T

In undecaying beauty were preserved; Mute register, to him, of time and place, And various fluctuations in the breast; To her, a monument of faithful Love Conquered, and in tranquillity retained!

« Close to his destined habitation lies
One who achieved a humbler victory,
Though marvellous in its kind. A Place there is
High in these mountains, that allured a Band
Of keen Adventurers to unite their pains

In search of precious ore: who tried, were foiled
And all desisted, all, save him alone.

He, taking counsel of his own clear thoughts,
And trusting only to his own weak hands,
Urged unremittingly the stubborn work,
Unseconded, uncountenanced; then, as time
Passed on, while still his lonely efforts found
No recompense, derided; and, at length,
By many pitied, as insane of mind;
By others dreaded as the luckless Thrall
Of subterranean Spirits feeding hope
By various mockery of sight and sound;
Hope, after hope, encouraged and destroyed.

-But when the Lord of seasons had matured
The fruits of earth through space of twice ten years,
The mountain's entrails offered to his view
And trembling grasp the long-deferred reward,
Not with more transport did Columbus greet
A world, his rich discovery! But our Swain,
A very Hero till his point was gained,
Proved all unable to support the weight
Of prosperous fortune. On the fields he looked
With an unsettled liberty of thought,

Of schemes and wishes; in the daylight walked
Giddy and restless; ever and anon
Quaffed in his gratitude immoderate cups;
And truly might be said to die of joy!
He vanished; but conspicuous to this day
The Path remains that linked his Cottage-door
To the Mine's mouth; a long, and slanting track,
Upon the rugged mountain's stony side,
Worn by his daily visits to and from
The darksome centre of a constant hope.
This Vestige, neither force of beating rain,
Nor the vicissitudes of frost and thaw
Shall cause to fade, till ages pass away;
And it is named, in memory of the event,
The PATH OF PERSEVERANCE.»

If to the opposite extreme they sank.
How would you pity Her who yonder rests;
Him, farther off; the Pair, who here are laid;
But, above all, that mixture of Earth's Mould
Whom sight of this green Hilclok to my mind
Recalls! He lived not till his locks were nipped
By seasonable frost of age; nor died
Before his temples, prematurely forced
To mix the mauly brown with silver grey,
Gave obvious instance of the sad effect
Produced, when thoughtless Folly hath usurped
The natural crown that sage Experience wears.
-Gay, volatile, ingenious, quick to learn,
And prompt to exhibit all that he possessed
Or could perform; a zealous actor-hired
Into the troop of mirth, a soldier-sworn
Into the lists of giddy enterprise-

Such was he; yet, as if within his frame
Two several souls alternately had lodged,
Two sets of manners could the Youth put on;
And, fraught with antics as the Indian bird
That writhes and chatters in her wiry cage,

Was graceful, when it pleased him, smooth and still
As the mute Swan that floats adown the stream,
Or, on the waters of the unruffled lake,
Anchors her placid beauty. Not a Leaf,
That flutters on the bough, more light than He;
And not a Flower, that droops in the green shade,
More winningly reserved! If ye inquire
How such consummate elegance was bred
Amid these wilds, this answer may suffice,
"T was Nature's will; who sometimes undertakes,
For the reproof of human vanity,

Art to outstrip in her peculiar walk.
Hence, for this Favourite, lavishly endowed
With personal gifts, and bright instinctive wit,
While both, embellishing each other, stood
Yet farther recommended by the charm
Of fine demeanour, and by dance and song,
And skill in letters, every fancy shaped
Fair expectations; nor, when to the World's
Capacious field forth went the Adventurer, there
Were he and his attainments overlooked,
Or scantily rewarded; but all hopes,
Cherished for him, he suffered to depart,

Like blighted buds; or clouds that mimicked Land
Before the Sailor's eye; or diamond drops

That sparkling decked the morning grass; or aught
That was attractive-and hath ceased to be!

