Chapter XII: Part II (5)

The following poem was contributed to, and printed in, a volume entitled “_La Petite Chouannerie, ou Histoire d’un Collège Breton sous l’Empire_. Par A. F. Rio. Londres: Moxon, Dover Street, 1842,” pp. 62, 63. The Hon. Mrs. Norton, Walter Savage Landor, and Monckton Milnes (Lord Houghton), were among the other English contributors to the volume, the bulk of which is in French. It was printed at Paris, and numbered 398 pages, including the title. It was a narrative of “the romantic revolt of the royalist students of the college of Vannes in 1815, and of their battles with the soldiers of the French Empire.” (H. REED.)--ED.

Composed (?).--Published 1842

Shade of Caractacus, if spirits love
The cause they fought for in their earthly home,
To see the Eagle ruffled by the Dove
May soothe thy memory of the chains of Rome.

These children claim thee for their sire; the breath 5
Of thy renown, from Cambrian mountains, fans
A flame within them that despises death,
And glorifies the truant youth of Vannes.

With thy own scorn of tyrants they advance,
But truth divine has sanctified their rage, 10
A silver cross enchased with flowers of France
Their badge, attests the holy fight they wage.

The shrill defiance of the young crusade
Their veteran foes mock as an idle noise;
But unto Faith and Loyalty comes aid 15
From Heaven, gigantic force to beardless boys.

[413] In the volume from which the above is copied, the original French lines (commencing at p. 106) are printed side by side with Wordsworth’s translation, which ends on p. 111, and closes the volume.--ED.

GRACE DARLING[414]

Composed 1842.--Published 1845

Wordsworth’s lines on Grace Darling were printed privately, and anonymously, at Carlisle, before they were included in the 1845 edition of his works. A copy was sent to Mr. Dyce, and is preserved in the Dyce Library at South Kensington. Another was sent to Professor Reed (March 27, 1843), with a letter, in which the following occurs: “I threw it off two or three weeks ago, being in a great measure impelled to it by the desire I felt to do justice to the memory of a heroine, whose conduct presented, some time ago, a striking contrast to the inhumanity with which our countrymen, shipwrecked lately upon the French coast, have been treated.”

Edward Quillinan, writing on 25th March 1843, enclosed a copy, adding, “Mr. Wordsworth desires me to send you the enclosed eulogy on Grace Darling, recently composed. He begs me to say that he wishes it kept out of the newspapers, as he has printed it only for some of his friends, and his friends’ friends more peculiarly interested in the subject, for the present. Do not therefore give a copy to any one.”

“Almost immediately after I had composed my tribute to the memory of Grace Darling, I learnt that the Queen and Queen Dowager had both just subscribed towards the erection of a monument to record her heroism, upon the spot that witnessed it.” (Wordsworth to Sir W. Gomm, March 24, 1843.)--ED.

Among the dwellers in the silent fields
The natural heart is touched, and public way
And crowded streets resound with ballad strains,
Inspired by ONE whose very name bespeaks
Favour divine, exalting human love; 5
Whom, since her birth on bleak Northumbria’s coast,
Known unto few but prized as far as known,
A single Act endears to high and low
Through the whole land--to Manhood, moved in spite
Of the world’s freezing cares--to generous Youth-- 10
To Infancy, that lisps her praise--to Age
Whose eye reflects it, glistening through a tear
Of tremulous admiration. Such true fame
Awaits her _now_; but, verily, good deeds
Do no imperishable record find 15
Save in the rolls of heaven, where hers may live
A theme for angels, when they celebrate
The high-souled virtues which forgetful earth
Has witness’d. Oh! that winds and waves could speak
Of things which their united power called forth 20
From the pure depths of her humanity!
A Maiden gentle, yet, at duty’s call,
Firm and unflinching, as the Lighthouse reared
On the Island-rock, her lonely dwelling-place;
Or like the invincible Rock itself that braves, 25
Age after age, the hostile elements,
As when it guarded holy Cuthbert’s cell.[415]

