and so winning an air; 
 That once on the ever-green bank as she stood ; 
 I could swear 't had been Venus just sprung from the flood. 
 
 " But looking again, I perceived my mistake ; 
 For Venus, though fair, has the looks of a rake ; 
 Where nothing but virtue and modesty fill 
 The more beautiful looks of the lass of the mill. 
 
 " Prometheus stole fire, as the poets all say. 
 To enliven the mass he had moulded of clay ; 
 But had Polly been near him, the beams of her eyes 
 Would have saved him the trouble of robbing the skies." 
 [First printed in Temple Bar, London, Jan., 1880.] 
 
 [ 51 ]
 
 ON RED BOXES. 
 
 Supplement by the Author. 
 
 ("From the fly-leaf at the end of a copy of 'Essays 
 •written in the Intervals of Business/ given me by Fitz- 
 Gerald" says Mr. W. Aldis Wright. " The fly-leaf at 
 the beginning has a drawing by Thackeray. Sir Arthur 
 Helps usually travelled toith a red box.") 
 
 It is good for a Counsellor to be attended on his travels 
 with a Red Box, which may be carried with him in his 
 Coach, and after him, as he alights, into his chamber. The 
 eyes of men will follow him with the greater reverence. 
 A Red Box is as it were a Star Chamber in small : a closed 
 Court of High Commissions. It should not be so light as 
 that men should conclude that the Counsellor had few and 
 slight matters to engage his ])rivacy: nor so large as to 
 leave room for supposing that he cannot stir a step with- 
 out the assistance of nudtiplied documents. It should be 
 carried with tolerable ease by one man. But by all means 
 let there be a Red Box of some size, though it be filled 
 with a shirt, or household bills. Men must have a mystery : 
 and to see the Counsellor after general solace and conver- 
 sation withdraw to his chamber — men think — " He goes 
 to his papers again till ever so late, and up to it again ever 
 so early " — He who first made a Box did much: he who 
 invented a lock did more: but he who invented the oblong 
 
 [ 52 ]
 
 ON RED BOXES. 
 
 Red Box did more than all. For that includes a secret in 
 the mechanism of Human Nature. There is a mystery in 
 the figure which is suitable to State matters, which are 
 commonly of diverse bearings and drawn out further in 
 one direction than another. The square and the circle are 
 too perfect shapes, where many interests of men are in- 
 volved: and the rhomb would disclaim all order whatso- 
 ever. The triangle might indeed be well: but that hath 
 been already bestowed upon the carriage of the cocked 
 Hat. Therefore the Oblong remains, the special prop- 
 erty, and as it were. Conscience of Counsellors. And Red 
 hath been long noted as the trumpet colour of Authority. 
 
 [ 53 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERXARD BARTON. 
 
 (From a letter of Bernard Barton's.) 
 
 " 2 mo, 11, 1839. 
 " Thy cordial approval of my brother John's hearty 
 wish to bring us back to the simple habits of the olden 
 time, induces me to ask thee if I mentioned in either of 
 my late letters the curious old papers he stumbled on in 
 hunting through the repositories of our late excellent 
 spinster sister? I quite forget whether I did or not; so I 
 will not at a venture repeat all the items. But he found 
 an inventory of the goods and chattels of our great-grand- 
 father, John Barton of Ive-Gill, a little hamlet about five 
 or seven miles from Carlisle; by which it seems our pro- 
 genitor was one of those truly patriarchal personages, a 
 Cumbrian statesman — living on his own little estate, and 
 drawing from it all things needful for himself and his 
 family. I will be bound for it my good brother was more 
 gratified at finding his earliest traceable ancestor such an 
 one than if he had found him in the college of heralds with 
 miles pur pure and argent emblazoned as his bearings. 
 Tlie total amount of his stock, independent of house, land, 
 and any money he miglit have, seems by the valuation to 
 liave been £01 Os., and the copy of his admission to his 
 little estate gives the fine as £5, so that I suppose its an- 
 nual value was then estimated at £2 15s. This was about 
 
 [ 5.1. ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 a century back. Yet this man was the cliief means of 
 building the little chapel in the dale, still standing. ( He 
 was a churchman.) I doubt not he was a fine simple- 
 hearted, noble-minded yeoman, in his day, and I am very 
 proud of him. Why did his son, my grandfather, after 
 whom I was named, ever leave that pleasant dale, and go 
 and set up a manufactory in Carlisle; inventing a piece 
 of machinery' for which he had a medal from the Royal 
 Society? — so says Pennant. Methinks he had better have 
 abode in the old grey stone, slate-covered homestead on 
 the banks of that pretty brooklet the Ive ! But I bear his 
 name, so I will not quarrel with his memory." 
 
 Thus far Bernard Barton traces the history of his fam- 
 ily. And it appears that, as his grandfather's mechanical 
 genius drew him away from the pastoral life at Ive-Gill, 
 so his father, who was of a literary turn, reconciled him- 
 self with difficulty to the manufactory he inherited at 
 Carlisle. " I always," he wrote, " perused a Locke, an 
 Addison, or a Pope, with delight,^ and ever sat down to 
 my ledger with a sort of disgust ; " and he at one time de- 
 termined to quit a business in which he had been " neither 
 successfully nor agreeably engaged," and become " a min- 
 ister of some sect of religion — it will then be time," he 
 
 ^ The manufactory was one of calico-printing. The "piece of ma- 
 chinery" is thus described by Pennant: — "Sam at Mr. Bernard Bar- 
 ton's a pleasing sight of twelve little girls spinning at once at a hori- 
 zontal wheel, which set twelve bobbins in motion; yet so contrived, that 
 should any accident happen to one, the motion of that might be stop- 
 ped without any impediment to the others." 
 
 ^ See an amusing account of his portrait, with his favourite books about 
 him, painted about this time. Letter I. of this Collection. 
 
 [ 55 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 says, " to determine of what sect, when I am enabled to 
 judge of their respective merits. But this I will freely 
 confess to you, that if there be any one of them, the tenets 
 of which are more f avom"able to rational religion than the 
 one in which 1 have been brought up, I shaU be so far 
 from thinking it a crime, that I cannot but consider it my 
 duty to embrace it." This, however, was written when he 
 was very young. He never gave up business, but changed 
 one business for another, and shifted the scene of its trans- 
 action. His religious hiquiries led to a more decided 
 result. He very soon left the Church of England, and 
 became a member of the Society of Friends. 
 
 About the same time he married a Quaker lady, INIaiy 
 Done, of a Cheshire family. She bore him several chil- 
 dren: but only three lived to maturity; two daughters, of 
 whom the elder, INIaria, distinguished herself, afterward, 
 as the author of many useful children's books under her 
 married name, Hack ; and one son, Bernard, the poet, who 
 was born on January 31, 1784. 
 
 Shortly before Bernard's birth, however, John Barton 
 had removed to London, where he engaged in something 
 of the same business he had (juitted at Carlisle, but where 
 he probably found society and interests more suited to his 
 taste. I do not know whether he ever acted as minister 
 in his Society; but his name appears on one record of their 
 most valuable endeavovu's. The Quakers had from the 
 very time of George Fox distinguished themselves by 
 their opposition to slavery: a like feeling had gradually 
 been growing up in other (quarters of England; and in 
 
 [ 5G ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 1787 a mixed committee of twelve persons was appointed 
 to promote the Abolition of the Slave-trade ; Wilber force 
 engaging to second them with all his influence in parlia- 
 ment. Among these twelve stands the name of John Bar- 
 ton, in honourable companionship with that of Thomas 
 Clarkson. 
 
 " I lost my mother," again writes B. B., " when I was 
 onlj^ a few days old ; and my father married again in my 
 infancy so wisely and so happily, that I knew not but his 
 second wife was my own mother, till I learned it years af- 
 ter at a boarding-school." The name of this amiable step- 
 mother was EHzabeth Home ; a Quaker also ; daughter of 
 a merchant, who, with his house in London and villa at 
 Tottenham, was an object of B. B.'s earliest regard and 
 latest recollection. " Some of my first recollections," he 
 wrote fifty years after, " are, looking out of his parlour 
 windows at Bankside on the busy Thames, with its ever- 
 changing scene, and the dome of St. Paul's rising out of 
 the smoke on the other side of the river. But my most 
 delightful recollections of boyhood are connected with the 
 fine old country-house in a green lane diverging from the 
 high road which runs through Tottenham. I would give 
 seven years of life as it now is, for a week of that which 
 I then led. It was a large old house, with an iron palisade 
 and a pair of iron gates in front, and a huge stone eagle 
 on each pier. Leading up to the steps by which you went 
 up to the liall door, was a wide gravel walk, bordered in 
 summer time by huge tubs, in which were orange and 
 lemon trees, and in the centre of the grass-plot stood a 
 
 [ 57 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 tub yet huger, holding an enormous aloe. The hall itself, 
 to my fancy then lofty and wide as a cathedral would seem 
 now, was a famous place for battledore and shuttlecock; 
 and behind was a garden, equal to that of old Alcinous 
 himself. ]\Iy favourite walk was one of turf by a long 
 strait pond, bordered with lime-trees. But the whole 
 demesne was the fairy-ground of mj' childlaood; and its 
 presiding genius was grandpapa. He must have been a 
 handsome man in his youth, for I remember him at nearly 
 eighty, a very fine looking one, even in the decay of mind 
 and body. In the morning a velvet cap; by dinner, a 
 flaxen wig; and features always expressive of benignity 
 and placid cheerfulness. When he walked out into the 
 garden, his cocked hat and amber-headed cane completed 
 his costume. To the recollection of this delightful person- 
 age, I am, I think, indebted for many soothing and pleas- 
 ing associations with old age." 
 
 John Barton did not live to see the only child — a son — 
 that was born to him by this second marriage. He had 
 some time before quitted London, and taken partnership 
 in a malting business at Hertford, where he died, in the 
 prime of life. After his death his widow returned to Tot- 
 tenham, and there with her son and step-children con- 
 tinued for some time to reside. 
 
 In due time, Bernard was sent to a mucli-esteemed 
 Quaker school at Ipswich: returning always to spend his 
 holidays at Tottenham. When fourteen years old, he was 
 apprenticed to ^Ir. Samuel Jesup, a shopkeeper at Hal- 
 stead in Essex. " There I stood," he writes, " for eight 
 
 [ r,8 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 years behind the counter of the corner shop at the top of 
 Halstead Hill, kept to this day " (Nov. 9, 1828) " by my 
 old master, and still worthy uncle S. Jesup." 
 
 In 1806 he went to Woodbridge; and a year after mar- 
 ried Lucy Jesup, the niece of his former master, and en- 
 tered into partnership with her brother as coal and corn 
 merchant. But she died a year after marriage, in giving 
 birth to the only child, who now survives them both ; and 
 he, perhaps sickened with the scene of his blighted love,^ 
 
 ^ The following verses were published in his first volume: — 
 
 O thmifrom earth for ever fled! 
 Whose reliques lie among the dead, 
 With daisied verdure overspread, 
 My iMcyl 
 
 For many a weary day gone by, 
 How many a solitary sigh 
 J'«e heaved for thee, no longer nigh, 
 My Lucy! 
 
 And if to grieve I cease awhile, 
 J look for that enchanting smile 
 Which all my cares could once beguile, 
 My Lucy! 
 
 But ah ! in vain — the blameless art 
 Which used to soothe my troubled heart 
 Is lost vrith thee, my better part, 
 
 My Lucy! 
 
 Thy converse, innocently free. 
 That made the fiends of fancy flee, 
 Ah then I feel the warit of thee. 
 
 My iMcyi 
 
 Nor is it for myself alone 
 That I thy early dsath bemoan ; 
 Our infant now is all my own. 
 
 My Lucy! 
 
 Couldst thou a guardian angel prove 
 To the dear offspring of our love. 
 Until it reach the realms above. 
 
 My Lucy! 
 
 [ 59 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 and finding, like his father, that he had less taste for the 
 ledger than for literature, almost directly quitted Wood- 
 bridge, and engaged himself as private tutor in the family 
 of ]Mr. Waterhouse, a merchant in Liverpool. There 
 Bernard Barton had some family connexions; and there 
 also he was kindly received and entertained by the Roscoe 
 family, who were old acquaintances of his father and 
 mother. 
 
 After a year's residence in Liverpool, he returned to 
 Woodbridge, and there became clerk in INIessrs. Alexan- 
 der's bank — a kind of oiRce which secures certain, if small, 
 remuneration, without any of the anxiety of business; 
 and there he continued for forty years, working till within 
 two days of his death. 
 
 He had always been fond of books ; was one of the most 
 active members of a Woodbridge Book Club, which he 
 only quitted a month or two before he died; and had 
 written and sent to his friends occasional copies of verse. 
 In 1812 he publislied hi^ first volume of Poems, called 
 
 Could thy angelic spirit stray, 
 Utisecn companion of mji way, 
 As onward drags the weary day, 
 My Lucy! 
 
 And when the midnight hour shall close 
 Mine ci/cs in short nnsonnd repone, 
 Couldst thou but whisjicr off my woes. 
 My Lucy! 
 
 Then, though tliy loss I must deplore, 
 Till next w. m^et to part no more 
 I'd wait the grasp that from me tore 
 My lAicy! 
 
 For, he my life Imt spent like thine. 
 With joy shall I that life resign. 
 And fly to thee, for ever mine. 
 
 My lAiey! 
 
 r f!'> ]
 
 MEJMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 " JNIetrical Effusions," and began a correspondence with 
 Southey, who continued to give him most kind and wise 
 advice for many years. A complhnentary copy of verses 
 which he had addressed to the author of the " Queen's 
 AVake," (just then come into notice,) brought him long 
 and vehement letters from the Ettrick Shepherd, full of 
 thanks to Barton and praises of himself; and along with 
 all this, a tragedy " that will astonish the world ten times 
 more than the ' Queen's Wake ' has done," a tragedy with 
 so many characters in it of equal importance " that justice 
 cannot be done it in Edinburgh," and therefore the author 
 confidentially intrusts it to Bernard Barton to get it repre- 
 sented in London. Theatres, and managers of theatres, 
 being rather out of the Quaker poet's way, he called into 
 council Capel Loff t, with whom he also corresj)onded, and 
 from whom he received flying visits in the course of 
 LofFt's attendance at the county sessions. LofFt took the 
 matter into consideration, and promised all assistance, but 
 on the whole dissuaded Hogg from trying London man- 
 agers ; he himself having sent them three tragedies of his 
 own; and others by friends of " transcendent merit, equal 
 to Miss BaiUie's," all of which had fallen on barren 
 ground.^ 
 
 In 1818 Bernard Barton published by subscription a 
 
 ^ This was 7iot B. B.'s nearest approach to theatrical honours. In 
 1822, (just after the Review on him in the Edinburgh,) his niece 
 Elizabeth Hack jvrites to him, "Aunt Lizzy tells us, that when one of 
 the Sharps was at Paris some little time ago, there was a party of 
 English actors performing plays. One night he was in the theatre, 
 and an actor of the name of Barton was announced, when the audience 
 called out to inquire if it was the Quaker poet." 
 
 [ 61 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 thin 4to volume — " Poems by an Amateur," — and shortly 
 afterward appeared under the auspices of a London pub- 
 lisher in a volume of " Poems," which, being favourably 
 re\dewed in the Edinburgh, reached a fourth edition by 
 1825. In 1822 came out liis " Napoleon," which he man- 
 aged to get dedicated and presented to George the 
 Fourth. And now being lamiched upon the public with 
 a favouring gale, he pushed forward with an eagerness 
 that was little to his ultimate advantage. Between 1822 
 and 1828 he pubUshed five volumes of verse. Each of 
 these contained many pretty poems ; but many that were 
 ver}'^ hasty, and written more as task-work, when the mind 
 was already wearied with the desk-labours of the day;' 
 not waiting for the occasion to suggest, nor the impulse 
 to improve. Of this he was warned bj^ his friends, and of 
 the danger of making himself too cheap with publishers 
 and the public. But the advice of others had little weight 
 in the hour of success with one so inexperienced and so 
 hopeful as himself. And there was in Bernard Barton a 
 certain boyish impetuosity in pursuit of anything he had 
 at heart, that age itself scarcely could subdue. Thus it 
 was with his correspondence; and thus it was with his 
 poetry. He wrote always with great facility, ahnost un- 
 retarded by tliat worst labour of correction ; for he was not 
 fastidious himself about exactness of thought or of har- 
 mony of nimibcrs, and he could scarce comprehend why 
 the public should be less easily satisfied. Or if he did la- 
 
 ' The "Poetic Vigils," pubUshed in 182^, have (he says in the Pref- 
 ace) "at least this claim to the title given them, that they are iiftc 
 production of hours snatched from recreation or repose." 
 
 [ 62 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 bour — and labour he did at that time— still it was at task- 
 work of a kind he liked. He loved poetry for its own 
 sake, whether to read or to compose, and felt assured that 
 he was employing his own talent in the cause of virtue 
 and religion,' and the blameless affections of men. No 
 doubt he also liked praise ; though not in any degree pro- 
 portional to his eagerness in publishing; but inversely, 
 rather. Very vain men are seldom so careless in the pro- 
 duction of that from which they expect their reward. And 
 Barton soon seemed to forget one book in the preparation 
 of another; and in time to forget the contents of all, ex- 
 cept a few pieces that arose more directly from his heart, 
 and so naturally attached themselves to his memory. And 
 there was in him one great sign of the absence of any in- 
 ordinate vanity — the total want of envy. He was quite 
 as anxious others should publish as himself; would never 
 believe there could be too much poetry abroad; would 
 scarce admit a fault in the verses of others, whether pri- 
 vate friends or public authors, though after a while (as in 
 his own case) his mind silently and unconsciously adoftted 
 only what was good in them. A much more likely motive 
 for this mistaken activity of publication is, the desire to 
 add to the slender income of his clerkship. For Bernard 
 Barton was a generous, and not a provident man; and, 
 few and modest as were his wants, he did not usually man- 
 age to square them to the still narrower limit of his means. 
 
 ^ The " Devotional Verses " (1827 ) were begun with a very serious 
 intention, and seem written carefully throughout, as became the 
 subject. 
 
 [ 63 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 But apart from all these motives, the preparation of a 
 book was amusement and excitement to one who had little 
 enough of it in the ordinary routine of daily life : treaties 
 with publishers — arrangements of printing — correspond- 
 ence with friends on the subject — and, when the little vol- 
 ume was at last afloat, watching it for a while somewhat 
 as a boy watches a paper boat committed to the sea. 
 
 His health appears to have suffered from his exer- 
 tions. He writes to friends complaining of low spirits, 
 head-ache, etc., the usual effect of sedentary habits, late 
 hours, and overtasked brain. Charles Lamb advises after 
 his usual fashion: some grains of sterling available truth 
 amid a heap of jests.' Southey replies more gravely, in 
 a letter that should be read and marked by every student. 
 
 ^"You are too much apprehensive about your complaint. I know many 
 that are always ailing of it, and live on to a good old age. I knon^ a 
 merry fellow (you partly know him) who, when his medical adviser 
 told him he had drunk away all Uiat [J.-irt. congratulated himself (now 
 his liver was gone) that he should be the longest liver of the two. The 
 best way in these cases is to keep yourself as ignorant as you can — as 
 ignorant as the world was before Galen— of the entire inner construc- 
 tions of the animal man; not to be conscious of a midriff; to hold kid- 
 neys (save of sheep and swine) to be an agreeable fiction ; not to know 
 whereabout s the gall grorvs; to account the circulation of the blood a 
 mere idle whim of Harvey's ; to acknowledge no mechanism not visible. 
 For, once fi.r the seat of your disorder, and your fancies flux into it 
 like so many bad humours. Those medical gentry choose each his 
 favourite part, one takes the lungs — another the aforesaid liver, and 
 refers to that whatever in the animal economy is amiss. Above all, use 
 exercise, take a little more spirituous liquors, learn to smoke, continue 
 to keep a good eonseience, and avoid tamperings with hard terms of 
 art — viscosity, schirrosity, and those bugl)ears by which simple pa- 
 tients are scared into their graves. Tielievc the general sense of the 
 •mercantile tvorld, which holds that desks are not deadly. It is the 
 mind, good li. /?., and not the limlis, tliat taints by long sitting. Think 
 of the patience of tailors — think how long the Lord Chancellor sits — 
 think of the brooding hen." 
 
 [ o-i. ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 "Keswick, 27 Jan., 1822. 
 
 " I am much pleased with the ' Poet's Lot ' — no, not 
 with his lot, but with the verses in which he describes it. 
 But let me ask you — are you not pursuing your studies in- 
 temperately, and to the danger of your health? To be 
 ' writing long after midnight ' and ' with a miserable head- 
 ache ' is what no man can do with impunity ; and what no 
 pressure of business, no ardour of composition, has ever 
 made me do. I beseech you, remember the fate of Kirke 
 White; — and remember that if you sacrifice your health 
 (not to say your life) in the same manner, you will be 
 held up to your own community as a warning — not as an 
 example for imitation. The spirit which disturbed poor 
 Scott of Amwell in his last illness will fasten upon your 
 name ; and your fate will be instanced to prove the incon- 
 sistency of your pursuits with that sobriety and evenness 
 of mind which Quakerism requires, and is intended to 
 produce. — 
 
 " You will take this as it is meant, I am sm-e. 
 
