ELLEN IRWIN:
OR,
THE BRAES OF KIRTLE

          Fair Ellen Irwin, when she sate
          Upon the braes of Kirtle,
          Was lovely as a Grecian maid
          Adorned with wreaths of myrtle;
          Young Adam Bruce beside her lay,
          And there did they beguile the day
          With love and gentle speeches,
          Beneath the budding beeches.

          From many knights and many squires
          The Bruce had been selected;                                10
          And Gordon, fairest of them all,
          By Ellen was rejected.
          Sad tidings to that noble Youth!
          For it may be proclaimed with truth,
          If Bruce hath loved sincerely,
          That Gordon loves as dearly.

          But what are Gordon's form and face,
          His shattered hopes and crosses,
          To them, 'mid Kirtle's pleasant braes,
          Reclined on flowers and mosses?                             20
          Alas that ever he was born!
          The Gordon, couched behind a thorn,
          Sees them and their caressing;
          Beholds them blest and blessing.

          Proud Gordon, maddened by the thoughts
          That through his brain are travelling,
          Rushed forth, and at the heart of Bruce
          He launched a deadly javelin!
          Fair Ellen saw it as it came,
          And, starting up to meet the same,                          30
          Did with her body cover
          The Youth, her chosen lover.

          And, falling into Bruce's arms,
          Thus died the beauteous Ellen,
          Thus, from the heart of her True-love,
          The mortal spear repelling.
          And Bruce, as soon as he had slain
          The Gordon, sailed away to Spain;
          And fought with rage incessant
          Against the Moorish crescent.                               40

          But many days, and many months,
          And many years ensuing,
          This wretched Knight did vainly seek
          The death that he was wooing.
          So, coming his last help to crave,
          Heart-broken, upon Ellen's grave
          His body he extended,
          And there his sorrow ended.

          Now ye, who willingly have heard
          The tale I have been telling,                               50
          May in Kirkconnel churchyard view
          The grave of lovely Ellen:
          By Ellen's side the Bruce is laid;
          And, for the stone upon his head,
          May no rude hand deface it,
          And its forlorn "Hie jacet"!

ANDREW JONES

          I hate that Andrew Jones; he'll breed
          His children up to waste and pillage.
          I wish the press-gang or the drum
          With its tantara sound would come,
          And sweep him from the village!

          I said not this, because he loves
          Through the long day to swear and tipple;
          But for the poor dear sake of one
          To whom a foul deed he had done,
          A friendless man, a travelling cripple!                     10

          For this poor crawling helpless wretch,
          Some horseman who was passing by,
          A penny on the ground had thrown;
          But the poor cripple was alone
          And could not stoop--no help was nigh.

          Inch-thick the dust lay on the ground
          For it had long been droughty weather;
          So with his staff the cripple wrought
          Among the dust till he had brought
          The half-pennies together.                                  20

          It chanced that Andrew passed that way
          Just at the time; and there he found
          The cripple in the mid-day heat
          Standing alone, and at his feet
          He saw the penny on the ground.

          He stopped and took the penny up:
          And when the cripple nearer drew,
          Quoth Andrew, "Under half-a-crown,
          What a man finds is all his own,
          And so, my Friend, good-day to you."                        30

          And 'hence' I said, that Andrew's boys
          Will all be trained to waste and pillage;
          And wished the press-gang, or the drum
          With its tantara sound, would come
          And sweep him from the village.
                                                              1800.

THE TWO THIEVES;
OR, THE LAST STAGE OF AVARICE

      O now that the genius of Bewick were mine,
      And the skill which he learned on the banks of the Tyne.
      Then the Muses might deal with me just as they chose,
      For I'd take my last leave both of verse and of prose.

      What feats would I work with my magical hand!
      Book-learning and books should be banished the land:
      And, for hunger and thirst and such troublesome calls,
      Every ale-house should then have a feast on its walls.