All night the storm had raged, nor ceased, nor paused,
When, as day broke, the Maid, through misty air,
Espies far off a Wreck, amid the surf, 30
Beating on one of those disastrous isles--
Half of a Vessel, half--no more; the rest
Had vanished, swallowed up with all that there
Had for the common safety striven in vain,
Or thither thronged for refuge.[416] With quick glance 35
Daughter and Sire through optic-glass discern,
Clinging about the remnant of this Ship,
Creatures--how precious in the Maiden’s sight!
For whom, belike, the old Man grieves still more
Than for their fellow-sufferers engulfed 40
Where every parting agony is hushed,
And hope and fear mix not in further strife.
“But courage, Father! let us out to sea--
A few may yet be saved.” The Daughter’s words,
Her earnest tone, and look beaming with faith, 45
Dispel the Father’s doubts: nor do they lack
The noble-minded Mother’s helping hand
To launch the boat; and with her blessing cheered,
And inwardly sustained by silent prayer,
Together they put forth, Father and Child! 50
Each grasps an oar, and struggling on they go--
Rivals in effort; and, alike intent
Here to elude and there surmount, they watch
The billows lengthening, mutually crossed
And shattered, and re-gathering their might; 55
As if the tumult, by the Almighty’s will
Were, in the conscious sea, roused and prolonged,[417]
That woman’s fortitude--so tried, so proved--
May brighten more and more!
True to the mark,
They stem the current of that perilous gorge, 60
Their arms still strengthening with the strengthening heart,
Though danger, as the Wreck is near’d, becomes
More imminent. Not unseen do they approach;
And rapture, with varieties of fear
Incessantly conflicting, thrills the frames 65
Of those who, in that dauntless energy,
Foretaste deliverance; but the least perturbed
Can scarcely trust his eyes, when he perceives
That of the pair--tossed on the waves to bring
Hope to the hopeless, to the dying, life-- 70
One is a Woman, a poor earthly sister,
Or, be the Visitant other than she seems,
A guardian Spirit sent from pitying Heaven,
In woman’s shape. But why prolong the tale,
Casting weak words amid a host of thoughts 75
Armed to repel them? Every hazard faced
And difficulty mastered, with resolve
That no one breathing should be left to perish,
This last remainder of the crew are all
Placed in the little boat, then o’er the deep 80
Are safely borne, landed upon the beach,
And, in fulfilment of God’s mercy, lodged
Within the sheltering Lighthouse.--Shout, ye Waves!
Send forth a song of triumph. Waves and Winds,
Exult in this deliverance wrought through faith 85
In Him whose Providence your rage hath served![418]
Ye screaming Sea-mews, in the concert join!
And would that some immortal Voice--a Voice
Fitly attuned to all that gratitude
Breathes out from floor or couch, through pallid lips 90
Of the survivors--to the clouds might bear--
Blended with praise of that parental love,
Beneath whose watchful eye the Maiden grew
Pious and pure, modest and yet so brave,
Though young so wise, though meek so resolute-- 95
Might carry to the clouds and to the stars,
Yea, to celestial Choirs, GRACE DARLING’S name!

[414] Grace Darling was the daughter of William Darling, the lighthouse keeper on Longstone, one of the Farne Islands on the Northumbrian coast. On the 7th of September 1838, the Forfarshire steamship was wrecked on these islands. At the instigation of his daughter, and accompanied by her, Darling went out in his lifeboat through the surf, to the wreck, and --by their united strength and daring--rescued the nine survivors.--ED.

[415] St. Cuthbert of Durham, born about 635, was first a shepherd boy, then a monk in the monastery of Melrose, and afterwards its prior. He left Melrose for the island monastery of Lindisfarne; but desiring an austerer life than the monastic, he left Lindisfarne, and became an anchorite, in a hut which he built with his own hands, on one of the Farne Islands. He was afterwards induced to accept the bishopric of Hexham, but soon exchanged it for the see in his old island home at Lindisfarne, and after two years there resigned his bishopric, returning to his cell in Farne Island, where he died in 687. His remains were carried to Durham, and placed within a costly shrine.--ED.