 " My friend, go early to bed ; — and if you eat suppers, 
 read afterwards, but never compose, that you may lie 
 down with a quiet intellect. There is an intellectual as 
 well as a religious peace of mind ; — and without the for- 
 mer, be assured there can be no health for a poet. God 
 
 bless you. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 R. SOUTHEY." 
 
 Mr. Barton had even entertained an idea of quitting 
 the bank altogether, and trusting to his pen for subsist- 
 
 [ 65 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 ence. — An unwise scheme in all men : most unwise in one 
 who had so little tact with the public as himself. From 
 this, however, he was fortunately diverted by all the 
 friends to whom he communicated liis design.' Charles 
 Lamb thus wrote to him : — 
 
 " 9th Januarif, 1823. 
 " Throw yourself on the world without any rational 
 plan of support beyond what the chance employ of book- 
 sellers would afford you ! ! ! 
 
 ' So long ago as the date of liis first volume he had written to Lord 
 Byron on the subject; who thus answered him: — 
 
 St. James's Street, June 1, 1812. 
 "Sir, 
 
 The most satisfactory answer to the concluding part of your let- 
 ter is, that Mr. Murray will re-publish your volume if you still retain 
 your inclination for the ej:perimcut, which I trust trill be successful. 
 Some weeh-s ago my friend Mr. Rogers showed me some of the Stanzas 
 in MS., and I then expressed my opinion of their merit, which a fur- 
 ther perusal of the printed volume has given me no reason to revoke. 
 I mention tJtis as it may not be disagreeable to you to learn that I en- 
 tertained a very favourable opinion of your power before I was aware 
 that such sentiments were reciprocal. — Jf'aving your obliging e.rpres- 
 sions as to my own productions, for which I thank you very sincerely, 
 and assure you that I think not lightly of the praise of one whose ap- 
 probation is valuable; will you allow me to talk to you candidly, not 
 critically, on the subject of yours? — You will not suspect me of a wish 
 to discourage, since I pointed out to the publisher the propriety of 
 complying ivith your wishes. I think more highly of your poetical 
 talents than it would perhaps gratify you to hear e.rprcssed, for I be- 
 lieve, from what I oliscrvc of your mind, that you arc above flattery. — 
 To come to the point, i/ou deserve success; but we knew before .Iddi- 
 son wrote his Cato, that desert does not always command it. But sup- 
 pose it attained — 
 
 * You know trhdt ills tho nnflinr'.s lifo anxnil. 
 Toil, fiiry, wditf, thii patron, tt)iil Iht' Jtiil.^ — 
 
 lio not renounce writing, but never trust rnlircly Id aulhnrship. If 
 you have a profession, retain it, it trill be like Prior's fellowship, a 
 last and sure resource. — Compare Mr. liogers with other authors of 
 
 [ ('■« ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 " Throw yourself rather, my dear Sir, from the steep 
 Tarpeian rock, slap-dash headlong upon iron spikes. If 
 you have but five consolatory minutes between the desk 
 and the bed, make much of them, and live a century in 
 them, rather than turn slave to the booksellers. They are 
 Turks and Tartars when they have poor authors at their 
 beck. Hitherto you have been at arm's length from them. 
 Come not within their grasp. I have known many authors 
 want for bread — some repining — others enjoying the 
 best security of a comiting-house — all agreeing they had 
 rather have been tailors, weavers, — what not? — rather 
 than the things they were. I have known some starved, 
 some to go mad, one dear friend literally dying in a work- 
 house. You know not what a rapacious, dishonest set 
 these booksellers are. Ask even Southey, who (a single 
 case almost ) has made a fortune by book-drudgery, what 
 he has found them. O you know not, may you never 
 know! the miseries of subsisting by authorship! 'T is a 
 pretty appendage to a situation like yovu's or mine ; but a 
 slavery worse than all slavery, to be a bookseller's depen- 
 
 the day; assuredly he is among the first of living poets, but is it to that 
 he owes his station in society and his intimacy in the best circles? no, 
 it is to his prudence and respectability. The world (a bad one I own) 
 courts him because he has no occasion to court it. — He is a poet, nor 
 is he less so because he was something more. — / am. not sorry to hear 
 that you are not tempted by the vicinity of Capel Lofft, Esq., though 
 if he had done for you what he has for the Bloomfields I should 
 nei'er have laughed at his rage for patronising. — But a truly well con- 
 stituted mind will ever be independent.- — That you may be so is my 
 sincere wish; and if others think as well of your poetry as I do, you 
 will have no cause to complain of your readers. — Believe me. 
 Your obliged and obedient Servant, 
 
 Byron." 
 
 [ 67 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 dant, to drudge your brains for pots of ale and breasts of 
 mutton, to change your free thoughts and voluntary num- 
 bers for ungracious task-work. The booksellers hate us. 
 The reason I take to be, that, contrary to other trades, in 
 which the master gets all the credit, (a jeweller or silver- 
 smith for instance,) and the journeyman, who really does 
 the fine work, is in the background: in our work the world 
 gives all the credit to us, whom they consider as their 
 joiuneymen, and therefore do they hate us, and cheat us, 
 and oppress us, and would wring the blood of us out, to 
 put another sixpence in their mechanic pouches. 
 
 " Keep to your bank, and the bank will keep you. Trust 
 not to the public; you may hang, starve, drown yourself 
 for any thing that worthy personage cares. I bless every 
 star that Providence, not seeing good to make me inde- 
 pendent, has seen it next good to settle me xipon the stable 
 foundation of Leadenhall. Sit down, good B. B., in the 
 banking office: what! is there not from six to eleven p.m., 
 six days in the week, and is there not all Sunday? Fie, 
 what a superfluity of man's time, if you could think so! 
 Enough for relaxation, mirth, converse, poetry, good 
 thoughts, quiet thoughts. O the corroding, torturing, tor- 
 menting thoughts that disturb tlie brain of the milucky 
 wight, who must draw upon it for daily sustenance! 
 Henceforth I retract all my fond comjdaints of mercantile 
 emi)l()yment — look upon them as lovers' (juarrels. I Avas 
 but half in earnest. Welcome dead timber of a desk that 
 
 [ 68 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 gives me life. A little grumbling is a wholesome medi- 
 cine for the spleen, but in my inner heart do I approve 
 and embrace this our close but unharassing way of life. 
 
 I am quite serious. 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 C. Lamb." 
 
 In 1824, however, his income received a handsome ad- 
 dition from another quarter. A few members of his So- 
 ciety, including some of the wealthier of his own family, 
 raised ,£1200 among them for his benefit. Mr. Shewell of 
 Ipswich, who was one of the main contributors to this 
 fund, writes to me that the scheme originated with Joseph 
 John Gurney : — " one of those innumerable acts of kind- 
 ness and beneficence which marked his character, and the 
 measure of which will never be known upon the earth." 
 Nor was the measure of it known in this instance ; for of 
 the large sum that he handed in as the subscription of 
 several, JNIr. Shewell tliinks he was " a larger donor than 
 he chose to acknowledge." The money thus raised was 
 vested in the name of Mr. Shewell, and its yearly interest 
 paid to Bernard Barton; till, in 1839, the greater part of 
 it was laid out in buying that old house and the land round 
 it, which Mr. Barton so much loved as the habitation of 
 his wife's mother, Martha Jesup. 
 
 It seems that he felt some delicacy at first in accepting 
 this munificent testimony which his own people offered to 
 his talents. But here again Lamb assisted him with plain, 
 sincere, and wise advice. 
 
 [ 69 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 " March 2Uh, 1824. 
 " Deae B. B., 
 
 I hasten to say that if my opinion can strengthen you 
 in your choice, it is decisive for your acceptance of what 
 has been so handsomely offered. I can see nothing in- 
 jurious to your most honourable sense. Think that you 
 are called to a poetical ministry — nothing worse — the mm- 
 ister is worthy of his hire. 
 
 " The only objection I feel is founded on a fear that 
 the acceptance may be a temptation to j^ou to let fall the 
 bone (hard as it is) which is in your mouth, and must af- 
 ford tolerable pickings, for the shadow of independence. 
 You cannot propose to become independent on what the 
 low state of interest could afford you from such a princi- 
 pal as you mention ; and the most graceful excuse for the 
 acceptance would be, that it left j^ou free to your volun- 
 tary functions: that is the less light part of the scruple. 
 It has no darker shade. I put in darker, because of the 
 ambiguity of the word light, which Donne, in his admir- 
 able poem on the INIetempsychosis, has so ingeniouslj'^ illus- 
 trated in his invocation — 
 
 ' Make my dark heavy poem light and light — ' 
 
 where the two senses of light are opposed to different op- 
 posites. A trifling criticism. — I can see no reason for any 
 scruple then but what arises from your own interest; 
 which is in your own power, of course, to solve. If you 
 still liave doubts, read over Sanderson's ' Cases of Con- 
 science,' and Jeremy Taylor's ' Ductor Dubitantium; ' 
 the first a moderate octavo, the latter a folio of nine hun- 
 
 [ 70 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 dred close pages ; and when you have thoroughly digested 
 the admirable reasons pro and con which they give for 
 every possible case, you will be— just as wise as when you 
 began. Every man is his own best casuist ; and, after all, 
 as Ephraun Smooth, in the pleasant comedy of Wild 
 Oats, has it, ' There is no harm in a guinea.' A fortiori, 
 there is less in two thousand. 
 
 " I therefore most sincerely congratulate with you, ex- 
 cepting so far as excepted above. If you have fair pros- 
 pects of adding to the principal, cut the bank ; but in either 
 case, do not refuse an honest service. Your heart tells you 
 it is not offered to bribe you from any duty, but to a duty 
 which you feel to be your vocation. 
 
 Farewell heartily, 
 
 C. L." 
 
 While Mr. Barton had been busy publishing, his cor- 
 respondence with literary people had greatly increased. 
 The drawers and boxes which at last received the over- 
 flowings of his capacious Quaker pockets, (and he scarcely 
 ever destroyed a letter,) contain a multitude of letters 
 from literary people, dead or living. Beside those from 
 Southey and Lamb, there are many from Charles Lloyd 
 — simple, noble, and kind, telling of his many Poems — 
 of a Romance in six volumes he was then copying out with 
 his own hand for the seventh time ;- — from old Lloyd, the 
 father, into whose hands Barton's letters occasionally fell 
 by mistake, telling of his son's many books, but " that it 
 is easier to write them than to gain numerous readers ; " 
 
 [ 71 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 — from old ]Mr. Plimiptre, who mourns the insensibiUty 
 of publishers to his castigated editions of Gay and Dibdin 
 — leaving one letter midway, to go to his " spring task of 
 pruning the gooseberries and currants." There are also 
 girlish letters from L. E. L. ; and feminine ones from INIrs. 
 Hemans. Of lixang authors there are many letters from 
 Mitford, Bowring, Conder, Mrs. Opie, C. B. Tayler, the 
 Howitts, etc. 
 
 Owing to IMr. Barton's circumstances, his connexion 
 with most of these persons was solely by letter. He went 
 indeed occasionally to Hadleigh, where Dr. Drake then 
 flourished, and Mr. Tayler was curate ; — to INIr. ISIitf ord's 
 at Benliall ; — ' and he visited Charles Lamb once or twice 
 in London and at Islington. He once also met Southey 
 at Thomas Clarkson's at Play ford, in the spring of 1824. 
 But the rest of the persons whose letters I have just men- 
 
 ^ Here is one of the notes that used to call B. B. to Benhall in those 
 days. 
 
 "Benhall, 1820. 
 "My dear Poet, 
 
 We got your note to-day. We are at home and shall he glad to see 
 you, but hope you trill not swim here; in other words, we think it bet- 
 ter that you should wait, till we can seat you under a chestnut and 
 listen to your oracular sayings. We hope that, like your sister of the 
 woods, you arc in full song; she does not print, I think; we hope you 
 do; seeing that you heat her in sense, though she has a little the ad- 
 vantage in melody. Together you will make a pretty duet in our 
 groves. You have both your defects; she devours glow-worms, you 
 take snuff; she is in a great hurry to go away, and you are prodigious 
 slow in arriving; she sings at night, when nobody can hear her, and 
 you write for Ackermann, which nobody thinks of reading. In spite 
 of all this, you will get a hundred a year from the king, and settle at 
 Woodhridge; in another month, she will find no more /lies, and set off 
 for Egypt. 
 
 Truly yours, 
 
 J. M." 
 
 [ 72 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 tioned, I believe he never saw. And thus perhaps he ac- 
 quired a habit of writing that supphed the place of per- 
 sonal intercourse. Confined to a town where there was but 
 little stirring in the literary way, he naturally travelled 
 out of it by letter, for communication on those matters; 
 and this habit gradually extended itself to acquaintances 
 not hterary, whom he seemed as happy to converse with 
 by letter as face to face. His correspondence with Mr. 
 Clemesha arose out of their meeting once, and once only, 
 by chance in the commercial room of an inn. And with 
 INIrs. Sutton, who, beside other matters of interest, could 
 tell him about the " North Countrie," from which his an- 
 cestors came, and which he always loved in fancy, (for he 
 never saw it,) — he kept up a correspondence of nearly 
 thirty years, though he and she never met to give form 
 and substance to their visionary conceptions of one an- 
 other. 
 
 From the year 1828, his books, as well as his correspon- 
 dence with those "avIiosc talk was of" books, declined; and 
 soon after this he seemed to settle down contentedly into 
 that quiet course of hfe in which he continued to the end. 
 His literary talents, social amiability, and blameless char- 
 acter made him respected, liked, and courted among his 
 neighbours. Few, high or low, but were glad to see him 
 at his customary place in the bank, from which he smiled 
 a kindly greeting, or came down with friendly open hand, 
 and some frank words of family inquiry — perhaps with 
 the offer of a pinch from his never-failing snufF-box — or 
 the withdrawal of the visitor, if more intimate, to see some 
 
 [ 73 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 letter or copy of verses, just received or just composed, or 
 some picture just purchased. Few, high or low, but were 
 glad to have him at their tables; where he was equally 
 pleasant and equally pleased, whether with the fine folks 
 at the Hall, or with the liomely company at the Farm; 
 carrying every where indifferently the same good feeling, 
 good spirits, and good manners ; and by a happy frankness 
 of nature, that did not too precisely measure its utterance 
 on such occasions, checkering the conventional gentility 
 of the drawing-room with some humours of humbler life, 
 which in turn he refined with a little sprinkling of litera- 
 ture. — Now too, after having long lived in a house that 
 was just big enough to sit and sleep in, while he was 
 obhged to board with the ladies of a Quaker school over 
 the way,^ he obtained a convenient house of his own, where 
 lie got his books and pictures about him. But, more than 
 all this, his daughter was now grown up to be his house- 
 keeper and companion. And amiable as Bernard Barton 
 was in social life, his amiability in this little tetc-a-tete 
 household of his Avas yet a fairer tiling to behold ; so com- 
 pletely was all authority absorbed into confidence, and 
 into love— 
 
 " A constant flow of love, that knew no fall, 
 Ne'er roughen'd by those cataracts iiud breaks 
 That humour interposed too often makes," 
 
 ' Where he writes a letter one tiay, but he knoivs not if intelligibly; 
 " for nil hands are bitsi/ round me to elap, to starch, to iron, to plait — 
 in plain English, 't is irashing-daj/ ; and I am now tvriting close to a 
 table in which is a bason of starch, caps, kerchiefs, etc., and bus;/ 
 hands and tongues round it." 
 
 [ 74. ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 but gliding on uninterruptedly for twenty years, until 
 death concealed its current from all human witness. 
 
 In earlier life Bernard Barton had been a fair pedes- 
 trian; and was fond of walking over to the house of his 
 friend Arthur Biddell at Playford. There, beside the in- 
 structive and agreeable society of his host and hostess, he 
 used to meet George Airy, now Astronomer Royal, then 
 a lad of wonderful promise; with whom he had many a 
 discussion about poetry, and Sir Walter's last new novel, 
 a volume of which perhaps the poet had brought in his 
 pocket. Mr. Biddell, at one time, lent him a horse to expe- 
 dite his journeys to and fro, and to refresh him with some 
 wholesome change of exercise. But of that Barton soon 
 tired. He gradually got to dislike exercise very much; 
 and no doubt greatly injured his health by its disuse. 
 But it was not to be wondered at, that having spent the 
 day in the uncongenial task of "figure-work," as he called 
 it, he should covet his evenings for books, or verses, or so- 
 cial intercourse. It was very difficult to get him out even 
 for a stroll in the garden after dinner, or along the banks 
 of his favourite Deben on a summer evening. He would, 
 after going a little way, with much humorous grumbling 
 at the useless fatigue he was put to endure, stop short of 
 a sudden, and, sitting down in the long grass by the river- 
 side, watch the tide run past, and the well-known vessels 
 ghding into harbour, or dropping down to pursue their 
 voyage under the stars at sea, until his companions, re- 
 turning from their prolonged walk, drew him to his feet 
 again, to saimter homeward far more willingly than he 
 
 [ 75 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 set forth, with the prospect of the easy chair, the book, 
 and the cheerful supper before him. 
 
 Plis excursions rarely extended beyond a few miles 
 roimd Woodbridge — to the vale of Dedliam, Constable's 
 birth-place and painting-room; or to the neighbouring 
 sea-coast, loved for its own sake — and few could love the 
 sea and the heaths beside it better than he did — but doubly 
 dear to him from its association with the memory and 
 poetry of Crabbe. Once or twice he went as far as Hamp- 
 shire on a visit to his brother; and once he visited Mr. 
 W. B. Donne, at IMattishall, in Norfolk, where he saw 
 many portraits and mementoes of his favourite poet Cow- 
 per, ]Mr. Donne's kinsman. That which most interested 
 him there was Mrs. Bodliam, ninety years old, and almost 
 blind, but with all the courtesy of the old school about 
 her — once tlie " Rose " whom Cowper had played with at 
 Catfield parsonage when both were children together, and 
 whom imtil 1790, when she revived their acquaintance by 
 sending liim his mother's picture, he had thought " with- 
 ered and fallen from the stalk." Such little excursions 
 it might be absurd to record of other men ; but they were 
 some of the few that Bernard Barton could take, and from 
 tlieir rare occurrence, and the simjilicity of his nature, 
 they made a strong im])ression upon him. 
 
 He still continued to write verses, as well on private oc- 
 casions as for annuals; and in IS.'JO ])ublishcd another vol- 
 ume, chiefly composed of such fragments. In 184..5 came 
 out his last volume; wliicli he got ])ennission to dedicate 
 to the Queen. He sent also a copy of it to Sir Robert 
 
 [ 76 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 Peel, then prime minister, with whom he had already cor- 
 responded slightly on the subject of the income tax, which 
 Mr. Barton thought pressed rather imduly on clerks, and 
 others, whose narrow income was only for life. Sir Robert 
 asked him to dinner at Whitehall. — " Twenty years ago," 
 writes Barton, " such a summons had elated and exhil- 
 arated me — now I feel humbled and depressed at it. 
 Why? — but that I verge on the period when the lighting 
 down of the grasshopper is a burden, and desire itself be- 
 gins to fail." — He went, however, and was sincerely 
 pleased with the courtesy, and astonished at the social 
 ease, of a man who had so many and so heavy cares on his 
 shoulders. When the Quaker poet was first ushered into 
 the room, there were but three guests assembled, of whom 
 he Uttle expected to know one. But the mutual exclama- 
 tions of " George Airy! " and " Bernard Barton! " soon 
 satisfied Sir Robert as to his country guest's feeling at 
 home at the great town dinner. 
 
 On leaving office a year after. Sir Robert recommended 
 him to the Queen for an annual pension of £100: — one 
 of the last acts, as the retiring minister intimated, of his 
 official career, and one he should always reflect on with 
 pleasure. — B. Barton gratefully accepted the boon. And 
 to the very close of hfe he continued, after his fashion, to 
 send letters and occasional poems to Sir Robert, and to 
 receive a few kind words in reply. 
 
 In 1844 died Bernard's eldest sister, Maria Hack. She 
 was five or six years older than himself; very like him in 
 the face; and had been his instructress ("a sort of oracle 
 
 [ 77 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 to me," he says) when both were children. " It is a heavy 
 blow to me," he writes, " for JNIaria is almost the first hu- 
 man being I remember to have fondly loved, or been 
 fondly loved by — the only H^dng participant in my first 
 and earliest recollections. When I lose her, I had almost 
 as well never have been a child ; for she only knew me as 
 such — and the best and brightest of memories are apt to 
 grow dim when they can be no more reflected." " She 
 was just older enough than I," he elsewhere says, " to 
 recollect distinctly what I have a confused glimmering 
 of — about our house at Hertford — even of hers at 
 Carlisle." 
 
 Mr. Barton had for many years been an ailing man, 
 though he never was, I believe, dangerously ill (as it is 
 called) till the last year of his life. He took very little 
 care of himself; laughed at all rules of diet, except tem- 
 perance ; and had for nearly forty years, as he said, " taken 
 almost as little exercise as a mile-stone, and far less fresh 
 air." Some years before his death he had been warned 
 of a liability to disease in the heart, an intimation he did 
 not regard, as he never felt pain in that region. Nor did 
 he to that refer the increased distress he began to feel in 
 exertion of any kind, walking fast or going up-stairs, a 
 distress which he looked upon as the disease of old age, 
 and which he used to give vent to in half -humorous groans, 
 that seemed to many of his friends rather expressive of 
 his dislike to exercise, than implying any serious incon- 
 venience from it. But probably the disease that partly 
 arose from inactivity now became the true apology for it. 
 