-Yet, when this Prodigal returned, the rites
Of joyful greeting were on him bestowed,
Who, by humiliation undeterred,

Songht for his weariness a place of rest

Within his Father's gates.-Whence came He?-clothed

In tattered garb, from hovels where abides

Necessity, the stationary Host

Of vagrant Poverty; from rifted barns

Where no one dwells but the wide-staring Owl

« Amid the noblest relics, proudest Dust,

That Westminster, for Britain's glory, holds,
Within the bosom of her awful Pile,

Ambitiously collected. Yet the sigh,

Which wafts that prayer to Heaven, is due to all, Wherever laid, who living fell below

Their virtue's humbler mark; a sigh of pain

He had descended from the proud Saloon,
He came, the Ghost of beauty and of health,
The Wreck of gaiety! But soon revived
In strength, in power refitted, he renewed
His suit to Fortune; and she smiled again
Upon a fickle Ingrate. Thrice he rose,
Thrice sank as willingly. For He, whose nerves

Were used to thrill with pleasure, while his voice
Softly accompanied the tuneful harp,
By the nice finger of fair Ladies, touched
In glittering Halls, was able to derive

Not less enjoyment from an abject choice.
Who happier for the moment-who more blithe
Than this fallen Spirit? in those dreary Holds
His Talents lending to exalt the freaks
Of merry-making Beggars,-now, provoked
To laughter multiplied in louder peals
By his malicious wit; then, all enchained
With mute astonishment, themselves to see
In their own arts outdone, their fame eclipsed,
As by the very presence of the Fiend
Who dictates and inspires illusive feats,
For knavish purposes! The City, too,

With shame I speak it) to her guilty bowers
Allured him, sunk so low in self-respect
As there to linger, there to eat his bread,
Hired Minstrel of voluptuous blandishment;
Charming the air with skill of hand or voice,
Listen who would, he wrought upon whe might,
Sincerely wretched Hearts, or falsely gay.
-Such the too frequent tenor of his boast
In ears that relished the report;-but all
Was from his Parents happily concealed;
Who saw enough for blame and pitying love.
They also were permitted to receive
His last, repentant breath; and closed his eyes,
No more to open on that irksome world
Where he had long existed in the state
Of a young Fowl beneath one Mother hatched,
Though from another sprung-of different kind:
Where he had lived, and could not cease to live,
Distracted in propensity; content
With neither element of good or ill;
And yet in both rejoicing; man unblest;

Of contradictions infinite the slave,

Till his deliverance, when Mercy made him

One with Himself, and one with them who sleep,»>

Tis strange,» observed the Solitary, «< strange
It seems, and scarcely less than pitiful,
That in a Land where Charity provides
For all that can no longer feed themselves,

A Man like this should chuse to bring his shame
To the parental door; and with his sighs
fofect the air which he had freely breathed
In happy infancy. He could not pine,
Through lack of converse; no, he must have found
Abundant exercise for thought and speech
In his dividual Being, self-reviewed,
Self-catechised, self-punished.---Some there are
Who, drawing near their final Home, and much
And daily longing that the same were reached,
Would rather shun than seek the fellowship
Of kindred mould.-Such haply here are laid?»

«Yes,» said the Priest, « the Genius of our Hills, ho seems, by these stupendous barriers cast Round his Domain, desirous not alone To keep his own, but also to exclude All other progeny, doth sometimes lure, Even by this studied depth of privacy, The unhappy Alien hoping to obtain Concealment, or seduced by wish to find

In place from outward molestation free,
Helps to internal case. Of many such
Could I discourse; but as their stay was brief,
So their departure only left behind
Fancies, and loose conjectures. Other trace
Survives, for worthy mention, of a Pair
Who, from the pressure of their several fates,
Meeting as Strangers, in a petty Town
Whose blue roofs ornament a distant reach
Of this far-winding Vale, remained as Friends
True to their choice; and gave their bones in trust
To this loved Cemetery, here to lodge
With unescutcheoned privacy interred
Far from the Family-vault.-A Chieftain One
By right of birth; within whose spotless breast
The fire of ancient Caledonia burned.
fle, with the foremost whose impatience hailed
The Stuart, landing to resume, by force
Of arms, the crown which Bigotry had lost,
Aroused his clan; and, fighting at their head,
With his brave sword endeavoured to prevent
Culloden's fatal overthrow.-Escaped

