Wordsworth (13 page)

    The Shepherd ended here; and Luke stooped down,

And, as his Father had requested, laid

The first stone of the Sheep-fold. At the sight

The old Man’s grief broke from him; to his heart

He pressed his Son, he kissèd him and wept;

And to the house together they returned.

– Hushed was that House in peace, or seeming peace,

Ere the night fell: – with morrows dawn the Boy

Began his journey, and when he had reached

The public way, he put on a bold face;

And all the neighbours, as he passed their doors,

Came forth with wishes and with farewell prayers,

That followed him till he was out of sight.

    A good report did from their Kinsman come,

Of Luke and his well-doing: and the Boy

Wrote loving letters, full of wondrous news,

Which, as the Housewife phrased it, were throughout

‘The prettiest letters that were ever seen.’

Both parents read them with rejoicing hearts.

So, many months passed on: and once again

The Shepherd went about his daily work

With confident and cheerful thoughts; and now

Sometimes when he could find a leisure hour

He to that valley took his way, and there

Wrought at the Sheep-fold. Meantime Luke began

To slacken in his duty; and, at length,

He in the dissolute city gave himself

To evil courses: ignominy and shame

Fell on him, so that he was driven at last

To seek a hiding-place beyond the seas.

    There is a comfort in the strength of love;

’Twill make a thing endurable, which else

Would overset the brain, or break the heart:

I have conversed with more than one who well

Remember the old Man, and what he was

Years after he had heard this heavy news.

His bodily frame had been from youth to age

Of an unusual strength. Among the rocks

He went, and still looked up to sun and cloud,

And listened to the wind; and, as before,

Performed all kinds of labour for his sheep,

And for the land, his small inheritance.

And to that hollow dell from time to time

Did he repair, to build the Fold of which

His flock had need. ’Tis not forgotten yet

The pity which was then in every heart

For the old Man – and ’tis believed by all

That many and many a day he thither went,

And never lifted up a single stone.

    There, by the Sheep-fold, sometimes was he seen

Sitting alone, or with his faithful Dog,

Then old, beside him, lying at his feet.

The length of full seven years, from time to time,

He at the building of this Sheep-fold wrought,

And left the work unfinished when he died.

Three years, or little more, did Isabel

Survive her Husband: at her death the estate

Was sold, and went into a stranger’s hand.

The Cottage which was named the
EVENING STAR

Is gone – the ploughshare has been through the ground

On which it stood; great changes have been wrought

In all the neighbourhood: – yet the oak is left

That grew beside their door; and the remains

Of the unfinished Sheep-fold may be seen

Beside the boisterous brook of Green-head Ghyll.

’Twas summer and the sun was mounted high.

Along the south the uplands feebly glared

Through a pale stream, and all the northern downs

In clearer air ascending shewed far off

Their surfaces with shadows dappled o’er

Of deep embattled clouds: far as the sight

Could reach those many shadows lay in spots

Determined and unmoved, with steady beams

Of clear and pleasant sunshine interposed;

Pleasant to him who on the soft cool moss

Extends his careless limbs beside the root

Of some huge oak whose aged branches make

A twilight of their own, a dewy shade

Where the wren warbles while the dreaming man,

Half-conscious of that soothing melody,

With side-long eye looks out upon the scene,

By those impending branches made more soft,

More soft and distant. Other lot was mine.

Across a bare wide Common I had toiled

With languid feet which by the slipp’ry ground

Were baffled still, and when I stretched myself

On the brown earth my limbs from very heat

Could find no rest nor my weak arm disperse

The insect host which gathered round my face

And joined their murmurs to the tedious noise

Of seeds of bursting gorse that crackled round.

I rose and turned towards a group of trees

Which midway in that level stood alone,

And thither come at length, beneath a shade

Of clustering elms that sprang from the same root

I found a ruined house, four naked walls

That stared upon each other. I looked round

And near the door I saw an aged Man,

Alone, and stretched upon the cottage bench;

An iron-pointed staff lay at his side.

With instantaneous joy I recognized

That pride of nature and of lowly life,

The venerable Armytage, a friend

As dear to me as is the setting sun.