 [ 78 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 During the last year of his life, too, some loss of his little 
 fortune, and some perplexity in his affairs, not so distress- 
 ing because of any present inconvenience to himself, as in 
 the prospect of future evil to one whom he loved as him- 
 self, may have increased the disease within him, and 
 hastened its final blow. 
 
 Toward the end of 1848 the evil symptoms increased 
 much upon him ; and, shortly after Christmas, it was found 
 that the disease was far advanced. He consented to have 
 his diet regulated; protesting humorously against the 
 small glass of small beer allowed him in place of the tem- 
 perate allowance of generous port, or ale, to which he was 
 accustomed. He fulfilled his daily duty in the bank,* only 
 remitting (as he was peremptorily bid) his attendance 
 there after his four o'clock dinner.^ And though not able 
 to go out to his friends, he was glad to see them at his own 
 house to the last. 
 
 Here is a letter, written a few days before his death, to 
 one of his kindest and most hospitable friends. 
 
 ^ He had written of himself, some years before, "I shall go on making 
 figures till Death makes me a cipher." 
 
 ' For which he half accused himself as "a skulker." And of late 
 years, when the day account of the hank had not come quite right by 
 the usual hour of closing, and it seemed necessary to carry on business 
 late into the evening, he would sometimes come up wearied to his room, 
 saying — "Well, we 've got all right but a shilling, and I 've left my 
 boys" (as he called the younger clerks) "to puzzle that out." But 
 even then he would get up from "Rob Roy" or the "Antiquary," 
 every now and then, and go to peep through the curtain of a window 
 that opens upon the back of the bank, and, if he saw the great gas- 
 lamp flaming within, announce with a half comical sympathy, that 
 "they were still at it; " or, when the lamp was at last extinguished, 
 would return to his chair more happily, now that his partners mere 
 liberated. 
 
 [ 79 ]
 
 IMEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 " 2 mo, 14, 184,9. 
 " My deae old Friend, 
 
 Thy home-brewed has been duly received, and I 
 drank a glass yesterday wdth relish, but I must not 
 indulge too often — for I make slow way, if any, toward 
 recoveiy, and at times go on pufiing, panting, groan- 
 ing, and making a variety of noises, not unlike a loco- 
 motive at first stai-ting; more to give vent to my own 
 discomfort, than for the delectation of those around me. 
 So I am not fit to go mto company, and cannot guess 
 w^hen I shall. However, I am free from much acute suf- 
 fering, and not so much hypp'd as might be forgiven in a 
 man who has such trouble about his breathing that it natu- 
 rally puts him on thinking how long he may be able to 
 breathe at all. But if the hairs of one's head are nimi- 
 bered, so, by a parity of reasoning, are the puffs of our 
 bellows. I write not in levity, though I use homely words. 
 
 I do not think J sees any present cause of serious 
 
 alarm, but I do not think he sees, on the other hand, much 
 prospect of speedy recovery, if of entire recovery at all. 
 The thing has been coming on for years; and cannot be 
 cured at once, if at all. A man can't poke over desk or 
 table for forty years without putting some of the ma- 
 chinery of the chest out of sorts. As the evenings get 
 warm and light we shall see what gentle exercise and a 
 little fresh air can do. In the last few days too I have 
 been in solicitude about a little pet niece of mine dying, 
 if not dead, at York: this has somewhat worried me, and 
 agitation or excitement is as bad for me as work or quick- 
 
 [ 80 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 ness of motion. Yet, after all, I have really more to be 
 thankful for than to grumble about. I have no very acute 
 pain, a skeely doctor, a good nurse, kind solicitous friends, 
 a remission of the worst part of my desk hours — so why 
 should I fret? Love to the yomikers. Thine, 
 
 B." 
 
 On Monday, February 19, he was unable to get into the 
 bank, having passed a very unquiet night — the first night 
 of distress, he thankfully said, that his illness had caused 
 him. He suffered during the day ; but welcomed as usual 
 the friends who came to see him as he lay on his sofa ; and 
 wrote a few notes — for his correspondence must now, as 
 he had humorously lamented, become as short-breathed as 
 himself. In the evening, at half -past eight, as he was yet 
 conversing cheerfully with a friend, he rose up, went to 
 his bed-room, and suddenly rang the bell. He was found 
 by his daughter — dying. Assistance was sent for; but all 
 assistance was vain. " In a few minutes more," says the 
 note despatched from the house of death that night, " all 
 distress was over on his part — and that warm kind heart 
 is still for ever." 
 
 The Letters and Poems that follow are very faithful 
 revelations of Bernard Barton's soul ; of the genuine piety 
 to God, goodwill to men, and cheerful guileless spirit, 
 which animated him, not only while writing in the imdis- 
 turbed seclusion of the closet, but (what is a very differ- 
 ent matter) through the walk and practice of daily life. 
 
 [ 81 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 They prove also Iiis intimate acquaintance with the Bible, 
 and his deep appreciation of many beautiful passages 
 which might escape a common reader. 
 
 The Letters show, that while he had well considered, 
 and well approved, the pure principles of Quakerism, he 
 was equally liberal in his recognition of other forms of 
 Christianity. He could attend the church, or the chapel, 
 if the meeting were not at hand; and once assisted in rais- 
 ing money to build a new Established Church in Wood- 
 bridge. And while he was sometimes roused to defend 
 Dissent from the \'xilgar attacks of High Church and 
 Tory,^ he could also give the bishops a good word when 
 they were unjustly assailed. 
 
 ^ Here are two little Epigrams showing that the quiet Quaker could 
 strike, though he was seldom provoked to do so. 
 
 Dr. E . 
 
 "A bullying, brawling champion of the Church; 
 Vain a,i a parrot screaming on her perch ; 
 And, like that parrot, screaming out by rote 
 The same stale, flat, nnprofitable note; 
 Still interrupting all diacreet debate 
 With one eternal cri/ of ' Church and State! ' — 
 With all the High Tbri/'s ignorance, increased 
 By all tlie arrogance that marks the priest; 
 One xvho declares upon his solemn word, 
 The voluntary system is absurd : 
 He well may say so; — for 'twere hard to tell 
 Wlio would support him, did not law compel." 
 
 On one who declared in a pttblic speech — "This tvas the opinion he 
 had formed of the Dissenters ; he only saw in them wolves in sheep's 
 clothing." 
 
 " 'Wolves in sheep's clothing! ' bitter words and big; 
 But who applies them f first tin- speaker scan; 
 A suckling Tory! an apostate Whig! 
 Indeed, a very silly, zveak young man! 
 
 What stich an one may cither think or say, 
 
 With sober people matters not one pin; 
 In tlicir opinion, nis oum, senseless bray 
 
 Proves him tlie ass wrait in a lion's skin." 
 
 [ 82 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 While duly conforming to the usages of his Society on 
 all proper occasions, he could forget thee and thou while 
 mixing in social intercourse with people of another vocab- 
 ulary, and smile at the Reviewer who reproved him for 
 using the heathen name November in his Poems. " I 
 find," he said, " these names of the months the prescriptive 
 dialect of poetry, used as such by many members of our 
 Society before me — ' sans peur et sans reproche ; ' and I 
 use them accordingly, asking no questions for conscience' 
 sake, as to their origin. Yet while I do this, I can give 
 my cordial tribute of approval to the scruples of our early 
 friends, who advocate a simpler nomenclature. I can 
 quite understand and respect their simplicity and godly 
 sincerity; and I conceive that I have duly shown my rev- 
 erence for their scruples in adhering personally to their 
 dialect, and only using another poetically. Ask the Brit- 
 ish Friend the name of the planet with a belt round it, 
 and he would say, Saturn; at the peril, and on the pain, of 
 excommunication . ' ' 
 
 As to his pohtics, he always used to call himself, " a 
 Whig of the old school." Perhaps, like most men in easy 
 circumstances, he grew more averse to change as he grew 
 older. He thus writes to a friend in 1845, during the 
 heats occasioned by the proposed Repeal of the Corn 
 Laws: — " Queer times these, and strange events. I feel 
 most shamefully indifferent about the whole affair; but 
 my political fever has long since spent itself. It was about 
 its height when they sent Burdett to the Tower. It has 
 cooled down wonderfully since then. He went there, to 
 
 [ 83 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 the best of my recollection, in the character of Burns's 
 Sir Wilham WaUace— 
 
 ' Great patriot hero — ill-requited chief; ' — 
 
 and dwindled down afterwards to ' Old Glory.' No more 
 patriots for me." But Bernard Barton did not trouble 
 himself much about politics. He occasionally grew inter- 
 ested wlien the interests of those he loved were at stake; 
 and his affections generally guided his judgment. Hence 
 he was always against a Repeal of the Corn Laws, because 
 he loved Suffolk farmers, Suffolk labourers, and Suffolk 
 fields. Occasionally he took part in the election of a friend 
 to Parliament — writing in prose or verse in the county 
 papers. And here also, though he more willingly sided 
 with the Liberal interest, he would put out a hand to help 
 the good old Tory at a pinch. 
 
 He was equally tolerant of men, and free of acquain- 
 tance. So long as men were honest, ( and he was slow to 
 suspect them to be otherwise,) and reasonably agreeable, 
 (and he was easily pleased,) he could find company in 
 them. " My temperament," he writes, " is, as far as a 
 man can judge of himself, eminently social. I am wont 
 to live out of myself, and to cling to anything or anybody 
 loveable within my reach." I have before said that lie was 
 equally welcome and equally at ease, whether at the Hall 
 or at the Farm; himself indifferent to rank, though he 
 gave every one his fitlc, not wondering even at those of 
 his own community, wlio, unmindful ])c'rlia]is of tlie mili- 
 tary implication, owned to the soft impeachment of Es- 
 
 [ 84 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 quire. But no where was he more amiable than in some 
 of those humbler meetings — about the fire in the keeping- 
 room at Christmas, or under the walnut-tree in summer. 
 He had his cheerful remembrances with the old ; a playful 
 word for the young — especially with children, whom he 
 loved and was loved by. — Or, on some summer afternoon, 
 perhaps, at the little inn on the heath, or by the river-side 
 — or when, after a pleasant pic-nic on the sea-shore, we 
 drifted homeward up the river, while the breeze died away 
 at sunset, and the heron, at last startled by our gliding 
 boat, slowly rose from the ooze over which the tide was 
 momentarily encroaching. 
 
 By nature, as well as by discipline perhaps, he had a 
 great dislike to most violent occasions of feeling and mani- 
 festations of it, whether in real life or story. Many years 
 ago he entreated the author of " May you like it," who 
 had written some tales of powerful interest, to write others 
 " where the appeals to one's feelings were perhaps less 
 frequent — I mean one's sympathetic feelings with suffer- 
 ing virtue — and the more pleasurable emotions called 
 forth by the spectacle of quiet, miobtrusive, domestic hap- 
 piness more dwelt on." And when Mr. Tayler had long 
 neglected to answer a letter. Barton hvmiorously proposed 
 to rob him on the highway, in hopes of recovering an in- 
 terest by crime which he supposed every-day good con- 
 duct had lost. Even in Walter Scott, his great favourite, 
 he seemed to relish the humorous parts more than the 
 pathetic; — Bailie Nicol Jarvie's dilemmas at Glenna- 
 quoich, rather than Fergus Mac Ivor's trial ; and Oldbuck 
 
 [ 85 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 and his sister Grizel rather than the scenes at the fisher- 
 man's cottage. Indeed, many, I dare saj^, of those who 
 only know Barton by his poetry, will be surprised to hear 
 how much humour he had in himself, and how much he 
 relished it in others. Especially, perhaps, m later life, 
 when men have commonly had quite enough of "domestic 
 tragedy," and are glad to laugh when they can. 
 
 With little critical knowledge of pictures, he was very 
 fond of them, especially such as represented scenery 
 familiar to him^the shady lane, the heath, the corn-field, 
 the village, the sea-shore. And he loved after coming 
 away from the bank to sit in his room and watch the twi- 
 light steal over his landscapes as over the real face of na- 
 ture, and then lit up again by fire or candle light. Nor 
 could any itinerant picture-dealer pass Mr. Barton's door 
 without calling to tempt him to a new purchase. And 
 then was B. B. to be seen, just come up from the bank, 
 with broad-brim and spectacles on, examining some pic- 
 ture set before him on a chair in the most advantageous 
 light; the dealer recommending, and Barton wavering, 
 until partlj^ by money, and partly by exchange of some 
 older favourites, with perhaps a snufF-box thrown in to 
 turn the scale; a bargain was concluded — generally to B. 
 B.'s great disadvantage and great content. Then friends 
 were called in to admire; and letters written to describe; 
 and the ])icture taken up to his bed-room to be seen by 
 candle light on going to bed, and by the morning sun on 
 awaking; tiicn hung uj) in the best ])lace in tlie best room; 
 till in time perhaps it was itself exchanged away for some 
 newer favourite. 
 
 [ 86 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 He was not learned — in language, science, or philos- 
 ophy. Nor did he care for the loftiest kinds of poetry — 
 " the heroics," as he called it. His favourite authors were 
 those that dealt most in humour, good sense, domestic 
 feeling, and pastoral description — Goldsmith, Cowper, 
 Wordsworth in his lowlier moods, and Crabbe. One of 
 his favourite prose books was Boswell's Johnson ; of which 
 he knew all the good things by heart, an inexhaustible 
 store for a country dinner-table.' And many will long 
 remember him as he used to sit at table, his snufF-box in 
 his hand, and a glass of genial wine before him, repeating 
 some favourite passage, and glancing his fine brown eyes 
 about him as he recited. 
 
 But perhaps his favourite prose book was Scott's 
 Novels. These he seemed never tired of reading, and 
 hearing read. During the last four or five winters I have 
 gone through several of the best of these with him — gen- 
 erally on one night in each week — Saturday night, that 
 left him free to the prospect of Sunday's relaxation. 
 Then was the volimie taken down impatiently from the 
 shelf almost before tea was over; and at last, when the 
 room was clear, candles snuffed, and fii'e stirred, he would 
 read out, or hsten to, those fine stories, anticipating with 
 a glance, or an impatient ejaculation of pleasure, the good 
 things he knew were coming — which he liked all the bet- 
 ter for knowing they were coming — relishing them afresh 
 in the fresh enjoyment of his companion, to whom they 
 were less familiar; until the modest supper coming in 
 
 * He used to look nnth some admiration at an ancient fellow-townsman, 
 who, beside a rich fund of Suffolk stories vested in him, had once seen 
 Dr. Johnson alight from a hackney-coach at the Mitre. 
 
 [ 87 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 closed the book, and recalled liim to his cheerful hos- 
 pitaUty. 
 
 Of the literary merits of this volume, others, less biassed 
 than myself by personal and local regards, Avill better 
 judge. But the Editor, to whom, as well as the jNIemoir, 
 the task of making any observations of this kind usually 
 falls, has desired me to saj^ a few words on the subject. 
 
 The Letters, judging from internal evidence as well 
 as from all personal knowledge of the author's habits, 
 were for the most part written oflF with the same careless 
 ingenuousness that characterized his conversation. " I 
 have no alternative," he said, " between not writing at all, 
 and writing what fost comes into my head." In both 
 cases the same cause seems to me to produce the same 
 agreeable effect. 
 
 The Letters on graver subjects are doubtless the result 
 of graver " foregone conclusion," — but equally spontane- 
 ous in point of utterance, without any eflfort at style 
 whatever. 
 
 If the Letters here published are better than the mass 
 of those they are selected from, it is because better topics 
 happened to present themselves to one who, though he 
 wrote so much, had perhaps as little of new or animating 
 to write about as most men. 
 
 The Poems, if not written off as easily as the Letters, 
 were probably as little elaborated as any that ever were 
 published. Without claiming for tliem tlie highest at- 
 tributes of poetry, (which the author never pretended to,) 
 
 t 88 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 we may surely say they abound in genuine feeling and ele- 
 gant fancy expressed in easy, and often very felicitous, 
 verse. These qualities employed in illustrating the re- 
 ligious and domestic affections, and the pastoral scenery 
 with which such affections are perhaps most generally 
 associated, have made Bernard Barton, as he desired to 
 be, a household poet with a large class of readers — a class, 
 who, as they may be supposed to welcome such poetry as 
 being the articulate voice of those good feelings yearning 
 in their own bosoms, one may hope will continue and in- 
 crease in England. 
 
 While in many of these Poems it is the spirit within 
 that redeems an imperfect form — just as it lights up the 
 irregular features of a face into beauty — there are many 
 which will surely abide the test of severer criticism. Such 
 are several of the Sonnets; which, if they have not (and 
 they do not aim at) the power and grandeur, are also free 
 from the pedantic stiffness of so many English Sonnets. 
 Surely that one " To my Daughter," is very beautiful in 
 all respects. 
 
 Some of the lighter pieces — " To Joanna," " To a 
 young Housewife," etc., partake much of Cowper's play- 
 ful grace. And some on the decline of life, and the re- 
 ligious consolations attending it, are very touching. 
 
 Charles Lamb said the verses " To the Memory of 
 Bloomfield" were "sweet with Doric delicacy." May not 
 one say the same of those " On Leiston Abbey," " Cow- 
 per's Rural Walks," on " Some Pictures," and others of 
 the shorter descriptive pieces? Indeed, utterly incongru- 
 
 [ 89 ]
 
 MEMOIR OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 ous as at first may seem the Quaker clerk and the ancient 
 Greek Idylhst, some of these httle poems recall to me the 
 inscriptions in the Greek Anthology — not in any particu- 
 lar passages, but in their general aii* of simplicity, leisurely 
 elegance, and quiet unimpassioned pensiveness. 
 
 Finally, what Southey said of one of Barton's volumes 
 — " there are many rich passages and frequent felicity of 
 expression " — may modestly be said of these selections 
 from ten. Not only is the fundamental thought of many 
 of them very beautiful — as in the poems, " To a Friend 
 in Distress," " The Deserted Nest," " Thought in a Gar- 
 den," etc., — but there are many verses whose melody will 
 linger in the ear, and many images that will abide in the 
 memory. Such surely are those of men's hearts brighten- 
 ing up at Christmas " like a fire new stirred," — of the 
 stream that leaps along over the pebbles " like happy 
 hearts bj' holiday made light," — of the solitary tomb show- 
 ing from afar like a lamb in the meadow. And in the 
 poem called " A Dream," — a dream the poet really had, — 
 how beautiful is that chorus of the friends of her youth 
 who surround the central vision of his departed wife, and 
 who, much as the dreamer wonders they do not see she is 
 a spirit, and silent as she remains to their greetings, still 
 with countenances of " blameless mirth," like some of 
 Correggio's angel attendants, press around her without 
 awe or hesitation, repeating " welcome, welcome! " as to 
 one suddenly retin-ned to them from some earthly absence 
 only, and not from beyond the dead — from heaven. 
 
 E. F. G. 
 
 [ 90 ]
 
 DEATH OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 At Woodbridge, on the night of Monday last, Febru- 
 ary the 19th, between the hours of eight and nine, after 
 a brief spasm in the heart, died Bernard Barton. He was 
 born near London in 1784, came to Woodbridge in 1806, 
 where he shortly after manned and was left a widower at 
 the birth of his only child, who now survives him. In 1810 
 he entered as clerk in Messrs. Alexander's Bank, where 
 he officiated almost to the day of his death. He had been 
 for some months afflicted with laborious breathing which 
 his doctor knew to proceed from disease in the heart, 
 though there seemed no reason to apprehend immediate 
 danger. But those who have most reason to lament his 
 loss, have also most reason to be thankful that he was 
 spared a long illness of anguish and suspense, by so sud- 
 den and easy a dismissal. 
 
 To the world at large Bernard Barton was known as 
 the author of much pleasing, amiable, and pious poetry, 
 animated by feeling and fancy, delighting in homely sub- 
 jects, so generally pleasing to English people. He sang 
 of what he loved — the domestic virtues in man, and the 
 quiet pastoral scenes of Nature — and especially of his own 
 county — its woods, and fields, and lanes, and homesteads, 
 and the old sea that washed its shores; and the nearer to 
 his own home the better he loved it. There was a true and 
 
 [ 91 ]
 
 DEATH OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 pure vein of pastoral feeling in him. Thousands have read 
 his books with uinocent pleasure ; none wiU ever take them 
 up and be the worse for doing so. The first of these vol- 
 umes was published in 1811. 
 
 To those of his own neighbourhood he was known be- 
 side as a most amiable, genial, charitable man — of pure, 
 unaffected, unpretending piety — the good neighbour — 
 the cheerful companion — the welcome guest — a hospitable 
 host — tolerant of all men, sincerely attached to many. 
 Few, high or low, but were glad to see him at his custom- 
 ary place in the bank ; to exchange some words of kindly 
 greeting with him — few but were glad to have him at their 
 own homes; and there he was the same man and had the 
 same manners to all; alwa5'^s equally frank, genial, and 
 communicative, without distinction of rank. He had all 
 George Fox's " better part " — thorough independence of 
 rank, titles, wealth, and all the distinctions of haber- 
 dashery, without making any needless display of such in- 
 dependence. He could dine with Sir Robert Peel 
 one day, and the next day sup off bread and cheese with 
 equal relish at a farmliouse, and relate with equal enjoy- 
 ment at the one place what he had heard and seen at the 
 other. 
 