      The traveller would hang his wet clothes on a chair;
      Let them smoke, let them burn, not a straw would he care!       10
      For the Prodigal Son, Joseph's Dream and his sheaves,
      Oh, what would they be to my tale of two Thieves?

      The One, yet unbreeched, is not three birthdays old,
      His Grandsire that age more than thirty times told;
      There are ninety good seasons of fair and foul weather
      Between them, and both go a-pilfering together.

      With chips is the carpenter strewing his floor?
      Is a cart-load of turf at an old woman's door?
      Old Daniel his hand to the treasure will slide!
      And his Grandson's as busy at work by his side.                 20

      Old Daniel begins; he stops short--and his eye,
      Through the lost look of dotage, is cunning and sly:
      'Tis a look which at this time is hardly his own,
      But tells a plain tale of the days that are flown.

      He once had a heart which was moved by the wires
      Of manifold pleasures and many desires:
      And what if he cherished his purse? 'Twas no more
      Than treading a path trod by thousands before.

      'Twas a path trod by thousands; but Daniel is one
      Who went something farther than others have gone,               30
      And now with old Daniel you see how it fares;
      You see to what end he has brought his grey hairs.

      The pair sally forth hand in hand: ere the sun
      Has peered o'er the beeches, their work is begun:
      And yet, into whatever sin they may fall,
      This child but half knows it, and that, not at all.

      They hunt through the streets with deliberate tread,
      And each, in his turn, becomes leader or led;
      And, wherever they carry their plots and their wiles,
      Every face in the village is dimpled with smiles.               40

      Neither checked by the rich nor the needy they roam;
      For the grey-headed Sire has a daughter at home,
      Who will gladly repair all the damage that's done;
      And three, were it asked, would be rendered for one.

      Old Man! whom so oft I with pity have eyed,
      I love thee, and love the sweet Boy at thy side:
      Long yet may'st thou live! for a teacher we see
      That lifts up the veil of our nature in thee.
                                                              1800.

A CHARACTER

      I marvel how Nature could ever find space
      For so many strange contrasts in one human face:
      There's thought and no thought, and there's paleness and bloom
      And bustle and sluggishness, pleasure and gloom.

      There's weakness, and strength both redundant and vain;
      Such strength as, if ever affliction and pain
      Could pierce through a temper that's soft to disease,
      Would be rational peace--a philosopher's ease.

      There's indifference, alike when he fails or succeeds,
      And attention full ten times as much as there needs;            10
      Pride where there's no envy, there's so much of joy;
      And mildness, and spirit both forward and coy.

      There's freedom, and sometimes a diffident stare
      Of shame scarcely seeming to know that she's there,
      There's virtue, the title it surely may claim,
      Yet wants heaven knows what to be worthy the name.

      This picture from nature may seem to depart,
      Yet the Man would at once run away with your heart;
      And I for five centuries right gladly would be
      Such an odd such a kind happy creature as he.                   20
                                                              1800.

INSCRIPTIONS
FOR THE SPOT WHERE THE HERMITAGE STOOD ON ST. HERBERT'S ISLAND, DERWENTWATER.

      If thou in the dear love of some one Friend
      Hast been so happy that thou know'st what thoughts
      Will sometimes in the happiness of love
      Make the heart sink, then wilt thou reverence
      This quiet spot; and, Stranger! not unmoved
      Wilt thou behold this shapeless heap of stones,
      The desolate ruins of St. Herbert's Cell.
      Here stood his threshold; here was spread the roof
      That sheltered him, a self-secluded Man,
      After long exercise in social cares                             10
      And offices humane, intent to adore
      The Deity, with undistracted mind,
      And meditate on everlasting things,
      In utter solitude.--But he had left
      A Fellow-labourer, whom the good Man loved
      As his own soul. And, when with eye upraised
      To heaven he knelt before the crucifix,
      While o'er the lake the cataract of Lodore
      Pealed to his orisons, and when he paced
      Along the beach of this small isle and thought                  20
      Of his Companion, he would pray that both
      (Now that their earthly duties were fulfilled)
      Might die in the same moment. Nor in vain
      So prayed he:--as our chronicles report,
      Though here the Hermit numbered his last day
      Far from St. Cuthbert his beloved Friend,
      Those holy Men both died in the same hour.
                                                               1800

INSCRIPTIONS
WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL UPON A STONE IN THE WALL OF THE HOUSE (AN OUTHOUSE), ON THE ISLAND AT GRASMERE.

