Life and Remains of John Clare Part 30

O it was a lorn and a dismal night, And the storm beat loud and high; Not a friendly light to guide me right Was there s.h.i.+ning in the sky, When a lonely hut my wanderings met, Lost in a foreign land, And I found the dearest friend as yet In my lovely Peggy Band.

"O, father, here's a soldier lad, And weary he seems to be."

"Then welcome in," the old man said, And she gave her seat to me.

The fire she trimmed, and my clothes she dried With her own sweet lily hand, And o'er the soldier's lot she sighed, While I blest my Peggy Band.

When I told the tale of my wandering years, And the nights unknown to sleep, She made excuse to hide her tears, And she stole away to weep.

A pilgrim's blessing I seemed to share, As saints of the Holy Land, And I thought her a guardian angel there, Though he called her his Peggy Band.

The night it pa.s.sed, and the hour to part With the morning winged away, And I felt an anguish at my heart That vainly bid to stay.

I thanked the old man for all he did, And I took his daughter's hand, But my heart was full, and I could not bid Farewell to my Peggy Band.

A blessing on that friendly cot, Where the soldier found repose, And a blessing be her constant lot Who soothed the stranger's woes.

I turned a last look at the door, As she held it in her hand, And my heart ached sore, as I crossed the moor, For to leave my Peggy Band.

TO A BROOK

Sweet brook! I've met thee many a summer's day, And ventured fearless in thy shallow flood, And rambled oft thy sweet unwearied way, 'Neath willows cool that on thy margin stood, With crowds of partners in my artless play-- Gra.s.shopper, beetle, bee, and b.u.t.terfly-- That frisked about as though in merry mood To see their old companion sporting by.

Sweet brook! life's glories then were mine and thine; Shade clothed thy spring that now doth naked lie; On thy white glistening sand the sweet woodbine Darkened and dipt its flowers. I mark, and sigh, And muse o'er troubles since we met the last, Like two fond friends whose happiness is past.

PROSE FRAGMENTS

A CONFESSION OF FAITH

My creed may be different from other creeds, but the difference is nothing when the end is the same. If I did not expect and hope for eternal happiness I should be ever miserable; and as every religion is a rule leading to good by its professor, the religions of all nations and creeds, where that end is the aim, ought rather to be respected than scoffed at. A final judgment of men by their deeds and actions in life is inevitable, and the only difference between an earthly a.s.size and the eternal one is, that the final one needs no counsellors to paint the bad or good better or worse than they are.

The Judge knows the hearts of all men, and the sentence may be expected to be just as well as final, whether it be for the worst or the best. This ought to teach us to pause and think, and try to lead our lives as well as we can.

ESSAY ON POPULARITY

"Rumour and the popular voice Some look to more than truth, and so confirm Opinions."

CARY'S Dante.

Popularity is a busy talker: she catches hold of topics and offers them to fame without giving herself time to reflect whether they are true or false, and fas.h.i.+on is her favourite disciple who sanctions and believes them as eagerly, and with the same faith, as a young lady in the last century read a new novel and a tavern-haunter in this reads the news. It is natural, with such foundations, to ask whether popularity is fame, for it often happens that very slender names come to be popular from many causes with which merit or genius has no sort of connection or kindred. It may be some oddity in the manner, or incident in the life, of the author that is whispered over before his book comes out. This often macadamizes the way to popularity, for gossip is a mighty spell in the literary world, and a concealment of the author's name often creates an anxiety in the public mind, for it leaves room for guesses and conjectures, and as some are very fond of appearing wise in such matters by saying they know from good authority that such a one is the author, it becomes the talk of the card party and tea-table, and he gains a superficial notoriety. Such was the case with the "Pursuits of Literature," a leaden-footed satire that had as much claim to merit as the statue of Pasquin in the Market-place of Rome, on which vulgar squibs were pasted. Everybody knew the author, and n.o.body knew him. The first names of the day were foisted into the concern, and when the secret was found out that it belonged to one of the lowest, the book sank to rise no more. Sometimes a pompous, pretending t.i.tle hits the mark at once and wins a name. Who among the lower orders of youth is ignorant of the "Young Man's Best Companion" by Mr. Fisher, Accomptant, or the "Book of Wisdom" by Mr. Penning, Philomath? They are almost as common as bibles and prayer-books in a cottage library.

A guess is not hazarded in believing that popularity is not the omen of true fame. Sometimes the trifling and ridiculous grow into the most extensive popularity, such as the share of it which a man gained by wearing a high brimmed hat, and another that cut off the tails of his coat and thereby branded his name on the remnant; and though the spencers are out of fas.h.i.+on they have outlived many a poetical popularity. These are instances of the ridiculous. The trifling are full as extensive. Where is the poet who shares half the popularity of Warren, Turner, or Day and Martin, whose ebony fames are spread through every dirty little village in England? These instances of the trifling and ridiculous made as much noise and stir in their day as the best, and noise and bustle are the essence and soul of popularity.