 He was indeed as free from vanity as any man, in spite 
 of the attention Avhich his books drew towards him. If he 
 liked to write, and recite, and print his own occasional 
 verses, it was simply that he himself was interested in 
 them at the time — interested in the subject — in the com- 
 position, and amused with the very printing; but he was 
 
 [ 92 ]
 
 DEATH OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 equally amused with anything his friends had said or 
 written — repeating it everywhere with ahnost dispropor- 
 tionate relish. And this surely is not a usual mark of 
 vanity. Indeed, had he had more vanity, he would have 
 written much less instead of so much, would have altered, 
 and polished, and condensed. Whereas it was all first im- 
 pulse with him; he would never correct his own verses, 
 though he was perfectly ready to let his friends alter what 
 they chose in them — nay, ask them to do so, so long as he 
 was not called on to assist. 
 
 It was the same with his correspondence, which was 
 one great amusement of his later years. He wrote off 
 as he thought and felt, never pausing to turn a sentence, 
 or to point one; and he was quite content to receive an 
 equally careless reply, so long as it came. He was con- 
 tent with a poem so long as it was good in the main, with- 
 out minding those smaller beauties which go to make up 
 perfection — content with a letter that told of health and 
 goodwill, with very little other news — and content with 
 a friend who had the average virtues and accomplishments 
 of men, without being the faultless monster which the 
 world never saw, but so many are half their lives look- 
 ing for. 
 
 It was the same with his conversation. He never 
 dressed himself for it, whatever company he was going 
 into. He would quote his favourite poems in a farm- 
 house, and tell his humorous Suif oik stories in the genteel- 
 est drawing-room — what came into his head at the impulse 
 of the moment came from his tongue ; a thing not in gen- 
 
 [ 93 ]
 
 DEATH OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 eral commendable, but whollj^ pleasant and harmless in 
 one so innocent, so kind, and so agreeable as himself. 
 
 He was excellent company in all companies ; but in none 
 more than in homely parties, in or out of doors, over the 
 winter's fire in the farmliouse, or under the tree in sum- 
 mer. He had a cheery word for all ; a challenge to good 
 fellowship with the old — a jest with the young — enjoy- 
 ing all, and making all enjoyable and joyous. INIany 
 hereabout will long look to that place in their rooms where 
 this good, amiable, and pleasant man used to sit, and 
 spread good-humour around him. Nor can the present 
 writer forget the last out-of-door party he enjoyed with 
 this most amiable man ; it was in last Jmie, down his fa- 
 vourite river Deben to the sea. Though far from Avell, 
 when once on board, he would be cheerful; was as lively 
 and hearty as any at the little inn at which we disem- 
 barked to refresh ourselves; and had a word of cheery 
 salute for every boat or vessel that passed or met us as 
 we drifted home again with a dying breeze at close of 
 evening. 
 
 He was not learned, in languages, or in science of any 
 kind. Even the loftier poetry of our own comitry he did 
 not much affect. He loved the masters of the homely, the 
 ])athetic, and the humorous — Crabbe, Cowper, and Gold- 
 smith — for it may surprise many readers of his poems 
 that he had as great relish for humour — good-humoured 
 humour — as any man. And few of his friends will forget 
 him as he used to sit at table, his snufF-lK)x in hand, and 
 a glass of genial wine befoi-e him as he repeated some 
 
 [ 94 ]
 
 DEATH OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 humorous passage from one of his favourites, glancing 
 his fine brown eyes around the company as he recited. 
 Amongst prose works, his great favourite was Sir Walter 
 Scott — him he was never tired of reading. He would not 
 allow that one novel was bad, and the best were to him 
 the best of all books. For the last four winters, the 
 present writer has gone through several of these master- 
 pieces with him — generally one night in the week was so 
 employed— Saturday night, which left him free to the 
 prospect of the Sunday's relaxation. Then was the vol- 
 ume taken down impatiently from the shelf, almost before 
 tea was over; and at last when all was ready, candle 
 snuffed, and fire stirred, he would read out, or listen to, 
 those fine stories, one after another, anticipating with a 
 smile, or a glance, the pathetic or humorous turns that 
 were coming — that he relished all the more because he 
 knew they were coming — enjoying all as much the twen- 
 tieth time of reading as he had done at the fii'st — till sup- 
 per coming in, closed the book, and recalled him to his 
 genial hospitality, which knew no limit. It was only on 
 Friday last we finished the " Heart of Midlothian," which 
 he enjoyed, however ill at ease; on Sunday he wanted to 
 know when we should begin another novel, and on Mon- 
 day night, after a little mortal agony (to use the words 
 of one who loved him best, and by him was best beloved 
 of all the world) , that warm kind heart was still for ever. 
 It would not be fitting to record in a public paper the 
 domestic virtues of a private man, but Bernard Barton 
 was a public man; and the public is pleased, or should be 
 
 [ 95 ]
 
 FUNERAL OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 pleased, to kiiow that a writer really is as amiable as his 
 books pretend. No common ease, especially in the poetic 
 line, where the verj^ sensibilities that constitute poetic feel- 
 ing are most apt to revolt at the little rubs of common 
 life. Scarce a j^ear has elapsed since the death of one of 
 his oldest and dearest friends — Major INIoor — whose 
 praise he justly celebrated in verse. Major Moor was 
 also as well known to the pubhc by his books, as much 
 beloved by a large circle of friends. These two men were, 
 perhaps, of equal abilities, though of a different kind; 
 their virtues equal and the same. Long does the memory 
 of such men haimt the places of their mortal abode ; stir- 
 ring within us, perhaps, at the close of many a day, as the 
 sun sets over the scenes with which they were so long as- 
 sociated. It is surely not improper to endeavour to record 
 something to the honour of such men in their own neigh- 
 bourhoods. Nay, should we not, if we could, make their 
 histories as public as possible, for sui'ely none could 
 honour them without loving them, and, perhaps, uncon- 
 sciously striving to follow in their footsteps. 
 
 [The Ipswich Journal, 24th February, ISIQ.] 
 
 FUNEEAL OF BeRNAED BaRTON. 
 
 WooDnRroGE. — On Monday Feb. 26, the mortal remains 
 of Bernard Barton were committed to the earth. A long 
 train of members of the Society to which lie belonged, 
 and of old friends and fellow-townsmen, waited to follow 
 him from the door from which he had so often been seen 
 
 [ 96 ]
 
 FUNERAL OF BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 to issue alive and welcome to all eyes. Thus attended, 
 the coffin was borne up the street to the cemetery of the 
 Friends' Meeting-house; and there, surrounded by the 
 grave and decent Brotherhood, and amid the affecting 
 silence of their ceremonial, broken but once by the warn- 
 ing voice of one reverent elder, was lowered down into its 
 final resting-place. 
 
 Lay him gently in the ground, 
 
 The good, the genial, and the wise; 
 While Spring blows forward in the skies 
 
 To breathe new verdure o'er the mound 
 Where the kindly Poet lies. 
 
 Gently lay him in his place, 
 
 Wliile the still Brethren round him stand ; 
 
 The soul indeed is far away. 
 
 But we would reverence the clay 
 
 In which so long she made a stay, 
 
 Beaming through the friendly face. 
 And holding forth the honest hand — 
 
 Thou, that didst so often twine 
 For other urns the funeral song, 
 One who has known and lov'd thee long, 
 Would, ere he mingles with the throng, 
 
 Just hang this little wreath on thine. 
 
 Farewell, thou spirit kind and true; 
 Old Friend, for evermore Adieu! 
 IThe Ipswich Journal, 3rd March, 1849.] 
 
 [ 97 ]
 
 THE REV. GEORGE CRABBE. 
 
 Sept. 16. Of epilepsy, aged 72, the Rev. George Crabbe, 
 Vicar of Bredfield, near Woodbridge, eldest son and 
 biographer of the celebrated poet. 
 
 He was born Nov. IG, 1785, at Stathern in Leicester- 
 shire ; educated at Ipswich Grammar School ; took his de- 
 gree in 1807, at Trinity College, Cambridge; a year after 
 was ordained deacon, and entered on the curacy of Ailing- 
 ton in Lincolnsliire, where he continued till 1811, when 
 he went to reside at Trowbridge, in Wiltshire, to which 
 Rectory his father had just been presented by the Duke 
 of Rutland. 
 
 In 1815 he gave up his duty and took to residing mainly 
 in London, taking various walking excursions through 
 the kingdom. In 1817 he married Caroline JNIatilda 
 Timbrell of Trowbridge, and took the curacy of Puckle- 
 churcli in Gloucestershire, where he continued 18 years. 
 It was in 1832, that, his father dying, and a complete 
 edition of his Poems being called for, INIr. Crabbe con- 
 tributed the volume containing the Poet's life, one of the 
 most delightful memoirs in the language. In 1834 he 
 was presented l)y Lord Chancellor Lyndhurst to the vicar- 
 ages of Bredfield and Petistree, in Suffolk, in the former 
 of which lie built a parsonage, and contimied residing 
 till his death. Of his numerous family five children alone 
 survive him, of whom the eldest son George, in holy or- 
 
 r 98 ]
 
 THE REV. GEORGE CRABBE. 
 
 ders, is Rector of Merton, Norfolk, and the second, 
 Thomas, is in Austraha; the remaining three are daugh- 
 ters. Besides his father's biography Mr. Crabbe was 
 author of a volimie of " Natural Theology," on the plan 
 and in the form of " The Bridgewater Treatises," and of 
 several Theological and Scientific Tracts published inde- 
 pendently or in magazines. 
 
 To manhood's energy of mind, and great bodily 
 strength, he united the boy's heart; as much a boy at 
 seventy as boys need be at seventeen; as chivalrously 
 hopeful, trustful, ardent, and courageous; as careless of 
 riches, as intolerant of injustice and oppression, as in- 
 capable of all that is base, little, and mean. With this 
 heroic temper were joined the errors of that over-much 
 affection, rashness in judgment and act, liability to sud- 
 den and violent emotions, to sudden and sometimes im- 
 reasonable like and dislike ; and, in defiance of experience 
 and probability, over-confidence — not in himself, for he 
 was almost morbidly self-distrustful — but in the cause he 
 had at heart, that it must bring about the result he desired. 
 One of those he was whose hearts, wild, but never going 
 astray, are able only to breathe in the better and nobler 
 elements of humanity. 
 
 Under a somewhat old-fashioned acquiescence with in- 
 different things and people he covered a heart that would 
 have gladly defied death in vindication of any vital truth, 
 often most loudly proclaiming what might most hkely 
 compromise himself; a passionate advocate of enquiry 
 and freedom and progress in all ways — civil, religious, 
 
 [ 99 ]
 
 THE REV. GEORGE CRABBE. 
 
 and scientijfic; as passionate a hater of all that would re- 
 tard or fetter it; and sometimes inclined to defend a 
 dogma because bold and new and likely to be assailed. 
 For there was much of the noble and Cervantic humourist 
 in him, beside a certain quaintness of taste, resulting from 
 a simple nature, brought up in simple habits and much 
 country seclusion. And if a boy in feeling, he was a child 
 in expressing his feelings, especially of enjoyment in 
 little and simple things, which those more pampered by 
 the world mistook for insincere. And whatever his in- 
 tolerance of verse, he was far more the poet's son than he 
 believed, bowing his white head with more than botanic 
 welcome over the flower which reminded him of child- 
 hood, and convinced him of the Creator's sympathetic 
 provision for his creatures' sense of beaut j^ ; or in some of 
 his long and strong walks, whether in solitary medita- 
 tion or earnest conversation on the only subject he cared 
 for, stopping to admire some little obscure parish church 
 in which he could discern cathedral proportions, or to 
 lament over some felled oak-trees, by whose however need- 
 ful fall, he declared the guilty landowner " scandalously 
 " misused the globe." For like many magnanimous men 
 he had a passion for great trees and buildings; itideed, an 
 aptitude for architecture, which, if duly cultivated, might 
 have become his real genius. 
 
 Not long before his death he left a short paper to be 
 read by his children immediately after it, affirming up to 
 the last period of responsible thought, that he was satisfied 
 with the convictions he had so carefully come to; bidding 
 
 [ 100 ]
 
 THE REV. GEORGE CRABBE. 
 
 nobody mourn over one who had lived so long, and on the 
 whole so happily; and desiring to be buried as simply as 
 he had lived, " in any vacant space on the south side of 
 " the churchyard." Thither, accordingly, he was carried, 
 on Tuesday, Sept. 22 ; and there, attended by many more 
 than were invited, and scarce one but with some funeral 
 crape about him, were it no bigger than that about the 
 soldier's arm, was laid in death among the poor whose 
 friend he had been ; while the descending September sun 
 of one of the finest summers in living memory, broke out 
 to fling a farewell beam into the closing grave of as gen- 
 erous a man as he is likely to rise upon again. 
 
 E. F. G. 
 
 [^The Gentleman's Magazine, Lond., Nov. 1857, pp. 562-3.] 
 
 [ 101 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS 
 IN CRABBE. 
 
 " Tales of the Hall," says the Poet's son and biog- 
 rapher, occupied his father during the years 1817, 1818, 
 and were pubUshed by John ^Murray in the following 
 year under the present title, which he suggested, instead 
 of that of " Remembrances," which had been originally 
 proposed. 
 
 The plan and nature of the work are thus described by 
 the author himself in a letter written to his old friend, 
 Mary Leadbeater, and dated October 30, 1817: 
 
 " I know not how to describe the new, and probably (most 
 probably) the last work I shall publish. Though a village is the 
 scene of meeting between my two principal characters, and gives 
 occasion to other characters and relations in general, yet I no 
 more describe the manners of village inhabitants. My people are 
 of superior classes, though not the most elevated ; and, with a 
 few exceptions, are of educated and cultivated minds and habits. 
 I do not know, on a general view, whether my tragic or lighter 
 Tales, etc., are most in number. Of those equally well executed, 
 the tragic will, I suppose, make the greater impression; but I 
 know not that it requires more attention." 
 
 " The plan of the work," says Jeffrey, in a succinct, if not quite 
 exact, epitome — " for it has more of plan and unity than any of 
 Mr. Crabbe's former productions — is abundantly simple. Two 
 brothers, both past middle age, meet together for the first time 
 
 [ 102 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 since their infancy, in the Hall of their native parish, which the 
 elder and richer had purchased as a place of retirement for liis 
 declining age; and there tell each other their own history, and 
 then that of their guests, neighbours, and acquaintances. The 
 senior is much the richer, and a bachelor — having been a little 
 distasted with the sex by the unlucky result of a very extravagant 
 passion. He is, moreover, rather too reserved, and somewhat 
 Toryish, though with an excellent heart and a powerful under- 
 standing. The younger is very sensible also, but more open, 
 social, and talkative ; a happy husband and father, with a tendency 
 to Whiggism, and some notion of reform, and a disposition to 
 think well both of men and women. The visit lasts two or three 
 weeks in autumn ; and the Tales are told in the after-dinner 
 tete-a-tetes that take place in that time between the worthy 
 brothers over their bottle. 
 
 " The married man, however, wearies at length for his wife 
 and children ; and his brother lets him go with more coldness 
 than he had expected. He goes with him a stage on the way ; 
 and, inviting him to turn aside a little to look at a new purchase 
 he had made of a sweet farm with a neat mansion, he finds his 
 wife and children comfortably settled there, and all ready to re- 
 ceive them ; and speedily discovers that he is, by his brother's 
 bounty, the proprietor of a fair domain within a morning's ride 
 of the Hall, where they may discuss politics, and tell tales any 
 afternoon they may think proper." — Edinburgh Review, 1819. 
 
 The Scene has also changed with Drama and Dramatis 
 Personse: no longer now the squalid purlieus of old, in- 
 habited by paupers and ruffians, with the sea on one side, 
 and as barren a heath on the other; in place of that, a 
 village, with its tidy homestead and well-to-do tenant, 
 
 [ 103 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 scattered about an ancient Hall, in a weU-wooded, well- 
 watered, well-cultivated country, within easy reach of a 
 thriving country town, and 
 
 " West of the waves, and just beyond the sound," 
 
 of that old familiar sea, which (with all its sad associa- 
 tions) the Poet never liked to leave far behind him.* 
 
 When he wrote the letter above quoted (two years be- 
 fore the publication of his book) he knew not whether 
 his tragic exceeded the lighter stories in quantity, though 
 he supposed they would leave the deeper impression on 
 the reader. In the completed work I find the tragic 
 stories fewer in number, and, to my thinking, assuredly 
 not more impressive than such as are composed of that 
 mingled yarn of grave and gay of which the kind of life 
 he treats of is, I suppose, generally made up. " Nature's 
 sternest Painter " may have mellowed Avith a prosperous 
 old age, and, from a comfortable grand-climacteric, liked 
 to contemplate and represent a brighter aspect of human- 
 ity than his earlier life afforded him. Anyliow, he has 
 here selected a subject whose character and circumstance 
 require a lighter touch and shadow less dark than such 
 as he formerly delineated. 
 
 ' "It was, J think, in the summer of 1787, that my father" (then 
 living in the Pale of Belvoir) "mas seised, one fine summer's day, 
 nnth so intense a longing to see the sea, from which he had never 
 before been so long absent, that he mounted his horse, rode alone to 
 the coast of lAncolnshire, si.rfy miles from his house, dipped in the 
 waves that washed the beach of Aldborough, and returned to 
 Stathern." — (From the Poet's Biography, written by his son.) 
 
 [ 101 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 Those who now tell their own as well as their neigh- 
 bours' stories are much of the Poet's own age as well as 
 condition of hfe, and look back (as he may have looked) 
 with what Sir Walter Scott calls a kind of humorous 
 retrospect over their own Uves, cheerfully extending to 
 others the same kindly indulgence which they solicit for 
 themselves. The book, if I mistake not, deals rather with 
 the follies than with the vices of men, with the comedy 
 rather than the tragedy of life. Assuredly there is scarce 
 anything of that brutal or sordid villainy^ of which one 
 has more than enough in the Poet's earlier work. And 
 even the more sombre subjects of the book are relieved 
 by the colloquial intercourse of the narrators, which twines 
 about every story, and, letting in occasional glimpses of 
 the country round, encircles them aU with something of 
 dramatic unity and interest, insomuch that of all the 
 Poet's works this one alone does not leave a more or less 
 melancholy impression upon me; and, as I am myself 
 more than old enough to love the sunny side of the wall, 
 is on that account, I do not say the best, but certainly that 
 which best I Hke, of all his numerous offspring. 
 
 Such, however, is not the case, I think, with Crabbe's 
 few readers, who, like Lord Byron, chiefly remember him 
 by the sterner realities of his earlier work. Nay, quite 
 recently Mr. Leslie Stephen, in that one of his admirable 
 essays which analyses the Poet's peculiar genius, says: 
 
 ^ I think, only one story of the baser sort — "Gretna Green" — a cap- 
 ital, if not agreeable, little drama in which all the characters defeat 
 themselves by the very means they take to deceive others. 
 
 [ 105 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 " The more humorous portions of these performances may be 
 briefly dismissed. Crabbe possessed the facult}', but not in any 
 eminent degree; his tramp is a Httle heavy, and one must remem- 
 ber that Mr. Tovell and liis like were of the race who require to 
 have a joke driven into tlieir heads by a sledge-hammer. Some- 
 times, indeed, we come upon a sketch which may help to explain 
 Miss Austen's admiration. There is an old maid devoted to china, 
 and rejoicing in stuffed parrots and puppies, who might have been 
 another Emma Woodhouse; and a Parson who might have suited 
 the Eltons admirably." 
 
 The spinster of the stuffed parrot indicates, I suppose, 
 the heroine of " Procrastination " in another series of 
 tales. But Miss Austen, I think, might also have ad- 
 mired another, although more sensible, spinster in these, 
 who tells of her girlish and only love while living with 
 the grandmother \vho maintained her gentility in the little 
 to^vii she lived in at the cost of such little economies as 
 " would scarce a parrot keep ; " and the story of the ro- 
 mantic friend who, having proved the vanity of human 
 bliss by the supposed death of a young lover, has devoted 
 herself to his memory, insomuch that as she is one fine 
 autumnal day protesting in her garden that, were he to 
 be restored to her in all his youthful beauty, she would 
 renounce the real rather than surrender the ideal Hero 
 aAvaiting her elsewhere, behold him advancing toward 
 her in the person of a prosperous, ]iortly merchant, who 
 reclaims, and. after some little hesitation on her part, re- 
 tains her hand. 
 
 [ 106 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 There is also an old Bachelor whom Miss Austen might 
 have liked to hear recounting the matrimonial attempts 
 which have resulted in the full enjoyment of single 
 blessedness; his father's sarcastic indifference to the first, 
 and the haughty defiance of the mother of the girl he first 
 loved. And when the young lady's untimely death has 
 settled that question, his own indifference to the bride his 
 own mother has provided for him. And when that scheme 
 has failed, and yet another after that, and the Bachelor 
 feels himself secure in the consciousness of more than 
 middle life having come upon him, his being captivated 
 — and jilted — by a country Miss, toward whom he is so 
 imperceptibly drawn at her father's house that 
 
 " Time after time the maid went out and in. 
 Ere love was yet beginning to begin; 
 The first awakening proof, the early doubt, 
 Rose from observing she went in and out." 
 