      Rude is this Edifice, and Thou hast seen
      Buildings, albeit rude, that have maintained
      Proportions more harmonious, and approached
      To closer fellowship with ideal grace.
      But take it in good part:--alas! the poor
      Vitruvius of our village had no help
      From the great City; never, upon leaves
      Of red Morocco folio, saw displayed,
      In long succession, pre-existing ghosts
      Of Beauties yet unborn--the rustic Lodge                        10
      Antique, and Cottage with verandah graced,
      Nor lacking, for fit company, alcove,
      Green-house, shell-grot, and moss-lined hermitage.
      Thou see'st a homely Pile, yet to these walls
      The heifer comes in the snow-storm, and here
      The new-dropped lamb finds shelter from the wind.
      And hither does one Poet sometimes row
      His pinnace, a small vagrant barge, up-piled
      With plenteous store of heath and withered fern,
      (A lading which he with his sickle cuts,                        20
      Among the mountains) and beneath this roof
      He makes his summer couch, and here at noon
      Spreads out his limbs, while, yet unshorn, the Sheep,
      Panting beneath the burthen of their wool,
      Lie round him, even as if they were a part
      Of his own Household: nor, while from his bed
      He looks, through the open door-place, toward the lake
      And to the stirring breezes, does he want
      Creations lovely as the work of sleep--
      Fair sights, and visions of romantic joy!                       30

INSCRIPTIONS
WRITTEN WITH A SLATE PENCIL UPON A STONE, THE LARGEST OF A HEAP LYING NEAR A DESERTED QUARRY, UPON ONE OF THE ISLANDS AT RYDAL.

      Stranger! this hillock of mis-shapen stones
      Is not a Ruin spared or made by time,
      Nor, as perchance thou rashly deem'st, the Cairn
      Of some old British Chief: 'tis nothing more
      Than the rude embryo of a little Dome
      Or Pleasure-house, once destined to be built
      Among the birch-trees of this rocky isle.
      But, as it chanced, Sir William having learned
      That from the shore a full-grown man might wade,
      And make himself a freeman of this spot                         10
      At any hour he chose, the prudent Knight
      Desisted, and the quarry and the mound
      Are monuments of his unfinished task.
      The block on which these lines are traced, perhaps,
      Was once selected as the corner-stone
      Of that intended Pile, which would have been
      Some quaint odd plaything of elaborate skill,
      So that, I guess, the linnet and the thrush,
      And other little builders who dwell here,
      Had wondered at the work. But blame him not,                    20
      For old Sir William was a gentle Knight,
      Bled in this vale, to which he appertained
      With all his ancestry. Then peace to him,
      And for the outrage which he had devised
      Entire forgiveness!--But if thou art one
      On fire with thy impatience to become
      An inmate of these mountains,--if, disturbed
      By beautiful conceptions, thou hast hewn
      Out of the quiet rock the elements
      Of thy trim Mansion destined soon to blaze                      30
      In snow-white splendour,--think again; and, taught
      By old Sir William and his quarry, leave
      Thy fragments to the bramble and the rose;
      There let the vernal slow-worm sun himself,
      And let the redbreast hop from stone to stone.
                                                              1800.

THE SPARROW'S NEST

          Behold, within the leafy shade,
          Those bright blue eggs together laid!
          On me the chance-discovered sight
          Gleamed like a vision of delight.
          I started--seeming to espy
          The home and sheltered bed,
          The Sparrow's dwelling, which, hard by
          My Father's house, in wet and dry
          My sister Emmeline and I
              Together visited.                                       10

          She looked at it and seemed to fear it;
          Dreading, tho' wishing, to be near it:
          Such heart was in her, being then
          A little Prattler among men.
          The Blessing of my later years
          Was with me when a boy:
          She gave me eyes, she gave me ears;
          And humble cares, and delicate fears;
          A heart, the fountain of sweet tears;
              And love, and thought, and joy.                         20
                                                              1801.