[416] Fifty-four persons had perished, before Grace Darling’s lifeboat reached the wreck.--ED.

[417] 1845.

As if the wrath and trouble of the sea
Were by the Almighty’s sufferance prolonged,

In privately printed edition.

[418] 1845.

For the last three lines, the privately printed edition has the single one--

Pipe a glad song of triumph, ye fierce Winds.

“WHEN SEVERN’S SWEEPING FLOOD HAD OVERTHROWN”

Composed 23rd January 1842.--Published 1842

In 1842 a bazaar was held in Cardiff Castle to aid in the erection of a Church, on the site of one which had been washed away by a flood in the river Severn (and a consequent influx of waters into the estuary of the British Channel) two hundred years before. Wordsworth and James Montgomery were asked to write some verses, which might be printed and sold to assist the cause. They did so. The following was Wordsworth’s contribution.--ED.

When Severn’s sweeping flood had overthrown
St. Mary’s Church, the preacher then would cry:--
“Thus, Christian people, God his might hath shown
That ye to him your love may testify;
Haste, and rebuild the pile.”--But not a stone 5
Resumed its place. Age after age went by,
And Heaven still lacked its due, though piety
In secret did, we trust, her loss bemoan.
But now her Spirit hath put forth its claim
In Power, and Poesy would lend her voice; 10
Let the new Church be worthy of its aim,
That in its beauty Cardiff may rejoice!
Oh! in the past if cause there was for shame,
Let not our times halt in their better choice.

RYDAL MOUNT, _23rd Jan. 1842_.

THE PILLAR OF TRAJAN

The Fenwick note to _The Pillar of Trajan_ mentions that the author’s son having declined to attempt to compete for the Oxford prize poem on “The Pillar of Trajan,” his father wrote it, to show him how the thing might be done. This son--the Rev. John Wordsworth of Brigham--wrote Latin verse with considerable success; and as specimens of the poetic work of Dorothy Wordsworth and of Sarah Hutchinson are included in these volumes, the following _Epistola ad Patrem suum_, written at Madeira by John Wordsworth in 1844, may be reproduced.--ED.