 Then there is a fair Widow, who, after wearing out 
 one husband with her ruinous tantrums, fuids herself all 
 the happier for being denied them by a second. And 
 when he too is dead, and the probationary year of mourn- 
 ing scarce expired, her scarce ambiguous refusal (fol- 
 lowed by acceptance) of a third suitor, for whom she is 
 now so gracefully wearing her weeds as to invite a 
 fourth. 
 
 If " Love's Delay " be of a graver complexion, is there 
 not some even graceful comedy in " Love's Natural 
 
 [ 107 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 Death ; " some broad comedy — too true to be farce — in 
 " William Bailey's " old housekeeper; and up and down 
 the book surelj^ many passages of gayer or graver hu- 
 moui" such as the Squire's satire on Iiis own house and 
 farm; his brother's account of the Vicar, whose daughter 
 he married; the gallery of portraits in the "Cathedral 
 Walk," besides many a shrewd remark so tersely put that 
 I should call them epigram did not INIr. Stephen think 
 the Poet incapable of such; others so covertly implied as 
 to remind one of old John Murray's remark on Mr. 
 Crabbe's conversation — that he said uncommon things in 
 so common a way as to escape notice; though assuredly 
 not the notice of so shrewd an observer as Mr. Stephen 
 if he cared to listen, or to read? 
 
 Nevertheless, with all my own partiality for this book, 
 I must acknowledge that, while it shares with the Poet's 
 other works in his characteristic disregard of form and 
 diction — of all indeed that is now called "Art " — it is yet 
 more chargeable with diff useness, and even with some in- 
 consistencj'^ of character and circumstance, for which the 
 large canvas he had taken to work on, and perhaps some 
 weariness in filling it up,* may be in some measure ac- 
 
 ' A Journal that he hepi in 1817 shows that some part of the hook 
 nms composed, not in the leisiireli/ quiet of his countri/ Parsonage, or 
 the fields around it, hut at the self-imposed rate of Ihirli/ lines a day, 
 in the intervals hetween the dejeuners, dinners, and soirees of a Lon- 
 don season, in which, "seeing much that was new," he sai/s: "I was 
 perhaps something of a novelty myself" — was, iii fact, the new lion 
 in fashion. 
 
 " July 5. — My thirty lines done, hut not very well, I fear. Thirty 
 daily is the self-engagement. 
 
 " July 8. — Thirty lines to-day, hut not yesterday. Must work up. 
 
 [ K'8 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 countable. So that, for one reason or another, but very 
 few of Crabbe's few readers care to encounter the book. 
 And hence this attempt of mine to entice them to it by 
 an abstract, omitting some of the stories, retrenching 
 others, either by excision of some parts, or the reduction 
 of others into as concise prose as would comprehend the 
 substance of much prosaic verse. 
 
 Not a very satisfactory sort of medley in any such case ; 
 I know not if more or less so where verse and prose are 
 often so near akin. I see, too, that in some cases they are 
 too patchily intermingled. But I have tried, though not 
 always successfully, to keep them distinct, and to let the 
 Poet run on by himself whenever in his better vein; in 
 two cases — that of the " Widow " and " Love's Natural 
 Death " — without any interruption of my own, though 
 not without large deductions from the author in the for- 
 mer story. 
 
 On the other hand, more than as many other stories 
 have shrunk under my hands into seeming disproportion 
 with the Prologue by which the Poet introduces them, 
 insomuch as they might almost as well have been can- 
 
 " July 10. — Make up my thirty lines for yesterday and to-day. 
 
 "Sunday, July 15 (after a sermon at St. James's, in which the 
 preacher thought proper to apologize for a severity which he had not 
 used). Write some lines in the solitude of Somerset House, not fifty 
 yards from the Thames on one side, and the Strand on the other; but 
 as quiet as the sands of Arabia." 
 
 Then leaving London for his Trowbridge home, and staying by the 
 way at the house of a friend near Wycombe — 
 
 " July 23. — A vile engagement to an Oratorio at the church by I 
 know not how many noisy people, women as well as men. Luckily, I 
 sat where I could write unobserved, and wrote forty lines, only inter- 
 rupted by a song of Mrs. Brand (Bland?) — a hymn, I believe. It 
 was less doleful than the rest." 
 
 [ 109 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 celled were it not for carrjang their introduction away 
 with them.' 
 
 And such alterations have occasionally necessitated a 
 change in some initial article or particle connecting two 
 originally separated paragraphs, of which I subjoin a list, 
 as also of a few that have inadvertently crept into the text 
 from the margin of my copy; all, I thought, crossed out 
 before going to press. For any poetaster can amend 
 many a careless expression which blemishes a passage 
 that none but a poet could indite. 
 
 I have occasionally transposed the original text, espe- 
 cially when I thought to make the narrative run clearer 
 by so doing. For in that respect, whether from lack or 
 laxity of constructive skill, Crabbe is apt to wander and 
 lose himself and his reader. This was shown especially 
 in some prose novels, which at one time he tried his hand 
 on, and (his son tells us), under good advice, conmiitted 
 to the fire. 
 
 I have replaced in the text some readings from the 
 Poet's original MS. quoted in his son's standard edition, 
 several of which appeared to me fresher, terser, and (as 
 so often the case) more apt than the second thought after- 
 ward adopted.^ 
 
 ' As "Itirhnrd'.i Jealousy," "Sir Owen Dale's Rerenge." the "Cathe- 
 dral JValk," in ii'hirli the Port's diffuse treatment seemed to vie 
 scarcely compensated by the interest of the story. 
 " A curious instance occurs in that fair Widow's story, when the 
 original 
 
 " Would ynu hnUfnif it, Richard, that fair sh» 
 Has had thrm hiishands — I repeat it, three/" 
 
 ts supplanted by the very enigmatical couplet: 
 
 " Would you heliei'e it, Richard? that fair dame 
 Has thrice retign'd and reasfumed her name." 
 
 r 110 1
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 Mr. Stephen has said — and surely said well — that, with 
 all its short- and long-comings, Crabbe's better work 
 leaves its mark on the reader's mind and memory as only 
 the work of genius can, while so many a more splendid 
 vision of the fancy slips away, leaving scarce a wrack be- 
 hind. If this abiding impression result (as perhaps in 
 the case of Richardson or Wordsworth) from being, as 
 it were, soaked in through the longer process by which the 
 man's peculiar genius works, any abridgement, whether 
 of omission or epitome, will diminish from the effect of 
 the whole. But, on the other hand, it may serve, as I have 
 said, to attract a reader to an original which, as appears 
 in this case, scarce anybody now cares to venture upon in 
 its integrity. 
 
 I feel bound to make all apology for thus dealing with 
 a Poet whose works are ignored, even if his name be 
 known, by the readers and writers of the present genera- 
 tion.* " Pope in worsted stockings " he once was called ; 
 
 * The final edition of 1883 continues as follows instead of as above: — 
 
 " Pope in worsted stockings," he has been called. But 
 in truth, the comparison, such as it is, scarcely reaches 
 beyond Crabbe's earliest essays. For in " The Village," 
 which first made him popular, he set out with Goldsmith 
 rather than with Pope, though toward a very different 
 object than " Sweet Auburn." And then, after nearly 
 twenty years' silence (a rare interval for a successful au- 
 thor), appeared a volume of " Tales"; and after them 
 " The Parish Register," accompanied with " Sir Eustace 
 and those stockings, it must be admitted, often down at 
 
 [ HI ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 heel, and begrimed by many a visit among the dreary 
 resorts of "pauvre et triste humanite." And if Pope, in 
 his silken court suit, scarcely finds admittance to the mod- 
 ern Parnassus, how shall Crabbe with his homely gear and 
 awkwarder gait? Why had he not kept to level prose, 
 more suitable, some think, to the subject he treats of, and 
 to his own genius? As to subject. Pope, who said that 
 ]Man was man's proper study, treated of finer folks in- 
 deed, but not a whit more or less than men and women, 
 nor the more life-like for the compliment or satire with 
 which he set them off. And, for the manner, he and 
 
 Grey," and by-and-by followed " The Borough " : in all 
 of which the style differed as much from that of Pope as 
 the character and scene they treated of from the Wits and 
 Courtiers of Twickenham and Hampton Court. But all 
 so sharply delineated as to make Lord Byron, according 
 to the comprehensive and comfortable form of decision 
 that is never out of date, pronounce him to be Nature's 
 best, if sternest, painter. 
 
 In the present " Tales of the Hall," the Poet, as I have 
 said, has in some measure shifted his grovmd, and Comedy, 
 whose shrewder — not to say more sardonic — element ran 
 through his earlier work, here discovers sometliing of her 
 ligliter humour. Not that the Poet's old Tragic power, 
 whether of Terror or Pity, is either absent or abated; as 
 witness the story of " Ruth "; and that of " The Sisters," 
 of whom one, with the simple piety that has held her up 
 against the storm which has overtaken them both, devotes 
 
 [ "2 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 Horace in his Epistles and Satires, and the comedy- 
 writers of Greece, Rome, Spain, and France, availed 
 themselves of Verse, through which ( and especially when 
 clenched with rhyme) the condensed expression, accord- 
 ing to Montaigne, rings out as breath through a trumpet. 
 I do not say that Comedy (whose Dramatic form Crabbe 
 never aimed at) was in any wise his special vocation, 
 though its shrewder — not to say, saturnine — element runs 
 through all except his earliest work, and somewhat of its 
 lighter humour is revealed in his last. And, if Verse has 
 been the chosen organ of Comedy proper, it assuredly can- 
 
 herself to the care of her whom it has bewildered, as she 
 wanders alone in the deepening gloom of evening, 
 
 " Or cries at mid-day, ' Then Good-night to all ! ' " 
 
 And to prove how the Poet's landscape hand has not 
 slackened in its cunning, we may accompany the Brothers 
 in their morning ramble to the farm; or Richard on his 
 horse to the neighbouring town; or at a respectful dis- 
 tance observe those two spinsters conversing in their gar- 
 den on that so still autumnal day, 
 
 " When the wing'd insect settled in our sight, 
 And waited wind to recommence her flight," 
 
 till interrupted by the very substantial apparition of him 
 who ought long ago to have been a Spirit in heaven. 
 
 But " Tragedy, Comedy, Pastoral," all that, applauded 
 as it was by contemporary critics and representatives of 
 
 [ lis ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 not be less suitable for the expression of those more serious 
 passions of which this Poet most generally treats, and 
 which are nowhere more absolutely developed than amid 
 the classes of men with which he had been so largely in- 
 terested. And whatever one may think Crabbe makes of 
 it, verse was the mode of utterance to which his genius led 
 him from fii'st to last (his attempt at prose having failed) ; 
 and if we are to have him at all, we must take him in his 
 own way. 
 
 Is he tlien, whatever shape he may take, worth making 
 
 literature, contributed to make this writer generally read 
 in the first quarter of this century, has left of him to the 
 present generation but the empty echo of a name, unless 
 such as may recall the 
 
 " John Richard William Alexander Dwyer " 
 
 of the " Rejected Addresses." Miss Austen, indeed, who 
 is still so much renowned for her representation of genteel 
 humanity, was so imaccountably smitten with Crabbe in 
 his worsted hose, that she playfully declared slie would 
 not refuse him for her husband. That Sir Walter Scott, 
 with his wider experience of mankind, could listen to the 
 reading of him when no longer able to hold the book for 
 himself, may pass for little in these days when tlie Lam- 
 niermoors and Midlothians are almost as much eclipsed 
 by modern fiction as " The Lady of tlie Lake " and 
 " Marmion " by the poetic revelations which have ex- 
 tinguished Crabbe. Nevertlieless, among the many ob- 
 
 [ "14 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 room for in our overcrowded heads and libraries? If the 
 verdict of such critics as Jeffrey and Wilson be set down 
 to contemporary partiality or inferior " culture," there is 
 Miss Austen, who is now so great an authority in the 
 representation of genteel humanity, so unaccountably 
 smitten with Crabbe in his worsted hose that she is said 
 to have pleasantly declared he was the only man whom she 
 would care to marry.' If Sir Walter Scott and Byron 
 are but xmasthetic judges of the Poet, there is Words- 
 worth, who was suiRciently exclusive in admitting any to 
 
 solete authorities of yesterday, there is yet one — William 
 Wordsworth — who now rules, where once he was least, 
 among the sacred Brotherhood to which he was exclusive 
 enough in admitting others, and far too honest to make 
 any exception out of compliment to anyone on any oc- 
 casion; he did, nevertheless, thus write to the Poet's son 
 and biographer in 1834:" "Any testimony to the merit 
 of your revered father's works would, I feel, be super- 
 fluous, if not impertinent. They will last, from their com- 
 bined merits as poetry and truth, full as long as anything 
 that has been expressed in verse since they first made their 
 appearance " — a period which, be it noted, includes all 
 Wordsworth's own volumes except " Yarrow Revisited," 
 " The Prelude," and " The Borderers." And Words- 
 worth's living successor to the laurel no less participates 
 
 ' 7 will add what, in his lately published "Reminiscences," Mr. Moz- 
 ley tells us, that Crabbe 7iias a favourite with no less shrewd a reader 
 of Humanity than Cardinal Newman. 
 2 See Vol. II., p. 8i. of the complete Edition, 1834.. 
 
 [ 115 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 the sacred brotherhood in which he still reigns, and far 
 too honest to make any exception out of compliment to 
 anyone on any occasion — he did, nevertheless, thus write 
 to the Poet's son and biographer in 183-1: * " Any testi- 
 mony to the merit of your revered father's works would, 
 I feel, be superfluous, if not impertinent. They will last, 
 from their combined merits as poetry and truth, full as 
 long as anything that has been expressed in verse since 
 they first made their appearance " — a period which, be 
 it noted, includes all Wordsworth's own volumes except 
 
 with him in his appreciation of their forgotten brother. 
 Almost the last time I met him he was quoting from mem- 
 ory that fine passage in " Delay has Danger," where the 
 late autumn landscape seems to borrow from the con- 
 science-stricken lover who gazes on it the gloom which 
 it reflects upon him ; and in the course of further conversa- 
 tion on the subject, Mr. Tennyson added, " Crabbe has 
 a world of his own; " by virtue of that original genius, 
 I suppose, which is said to entitle, and carry, the possessor 
 to what we call Immortality. 
 
 Mr. Mozley, in his " Recollections of Oriel College," 
 has told us that Cardinal Newman was a great reader of 
 Crabbe in those early days ; and the Cardinal himself, in 
 one of his "Addresses to the Catholics of Dublin," pub- 
 lished in 1873, tells us that so he continued to be, and. for 
 
 ^See Vol. II., p. SJ,, of flu- complete Edition, 183^.. 
 
 [ 116 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 " Yarrow Revisited," " The Prelude," and " The Bor- 
 derers." And Wordsworth's living successor to the lam-el 
 no less participates with him in his appreciation of their 
 forgotten brother. Almost the last time I met him he was 
 quoting from memory that fine passage in " Delay has 
 Danger," where the late autumn landscape seems to bor- 
 row from the conscience-stricken lover who gazes on it 
 the gloom which it reflects upon him; and in the course 
 of further conversation on the subject, Mr. Tennyson 
 added, " Crabbe has a world of his own; " by virtue of 
 that original genius, I suppose, which is said to entitle, 
 and carry, the possessor to what we call Immortality.* 
 
 one reason, why. For in treating of what may be called 
 his Ideal of a University, he speaks of the insufficiency 
 of mere Book-learning toward the making of a Man, as 
 compared with that which the Richard of these " Tales " 
 imconsciously gathered in the sea-faring village where his 
 boyhood passed; and where — not from books (of which 
 he had scarce more than a fisherman's cottage supplied), 
 but from the seamen on the shore, and the solitary shep- 
 herd on the heath, and a pious mother at home — -" he con- 
 trived to fashion a philosophy and poetry of his own ; " 
 which, followed as it was by an active life on land and sea, 
 made of him the Man whom his more educated and pros- 
 perous brother contemplated with mingled self -regret 
 and pride. And the poem in which this is told is consid- 
 ered by Cardinal Newman as, " whether for conception 
 
 * [The Introduction to the first edition ends here.] 
 
 [ H7 ]
 
 INTRODUCTION TO READINGS IN CRABBE. 
 
 or execution, one of the most touching in our language," 
 which having read " on its fkst publication with extreme 
 delight," and again, thirty years after, with even more 
 emotion, and j'et again, twenty years after that, with un- 
 diminished interest, he concludes by saying that " a work 
 which can please in youth and age seems to fulfil (in 
 logical language) the accidental definition of a classic." 
 For a notice of this passage (which may be read at 
 large in Cardinal Newman's sixth Discourse delivered to 
 the Catholics of Dublin, p. 150. Edit. 1873) I am in- 
 debted to INIr. Leslie Stephen, against whom I ventured 
 to break a lance, and who has supplied me with one that 
 recoils upon myself for having mutilated a poem which 
 so great an authority looks on as so perfect. 
 
 [ 118 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 Prime: 
 
 " We prune our hedges, prime our slender trees, 
 And nothing looks untutored, or at ease." — Borough. 
 
 Moor defines "priming; pruning tlie lower, or wash 
 boughs of a tree." But Forby, " to trim up the stems; 
 to give them the first dressing in order to make them look 
 shapely " ; which accords more with the original meaning 
 of the word and with Crabbe's use of it. 
 
 But Crabbe has another word on the same subject, 
 which is not found in Moor or Forby — and where else? — 
 in such a sense ; in which sense I am persuaded it was used, 
 by some Suffolk people at least, from whom Crabbe 
 caught it carelessly up. It has the true Suffolk stamp 
 about it. 
 
 " Where those dark shrubs, that now grow wild at will. 
 Were chpped in form, and tantalized with skill." 
 
 — Parish Register. 
 
 We should now, perhaps, say " titivated." 
 
 Tantalize, Dogmatize, Moralize, etc., we are all famil- 
 iarized with in some way or other. So much cannot be 
 said for another such word, as properly formed, which 
 Crabbe uses, but did not pick up in Suffolk, I think. A 
 too happy lover tells of having, in the midst of his own 
 exultation, met a poor unhappy man; 
 
 [ 119 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 " And I was thankful for the moral sight, 
 Which soberized the vast and wild delight." 
 
 Well, the word is worthy of the lines, and the lines of the 
 foolish story they wind up. And this inequality and dis- 
 proportion it is — this " loose screw " in so great a faculty, 
 together with great carelessness in his later poems, and 
 a want of what is called Art m all — that weighs down the 
 popularity of a writer, whose couplets Johnson, Pope, 
 and Dryden might have familiarly quoted, and whose 
 whole poems, with all their imperfections, will live, old 
 Wordsworth says, at least as long as anything written 
 since — including his own. 
 
 Conceit: In the sense of conception, noun and verb. 
 "I du conceit " — pronounced, of course, " concite." 
 
 Ruth's father and mother have been waiting for her 
 (the passage is so fine that it is even a pleasure to tran- 
 scribe, and I think no one will grudge to read it) from 
 morning till evening: 
 
 " Still she came not home; 
 Tiic night grew dark and yet she was not come; 
 Tiic east wind roared, the sea return'd the sound, 
 And the rain fell as if the world were drown'd. 
 There were no lights without ; and my good man. 
 To kindness frighten'd, with a groan began 
 To talk of Ruth, and praj' ; and then he took 
 The Bible down, and read the Holy Book ; 
 For he had learning; and when that was done, 
 Wc sat in silence — ' Wliithcr can we run? ' 
 [ 120 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 We said, and tlien ran frighten'd from the door. 
 For we could bear our own conceit no more." 
 
 What became of Ruth? Let every good East Anglian 
 who can afford it buy the book see. What a Dryden 
 hne, the fourth! 
 
 Like: As we take the word in full to the end of an 
 adjective; adjectiveZi/c^j not adjective/?/. 
 
 I am sorry to find this good old form supplanted by a 
 vile compound. Instead of the sky looking squally-like, 
 rainy-like, "my dear friends" will say "squallified, raini- 
 fied," etc., for which they deserve a round dozen. Fuimus 
 Troes. 
 
 But to return to Crabbe. His word occurs in another 
 passage, so fine that I miist transcribe — one of the best 
 glimpses of a ghost I know — because it is but a glimpse : 
 
 " I loved in summer on the heath to walk. 
 And seek the shepherd — shepherds love to talk;- — 
 His boy, his Joe, he said, from duty ran, 
 Took to the sea, and grew a fearless man — 
 On yonder knoll — the sheep were in the fold — 
 His spirit passed me, shivermg-like and cold; 
 I felt a fluttering, but I knew not how. 
 And heard him utter, like a whisper, " Now! " 
 Soon came a letter from a friend to tell 
 That he had fallen, and the hour he fell." 
 
 Dole: A word we are very familiar with, especially 
 on the coast, where Crabbe heard of it before his A B C : 
 
 [ 121 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 " His very soul was not his own ; he stole 
 As others ordered, and without a dole." 
 
 — Parish Register. 
 
 Without having any share in the plunder, as we know; 
 but I wonder if the word was generally understood? 
 Crabbe felt called on to explain it by a note in another 
 poem : 
 
 " He was a fisher from his earliest day, 
 And placed " (No ! no ! remember your old Aldbro' !) 
 
 " And shot his nets within the borough's bay ; 
 There by his skates, his herrings, and his soles, 
 He Hved, nor dreamed of Corporation-doles." ' 
 
 — Borough Election. 
 