                         Two days before

We had been fellow-travellers. I knew

That he was in this neighbourhood and now

Delighted found him here in the cool shade.

He lay, his pack of rustic merchandize

Pillowing his head – I guess he had no thought

Of his way-wandering life. His eyes were shut;

The shadows of the breezy elms above

Dappled his face. With thirsty heat oppressed

At length I hailed him, glad to see his hat

Bedewed with water-drops, as if the brim

Had newly scooped a running stream. He rose

And pointing to a sun-flower bade me climb

The [         ] wall where that same gaudy flower

Looked out upon the road. It was a plot

Of garden-ground, now wild, its matted weeds

Marked with the steps of those whom as they passed,

The goose-berry trees that shot in long lank slips,

Or currants hanging from their leafless stems

In scanty strings, had tempted to o’erleap

The broken wall. Within that cheerless spot,

Where two tall hedgerows of thick willow boughs

Joined in a damp cold nook, I found a well

Half-choked [with willow flowers and weeds.]

I slaked my thirst and to the shady bench

Returned, and while I stood unbonneted

To catch the motion of the cooler air

The old Man said, ’I see around me here

Things which you cannot see: we die, my Friend,

Nor we alone, but that which each man loved

And prized in his peculiar nook of earth

Dies with him or is changed, and very soon

Even of the good is no memorial left.

The Poets in their elegies and songs

Lamenting the departed call the groves,

They call upon the hills and streams to mourn,

And senseless rocks, nor idly; for they speak

In these their invocations with a voice

Obedient to the strong creative power

Of human passion. Sympathies there are

More tranquil, yet perhaps of kindred birth,

That steal upon the meditative mind

And grow with thought. Beside yon spring I stood

And eyed its waters till we seemed to feel

One sadness, they and I. For them a bond

Of brotherhood is broken: time has been

When every day the touch of human hand

Disturbed their stillness, and they ministered

To human comfort. When I stooped to drink,

A spider’s web hung to the water’s edge

And on the wet and slimy foot-stone lay

The useless fragment of a wooden bowl;

It moved my very heart. The day has been

When I could never pass this road but she

Who lived within these walls, when I appeared,

A daughter’s welcome gave me, and I loved her

As my own child. O Sir! the good die first,

And they whose hearts are dry as summer dust

Burn to the socket. Many a passenger

Has blessed poor Margaret for her gentle looks

When she upheld the cool refreshment drawn

From that forsaken spring, and no one came

But he was welcome, no one went away

But that it seemed she loved him. She is dead,

The worm is on her cheek, and this poor hut,

Stripped of its outward garb of household flowers,

Of rose and sweet-briar, offers to the wind

A cold bare wall whose earthy top is tricked

With weeds and the rank spear-grass. She is dead,

And nettles rot and adders sun themselves

Where we have sate together while she nursed

Her infant at her breast. The unshod Colt,

The wandring heifer and the Potter’s ass,

Find shelter now within the chimney-wall

Where I have seen her evening hearth-stone blaze

And through the window spread upon the road

Its chearful light. – You will forgive me, Sir,

But often on this cottage do I muse

As on a picture, till my wiser mind

Sinks, yielding to the foolishness of grief.

    She had a husband, an industrious man,

Sober and steady; I have heard her say

That he was up and busy at his loom

In summer ere the mower’s scythe had swept

The dewy grass, and in the early spring

Ere the last star had vanished. They who passed

At evening, from behind the garden-fence

Might hear his busy spade, which he would ply

After his daily work till the day-light

Was gone and every leaf and flower were lost

In the dark hedges. So they passed their days

In peace and comfort, and two pretty babes

Were their best hope next to the God in Heaven.