"PELION AND OSSA FLOURISH SIDE BY SIDE"

          Pelion and Ossa flourish side by side,
          Together in immortal books enrolled:
          His ancient dower Olympus hath not sold;
          And that inspiring Hill, which "did divide
          Into two ample horns his forehead wide,"
          Shines with poetic radiance as of old;
          While not an English Mountain we behold
          By the celestial Muses glorified.
          Yet round our sea-girt shore they rise in crowds:
          What was the great Parnassus' self to Thee,                 10
          Mount Skiddaw? In his natural sovereignty
          Our British Hill is nobler far; he shrouds
          His double front among Atlantic clouds,
          And pours forth streams more sweet than Castaly.
                                                              1801.

THE PRIORESS'S TALE
FROM CHAUCER

                    "Call up him who left half told
                     The story of Cambuscan bold."

                                   I

          "O Lord, our Lord! how wondrously," (quoth she)
          "Thy name in this large world is spread abroad!
          For not alone by men of dignity
          Thy worship is performed and precious laud;
          But by the mouths of children, gracious God!
          Thy goodness is set forth; they when they lie
          Upon the breast thy name do glorify.

                                   II

          "Wherefore in praise, the worthiest that I may,
          Jesu! of thee, and the white Lily-flower
          Which did thee bear, and is a Maid for aye,
          To tell a story I will use my power;
          Not that I may increase her honour's dower,
          For she herself is honour, and the root
          Of goodness, next her Son, our soul's best boot.

                                  III

          "O Mother Maid! O Maid and Mother free!
          O bush unburnt! burning in Moses' sight!
          That down didst ravish from the Deity,
          Through humbleness, the spirit that did alight
          Upon thy heart, whence, through that glory's might,
          Conceived was the Father's sapience,
          Help me to tell it in thy reverence!

                                   IV

          "Lady! thy goodness, thy magnificence,
          Thy virtue, and thy great humility,
          Surpass all science and all utterance;
          For sometimes, Lady! ere men pray to thee
          Thou goest before in thy benignity,
          The light to us vouchsafing of thy prayer,
          To be our guide unto thy Son so dear.

                                   V

          "My knowledge is so weak, O blissful Queen!
          To tell abroad thy mighty worthiness,
          That I the weight of it may not sustain;
          But as a child of twelvemonths old or less,
          That laboureth his language to express,
          Even so fare I; and therefore, I thee pray,
          Guide thou my song which I of thee shall say.

                                   VI

          "There was in Asia, in a mighty town,
          'Mong Christian folk, a street where Jews might be,
          Assigned to them and given them for their own
          By a great Lord, for gain and usury,
          Hateful to Christ and to his company;
          And through this street who list might ride and wend;
          Free was it, and unbarred at either end.

                                  VII

          "A little school of Christian people stood
          Down at the farther end, in which there were
          A nest of children come of Christian blood,
          That learned in that school from year to year
          Such sort of doctrine as men used there,
          That is to say, to sing and read also,
          As little children in their childhood do.

                                  VIII

          "Among these children was a Widow's son,
          A little scholar, scarcely seven years old,
          Who day by day unto this school hath gone,
          And eke, when he the image did behold
          Of Jesu's Mother, as he had been told,
          This Child was wont to kneel adown and say
          "Ave Marie," as he goeth by the way.

                                   IX

          "This Widow thus her little Son hath taught
          Our blissful Lady, Jesu's Mother dear,
          To worship aye, and he forgat it not;
          For simple infant hath a ready ear.
          Sweet is the holiness of youth: and hence,
          Calling to mind this matter when I may,
          Saint Nicholas in my presence standeth aye,
          For he so young to Christ did reverence.