 Lastly, the poet in several instances dismisses the final 
 s from the third person singular, after our oriental 
 fashion. I confess to a liking for this, partly because 
 of its ridding us of one hiss from our hissing language. 
 And why, as Forby asks, should there be such an addition 
 to this single person of the verb? He remarks that the 
 auxiliarj'' verbs do not follow the rule; and he quotes the 
 conjugation of Icelandic ber (porto) to prove that our 
 Suffolk usage has very ancient precedent in its favour: 
 first person ber, second ber, third ber — that is, " I bear, 
 you bear, he bear," just as we Suffolk people now talk. 
 Therefore, I say, that when Crabbe say so, it do not shock 
 
 * "7 am in formed that some erplanaiion is here necessart/. fhoui;h I 
 am ignorani for whnl rlasx of rentiers it ean he reqnireil." Anil lie 
 goes on to exjilain etienilhing; e.reept tlic word. irhirJi sim])!!/ means 
 a share, whether of a boat's earnings or of Corporation funds. 
 
 [ 122 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 me, though I would not adopt the usage from him at this 
 time of day. And, certainly, if I wrote verse meant to 
 last (as I am svu-e Crabbe's will last, though I am not sure 
 that he reckoned upon it), I would take care to stick to 
 the tongue that Shakespeare, Bacon, and our Bible have 
 fixed for us. 
 
 There are several instances in his books; but I content 
 myself with two : one of which was recited at the Literary 
 Fund Dinner by a poet, who never made any such mis- 
 takes — W. T. Fitz-Gerald — and the other passed without 
 a comment under Johnson's own eyes.* But the old 
 lion's eye was fast dimming then. 
 
 " When our relief from such resources rise. 
 All painful sense of obligation dies." 
 
 — Borough Curate. 
 
 " No ; cast by fortune on a frowning coast, 
 Which neither groves nor happy valleys boast," etc. 
 
 — Village. 
 
 To be sure, the rhyme might have misled him, must we 
 say? or, perhaps, what will sometimes happen, the other 
 plural noun in the sentence. 
 
 One maxim of Johnson's made a deep impression on 
 Crabbe's mind, says his Biographer: " Never fear put- 
 ting the strongest and best things you can think of into 
 the mouth of your speaker, whatever may be his condi- 
 
 * " He is not to think his copy wantonly defaced : a wet sponge will 
 wash all the red lines away, and leave the page clean." (Johnson on 
 returning the MS. of "The Village" to Sir Joshua.) 
 
 [ 123 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 tion." This reminds one a little of Goldsmith's joke, 
 that if Johnson had to make animals speak, his sprats 
 would talk as big as whales. Johnson certainly misrepre- 
 sented his own great powers by acting on his own advice ; 
 and his pupil, who has been called Nature's best and 
 sternest painter, and who certainly had as keen insight as 
 any into the larger half of human nature, sometimes loses 
 his strong outline bj' daubing over it. And this with sub- 
 jects he had been most familiar with. He does not make 
 fishes talk, but he himself talks of the porpoise ha\'ing 
 been seen rolling about the day before a gale — 
 
 " Dark as the cloud and furious as the storm." 
 
 And the sailor, come from sea, with his children on his 
 knees, and his friends about him, tells them of his dangers : 
 
 " When seas ran mountains hif^h, 
 When tempest raved, when horrors veiled the sky; 
 When in the yawning gulf far down we drove, 
 And gazed upon the billowy mount above. 
 Till up that mountain, swinging with the gale. 
 We view'd the horrors of the watery vale." 
 
 When did he ever hear the like at Aldbro', or elsewhere, 
 from a sailor's mouth ? Crabbe was thinking of Thomson 
 and the poets of the century which he was born in, and 
 out of wliich he had not quite risen into himself. Com- 
 pare the foregoing with the old shepherd's gliost, written 
 twenty years after, when, liowever, the poet began to 
 
 [ 124 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 err from carelessness, as formerly from mistaken care, 
 perhaps. 
 
 Having said thus much of the poet's " Suffolk," I must 
 give one word of it from the capital biography of him by 
 my noble old friend, his son George, Vicar of Bredfield, 
 now gone the way of his father. In the admirable ac- 
 count of Mr. Tovell's farm at Parham — a perfect Dutch 
 interior — he says that, while master and mistress were at 
 dinner at the main table in the room, the " female 
 servants " were " at a side table called a B outer." As I 
 could not for a long while get any explanation of this 
 word, I thought the meaning might be a table in a bight, 
 or bought, as sometimes called — that is, in an angle or 
 corner of the room. At last I heard of some farmers who 
 knew the thing well, that it was properly a "Boulter 
 table," a sort of covered hutch, with a machine inside to 
 boult the meal for household use ; and, when not so used, 
 with a cover or lid to go over, which might serve as a table 
 for a servant or a chance guest. And Boulter might be 
 pronounced Bowter in the same way as (Moor says, and 
 we all know) colt is pronounced cowt; cold, cowd; hold, 
 howd, etc. 
 
 Mr. Nail was not contented with this explanation, of 
 which the farmers made no sort of doubt; he derives the 
 word from Dutch and Flemish die booden, the domestic 
 servant. So people must please themselves between the 
 learned etymologist who has to cross the water for a 
 derivation, and the unetymological farmers who went no 
 
 [ 125 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 further for it than the thing itself, which thej' had been 
 famihar with from infancy. 
 
 One story draws another. The mention of ]Mr. Tovell's 
 farm has recalled it to my memory, and as it includes the 
 poet, his biographer, and one of the most venerable of old 
 Suffolk words, it shall close this gossip, and leave the 
 East Anglian to its usual tone and topics. Whoever has 
 read that account of Parham Farm will remember that, 
 not Mr. Tovell, but "his Missis," is the chief figure there. 
 She was aunt to the IMiss Elmy whom the poet married, 
 and used to boast that " she could screw up old Crabbe 
 like a fiddle." In the " Life " there is a story of this 
 good lady once finding one of her maids daring to scnib 
 — the parlour floor! — an office sacred to Mrs. Tovell her- 
 self. "You wash such floors as these! Get down to the 
 scullery ! As true 's God 's in heaven, here comes Lord 
 Rochford to call on Mr. Tovell ! " etc. And she whips off" 
 a scrubbing-apron, which she calls her "mantle," and goes 
 down to let his lordship in. It might have been this same 
 servant who, having been pursued one day by her mis- 
 tress, armed with a frying-pan, said, when the chase was 
 over, and she could draw breatli in safety : " Well, this 
 I will say: if an angel of Iliv'n was to come down and 
 live with Manther for missis, she could n't give satis- 
 faction." This the poet heard : and this his son told me — 
 some happy day — or happy night. 
 
 [From The East Anglian.l 
 
 t 126 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 ANECDOTE BIOGRAPHY. 
 
 At p. 238 of Mr. Timbs's very agreeable Anecdote Biog- 
 raphy ^ I read: — 
 
 " The author of a volume of Pen and Ink Sketches, 
 published in 1847, relates that he was introduced to 
 Crabbe at a Conversazione at the Beccles Philosophical 
 Institution. The poet was seated in Cowper's arm-chair, 
 the same which the Bard of Olney occupied at Mrs. Un- 
 win's. ' Pleased to see you, my young friend : very pleased 
 ' to see you,' said Crabbe to the author of the Sketches: 
 and after a little while he pointed to the fine portrait of 
 Burke by Sir Joshua Reynolds that himg near him, and 
 said, ' Very like, very like indeed. I was in Sir Joshua's 
 ' study when Burke sat for it. ^ A.' there was a man! If 
 ' you ever come to Trowbridge,' he added, ' you must call 
 ' at the Vicarage, and I '11 show you a sketch of Burke, 
 ' taken at Westminster Hall when he made his great 
 ' speech in the Warren Hastings case. Edmund left it 
 ' to me ; it is only a rude pencil drawing, but it gives more 
 ' of the orator than that picture does.' " 
 
 Having had the pleasure of knowing Beccles and the 
 poet Crabbe's family rather intimately, I was startled 
 with this new anecdote ; and, inquiring in both these quar- 
 ters, I find, first, that there never was a Philosophical In- 
 stitute at Beccles; nor ever a "Conversazione" except 
 one, in connexion with the Public Library, long after the 
 poet's death, nor Burke's portrait, nor Cowper's arm- 
 chair ever remembered in the town at all. 
 
 [ 127 ]
 
 CRABBE'S "SUFFOLK." 
 
 " Beccles," however, may be a slip of the author's or 
 transcriber's pen for Xorwich, where Crabbe usually 
 spent a day or two with INIrs. Opie when he came this way, 
 and where Cowper's arm-chair, at least, may very likely 
 have been produced at some such Conversazione; but 
 whence the portrait of Burke, at the painting of which 
 " I was in Sir Joshua's study," &c. ? As to the " pencil 
 " drawing" of Burke making " his great speech," and left 
 " by Edmund to me "! nothing is remembered of it by any 
 one of the poet's surviving family; one of whom, most 
 competent to speak, is quite certain that " it did not exist 
 " when the property was divided " between the poet's two 
 sons at his death; and such a relic was not likely to be 
 overlooked. The same person observes on the utter im- 
 probability of the language put into the poet's mouth: 
 "Ilowdifficult it was ever to get him to speak in the coun- 
 " try of the great people he fell in with in town;" how 
 very little given he was to invite strangers to his house: 
 " not always civil to such as broke in upon him," as a 
 celebrity: that whether "Edmund left it to me" were a 
 fact, such were "certainly not his words " in telling it ; 
 " he would have said ' Mr. Burke,' " l>eing, as every one 
 who knew him knows, somewhat over-formal in such 
 punctilio. 
 
 Parathina. 
 
 [From Notes and Queries. 18 Aug., I860.] 
 
 [ 128 ]
 
 EXTRACTS FROM FITZGERALD'S 
 
 LETTERS RELATING TO THE 
 
 "LAMB CALENDAR." 
 
 To J. R. Lowell. 
 
 Woodbridge, April A, 1878. 
 
 Now I enclose you a little work of mine which I hope 
 does no irreverence to the Man it talks of. It is meant 
 quite otherwise. I often got puzzled, in reading Lamb's 
 Letters, about some Data in his Life to which the Letters 
 referred; so I drew up the enclosed for my own behoof, 
 and then thought that others might be glad of it also. If 
 I set down his Miseries, and the one Failing for which 
 those Miseries are such a Justification, I only set down 
 what has been long and publicly known, and what, except 
 in a Noodle's eyes, must enhance the dear Fellow's char- 
 acter, instead of lessening it. ' Saint Charles! ' said 
 Thackeray to me thirty years ago, putting one of C. L.'s 
 letters ^ to his forehead; and old Wordsworth said of 
 him: ' If there be a Good Man, Charles Lamb is one! ' 
 
 To C. E. Norton. 
 
 Woodbridge, April 17, '78. 
 . . . Only you will certainly read my last Great 
 Work, which I enclose, drawn up first for my own benefit, 
 
 '^That to Bernard Barton about Mit ford's vases, December 1, 1824. 
 
 [ 129 ]
 
 "LAMB CALENDAR." 
 
 in reading Lamb's Letters, as now printed in hatches, to 
 his several Correspondents; and so I thought others than 
 myself might he glad of a few Data to refer the letters 
 to. Pollock calls my Paper ' Cotelette d'Agneau a la 
 minute.' 
 
 [The " Lamb Calendar," with additions in FitzGcrald's writing, is 
 printed in photographic facsimile herewith, by tlie kind permission of 
 the owner, Mr. W. Irving Way, of Chicago, and of Mr. J. A. Spoor, 
 for whose bibliograph}' of Lamb the plates were made. The foot- 
 notes printed in italics are fnrther additions by FitzGerald to the 
 copy used by Mr. W. Aldis Wright.] 
 
 1 
 I 
 
 [ l'"1 ]
 
 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 t77S Born February lo, in Crown Office Row, Middle Temple, 
 where his Father, John Lamb, (Elias* Lovell) was confi- 
 dential Factotum to Samuel Salt, one of the Benchers. 
 John Lamb had two other children ; John (James Elia) 
 bom in 1763, and a clerk in the South Sea House; Mary 
 CBridget Elia) born in 1765. 
 
 1782 Charles Lamb sent to Christ's Hospital, where Jem 
 VVhite an officer ; and Coleridge, George Dyer, and Le 
 Grice, his school-fellows. 
 
 1789 Leaves School. 
 
 1792 Made Clerk in the East India House; occasionally 
 meeting Coleridge (from Cambridge) at the " Salutation 
 and Cat," 17, Newgate Street; and by hjm introduced to 
 Southey, and Charles Lloyd, all warm with Poetry, Pan- 
 tisocracy, &c 
 
 1795 Living with paralyzed Father, Mother, aged Aunt, and 
 Sister Mary, on their united means of about ;^i8o a year, 
 at 7, Little Queen's Street, Holborn. 
 
 1796 At the end of last year, and beginning of this, C. L. for 
 six weeks in a mad-house at Hoxton. Soon after this, his 
 Brother John (who does not live with the Family) is 
 brought home to be nursed by them after &a accident 
 which threatened his own mind also. And on September 
 22, Mary Lamb, worn out with nursing her Family, kills 
 her Mother, beside wounding her Father, in a fit of insanity. 
 Charles wrests the knife from her hand and places her in 
 
 • "Call him EUml." C. L. 1o Taylor, his publisher 
 
 [ 131 ]
 
 a Private — he \\n\i not hear of a Public — Asj'lum, for so 
 long as his Father survives. 
 • 797 His Father dying, and carrying with him what pension 
 he had from Mr. Salt, Charles takes his sister home, and 
 lives with her on little more than his Clerkship of £^\ao 
 a year. The old Aunt who lived with them dies at the 
 beginning of the year ; and another Aunt (Hetty) who 
 had been taken to live mth a Kinswoman is returned 
 home at the end of it* to linger out nearly three years 
 with Uiem. In the meanwhile, Charles visits Coleridge in 
 Somersetshire, where he meets Wordsworth. 
 
 1798 Poems by C. Lloyd and C. Lamb published, some of 
 which had been included in a previous volume of 
 Coleridge's, who goes to Germany at Midsummer ; up to 
 which time he was Lamb's chief correspondent and ad- 
 viser. After which, 
 
 1799 Correspondence with Southey ; toward the end of the 
 year introduction by C. Lloyd to Manning, ALathematical 
 Tutor at Cambridge : who becomes Lamb's most intimate 
 friend and correspondent till his departure for China. 
 
 800 Established with Mary at 16, Mitre Court Buildings. 
 
 Correspondence with Wordsworth begins. 
 
 1801 "John Woodvil" published. About this time Lamb 
 
 comes to know Godwin and Hazlitt. 
 2 I, 
 
 1800 Visit with Mary to Coleridge at Keswick; who, afterward 
 
 engaging to write for the Morning Post, gets Lamb to jest 
 for it, at £,2 zs. a week. 
 
 * 1 find but one Aunt named by Liimb's bio7r.apliel% ; but the oversight nmy bo 
 mine. Cnrtointy ivio nrc named us above in Lamb'6 letters to Coloriagc 19, 22; 
 and 29, 91 
 
 ^Before settling here, he had lived at [15] Chapel Street, Pcntonville; 
 where he fell in love — for tlic first and only time — with Hester Savory, 
 the Quaker. 
 [= This should be 1802.] 
 
 r '•■'2 ] 
 
 i
 
 i8o3 No literary work : punning for the- "Post" discontinued. 
 
 1804 No Zei/er extant, save one to Southey: but much drink 
 and smoke by night, and depression by day : a condition 
 which, as we know from his own, and his sister's letters, 
 had begun some years before, and lasted some years 
 after. 
 
 1806 Manning goes to China, " Mr. H." written in a 3s. 
 per week room, acted at Drury Lane and damned. 
 
 1807 Tales from " Shakespeare " by C. and M. Lamb. 
 
 1808 " Specimens of Old Diamatists : " " Adventures of 
 Ulysses;" "Mrs. Leicester's School:" and, soon after/ 
 " Poetry for Children ." in all which, except the two first, 
 Sister and Brother have a hand. 
 
 1 809 Removal to 4, Inner Temple Lane, where the " Wed- 
 nesday nights." 
 
 1817 Removed to Great Russell Street, comer of Bow 
 Street, (once Will's Coffee House) by and by taking also 
 a lodging at 14, Kingsland Road, Dalston, to escape from 
 over-much company. 
 
 1820 " Elia" begun with London Magazine- 
 
 1821 John Lamb dies. 
 
 1822 Trip to France with Mary, who taken ill, and left with 
 a friend at Amiens while Charles runs to Pans, sees 
 Talma, &c. Jl^ <n-w^^| /^i-» «-^ ou^Wo— o-tX- 
 
 1S23 Elia published separately : difference and reconciliation 
 with Southey ; and removal from lodgings to Colebrooke 
 (Coin-brook) Cottage, Islington, as householders. During 
 a holiday at Cambridge becomes acquainted with, and 
 finally adopts, Emma Isola, orphan daughter of an Italian 
 refugee and Esquire Bedell there. 
 
 ^ (1810) 
 
 ^ "top-story " interpolated after word Lane. 
 
 [=No. 21.] 
 
 [ 133 ]
 
 1825 Pensioned off by the India House on j£4So a year, 
 
 with a small deduction for Mary in case of her surviving 
 
 him.^ 
 1837 Removes from Islington to a small furnished house at 
 
 Enfield Chase, where he had previously lodged from time 
 
 to time. 
 1829 His old servant Becky having married and left, and his 
 
 sister too much worried with housekeeping, they go to 
 
 lodge and board with Mr. and Mrs. VVestwood next door, 
 
 in Enfield. 
 
 1833 To "Bay Cottage," Church Street, Edmonton, to board 
 and lodge with Mr. and Mrs. Walden, under whose care 
 Mary had previously been. Emma Isola marries Moxon 
 the Publisher at Midsummer. 
 
 1834 Coleridge dies July 25 ; and Charles Lamb Dec. 24.2 
 
 Oq removing from Islington to Enfleld in 1827 Lamb had written to Hood ; 
 
 "To change habitations is to die with tlrcm, and in my time I have died seven 
 deaths. My household deaths have been all periodical, recurring after seven 
 yeare." 
 
 Tliis may include some minor removals ; such as one for a few months in 1809 
 to SouthainptoQ Buildings. Holboru. 
 
 M.» she did for 13 years: dying May, 1847. 
 
 -lie left .£2000 — all his Earnings— for his Sister's use.
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY
 
 FITZGERALD'S BOOK-PLATE. 
 
 UUAWN UV TIIACKEUAY. THE ANOEL IS SAIl) TO HK 
 A PUIIXKAIT OF SIBS. BROOKFI£LD.
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY 
 
 CHRONOLOGICALLY ARRANGED 
 
 EUPHRANOR | A Dlu^ogue on Youth | 
 
 LONDON I WLLLLUM PICKERING | 1851 | 
 
 (See facsimile title, Vol. I, p. 137.) 
 Small 8°. Page measure, 4^ x 6^ ins. 
 Collation: title, — printers' name, John Childs and Son, 
 Bungay, on verso; pages [1]— 81, text; Errata and printers' 
 name on page 82, unnumbered. 
 
 Green cloth boards with stamped sides; word Euphranoe, in 
 ornamental border, stamped vertically on back in gold. 
 
 POLONIUS: I A Collection | of | Wise Saws and 
 Modern Instances. | 
 
 london: i william pickering. ] 1852. \ 
 
 (See facsimile title, Vol. V, p. 199.) 
 Square 8°. Page measure, 5 x 6\q ins. 
 
 Collation: title, — printers' name, John Childs and Son, 
 Bungay, on verso; pages \^i^—xvi, preface; page [i], title 
 repeated without place, publisher's name, or date; pages 
 n-cxLH, text; pages cxlih-cxlv, index; page cxlvi. Errata 
 and printers' name, unnumbered. 
 
 Double-rule borders round all pages except verso of title. 
 Green cloth, with ornamental borders stamped on sides. | La | 
 
 [ 137 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 VERDAD I ES siEMPRE | VERDE. | in Tust'ic Capitals, within 
 wreath, stamped on first cover, and Polonius stamped verti- 
 cally on back iji gold. 
 
 SIX DRAMAS I OF | CALDEROX. | Freely 
 Translated | by | Edw^u{d Fitzgerald. 1 
 
 london: i willlvm pickering. | mdcccliii. | 
 
 (See facsimile titles, Vol. IV, pp. 1 and 3.) 
 Small 8°. Page measure, 4<-| x G-j-q ins. 
 Collation: half title, verso blank; title, — John Childs and 
 Son, Bungay, on verso; pages [t']-vrn, advertisement; page 
 [1], title of The Painter of his own dishonour and Dra- 
 matis Personas; verso blaiik; pages [3]-58, text; page [59], 
 title. Keep your own secret; verso. Dramatis Personas; 
 pages [61]— 102, text; page [103], title, Gil Perez, the 
 Gallician ; verso. Dramatis Persona;; pages [105]-142, 
 text; page [143], title. Three Judgments at a blow; 
 verso. Dramatis Persons; pages [145]-! 89, text; page 
 [190], blank; page [191], title. The Mayor of Zalamea; 
 verso. Dramatis Persona"; pages [193] -228, text; page 
 [229], title. Beware of Smooth Water; verso. Dramatis 
 Persona'; pages [231]-273, text; verso, John Childs and 
 Son, Bungay; and an unnumbered page of Errata, verso 
 blank. 
 