The nearest akin to popularity is common fame. I mean names that are familiar among the common people. It is not a very envious species, for they seldom know how to value or appreciate what they are acquainted with. The name of Chatterton is familiar to their ears as an unfortunate poet, because they saw his history printed on pocket handkerchiefs; and the name of Shakespeare as a great play writer, because they have often seen him nominated as such on the bills of strolling players, who make s.h.i.+ft with barns for theatres. But this sort of revelry makes a corresponding idea in their minds, for the paltry ballad mongers, whose productions supply hawkers with their wares, are poets with them, and they imagine one as great as the other, common minds making no distinction in these common fames. On the other hand there is something in it to wish for, because there are things as old as England that have outlived centuries of popularity, nay, left half its history in darkness, and they still live on, as common in every memory as the seasons, and as familiar to children even as the rain and Spring flowers. I allude to the old superst.i.tious fragments of legends and stories in rhyme that are said to be Norman, or Saxon, or Danish. There are many desire this common fame, and it is mostly met in a manner least expected. While some affectations are striving for a lifetime to hit all tastes and always miss the mark by a wide throw, an unconscious poet of little name writes a trifle as he feels, without thinking of others, and he becomes a common name.

Unaffected simplicity is the everyday picture of Nature. Thus, little children's favourites of "c.o.c.k Robin," "Little Red Riding Hood," and "Babes in the Wood," have impressions at the core that grow up with manhood and are always dear. Poets anxious after common fame, as some of the "naturals" seem to be, imitate these things by affecting simplicity, and become unnatural. These things found fame where the greatest names are still oblivious. A literary man might enquire after the names of Spenser and Milton in vain in half the villages in England, even among what are called its gentry, but I believe it would be difficult to find a corner in any county where the others are not known, nor an old woman in any hamlet with whom they are not familiar.

In my days, some of the pieces of the modern poets have gained this common popularity, which must be distinguished from fame as it may only live for a season.

Wordsworth's beautiful, simple ballad of "We are seven" I have seen hawked about for a penny, and Tannahill's song of "Jessy" has met with more popularity among the common people than all other songs, English and Scottish, put together. Lord Byron's hasty fame may be deemed a contradiction to the above opinion that popularity is not true fame, though at its greatest extent it is but an exception, and scarcely that, for his great and hurried popularity, that almost trampled on its own heels in its haste, must drop into a less bustling degree, and become cool and quiet, like the preaching of Irving. Shakespeare was hardly noticed in his lifetime by popularity, but he is known now, and Byron is hardly the tenth part of a Shakespeare. Every storm must have its calm, and Byron took fame by storm. By a desperate daring he over-swept petty control like a rebellious flood, or a tempest worked up into madness by the quarrel of the elements, and he seemed to value that daring as the attainment of true fame. He looked upon Horace's "Art of Poetry" no doubt with esteem as a reader, but he cared no more for it in the profession of a poet than the weather does for an almanack. He looked upon critics as the countryman does on a magistrate. He beheld them as a race of petty tyrants that stood in the way of genius. They were in his eyes more of stumbling-blocks than guides, and he treated them accordingly. He let them know there was another road to Parna.s.sus without taking theirs, and being obliged to do them homage. Not stooping to the impediments of their authorities, like the paths of a besieged city enc.u.mbered with sentinels, he made a road for himself, and, like Napoleon crossing the Alps, he let the world see that even in the eye of a mortal their greatest obstacles were looked on "as the dust in a balance." He gained the envied eminence of living popularity by making a breach where it was thought impregnable. Where others had laid siege for a lifetime, and lost their hopes and their labour at last, he gained the heights of popularity by a single stride, and looked down as a free-booter on the world below, scorning the applause his labours had gained him, and scarcely returning a compliment for the laurels which fas.h.i.+on so eagerly bound round his brows, while he saw the alarm of his leaden-footed enemies, and withered them to nothings with his sneer. He was an Oliver Cromwell with the critics. He broke up their long-standing Parliament and placed his own will in the Speaker's chair, and his will they humbly accepted. They submitted to one that scorned to be shackled, and champed the bit in his stead. They praised and respected him, nay, they wors.h.i.+pped him. He was all in all in their mouths and in their writings, but I suspect their hearts had as much love for him as the peasantry had for witches in the last century, who spoke well of them to their faces because they dared not do other-wise for fear of meeting an injury. Whether Byron hath won true fame or not I cannot say; my mind is too little to grasp that judgment. To say that he was the first of his age in his way is saying nothing, but we have sufficient ill.u.s.tration for the argument in saying that popularity is not the forerunner of fame's eternity. Among all the bustle of popularity there must be only a portion of it accepted as fame. Time will sift it of its drossy puffs and praises. He has been with others extolled as equal to Shakespeare, and I dare say the popular voice of "readers" thought him superior. But three centuries will wither every extravagance, and sober the picture of its glaring colours. He is no doubt one of the eternals, but he is one of those of the 19th century, and if all its elements be cla.s.sed together in the next they would make but a poor subst.i.tute for a Shakespeare. Eternity will not rake the bottom of the sea of oblivion for puffs and praises, and all their attendant rubbish, the feelings that the fas.h.i.+on of the day created, and the flatteries uttered. Eternity will estimate things at their proper value, and no other. She will not even seek for the newspaper praise of Walter Scott. She will not look for Byron's immortality in the company of Warren's blacking, Prince's kalydor, and Atkinson's bear's grease. She looks for it in his own merit, and her impartial judgment will be his best reward.