From that disastrous rout, to foreign shores
He fled; and when the lenient hand of Time
Those troubles had appeased, he sought and gained,
For his obscured condition, an obscure
Retreat, within this nook of English ground.
-The Other, born in Britain's southern tract,

Had fixed his milder loyalty, and placed

His gentler sentiments of love and hate,

There, where they placed them who in conscience prized
The new succession, as a line of Kings
Whose oath had virtue to protect the Land
Against the dire assaults of Papacy

And arbitrary Rule. But launch thy Bark

On the distempered flood of public life,

And cause for most rare triumph will be thine
If, spite of keenest eye and steadiest hand,
The Stream, that bears thee forward, prove not, soon
Or late, a perilous Master. He, who oft,
Under the battlements and stately trees
That round his Mansion cast a sober gloom,
Had moralized on this, and other truths
Of kindred import, pleased and satisfied,
Was forced to vent his wisdom with a sigh
Heaved from the heart in fortune's bitterness,
When he had crushed a plentiful estate
By ruinous Contest, to obtain a Seat
In Britain's Senate. Fruitless was the attempt:
And while the uproar of that desperate strife
Continued yet to vibrate on his ear,
The vanquished Whig, beneath a borrowed name,
(For the mere sound and echo of his own
Haunted him with sensations of disgust
That he was glad to lose) slunk from the World
To the deep shade of these untravelled Wilds;
In which the Scottish Laird had long possessed
An undisturbed Abode.—Here, then, they met,
Two doughty Champions; flaming Jacobite
And sullen Hanoverian! You might think
That losses and vexations, less severe
Than those which they had severally sustained,
Would have inclined each to abate his zeal

For his ungrateful canse; no,-I have heard

My reverend Father tell that, mid the calm

Of that small Town encountering thus, they filled,

Daily, its Bowling-green with harmless strife;
Plagued with uncharitable thoughts the Church;
And vexed the Market-place. But in the breasts
Of these Opponents gradually was wrought,
With little change of general sentiment,
Such change towards each other, that their days
By choice were spent in constant fellowship;
And if, at times, they fretted with the yoke,
Those very bickerings made them love it more.

« A favourite boundary to their lengthened walks This Church-yard was. And, whether they had come Treading their path in sympathy and linked

In social converse, or by some short space
Discreetly parted to preserve the peace,
One Spirit seldom failed to extend its sway
Over both minds, when they awhile had marked
The visible quiet of this holy ground,

And breathed its soothing air;-the Spirit of hope
And saintly magnanimity; that, spurning
The field of selfish difference and dispute,
And every care which transitory things,
Earth, and the kingdoms of the earth, create,
Doth, by a rapture of forgetfulness,
Preclude forgiveness, from the praise debarred,
Which else the Christian Virtue might have claimed.
-There live who yet remember here to have seen
Their courtly Figures,-seated on the stump
Of an old Yew, their favourite resting-place.
But, as the Remnant of the long-lived Tree
Was disappearing by a swift decay,
They, with joint care, determined to erect,
Upon its site, a Dial, that might stand
For public use preserved, and thus survive
As their own private monument; for this
Was the particular spot, in which they wished,
(And Heaven was pleased to accomplish the desire)
That, undivided, their Remains should lie.

So, where the mouldered Tree had stood, was raised
You Structure, framing, with the ascent of steps
That to the decorated Pillar lead,

A work of art more sumptuous than might seem
To suit this Place; yet built in no proud scorn
Of rustic homeliness; they only aimed
To ensure for it respectful guardianship.
Around the margin of the Plate, whereon
The Shadow falls to note the stealthy hours,
Winds an inscriptive Legend ».—At these words
Thither we turned; and, gathered, as we read,
The appropriate sense, in Latin numbers couched,-
Time flies; it is his melancholy task
To bring, and bear away, delusive hopes,
And re-produce the troubles he destroys.
But, while his blindness thus is occupied,
Discerning Mortal! do thou serve the will
Of Time's eternal Master, and that peace
Which the World wants, shall be for Thee confirmed.»