– You may remember, now some ten years gone,

Two blighting seasons when the fields were left

With half a harvest. It pleased heaven to add

A worse affliction in the plague of war:

A happy land was stricken to the heart;

’Twas a sad time of sorrow and distress:

A wanderer among the cottages,

I with my pack of winter raiment saw

The hardships of that season: many rich

Sunk down as in a dream among the poor,

And of the poor did many cease to be,

And their place knew them not. Meanwhile, abridged

Of daily comforts, gladly reconciled

To numerous self-denials, Margaret

Went struggling on through those calamitous years

With chearful hope: but ere the second autumn

A fever seized her husband. In disease

He lingered long, and when his strength returned

He found the little he had stored to meet

The hour of accident or crippling age

Was all consumed. As I have said, ’twas now

A time of trouble; shoals of artisans

Were from their daily labour turned away

To hang for bread on parish charity,

They and their wives and children – happier far

Could they have lived as do the little birds

That peck along the hedges or the kite

That makes her dwelling in the mountain rocks.

Ill fared it now with Robert, he who dwelt

In this poor cottage; at his door he stood

And whistled many a snatch of merry tunes

That had no mirth in them, or with his knife

Carved uncouth figures on the heads of sticks,

Then idly sought about through every nook

Of house or garden any casual task

Of use or ornament, and with a strange,

Amusing but uneasy novelty

He blended where he might the various tasks

Of summer, autumn, winter, and of spring.

But this endured not; his good-humour soon

Became a weight in which no pleasure was,

And poverty brought on a petted mood

And a sore temper: day by day he drooped,

And he would leave his home, and to the town

Without an errand would he turn his steps

Or wander here and there among the fields.

One while he would speak lightly of his babes

And with a cruel tongue: at other times

He played with them wild freaks of merriment:

And ’twas a piteous thing to see the looks

Of the poor innocent children. “Every smile,”

Said Margaret to me here beneath these trees,

“Made my heart bleed.” ’ At this the old Man paused

And looking up to those enormous elms

He said, ‘’Tis now the hour of deepest noon.

At this still season of repose and peace,

This hour when all things which are not at rest

Are chearful, while this multitude of flies

Fills all the air with happy melody,

Why should a tear be in an old man’s eye?

Why should we thus with an untoward mind

And in the weakness of humanity

From natural wisdom turn our hearts away,

To natural comfort shut our eyes and ears,

And feeding on disquiet thus disturb

The calm of Nature with our restless thoughts?’

He spake with somewhat of a solemn tone:

But when he ended there was in his face

Such easy chearfulness, a look so mild

That for a little time it stole away

All recollection, and that simple tale

Passed from my mind like a forgotten sound.

A while on trivial things we held discourse,

To me soon tasteless. In my own despite

I thought of that poor woman as of one

Whom I had known and loved. He had rehearsed

Her homely tale with such familiar power,

With such a [n active] countenance, an eye

So busy, that the things of which he spake

Seemed present, and, attention now relaxed,

There was a heartfelt chillness in my veins.

I rose, and turning from that breezy shade

Went out into the open air and stood

To drink the comfort of the warmer sun.

Long time I had not stayed ere, looking round

Upon that tranquil ruin, I returned

And begged of the old man that for my sake

He would resume his story. He replied,

’It were a wantonness and would demand

Severe reproof, if we were men whose hearts

Could hold vain dalliance with the misery

Even of the dead, contented thence to draw

A momentary pleasure never marked

By reason, barren of all future good.

But we have known that there is often found

In mournful thoughts, and always might be found,

A power to virtue friendly; were’t not so,

I am a dreamer among men, indeed

An idle dreamer. ’Tis a common tale,

By moving accidents uncharactered,

A tale of silent suffering, hardly clothed

In bodily form, and to the grosser sense

But ill adapted, scarcely palpable

To him who does not think. But at your bidding

I will proceed.

                         While thus it fared with them

To whom this cottage till that hapless year

Had been a blessed home, it was my chance

To travel in a country far remote.

And glad I was when, halting by yon gate

That leads from the green lane, again I saw

These lofty elm-trees. Long I did not rest:

With many pleasant thoughts I cheered my way

O’er the flat common. At the door arrived,

I knocked, and when I entered with the hope

Of usual greeting, Margaret looked at me

A little while, then turned her head away

Speechless, and sitting down upon a chair

Wept bitterly. I wist not what to do

Or how to speak to her. Poor wretch! at last

She rose from off her seat – and then, oh Sir!