I pete longinquas, non segnis Epistola, terras,
I pete, Rydaliae conscia saxa lyrae:
I pete quà valles rident, sylvaeque lacusque,
Quamvis Arctoo paenè sub axe jacent.
Parvos quaere Lares, non aurea Tecta, poetae, 5
Qui tamen ingenii sceptraque mentis habet.
Quid faciat genitor? valeatne, an cura senilis
Opprimat? Ista refer, filius ista rogat.
Scire velit, quare venias tu scripta _latine_?
Dic “fugio linguam, magne poeta, tuam! 10
Quem Regina jubet circumdare tempora lauro,
Quem verè vatem saecula nostra vocant.”
Inde refer gressus responsaque tradita curae
Fida tuae, numeris in loca digna senis,
Haec ego tradiderim, majoribus ire per altum 15
Nunc velis miserum me mea musa rapit.
Solvimus è portu, navisque per aequora currit
Neptuni auxilio fluctifragisque rotis.
Neptunus videt attonitus, Neptunia conjux,
Omnis et aequorei nympha comata chori. 20
Radimus Hispanum litus, loca saxea crebris
Gallorum belli nobilitata malis.
Haud mora, sunt visae Gades,[419] urbs fabula quondam,
Claraque ab Herculeo nomine, clara suo.
Hanc magnam cognovit Arabs, Romanus candem, 25
Utraque gens illi vimque decusque tulit.
Hora brevis, fragilisque viris! similisque ruina
Viribus humanis omnia facta manet
Pulchra jaces, olim Carthaginis aemula magnae,
Nataque famosae non inhonesta Tyri! 30
En! ratibus navale caret, nautis caret alnus,
Mercatorque fugit dives inane Forum.
Templa vacant pompâ, nitidisque theatra catervis,
Tristis et it foedâ foemina virque via.
Segnis in officiis, nec rectus ad aethera miles 35
Pauperis et vestes, armaque juris habet.
Sic gens quaeque perit,[420] quando civilia bella
Viscera divellunt, jusque fidesque fugit.
Auspiciis laetam nostris lux proxima pandit
Te, Calpe[421] celsis imperiosa jugis. 40
Urbs munimen habet nullo quassabile bello,
Claustrum Tyrrhenis, claustrum et Atlantis, aquis.
Undique nam vastae sustentant moenia rupes,
Quae torvè in terras inque tuentur aquas.
Arteque sunt mirâ sectae per saxa cavernae, 45
Atria sanguineo saeva sacrata Deo.
Urbs invicta tamen populis commercia tuta
Praebet, et in portus illicit inque Forum.
Hic Mercator adest Maurus cui rebus agendis.
Ah! nimis est cordi Punica prisca fides; 50
Afer et è mediis Libyae sitientis arenis,
Suetus in immundâ vivere barbarie;
Multus et aequoreis, ut quondam, Graius in undis,
Degener, antiquum sic probat ille genus;
Niliacae potator aquae, Judaeus, et omne 55
Litus Tyrrhenum quos, et Atlantis, alit.
Hos quàm dissimiles (linguae sive ora notentur)
Hos quàm felices pace Britannus habet!
Anglia! dum pietas et honos, dum nota per orbem
Sit tibi in intacto pectore prisca fides; 60
Dum pia cura tibi, magnos meruisse triumphos,
Justaque per populos jura tulisse feros;
Longinquas teneat tua vasta potentia terras,
Et maneat Calpe gloria magna Tibi!
Insula Atlanteis assurgit ab aequoris undis, 65
Insula flammigero semper amata Deo,
Seu teneat celsi flagrantia signa Leonis,
Seu gyro Pisces interiore petat.
“Hic ver assiduum atque alienis mensibus aestas,”
Flavus et autumnus frugibus usque tumet. 70
Non jacet Ionio felicior Insula ponto
Ulla, nec Eoi fluctibus oceani.
Vix, Madeira! tuum nunc refert dicere nomen,
Floribus, et Bacchi munere pingue solum.
Te vetus haud vanis cumulavit laudibus aetas, 75
O fortunato conspicienda choro!
Haec nunc terra sinu nos detinet alma, proculque
A Patriae curis, anxietate domi.
Sic cepisse ferunt humanae oblivia curae
Quisquis Lethaeae pocula sumpsit aquae: 80
Sic semota sequi studiisque odiisque docebas
Otia discipulos, docte Epicure, tuos.
Sed non ulla dies grato sine sole, nec ullo
Fruge carens hortus tempore,[422] fronde nemus;[423]
Nec levis ignotis oneratus odoribus aer, 85
Quales doctus equum flectere novit Arabs;
Nec caecae quaecumque jacent sub rupe cavernae,[424]
Queîs nunquam radiis Phoebus adire potest;
Nec currentis aquae strepitus,[425] nec saxa, petensque
Mons[426] excelsa suis sidera culminibus; 90
Nec tranquilla quies, rerumque oblivia, ponti
Suadebunt iterum solicitare vias!
Rideat at quamvis haec vultu terra sereno,
Tabescit pravo gens malefida jugo:
Dum sedet heu! tristis morborum pallor in ore, 95
Crebraque anhelanti pectore tussis inest.
Ambitus et luxus, totoque accersita mundo,
Queîs omnis populus quoque sub axe peril;
Famae dira sitis, rerumque onerosa cupido,
Raptaque ab irato templa diesque Deo, 100
Supplicium non lene suum, poenasque tulerunt;
Saepè petis proprio, vir miser, ense latus!
Uxor adhuc aegros dilecta resuscitat artus;
Anxia cura suis, anxia cura mihi.
Altera quodque dies jam roboris attulit, illud 105
Altera dura suis febribus abstulerit.
Aurea mens illi, mollique in pectore corda,
Et clarum longâ nobilitate genus.
Quanquàm saepe trahunt Libycum non[427] aera sanum
(Gratia magna Dei), pignora nostra vigent. 110
Iamque vale grandaeve Pater, grandaevaque Mater,
Tuque O dilecto conjuge laeta soror!
Quaeque pias nobis partes cognata ferebas,
Nomina vana cadunt, Tu mihi Mater eras;
Ingenioque mari, pietate ornata fideque, 115
Sanguine nulla domûs, semper amore, soror;
Tu quoque, care, vale, Frater, quamvis procul absis,
Per virides campos, quà petit aequor Eden.
Denique tota domus, cunctique valete propinqui,
Carmina plura mihi musa manusque negat. 120