                                   X

          "This little Child, while in the school he sate
          His Primer conning with an earnest cheer,
          The whilst the rest their anthem-book repeat
          The "Alma Redemptoris" did he hear;
          And as he durst he drew him near and near,
          And hearkened to the words and to the note,
          Till the first verse he learned it all by rote.

                                   XI

          "This Latin knew he nothing what it said,
          For he too tender was of age to know;
          But to his comrade he repaired, and prayed
          That he the meaning of this song would show,
          And unto him declare why men sing so;
          This oftentimes that he might be at ease,
          This child did him beseech on his bare knees.

                                  XII

          "His Schoolfellow, who elder was than he,
          Answered him thus:--'This song, I have heard say,
          Was fashioned for our blissful Lady free;
          Her to salute, and also her to pray
          To be our help upon our dying day:
          If there is more in this, I know it not;
          Song do I learn,--small grammar I have got.'

                                  XIII

          "'And is this song fashioned in reverence
          Of Jesu's Mother?' said this Innocent;
          'Now, certes, I will use my diligence
          To con it all ere Christmas-tide be spent;
          Although I for my Primer shall be shent,
          And shall be beaten three times in an hour,
          Our Lady I will praise with all my power.'

                                  XIV

          "His Schoolfellow, whom he had so besought,
          As they went homeward taught him privily
          And then he sang it well and fearlessly,
          From word to word according to the note:
          Twice in a day it passed through his throat;
          Homeward and schoolward whensoe'er he went,
          On Jesu's Mother fixed was his intent.

                                   XV

          "Through all the Jewry (this before said I)
          This little Child, as he came to and fro,
          Full merrily then would he sing and cry,
          O "Alma Redemptoris!" high and low:
          The sweetness of Christ's Mother pierced so
          His heart, that her to praise, to her to pray,
          He cannot stop his singing by the way.

                                  XVI

          "The Serpent, Satan, our first foe, that hath
          His wasp's nest in Jew's heart, upswelled--'O woe,
          O Hebrew people!' said he in his wrath,
          'Is it an honest thing? Shall this be so?
          That such a Boy where'er he lists shall go
          In your despite, and sing his hymns and saws,
          Which is against the reverence of our laws!'

                                  XVII

          "From that day forward have the Jews conspired
          Out of the world this Innocent to chase;
          And to this end a Homicide they hired,
          That in an alley had a privy place,
          And, as the Child 'gan to the school to pace,
          This cruel Jew him seized, and held him fast
          And cut his throat, and in a pit him cast.

                                  XVIII

          "I say that him into a pit they threw,
          A loathsome pit, whence noisome scents exhale;
          O cursed folk! away, ye Herods new!
          What may your ill intentions you avail?
          Murder will out; certes it will not fail;
          Know, that the honour of high God may spread,
          The blood cries out on your accursed deed.

                                  XIX

          "O Martyr 'stablished in virginity!
          Now may'st thou sing for aye before the throne,
          Following the Lamb celestial," quoth she,
          "Of which the great Evangelist, Saint John,
          In Patmos wrote, who saith of them that go
          Before the Lamb singing continually,
          That never fleshly woman they did know.

                                   XX

          "Now this poor widow waiteth all that night
          After her little Child, and he came not;
          For which, by earliest glimpse of morning light,
          With face all pale with dread and busy thought,
          She at the School and elsewhere him hath sought
          Until thus far she learned, that he had been
          In the Jews' street, and there he last was seen.

                                  XXI

          "With Mother's pity in her breast enclosed
          She goeth, as she were half out of her mind,
          To every place wherein she hath supposed
          By likelihood her little Son to find;
          And ever on Christ's Mother meek and kind
          She cried, till to the Jewry she was brought,
          And him among the accursed Jews she sought.

                                  XXII

          "She asketh, and she piteously doth pray
          To every Jew that dwelleth in that place
          To tell her if her child had passed that way;
          They all said--Nay; but Jesu of his grace
          Gave to her thought, that in a little space
          She for her Son in that same spot did cry
          Where he was cast into a pit hard by.