Wordsworth has had little share of popularity, though he bids fair to be as great in one species of poetry as Byron was in another, but to acknowledge such an opinion in the world's ear would only pucker the lips of fas.h.i.+on into a sneer against it. Yet his lack of living praise is no proof of his lack of genius. The trumpeting clamour of public praise is not to be relied on as the creditor of the future.

The quiet progress of a name gaining ground by gentle degrees in the world's esteem is the best living shadow of fame to follow. The simplest trifle and the meanest thing in nature is the same now as it shall continue to be till the world's end.

Men trample gra.s.s and prize the flowers in May, But gra.s.s is green when flowers do fade away.

Sc.r.a.pS FOR AN ESSAY ON CRITICISM AND FAs.h.i.+ON

None need be surprised to see these two false prophets in partners.h.i.+p or conjunction for an essay, as they may be called brothers, for the one attests what it pleases and the other takes it for granted.

Criticism is grown a sort of book milliner, who cuts a book to any pattern of abuse or praise, and Fas.h.i.+on readily wears the opinion.

How many productions whose milk-and-water merits, or unintelligible stupidity, have been considered as novelties, have by that means gained the admiration of Criticism and the praise of Fas.h.i.+on, until a more absurd novelty pushed them from their preferments and caused them to be as suddenly forgotten! The vulgar, tasteless jargon of "Dr. Syntax," with all the above-mentioned excellencies to excite public notice from the b.u.t.terflies of fas.h.i.+on, soon found what it sought, though some of the plates or ill.u.s.trations possess the disadvantageous merit of being good. Yet the letter-press doubly made up for all, for it was prose trebly prosified into wire-drawn doggrel, and consequently met with a publicity and sale unprecedented. Edition multiplied on edition, till it was found needless to number the t.i.tle page, and it was only necessary to say "A New Edition;" while the poems of Wordsworth scarcely found admirers enough to ensure a second edition. What will the admirers of poetry in the next age think of the taste of this, which has been called "the Golden Age of criticism, poetry, taste, and genius"?

Fas.h.i.+on is like a new book "elegantly bound and lettered." It cannot endure dust and cobwebs; but true criticism is like a newly-planted laurel: it thrives with age and gathers strength from antiquity, till it becomes a spreading tree and shelters the objects of its praise under its shadow. Just Criticism is a stern but laudable prophet, and Time and Truth are the only disciples who can discern and appreciate his predictions.

Sc.r.a.pS FOR AN ESSAY ON CRITICISM

Flowers must be sown and tended with care, like children, to grow up to maturity, but weeds grow of themselves and multiply without any attention, choking up those flowers that require it; and lies are propagated as easily as weeds, and choke up the blossoms of truth in the same manner. But the evils and misrepresentations of false criticism, though great and many, are not lasting.

Upon its principles fas.h.i.+on and flattery have made many Shakespeares, and these false prophets have flourished and will flourish for a season, for truth, when she cannot be heard by the opposition of falsehood, remains silent and leaves time to decide the difference, who cometh quietly and impartially to her a.s.sistance, hurling without ceremony, century after century, usurper after usurper from the throne of the mighty, and erasing their names from his altar as suddenly and as perfectly as the sunbeam pa.s.ses over and washes away the stains of a shadow on the wall. Fame hath weighed the false criticisms and pretensions of centuries already, and found nothing as yet but dust in the balance. Shadows of Shakespeare are cast away as profane idols, and reality hath fallen short of even a trinity. She acknowledges as sacred but one, and I fear that when she shall calculate the claims of ten centuries she will find the number of the mighty a unit. But why should fear be expressed for a repet.i.tion which we neither hope for nor need? We have but one sun in our firmament, and upwards of six thousand years have neither added to nor diminished its splendour, neither have vain desires been expressed for the existence of another. Needless wishes create painful expectations. When a man is warm and comfortable on a cold day he cannot wish for an excess that would burn him. Therefore we need neither hope for more Shakespeares nor regret that there is but one. When the Muses created him a poet they created him the sun of the firmament of genius, and time has proved, and will prove, that they glory in their creation, deeming it sufficient, without striving to find or create another, for nature knows the impossibility. There have been, both before and after, constellations of great and wonderful beauty, and many in this age will be found in the number who s.h.i.+ne in their own light with becoming splendour, but whenever flattery or vanity places them near the great luminary their little lights lose their splendour and they vanish in his brightness as the stars are lost at noon.

The falling stars leave a stream of splendour behind them for a moment; then utter darkness follows, and not a spark is left to show where they fell.

It is said that Byron is not to have a monument in Westminster Abbey.

To him it is no injury. Time is his monument, on whose scroll the name of Byron shall be legible when the walls and tombs of Westminster Abbey shall have mingled with the refuse of ruins, and the sun, as in scorn, be left free again to smile upon the earth so long darkened with the pompous shadows of bigotry and intolerance.

OLD SONGS AND BALLADS

Respecting these compositions Clare says:--