 Crimson watered cloth boards; back divided bi/ four blind- 
 stamped bands; lettered in gold, in second division from top, | 
 Translations | from | Calderon |, and in fourth division, | 
 £. F. G |. 
 
 The only book of FitzGcr.'ild's in wliicli lii.s nnmc .appears. A 
 flippant notice of it in 77/c Alhciia-um hurt liini so tli.-it Iio witlidrcw 
 from the jniblishers all iinsuld copii's. 
 
 [ 138 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 EUPHRANOR, | A Diai^ogue on Youth. ] 
 
 SECOND EDITION. | 
 
 LONDON: I JOHN W. PAKKER AND SON, WEST 
 STRAND. I 1855. 
 
 (See facsimile title, Vol. II, p. 131.) 
 Small 8°. Page measure, i^ x 6i^ ins. 
 Collation: title, — John Childs and Son, Bungay, on 
 verso; pages [l]-87, text; page 88, blank; pages [89]-101, 
 Appendix; printers'' name repeated on verso of page 101. 
 Green cloth hoards, lettered vertically on hack, in gold, 
 EuPHKANOR, in ornamental harder. Some copies were only 
 stitched in the most primitive way, without cover of any 
 kind. 
 
 SAL AM AN AND ABSAL. 1 An Allegory. ] Trans- 
 lated FROM THE Persian | of | Jami. | 
 
 LONDON : I J. W. PARKER AND SON, WEST STRAND. | 
 MDCCCLVI. I 
 
 (See facsimile title and frontispiece. Vol. I, pp. 38 and 39.) 
 
 Small 4fo. Page measure, 5|- x S-pg- ins. 
 Collation: steel frontispiece facing page [i], title, on verso 
 of which John Childs and Son, Bungay; pages [m]— wfij, 
 letter to Professor Cowell; \ix'\—xvi. Life of Jami; pages 
 [l]-75, text; page 76, blank; pages [77]-84, Appendix. 
 All pages, except 76, with single-rule horder. 
 Bright hlue cloth hoards; hlind-stamped straight-lined hor- 
 der on sides; | Salaman | and | Absal. | stamped in gold, 
 from special die, on front cover; same words, in similar let- 
 ters, within horder with end ornaments, vertically, in gold 
 on back. 
 
 [ 139 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 RUBAIYAT 1 OF | 0]MAR KHAYYAJSI, [ The 
 Astronomer-Poet of Persli. | Translated into 
 English Verse. | 
 
 london: i bernard quaritch, | castle street, 
 leicester square. | 1859. | 
 
 (See facsimile title, Vol. I, p. 3.) 
 Square S° . Page vicasure, 6]^ x S\ ins. 
 Collation: title; in centre of verso, G. Norman, printer, 
 Maiden Lane, Covent Garden, London; pages [iii]— xiii, 
 Omar Khayyam, the Astbonomer-Poet of Persia ; page 
 [xiv], bla7ik; pages [1]-16, text; pages [17]-21, notes; 
 page 22, blank. 
 
 Containing seventy-five Ruhdiydt. 
 
 Brown paper wrapper; first cover printed from title-page 
 with addition of double-rule border rcitli ornaments at corners. 
 250 copies were printed for the author, who gave 200 of 
 them to Mr. Quaritch. 
 
 Although this, in common with all FitzGcrald's books, was 
 issued " cut," an uncut (and unopened) copy in the original 
 covers was sold at Bangs' Auction Rooms, on ISth February, 
 1901, for $260. 
 
 RUBAIYAT I OF | OIMAR KHAYYAM, | Re- 
 printed Privately from the London Edition ; ] 
 
 WITH AN EXTRACT | FROM THE | CALCUTTA ReVIEW, | 
 
 No. LIX, ]\Iarch, 1856; | a note by M. Garcin de 
 
 TaSSY, I AND I A FEW ADDITIONAL QUATRAINS ] [LiNE] 
 
 Madras: ] 1862. 
 
 8°. Limp green cloth, with label rcith title, \ Rthaiyat ] oi- 
 Omar Khayyam | , rcithin an ornamental border, pasted on 
 top cover. 
 
 [ IK. ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 Collation: page [i], title, as above; on verso, "Fifty 
 Copies Printed." between two lines; second title, as un- 
 der: I Rtibdiydt | of \ Omar Khayyam, \ the Astronomer 
 Poet of Persia \ Translated into Eiiglish Verse. \ [Lmt?.] | 
 London: \ Bernard Quaritch, \ Castle Street, Leicester Square. 
 1 1859 1 [Linc.^ Madras :\ Reprinted from the London edition. 
 I 1862. I ; verso blank; pages \J\—x, introduction, headed as 
 in London edition; pages [1]-13, text; pages [14J-17, 
 notes; page 18, blank and unnumbered; page [1], title, 
 as under: \ A^ote | sur | Les Rubdi'ydt de 'Omar Khaiydm \ par 
 M. Garcin de Tassy, \ Mcmbre de VInstitut. \ [£i«^.] Paris. 
 I Imprimerie Imperiale. \ [Lme.] mdccclvii. | ; verso blank; 
 pages [3]-7, text; page 8, blank and unnumbered; pages 
 [1]-14, "From the Calcutta Review, No. LIX, March, 
 1856." ; pages 15-17, "Some More of Omar's Quatrains " ; 
 page 18, blank and unnumbered. 
 
 This is the first reprint of FitzGerald's Rubdiydt, and I am 
 indebted for the above description of this very rare edition 
 to Colonel W. F, Prideaux's " Notes for a Bibliography of 
 Edward FitzGerald." London, Frank Rollings, 1901. 
 Colonel Prideaux further says: 
 
 "Of the contents of this very scarce brochure, the 'Rubdiydt ' 
 " are a literal reprint of the first London edition; the note by 
 " the learned Orientalist, M. Garcin de Tassy, is reprinted 
 " from the Journal Asiatique ; the article from the Calcutta 
 " Review was written by Prof. E. B. Cowell; and the addi- 
 " tional quatrains, fifteen in number, and dated 'Adiydr, Dec. 
 " 20, 1862,' are by Dr. Whitley Stokes, who is understood to 
 " have been the editor of the volume. The copy which I have 
 " had the advantage of using has also six additional quatrains, 
 " together with a note by Dr. Stokes, pasted into appropriate 
 " places in the text, together with a few interesting additions 
 " im, manuscript and print." 
 
 [ 141 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 [TWO DRAJNIAS FROM CALDEROX.] THE 
 MIGHTY MAGICIAN.—" SUCH STUFF AS 
 DREA3IS ARE MADE OF." 
 
 (See facsimile title of " Such Stuff as Dreams are Made 
 of," Vol. V, p. 97.) 
 Small 8°. Page measure, 'i^g x 6^ ins. 
 Collation: no title-page; the book begins with sig. B, un- 
 numbered. The Mighty Magician [Lm<?] and Dramatis 
 Personfe; verso blank; pages [l]-63, text; page 64, blank; 
 page [65,] sig. F, " Such Stuff as Dreams are Made 
 of" ; verso. Dramatis Personse; pages [67]— 131, text; 
 verso, John Childs and Son, Printers. 
 
 About 100 copies printed some time between November, 186t, and 
 February, ISC'). The plays were printed separately, for private 
 distribution. "The Mighty Magician" first; and it is said (in the 
 Catalogue of a portion of the Library of Edmund Gosse, London, 
 1893) that more copies of it were given out tlian of the second. 
 
 AGAINIEMNON. | A Tragedy, [ taken from ^schy- 
 
 LUS. I 
 
 (See facsimile title, Vol. II, p. 239.) 
 
 Small S°. Page measure, 4|- x 1^ ins. 
 
 Collation: page [1], half title, Agamemnon; verso blank; 
 
 page [3], title; verso blank; pages [5]-6, \introduction'\; 
 
 page [7], blank; page [8], Dranuvtis Persona-; pages [9]- 
 
 63, text; page [64], blank. 
 
 Dark blue paper wrappers. No date or imprint. 
 
 My copy has a i)rintcd sliji |)aslefi over the footnote on page 6. 
 See Vol. II, p. 2t2. 
 
 [ H2 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 RUBAIYAT I OF | OMAR KHAYYAM, | The 
 Astronomer-Poet of Persls.. | second edition. | 
 
 london: i bernard quaritch, [ piccadilly, [ 
 1868 1 
 
 (See facsimile title, Vol. II, p. 3.) 
 Square 8°. Page measure, 6^^ x S\ms. 
 Collation: page [i], title; at bottom of verso, John Childs 
 AND Son, Printers, with thin rule above; pages l^iii']-xviii, 
 Omar Khayyam, the Astuonomek-Poet of Persia; pages 
 [l]-23, text; page [24], blank; pages [25]-30, notes. 
 Containing one hundred and ten Rubdiydt. 
 Brown paper wrapper; first cover printed from title-page 
 with addition of double-ruled border with ornaments at 
 corners. 
 
 In August, 1895, Mr. Quaritch wrote that he would report to me 
 when he had secured a copy of either the 1st, 2d or 3d editions of 
 the Rubaiyat. He supplied me with the 1st and 3d; but never re- 
 ported the 2d, which he said was " at least as rare as the 1st." 
 
 The first American edition of FitzGerald's " Rubaiyat " was a 
 private issue of seventy-five or one hundred copies, made for Colo- 
 nel James Watson, Dr. Starling Loving, Mr. E. L. Dewitt, and a 
 coterie of Omar enthusiasts, who had vainly tried to secure copies 
 of the Quaritch imprints. It is a close reproduction of the London 
 issue of 1868, omitting on cover and title place, publisher's name, and 
 date. It was issued in the summer of 1870. Nevins and Meyers were 
 the printers. An interesting article on this edition by Miss Lida 
 Rose McCabe appeared in The Book Buyer for June, 1902. 
 
 SAL AM AN AND ABSAL. | An Allegory. | From 
 
 THE Persian | of ! Jami. 
 
 I IPSWICH: I COWELl's steam PRINTING WORKS, 
 BUTTER MARKET. | 1871- 
 
 (See facsimile frontispiece and title, Vol. II, pp. 52 and 53.) 
 Square 8°. Page measure, 6j x Sf ins. 
 
 [ 143 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 Collation: steel frontispiece facing title; title, verso blank; 
 pages [1]— i2, text; pages 43—45, Appendix; page 46, blank. 
 Broicn paper cover without print of any kind. Sometimes 
 bound in maroon cloth boards, with green morocco back, on 
 which is stamped Salaman & Absal vertically in gold. 
 Copies of this edition are also found bound up with the Life 
 of J ami taken from the edition of 1856. 
 
 RUBAIYAT I OF | OMAR KHAYYAJM, ] The 
 
 ASTEONOilER-PoET OF PERSLk. | THIRD EDITION. | 
 
 LONDON: I BERNABD QU^VRITCH, | PICCADILLY. ] 
 
 1872. I 
 
 (See facsimile title, Vol. Ill, p. 3.) 
 Small 4°. Page measure, 6^ x 8f ins. 
 Collation: page [i], title; in centre of verso, \ London: ] G. 
 Norman and Son, Printers, Maiden Lane, | Covent Gar- 
 den. I ; pages [iii^—xxiv, Omar Khayyam, the Astrono- 
 mer-Poet of Persia; pages [l]-27, text; pages [28]-36. 
 notes; every page, except verso of title, having double-lined 
 border with ornaments at corners, as on title. 
 Containing one hundred and one llubaiydt. 
 Maroon cloth, with dark green smooth morocco back, lettered 
 upward in gold, Uubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. 
 
 AGAINIEMNON | A Tragedy | taken from xEsciiy- 
 
 LUS. I 
 
 I LONDON: I BERNARD QUARITCH, | 1.5 PICCA- 
 DILLY. I 1876. I 
 
 (See facsiniil.' lille. Vol. TIL p. 195.) 
 Small 4". Page mriisurr, fif x 8.\ ins. 
 
 Collation: page [i], title; on verso, Tlio ((litioii consists of 
 250 copies. Bernard Quakitcii ; pages [ /('/]--•(, preface; 
 
 [ IH' ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 page \vii\. Dramatis Personje; page [»m], border with scroll 
 vn centre; pages [l]-79, text; page 80, harder with scroll in 
 centre. All text enclosed in double-line border with orna- 
 ments at corners, as on title. 
 
 Maroon cloth, with very dark green smooth morocco back, 
 lettered upward, Agamemnon of ^schylus. 
 
 RUBAIYAT I OF | OMAR KHAYYAM; 1 and 
 THE I SALAMAN AND ABSAL ] or | JAMI; 1 
 
 RENDERED INTO ENGLISH VERSE. | 
 
 I BERNARD QUARITCH", 15 PICCADILLY, LONDON. | 
 1879. I 
 
 (See facsimile frontispiece and titles, Vol. Ill, pages 2, 
 5, 7, 9 and 43.) 
 Square 8°. Page measure, S^g- x 6i4 ins. 
 Collation: \ Poems | from the | Persian | ; verso, border; 
 blank page; frontispiece facing title; general title; verso, 
 in centre, \ London : | G. Norman and Son, Printers, 
 Maiden Lane, | Covent Garden. | ; page [i], title to Ru- 
 hdiydt; verso, border with ornament in centre; pages 
 \iii'\—xv, Omar Khayyam, the Astronomer-Poet of 
 Persia; page [xvi^, border with ornament in centre; pages 
 [l]-27, text; pages [28]-35, notes; page [36], border, 
 ornament in centre; page [37], Salaman | and | Absal. | ; 
 page [38], border with ornament in centre; pages [39]-50, 
 Notice of Jami's Life; pages [51]-107, text; pages 
 [108]-112, Appendix. Every page, except obverse of 
 frontispiece, within single-line border with floriated corner- 
 pieces. 
 
 Maroon cloth boards with dark green straight-grained mo- 
 rocco back; lettered horizontally in gold, \ The | Rubaiyat ] 
 
 [ 145 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 OF I Omar | Khayyam ] ■ — ■ — | Salaman | and|Absal | of | 
 Jami. I ENGLISH VERSIONS, 1879. 
 
 Containing one Iiundred and one Rubaiyat; differing very slightly 
 from the third edition. 
 
 [READINGS IN CRABBE.] 
 
 [1879] 
 Small 8°. Page meastirc, 4^ x G^ ins. 
 Collation: page [i], half title, | Readings | in | Crabbe's 
 " Tales of the Hall " | ; page [ii], blank; pages [Hi, iw], 
 introductory note; pages [l]-242, text; imprint at bottom 
 of page 242, Billing and Sons, Printers, Guildford, 
 Surrey. 
 
 Red cloth boards; lettered upward on back. Readings in 
 Crabbe. 
 
 Three hundred and fifty copies were printed, of which a few 
 copies were given to friends; the rest remained in sheets which, with 
 additions, were published in 1882 and 1883. 
 
 THE I DOWNFALL AND DEATH \ OF | KING 
 (EDIPUS. I A Drama in Two Parts. | Chiefly 
 
 TAKEN FROM THE | CEdIPUS TyRANNUS AND CoLO- 
 
 N^.us OF I Sophocles. | The Inter-act Choruses 
 ARE FROM Potter. [ 
 
 (Sec facsimile title. Vol. VI, p. 13.) 
 8°. Page measure, 5-^g x 8^ ins. 
 
 Collation: pages [i]— 7'i«", dedicator)/ letter to Professor 
 Norton; page [1], title; page [2], blank; page [3], Part 
 I. I (Edipus in Thebes. | Dramatis Person^,.] ; page [4], 
 blank; pages [.5]-46, text; at bottom of page 46, Billing 
 and Sons, Printers and ELEc^TROTVi'Ens, Gitildford, nith 
 rule above; page [3], half title, | The Downfall and 
 Di-.A Til ok I King QEdipus. | Part II. | Q'^dipus at Athens. | 
 
 r iifi ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 Deamatis Persons. | ; page [4], blank; pages [5]-45, text; 
 at bottom of page 45, | Billing and Sons, Printers and 
 Electrotypers, Guildford | ; verso blank. 
 Pale blue paper wrapper; quite plain. 
 
 Fifty copies were printed of Part I in February, 1880, and fifty 
 copies of Part II in February, 1881. The dedicatory letter was first 
 printed with Part II. The whole was revised by FitzGerald and sent 
 to Professor Norton on 25th January, 1882. The two parts are some- 
 times found separate, each in blue wrappers, the page of Part II being 
 somewhat larger than Part I. They also occur together in one 
 wrapper; and I have seen three copies each bound in half-morocco, 
 marbled paper sides, lettered upwards in gold on the back, | Downfall 
 and Death of King CEdipus. Fitzgerald. | in upper- and lower-case 
 type. 
 
 READINGS IN CRABBE. | "Tales of the 
 Hall." | 
 
 i london: bernard quaritch. [ 1882. | 
 
 Small 8°. 
 
 Collation: page [i], title; page [ii], blank; pages \iii'\—xiv, 
 introduction; pages [xv, xvi^, blank; pages [lJ-242, text; 
 a note, with a quotation from a tale not included in the vol- 
 ume, is pasted on page 242, above imprint, | Billing and 
 Sons, Printers, Guildford, Surrey | , below rule. 
 Green cloth boards; lettered across back in gold, Crabbe. 
 
 READINGS IN CRABBE. | "Tales of the 
 Hall." ] 
 
 i london: bernard quaritch. | 1883. [ 
 
 Small 8°. Page measure, 4<^e xG^ ins. 
 
 Collation: page [i], title; page [ii], blank; pages [^iiij-xvi, 
 
 [ 147 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 introduction; pages [l]-242, text; page [243], note and 
 quotation; verso blank. 
 
 Crimson cloth boards; lettered across hack in gold, \ Read- 
 ings I IN 1 Crabbe I . 
 
 THE TWO GENERALS. I. Lucius iEaiiLius 
 Paullus. II. Sir Charles Napier. 
 
 Small 4to. Eight pages, last two blank. 
 
 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 Four pages. Size, 4|^ x T-j ins. 
 
 See photographic reproduction, pages 131-4 of this volume. 
 
 CONTRIBUTIONS TO PERIODICALS AND 
 
 BOOKS. 
 
 The Me^vdows in Spring. 
 
 Hone's Y car-Book, 30 April, 1831, ami The Athenceum, 9 
 July, 1831. 
 
 Chronomoros. 
 
 Signed "Anon." in Fulchcr's Poetical Misccllanji. Pub- 
 lished by G. W. Fulchcr, Sudburij, and Suttabij c^- Co., Lon- 
 don [1841]. 
 
 The Taiu.e-Talk | of .John Sei.den | Esq. | With a 
 Biographic.ve Preface and Notes | by S.W. Singer, 
 Esq. I 
 
 I LONDON I WILLIAM PICKERINCi | 1847 I 
 
 The Notes were largely the work of FitzGerald. 
 
 [ MS ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 Selections | from | the Poems and Letters | of | 
 Bernard Barton. | Edited | by his Daughter. | 
 
 I LONDON : I hall, VIRTUE, AND CO., 25 PATER- 
 NOSTER row. I MDCCCXLIX. | 
 
 The Memoir (pages ix—xxxvi) is hy FitzGerald and is re- 
 printed in this volume. 
 
 The Rev. George Ceabbe. 
 
 The Gentleman's Magazine, November, 1857. 
 
 The following nine items appeared in The East Anglian; or. 
 Notes and Queries on Subjects connected with the Counties of 
 Suffolk, Cambridge, Essex, and Norfolk. Edited by Samuel 
 Tymms. Lowestoft: Samuel Tymms, 60 High Street. Lon- 
 don: Whittaker and Co., Ave Maria Lane. 
 
 Play Stalls. Signed F. 
 
 Vol. I, p. 71, April, 1860. 
 
 Orwell Wands. Signed F. 
 
 Vol. I, p. 76, April, 1860. 
 
 East Anglian Songs. Signed F. 
 
 Vol. I, p. 139, July, 1860. 
 
 The Vocabulary of the Seaboard. Signed F. 
 
 Vol. I, p. Ul, July, 1860. 
 
 Sea Words and Phrases along the Suffolk Coast. 
 Vol. Ill, pp. 347-363, December, 1868. 
 
 Sea Words and Phrases along the Suffolk Coast. 
 
 Vol. IV, pp. 109-120. 
 
 Additions to Forby's Vocabulary of East Anglia. 
 
 Vol. IV, pp. 128-9. 
 [ 149 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 Eeeata to above. 
 
 Vol. IF, p. 156. 
 
 A Capfull of Sea-Slang for Chbistmas. 
 
 Vol. IV, pp. 261-4-. 
 
 FitzGerald had the two papers on " Sea Words and Phrases " 
 and "A Capfull of Sea- Slang" stitched in wrappers for 
 presentation to friends. Tlie paper cover, which is pink, is 
 reproduced in Vol. VI, p. 203. The pagination runs : 34<7- 
 363, verso blank; [1]-12; [l]-4. 
 
 The following twelve items appeared in Notes and Queries, 
 signed Parathiiia. Being but queries or ixplics they are 
 not reprinted in this edition, nor are the first tliree items 
 from the East Anglian. 
 
 Anecdote Biography. 
 
 18 August, 1860. 
 Old English Tunes. 
 
 18 August, 1860. 
 Gonge: the Conge, Yarmouth. 
 
 18 August, 1860. 
 Latin, Greek, and Roman JNIetres. 
 
 18 August, 1860. 
 Harmonious Bi^vcksmith. 
 
 22 Scptcmhcr, 1860. 
 
 Bachaumont's Memoires Secrets^ Londues, 1778. 
 