                                  XXIII

          "O thou great God that dost perform thy laud
          By mouths of Innocents, lo! here thy might;
          This gem of chastity, this emerald,
          And eke of martyrdom this ruby bright,
          There, where with mangled throat he lay upright,
          The "Alma Redemptoris" 'gan to sing,
          So loud, that with his voice the place did ring.

                                  XXIV

          "The Christian folk that through the Jewry went
          Come to the spot in wonder at the thing;
          And hastily they for the Provost sent;
          Immediately he came, not tarrying,
          And praiseth Christ that is our heavenly King,
          And eke his Mother, honour of Mankind:
          Which done he bade that they the Jews should bind.

                                  XXV

          "This Child with piteous lamentation then
          Was taken up, singing his song alway;
          And with procession great and pomp of men
          To the next Abbey him they bare away;
          His Mother swooning by the body lay:
          And scarcely could the people that were near
          Remove this second Rachel from the bier.

                                  XXVI

          "Torment and shameful death to every one
          This Provost doth for those bad Jews prepare
          That of this murder wist, and that anon:
          Such wickedness his judgments cannot spare;
          Who will do evil, evil shall he bear;
          Them therefore with wild horses did he draw,
          And after that he hung them by the law.

                                  XXVII

          "Upon his bier this Innocent doth lie
          Before the altar while the Mass doth last:
          The Abbot with his convent's company
          Then sped themselves to bury him full fast;
          And, when they holy water on him cast,
          Yet spake this Child when sprinkled was the water,
          And sang, "O Alma Redemptoris Mater!"

                                 XXVIII

          "This Abbot, for he was a holy man,
          As all Monks are, or surely ought to be,
          In supplication to the Child began
          Thus saying, 'O dear Child! I summon thee
          In virtue of the holy Trinity
          Tell me the cause why thou dost sing this hymn
          Since that thy throat is cut, as it doth seem.'

                                  XXIX

          "'My throat is cut unto the bone, I trow,'
          Said this young Child, 'and by the law of kind
          I should have died, yea many hours ago;
          But Jesus Christ, as in the books ye find,
          Will that his glory last, and be in mind;
          And, for the worship of his Mother dear,
          Yet may I sing "O Alma!" loud and clear.

                                  XXX

          "'This well of mercy, Jesu's Mother sweet,
          After my knowledge I have loved alway;
          And in the hour when I my death did meet
          To me she came, and thus to me did say,
          'Thou in thy dying sing this holy lay,'
          As ye have heard; and soon as I had sung
          Methought she laid a grain upon my tongue.

                                  XXXI

          "'Wherefore I sing, nor can from song refrain,
          In honour of that blissful Maiden free,
          Till from my tongue off-taken is the grain;
          And after that thus said she unto me;
          "My little Child, then will I come for thee
          Soon as the grain from off thy tongue they take:
          Be not dismayed, I will not thee forsake!"

                                  XXXII

          "This holy Monk, this Abbot--him mean I,
          Touched then his tongue, and took away the grain;
          And he gave up the ghost full peacefully;
          And, when the Abbot had this wonder seen,
          His salt tears trickled down like showers of rain;
          And on his face he dropped upon the ground,
          And still he lay as if he had been bound.

                                 XXXIII

          "Eke the whole Convent on the pavement lay,
          Weeping and praising Jesu's Mother dear;
          And after that they rose, and took their way,
          And lifted up this Martyr from the bier,
          And in a tomb of precious marble clear
          Enclosed his uncorrupted body sweet.--
          Where'er he be, God grant us him to meet!

                                  XXXIV

          "Young Hew of Lincoln! in like sort laid low
          By cursed Jews--thing well and widely known,
          For it was done a little while ago--
          Pray also thou for us, while here we tarry
          Weak sinful folk, that God, with pitying eye,
          In mercy would his mercy multiply
          On us, for reverence of his Mother Mary!"