« Smooth verse, inspired by no unlettered Muse, »> Exclaimed the Sceptic, «and the strain of thought Accords with Nature's language;-the soft voice Of yon white torrent falling down the rocks Speaks, less distinctly, to the same effect. If, then, their blended influence be not lost Upon our hearts, not wholly lost, I grant, Even upon mine, the more are we required

To feel for those, among our fellow-men,
Who, offering no obeisance to the world,
Are yet made desperate by ‘too quick a sense
Of constant infelicity' — cut off
From peace like Exiles on some barren rock,
Their life's appointed prison; not more free
Than Sentinels, between two armies, set,
With nothing better, in the chill night air,
Than their own thoughts to comfort them.-Say why
That ancient story of Prometheus chained?

The Vulture-the inexhaustible repast

Drawn from his vitals? Say what meant the woes

By Tantalus entailed upon his race,

And the dark sorrows of the line of Thebes?
Fictions in form, but in their substance truths,
Tremendous truths! familiar to the men
Of long-past times; nor obsolete in ours.
-Exchange the Shepherd's frock of native grey
For robes with regal purple tinged; convert
The crook into a sceptre;-give the pomp
Of circumstance, and here the tragic Muse
Shall find apt subjects for her highest art.
-Amid the groves, beneath the shadowy hills,
The generations are prepared; the pangs,
The internal pangs are ready; the dread strife
Of poor humanity's afflicted will

Struggling in vain with ruthless destiny.»

« Though,» said the Priest in answer, « these be terms
Which a divine philosophy rejects,
We, whose established and unfailing trust
Is in controlling Providence, admit
That, through all stations, human life abounds
With mysteries;-for, if Faith were left untried,
How could the might, that lurks within her, then
Be shewn her glorious excellence—that ranks
Among the first of Powers and Virtues-proved?
Our system is not fashioned to preclude
That sympathy which you for others ask;
And I could tell, not travelling for my theme
Beyond these humble graves, of grievous crimes
And strange disasters; but I pass them by,
Loth to disturb what Heaven hath hushed in peace.
-Still less, far less, am I inclined to treat
Of Man degraded in his Maker's sight
By the deformities of brutish vice :
For, in such Portraits, though a vulgar face
And a coarse outside of repulsive life
And unaffecting manners might at once
Be recognized by all »>« Ah! do not think,>>
The Wanderer somewhat eagerly exclaimed,

« Wish could be ours that you, for such poor gain,
(Gain shall I call it?-gain of what?-for whom?)
Should breathe a word tending to violate
Your own pure spirit. Not a step we look for
In slight of that forbearance and reserve
Which common human-heartedness inspires,
And mortal ignorance and frailty claim,
Upon this sacred ground, if nowhere else.»

«< True,» said the Solitary, « be it far From us to infringe the laws of charity. Let judgment here in mercy be pronounced; This, self-respecting Nature prompts, and this Wisdom enjoins; but, if the thing we seek Be genuine knowledge, bear we then in mind

How, from his lofty throne, the Sun can fling
Colours as bright on exhalations bred
By weedy pool or pestilential swamp,
As by the rivulet sparkling where it runs,
Or the pellucid Lake. »

<< Small risk,» said I,
« Of such illusion do we here incur ;
Temptation here is none to exceed the truth;
No evidence appears that they who rest
Within this ground, were covetous of praise,
Or of remembrance even, deserved or not.
Green is the Church-yard, beautiful and green;
Kidge rising gently by the side of ridge:
A heaving surface-almost wholly free
From interruption of sepulchral stones,
And mantled o'er with aboriginal turf

And everlasting flowers. These Dalesmen trust
The lingering gleam of their departed Lives
To oral records and the silent heart;