MADEIRAE, _MARTIIS CALENDIS_, 1844.

[419] Cadiz.

[420] Hispania hoc tempore bello civili divulsa fuit.

[421] Gibraltar.

[422] Sunt hibernis mensibus aurea mala.

[423] Laureae sylvae sunt.

[424] Antris abundat Insula.

[425] Multos rivos naturâ, mirâque humani ingenii arte constructos continet Madeira.

[426] Pace Lusitanorum Insula nil nisi mons est, rectis culminibus mari conspicua.

[427] Ventus ex Africa.--_Leste._

See also the _Carmen Maiis calendis compositum_, the _Carmen ad Maium mensem_, and the _Somnivaga_,--evidently by the same writer,--in the appendix to the second edition of _Yarrow Revisited_, 1836.--ED.

1846

“DEIGN, SOVEREIGN MISTRESS! TO ACCEPT A LAY”

In January 1846 Wordsworth sent a copy of his Poems to the Queen, for the Royal Library at Windsor, and inscribed the following lines upon the fly-leaf. For their republication I am indebted to the gracious permission of Her Majesty.--ED.

Deign, Sovereign Mistress![428] to accept a lay,
No Laureate offering of elaborate art;
But salutation taking its glad way
From deep recesses of a loyal heart.

Queen, Wife, and Mother! may All-judging Heaven 5
Shower with a bounteous hand on Thee and Thine
Felicity that only can be given
On earth to goodness blest by grace divine.

Lady! devoutly honoured and beloved
Through every realm confided to thy sway; 10
Mayst thou pursue thy course by God approved,
And He will teach thy people to obey.

As thou art wont, thy sovereignty adorn
With woman’s gentleness, yet firm and staid;
So shall that earthly crown thy brows have worn 15
Be changed for one whose glory cannot fade.

And now, by duty urged, I lay this Book
Before thy Majesty, in humble trust
That on its simplest pages thou wilt look
With a benign indulgence more than just. 20

Nor wilt thou blame an aged Poet’s prayer,
That issuing hence may steal into thy mind
Some solace under weight of royal care,
Or grief--the inheritance of humankind.

For know we not that from celestial spheres, 25
When Time was young, an inspiration came
(Oh, were it mine!) to hallow saddest tears,
And help life onward in its noblest aim.

W.W.

_9th January 1846._

[428] Compare the address presented by the Deputies of the Kingdom of Italy to Buonaparte, on Oct. 27, 1808, beginning, “Deign, Sovereign Master of all Things.”--ED.

1847

ODE, PERFORMED IN THE SENATE-HOUSE, CAMBRIDGE, ON THE 6TH OF JULY 1847, AT THE FIRST COMMENCEMENT AFTER THE INSTALLATION OF HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE ALBERT, CHANCELLOR OF THE UNIVERSITY.[429]

INSTALLATION ODE

Composed 1847.--Published 1847.