 8 December, 1860. 
 
 East Angllvn Words. 
 France Past and Present. 
 Dryden's Prefaces. 
 
 26 Januurij, 1861. 
 
 9 February, 1861. 
 
 16 February, 1861.
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 Whittington and his Cat. 
 
 11 May, 1861. 
 Memoranda. 
 
 11 May, 1861. 
 Detrus [Petrus]. 
 
 25 May, 1861. 
 
 The following nine items appeared in The Ipswich Journal 
 (Suffolk Notes and Queries), signed Effigy. 
 
 Death of Bernard Barton. 
 
 24- February, 1849. 
 Funeral of Bernard Barton. 
 
 3 March, 1849. 
 Limb. 
 
 (No. VII.) 1877-78. 
 Rev. John Carter of Bramfobd. 
 
 (No. VII.) 1877-78. 
 Huzzy. 
 
 (No. XIX.) 1877-78. 
 
 East Anglian Query, as to the rime 
 
 " He who would old England win 
 At Weyhourne Hoope must first begin." 
 
 (No. XXI.) 1877-78. 
 
 Norfolk Superstition as to All Hallow's Eve. 
 
 (No. XXII.) 
 
 Major Moor, David Hume, and the Royal George. 
 
 (No. XXIII.) 1877-78. 
 Suffolk Minstrelsy. 
 
 (No. L.) 1877-78. 
 
 [ 151 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 Pekcival StockdaIxE and B^viDOCK Black Hokse. 
 
 Temple Bar, January, 1880. 
 
 Vergil's Garden laid out a la Delille. 
 
 Temple Bar, April, 1882. 
 
 POSTHUMOUS EDITIONS. 
 
 WORKS OF I EDWARD FITZGERALD | Trans- 
 LATOR OF Omar Khayyam | Reprinted | from the 
 Original Impressions, With Some Corrections | 
 Derived from his Own Annotated Copies | In Two 
 Volumes. | 
 
 new YORK AND BOSTON: HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN 
 & CO. LONDON: BERNARD QU^UHTCH. 1887- 
 
 8°. Page measure, 6 x 8-j-| ('««.,• large paper, 7^ .r lOf ins. 
 Collation: Vol. I: page [i], half title; page [ii], blank; in- 
 serted leaf, portrait on verso; page [ifi], title; page [if], im- 
 print of De Vinnc Press in centre of page; page [i'], dedica- 
 tion; page [I'i], blank; pages l^vii'\-xxii. Biographical 
 Preface; pages [xxii'i,!^ xxiv, poem to Edxcard FitzGcrald; 
 pages [xxv^—xxx, Omar Khayyam's Grave; title to Omar 
 Khayyam (unnumbered ), vrrso blank; pages [1]-17, Life 
 OF Omaii Khayyam ; page [18], blank; inserted leaf xcith cut 
 of Omar's tomb on verso; pages [19]-94, Rubaiyat, text 
 (First and Fourth editions) and notes; page [95], title to 
 " Salaman and Adsat, " ; verso blank; pages [97]-107, 
 Jami's Life; page [108], blank; inserted leaf with frontis- 
 piece on verso; pages [109]-162, text and notes; page 
 [IfiS], Agamemnon, title; verso blank; pages [165]-9t3, 
 Preface and text; page [244], blank; page [245], half title, 
 " EupiinANOR " ; page [24fi], blank; page [247], title to 
 "Euphranok," Third edition; page [248], blanlc; pages 
 [249]-328, text; page [.'529], " Polonius," half title; 
 
 [ 152 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 page [330], blank; page [331], title; page [332], blank; 
 pages [333]-457, Preface and text; page [458], blank; 
 pages [459]-460, Index (to Polonius); page [461], "Es- 
 says ON Crabbe " ; verso blank; page [463], title to "Read- 
 ings IN Crabbe"; verso blank; pages [465]— 477, "Crabbe's 
 Tales op the Hall" ; page [478], wholly blank; all 
 other pages above noted as blank have a double-lined border 
 •with corner-pieces and centre ornament imprinted on them, 
 like the rest of the book, excepting the inserted leaves. 
 Vol. II: page \i\, half title; verso blank; page [iii], title; 
 verso blank; page [»], Six Dramas of Calderon, title; 
 verso blank; pages \yii'\-ix, advertisement; page [a;], blank; 
 pages [11]— 454, text; page [455], Errata; page 456, 
 blank; page 457, half title, Suffolk Sea Phrases ; verso 
 blank; page 459, title; verso blank; pages [461]— 529, text; 
 page [530], blank; page [531], Table of Contents; verso 
 blank. 
 
 [Note. The Text of the Dramas appears to begin^ as above noted, 
 with page 11.] 
 
 Bound m smooth dark blue cloth; paper label on back, let- 
 tered, I Works of ] Edward | FitzGerald | (line) \ Vol. I. 
 
 LETTERS I AND | LITERARY REMAINS | 
 OF I EDWARD FITZGERALD | Edited by | 
 William Aldis Wright | In Three Volumes | 
 Vol. I I 
 
 LONDON: I MACMILLAN AND CO. [ AND NEW 
 YORK. I 1889 
 
 I All rights reserved. '\ 
 
 8°. Page measure, 4|- x 7f ins. 
 
 Collation: Vol. I: page [i], half title; page [ii], publishers' 
 monogram in centre; inserted leaf with steel-engraving of 
 FitzGerald on verso; page [m], title; verso blank; page 
 
 [ 153 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 [f], Contents; verso blank; pages [riij-xii, preface; pages 
 [lJ-499, letters of Edicard FitzGerald; page [500], blank; 
 pages [501]— 502, Index to letters; two-page list of Mac- 
 millan's publications. 
 
 Vol.. II: page [J], half title; page [ii], as in Vol. I; page 
 [iif], blank; page [if], woodcut of " Little Grange " ; page 
 [»], title; page [wJ], in centre of page: Cambridge: | 
 Peinted by C. J. Clay, M. A., and Sons, | at the Univee- 
 siTY Press. | ; page \yii~\. Contents; verso blank; pages 
 [1]— 66, EuPHEANOR ; page [67], Six Dramas | of | Cal- 
 DEEON, I title; verso blank; pages [69]— 429, text; page 
 [430], blank; page [431], A Bird's-eye View | of \ Farid- 
 UDDiN Attar's | Bird-Parliament. | , title; page [432], 
 note; pages [433]-482, text; pages [483]-488, The Two 
 Generals. 
 
 Vol. Ill: page [i], half title; page [ii], as in Vol. I; inserted 
 frontispiece to "Saldmdn and Absdl " ; page [iii\, title and 
 verso as in Vol. II; page [»], Contents; verso blank; page 
 [1], The Mighty Magician, title; page [2], extract from 
 letter; page [3], Dramatis Persona;; verso blank; pages 
 [5]-76, text; page [77], " Such Stuff as Dreams | aee 
 Made of " | , title; page [78], Dramatis Personas; pages 
 [79]-155, text; page [156], blank; page [157], The] 
 Downfall and Death | of | King OEdipus | , title; verso 
 blank; pages [159]-166, letter to C. E. Norton; page 
 [167], Qi^DiPus in Thebes, title; page [168], Dramatis 
 Persons; pages [169]-215, text; page [216], blank; page 
 [217], Part II. \ ^dipus in Athens, title; page [218], 
 Dramatis Persona;; pages [219]-264, text; page [265], 
 Agamemnon, title; page [266], note; pages [267]-269, 
 Preface; page [270], Dramatis 1'(M'soii,t; pages [271]-331, 
 text; page l',W2],blank; page [333], Omar KiiAYYAM,title; 
 page [334], blank; pages [335]-372, text of Fifth edition; 
 [373]-386, text of First edition; pages [387]-396, varia- 
 tions of Second, Third, and Fourth editions; page [397], 
 
 [ 151. ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 Salaman and Absal, title; verso blank; pages [399]-4!57, 
 text and notes; pages 458-461, Bredfield Hall; pages 
 461—464, Chronomoros ; pages 464-466, Virgil's Garden ; 
 page 466, From Petrarch; pages 467—479, Preface to 
 PoLONius ; pages 480—491 , Introduction to Readings in 
 Crabbe ; page 492, Written by Petrarch in his Virgil. 
 Red cloth boards; lettered at top, on back, in gold, \ Letters 
 I AND I Literary | Remains | of | Edward | FitzGerald | 
 Vol. I I ; and at bottom, Macmillan & Co. 
 
 LETTERS I OF ] EDWARD FITZGERALD | 
 In Two Volumes | Vol. I. | [II] 
 
 I LONDON I MACMILLAN AND CO. | AND NEW 
 
 YORK j 1894 I All rights reserved. 
 
 8°. Page measure, 4-| a? 7 ins. 
 
 Collation: Vol. I: page [i], half title; page [m], publish- 
 ers' monogram in centre; inserted leaf with steel portrait of 
 FitzGerald on verso; page [iii], title; verso blank; pages 
 \y^—vi. Preface; pages \yii'\~xiv. Preface to Letters and 
 Literary Remains; pages [lJ-348, Letters of Edward 
 FitzGerald; page [349], Index; page [350], Printed by 
 R. & R. Clarke, Edinburgh, in centre of page; two pages 
 of advertisements. 
 
 Vol. II: page [J, ii], as in Vol. I; page [Jii], blank; page 
 [iw], woodcut of "Little Grange" ; page [f], title; verso 
 blank; pages [l]-349, Letters of Edward FitzGerald; 
 page [350], blank; pages [351]-352, Index to Letters; 
 pages [353]-368, Index. 
 
 Bound in smooth red cloth; lettered across back, in gold, at 
 top. Letters | of | Edward | FitzGerald | Vol. I | ; and at 
 bottom, I Macmillan & Co. 
 
 [ 155 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 LETTERS I OF | EDWARD FITZGERALD | 
 
 TO i FANNY KEMBLE | 1871-1883 | Edited by | 
 Wttj.tam Axdis Wright 
 
 new york i macmill2i1n and co. ] and lon- 
 DON I 1895 I All rights reserved. 
 
 8°. Page measure, 4f x Gi^ ins. 
 
 Collation: page [J], half title; page [Ji], publishers' mono- 
 gram in centre; page [«J], title; page [if], in centre, \ Copy- 
 eight, 1895 I BY Macmillan and Co. | , and at foot, \ Nor- 
 wood PuEss : I J. S. CusHiNG & Co. — Berwick & Smith. | 
 Norwood, Mass., U. S. A. ] ; page [f], Prefatory Note; 
 verso blank; pages vii, viii. Preface; pages 1—253, Letters 
 OF Edward FitzGerald to Fanny Kemble; page [254], 
 blank; pages 255-261, Index; page [262], blank; page 
 [263], advertisement of FitzGeraWs Letters and Rubdiydt; 
 verso blank. 
 
 Bound in smooth red cloth; lettered across back, in gold, at 
 top, I Letters | of | Edward | FitzGerald | to [ Fanny | 
 Kemble I , and at bottom, \ Macmillan & Co. | 
 
 MISCELLANIES | BY ] EDWARD FITZ- 
 GERALD I 
 
 LONDON I MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED | NEW 
 YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY ] 1900 | 
 
 All rights reserved. 
 
 Small 8°. Page measure, -i^ x (y-^g ins. 
 
 Collation: page [i], Golden Treasury Series | Miscel- 
 lanies I FitzGerald | ; verso blank; page \^iii^, title; verso 
 blank; page [v^—vi. Preface; page [wii]. Contents; page 
 viii, blank; page [l]-48, Memoir of Bkrnard Barton; 
 page [49]-56, Death of Bernard Barton: page [57]- 
 58, Funeral op Bernard Hah ton; page [59]-153, Eu- 
 
 [ 156 ]
 
 BIBLIOGRArHY. 
 
 PHEANOR (Second edition, with corrections); pages [156]— 
 172, Peeface to Polonius; pages [173]-177, Death of 
 THE Rev. Geoege Crabbe; pages [178]-183, Charles 
 Lamb; pages [184]— 200, Introduction to Readings in 
 Crabbe; pages [201]-202, On Red Boxes; pages [203]- 
 207, Occasional Veeses; To a Lady Singing; [On Anne 
 Allen] ; [To a Violet] ; page [208], blank; four pages of 
 advertisements. 
 
 Bound in smooth blue cloth; lettered across back, in gold, at 
 top, I Miscellanies | Edward | FitzGeeald | , and at bot- 
 tom, Macmillan & Co. I ; in centre of front cover, the letters 
 G. T. s. in gold ornament. 
 
 MORE LETTERS | OF | EDWARD FITZ- 
 GERALD I 
 
 LONDON I MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED | NEW 
 YORK : THE MACMILLAN COMPANY | 1901 | 
 
 All rights reserved. 
 
 8°. Page measure, 4f x Iyg ^'^s- 
 
 Collation: page [i], blank; on verso, advertisement of Fitz- 
 Gerald's Letters, etc.; page [m], half title; on verso, pub- 
 lishers' monogram in centre; page [»], title; verso blank; 
 page [vii], Preface; page [viii~\, blank; pages [l]-285. 
 More Letters of Edwaed FitzGeeald; page [286], 
 blank; page [287], Index to Letters; page [288], blank; 
 pages [289]-295, Index; page [296], blank; two pages of 
 advertisements. 
 
 Bound in smooth red cloth; lettered across back in gold, at top, 
 I More | Letters | of | Edwaed | FitzGeeald ] , and at 
 bottom, I Macmillan & Co. | 
 
 [ 157 ]
 
 INDEX
 
 INDEX 
 
 "A BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF FARID- 
 UDDIN ATTAR'S BIRD- 
 PARLIAMENT" Vol. VI, p. 137 
 
 "AGAMEMNON." First edition . . . Vol. II, p. 237 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . Vol. II, p. xiii 
 
 Third edition Vol. Ill, p. 193 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . . Vol. Ill, p. xv 
 
 ANNE ALLEN. Poem on Vol. VII, p. 8 
 
 ATTAR. " Bird-Parliament " of . . Vol. VI, p. 137 
 
 BARTON, BERNARD. A Memoir of . Vol. VII, p. 54. 
 
 Death of Vol. VII, p. 91 
 
 Funeral of Vol. VII, p. 96 
 
 "BEWARE OF SMOOTH WATERS." 
 
 Calderon Drama Vol. IV, p. 389 
 
 Bibliography Vol. VII, p. 135 
 
 "BIRD-PARLIAMENT " of /fHar . . Vol. VI, p. 137 
 
 Extract from letters relating to . . Vol. VI, p. xv 
 
 Book-plate of Edward FitzGerald . . . Vol. VII, p. 136 
 
 "BREDFIELD HALL" Vol. VII, p. 11 
 
 CALDERON. Six Dramas op . . . Vol. IV, p. 1 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . . Vol. IV, p. ix 
 
 Two Dramas or Vol. V, p. 1 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . . Vol. V, p. ix 
 
 "CHRONOMOROS" Vol. VII, p. 16 
 
 CRABBE. Rev. GEORGE. Obituary 
 
 notice of Vol. VII, p. 98 
 
 Introduction to "Readings in Crabbe" Vol. VII, p. 102 
 
 Crabbe's "Suffolk" Vol. VII, p. 119 
 
 EAST ANGLIAN WORDS .... Vol. VI, p. 285 
 
 [ 161 ]
 
 INDEX. 
 
 "EUPHRANOR." First edition . . . Vol. I, p. 135 
 
 Ejrtracts from letters relating to . . Vol. I, p. xliii 
 
 Second edition Vol. 11, p. 129 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . . Vol. II, p. xi 
 
 Third edition Vol. Ill, p. 109 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . . Vol. Ill, p. xi 
 
 FITZGERALD, EDWARD. By 
 
 Edmund Gosse Vol. I, p. ix 
 
 FORBY'S VOCABULARY OF EAST 
 
 ANGLIA. Additions to . . . Vol. VI, p. 281 
 
 "GIL PEREZ, THE GALLICIAN." 
 
 Calderon Drama Vol. IV, p. 179 
 
 HELPS, SIR ARTHUR. Travesty on 
 
 Essay by Vol. VII, p. 52 
 
 HERON-ALLEN, EDWARD. On the 
 
 "Rubdiydt" Vol. I, p. xxxvi 
 
 J AMI. See "Saldmdn and Absal" 
 
 "KEEP YOUR OWN SECRET." 
 
 Calderon Drama Vol. IV, p. 105 
 
 KERNEY, MICHAEL. On the "Ru- 
 bdiydt" Vol. I, p. XXXV 
 
 "LAMB CALENDAR" Vol. VII, p. 131 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . Vol. VII, p. 129 
 
 LAMB, CHARLES. On "The Meadorvs 
 
 in Spring" Vol. VII, p. 4 
 
 "MANTIC-UT-TAIR" of Attar . . . Vol. VI, p. 137 
 
 NORTON. C. E. On the "Rubdiydt" . Vol. I, p. xxxvi 
 
 OiDIPUS. The Downfall and Death 
 
 OF Kino Vol. VI, p. 1 
 
 OMAR KHAYYAM. Rubaiyat of. 
 
 First edition Vol. I, p. 1 
 
 Extracts from letters, etc., relating to Vol. I, p. xxix 
 
 Second edition Vol. II, p. 1 
 
 Extracts from Irilcrs relating to . . Vol. II,]). ix 
 
 Thiril edition. Titlr-pagc of . . . Vol. III,)). 3 
 
 Fourth edition. Title-pages of . . Vol. I II. pp. .'>, 7, 9 
 
 Fifth edition Vol. Ill, j). 11 
 
 [ 162 ]
 
 INDEX. 
 
 "ON RED BOXES" . Vol. VII, p. 52 
 
 PAULLUS, MMILIVS. Paraphrase of 
 
 speech of Vol. VII, p. 31 
 
 "PERCIVAL STOCKDALE AND 
 
 BALDOCK BLACK HORSE" . Vol. VII, p. 38 
 
 PETRARCH. From Vol. VII, p. 23 
 
 Written by, in his Virgil . . . Vol. VII, p. 37 
 
 PLATT, ARTHUR. On "Agamemnon" Vol. Ill, p. xvii 
 
 "POLONIUS" Vol. V, p. 197 
 
 PROLOGUE VoLVII, p. 20 
 
 QUARITCH, B., and the "Rubdiydt" of 
 
 1859 Vol. I, p. xxxiii 
 
 ROSSETTI, D. G.. and the "Rubdiydt" of 
 
 1859 Vol. I, p. xxxiv 
 
 "SALAMAN AND ABSAL." First 
 
 edition Vol. I, p. 37 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . . Vol. I, p. xxxix 
 
 Second edition Vol. II, p. 51 
 
 Third edition Vol. Ill, p. 41 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . . Vol. Ill, p. ix 
 
 Frontispiece and title-pages of . . Vol. Ill, pp. 2, 5, 7, 43 
 
 "SEA WORDS AND PHRASES ALONG 
 
 THE SUFFOLK COAST" . . Vol. VI, p. 201 
 
 Extracts from letters relating to . . Vol. VI,p. xix 
 
 SOPHOCLES. Dramas of Vol. VI, p. 1 
 
 STOKES, WHITLEY, ana the "Ru- 
 bdiydt" of 1859 Vol. I, p. xxxiii 
 
 "SUCH STUFF AS DREAMS ARE 
 
 MADE OF." Calderon Drama . Vol. V, p. 95 
 
 SUFFOLK. Crabbe's Vol. VII, p. 119 
 
 Sea Words and Phrases .... Vol. VI, p. 201 
 
 SWINBURNE, A. C. On the "Ru- 
 bdiydt" Vol. I, p. xxxiv 
 
 TENNYSON, ALFRED, Lord. On 
 
 "Euphranor." Note Vol. I, p. xlv 
 
 Reference to Vol. Ill, pp. xi and 140 
 
 [ 163 ]
 
 INDEX. 
 
 "THE DOWNFALL AND DEATH OF 
 KING CEDIPUS" . . . 
 Extracts from letters relating to 
 
 "THE MAYOR OF ZALAMEA." 
 Calderon Drama .... 
 
 "THE MEADOWS IN SPRING" 
 
 "THE MIGHTY MAGICIAN." 
 Calderon Drama ... 
 
 "THE PAINTER OF HIS OWN DIS- 
 HONOUR." Calderon Drama . 
 
 'THE TWO GENERALS' 
 
 "THREE JUDGMENTS AT A BLOW.' 
 Calderon Drama 
 
 "TO A LADY SINGING" .... 
 
 "TO A VIOLET" 
 
 "VIRGIL'S GARDEN" 
 
 Vol. VI, p. 1 
 Vol. VI, p. ix 
 
 Vol. IV, p. 323 
 Vol. VII, p. 1 
 
 Vol. V, p. 1 
 
 Vol. IV, p. 9 
 Vol. VII, p. 24 
 
 V^ol. IV, p. £45 
 Vol. VII, p. 6 
 Vol. VII, p. 10 
 Vol. VII, p. 34 
 
 [ ifil. ]
 
 PLANKED, DESIGNED AND SUPERINTENDED 
 
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 PRINTED AT THE DE VINNE PRESS 
 
 BEGUN IN JANUARY, I901 
 FINISHED IN APRIL, igo3
 
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 THE LIBRARY 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
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 STAMPED BELOW. 
 
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