Depository faithful, and more kind

Than fondest Epitaphs: for, if that fail,

Than brotherly forgiveness may attend:
To such will we restrict our notice; else
Better my tongue were mute. And yet there are,
I feel, good reasons why we should not leave
Wholly untraced a more forbidding way.
For strength to persevere and to support,
And energy to conquer and repel ;—
These elements of virtue, that declare
The native grandeur of the human Soul,
Are oft-times not unprofitably shewn
In the perverseness of a selfish course :
Truth every day exemplified, no less
In the grey cottage by the murmuring stream
Than in fantastic Conqueror's roving camp,
Or 'mid the factious Senate, unappalled
While merciless proscription ebbs and flows.
-There,» said the Vicar, pointing as he spake,
« A Woman rests in peace; surpassed by few
In power of mind, and eloquent discourse.
Tall was her stature; her complexion dark
And saturnine: her head not raised to hold

Who rather would not envy, men that feel
This mutual confidence; if, from such source,
The practice flow,-if thence, or from a deep
And general humility in death?

Nor should I much condemn it, if it spring
From disregard of Time's destructive power,
As only capable to prey on things

Of earth, and human nature's mortal part.
Yet-in less simple districts, where we see
Stone lift its forehead emulous of stone
In courting notice, and the ground all paved
With commendations of departed worth;
Reading, where'er we turn, of innocent lives,
Of each domestic charity fulfilled,

And sufferings meekly borne-1, for my part,
Though with the silence pleased that here prevails,
Among those fair recitals also range,
Soothed by the natural spirit which they breathe.
And, in the centre of a world whose soil
Is rank with all unkindness, compassed round
With such Memorials, I have sometimes felt
That it was no momentary happiness

To have one Enclosure where the voice that speaks
In envy or detraction is not heard;

Which malice may not enter; where the traces

Of evil inclinations are unknown;

Where love and pity tenderly unite

With resignation; and no jarring tone
Intrudes, the peaceful concert to disturb
Of amity and gratitude.»>

«Thus sanctioned,»
The Pastor said, «I willingly confine
My narratives to subjects that excite
Feelings with these accordant; love, esteem,
And admiration; lifting up a veil,
A sunbeam introducing among hearts
Retired and covert; so that ye shall have
Clear images before your gladdened eyes
Of Nature's unambitious underwood,

And flowers that prosper in the shade. And when
I speak of such among my flock as swerved

Or fell, those only will I single out
Upon whose lapse, or error, something more

But in projection carried, as she walked
For ever musing. Sunken were her eyes;
Wrinkled and furrowed with habitual thought
Was her broad forehead; like the brow of One
Whose visual nerve shrinks from a painful glare
Of overpowering light.-While yet a Child,
She, 'mid the humble Flowerets of the vale,
Towered like the imperial Thistle, not unfurnished
With its appropriate grace, yet rather seeking
To be admired, than coveted and loved.
Even at that age, she ruled as sovereign Queen
Mid her Companions; else their simple sports,
Wanting all relish for her strenuous mind,
[lad crossed her, only to be shunned with scorn.
-Oh! pang of sorrowful regret for those
Whom, in their youth, sweet study has enthralled,
That they have lived for harsher servitude,
Whether in soul, in body, or estate!
Such doom was hers; yet nothing could subdue
Her keen desire of knowledge; nor efface
Those brighter images-by books impressed
Upon her memory; faithfully as stars
That occupy their places,-and, though oft
Hidden by clouds, and oft bedimmed by haze,
Are not to be extinguished, or impaired.

« Two passions, both degenerate, for they both Began in honour, gradually obtained Rule over her, and vexed her daily life;

An unrelenting, avaricious thrift;
And a strange thraldom of maternal love,
That held her spirit, in its own despite,
Bound-by vexation, and regret, and scorn,
Constrained forgiveness, and relenting vows,
And tears, in pride suppressed, in shame concealed-
To a poor dissolute Son, her only Child.
-Her wedded days had opened with mishap,
Whence dire dependence.-What could she perform
To shake the burthen off? Ah! there was felt
Indignantly, the weakness of her sex.
She mused-resolved, adhered to her resolve;
The hand grew slack in alms-giving, the heart
Closed by degrees to charity; heaven's blessing