I cannot tell how she pronounced my name:

With fervent love, and with a face of grief

Unutterably helpless, and a look

That seemed to cling upon me, she enquired

If I had seen her husband. As she spake

A strange surprize and fear came to my heart,

Nor had I power to answer ere she told

That he had disappeared – just two months gone.

He left his house; two wretched days had passed,

And on the third by the first break of light,

Within her casement full in view she saw

A purse of gold. “I trembled at the sight,”

Said Margaret, “for I knew it was his hand

That placed it there, and on that very day

By one, a stranger, from my husband sent,

The tidings came that he had joined a troop

Of soldiers going to a distant land.

He left me thus – Poor Man! he had not heart

To take a farewell of me, and he feared

That I should follow with my babes, and sink

Beneath the misery of a soldier’s life.”

This tale did Margaret tell with many tears:

And when she ended I had little power

To give her comfort, and was glad to take

Such words of hope from her own mouth as served

To cheer us both: but long we had not talked

Ere we built up a pile of better thoughts,

And with a brighter eye she looked around

As if she had been shedding tears of joy.

We parted. It was then the early spring;

I left her busy with her garden tools;

And well remember, o’er that fence she looked,

And while I paced along the foot-way path

Called out, and sent a blessing after me

With tender chearfulness and with a voice

That seemed the very sound of happy thoughts.

    I roved o’er many a hill and many a dale

With this my weary load, in heat and cold,

Through many a wood, and many an open ground,

In sunshine or in shade, in wet or fair,

Now blithe, now drooping, as it might befal,

My best companions now the driving winds

And now the “trotting brooks” and whispering trees

And now the music of my own sad steps,

With many a short-lived thought that passed between

And disappeared. I came this way again

Towards the wane of summer, when the wheat

Was yellow, and the soft and bladed grass

Sprang up afresh and o’er the hay-field spread

Its tender green. When I had reached the door

I found that she was absent. In the shade

Where now we sit I waited her return.

Her cottage in its outward look appeared

As chearful as before; in any shew

Of neatness little changed, but that I thought

The honeysuckle crowded round the door

And from the wall hung down in heavier wreaths,

And knots of worthless stone-crop started out

Along the window’s edge, and grew like weeds

Against the lower panes. I turned aside

And strolled into her garden. – It was changed:

The unprofitable bindweed spread his bells

From side to side and with unwieldy wreaths

Had dragged the rose from its sustaining wall

And bent it down to earth; the border-tufts –

Daisy and thrift and lowly camomile

And thyme – had straggled out into the paths

Which they were used to deck. Ere this an hour

Was wasted. Back I turned my restless steps,

And as I walked before the door it chanced

A stranger passed, and guessing whom I sought

He said that she was used to ramble far.

The sun was sinking in the west, and now

I sate with sad impatience. From within

Her solitary infant cried aloud.

The spot though fair seemed very desolate:

The longer I remained more desolate.

And, looking round, I saw the corner-stones,

Till then unmarked, on either side the door

With dull red stains discoloured and stuck o’er

With tufts and hairs of wool, as if the sheep

That feed upon the commons thither came

Familiarly and found a couching-place

Even at her threshold. – The house-clock struck eight;

I turned and saw her distant a few steps.

Her face was pale and thin, her figure too

Was changed. As she unlocked the door she said,

“It grieves me you have waited here so long,

But in good truth I’ve wandered much of late

And sometimes, to my shame I speak, have need

Of my best prayers to bring me back again.”

While on the board she spread our evening meal

She told me she had lost her elder child,

That he for months had been a serving-boy

Apprenticed by the parish. “I perceive

You look at me, and you have cause. Today

I have been travelling far, and many days

About the fields I wander, knowing this

Only, that what I seek I cannot find.

And so I waste my time: for I am changed;

And to myself,” said she, “have done much wrong,

And to this helpless infant. I have slept

Weeping, and weeping I have waked; my tears

Have flowed as if my body were not such

As others are, and I could never die.

But I am now in mind and in my heart

More easy, and I hope,” said she, “that heaven

Will give me patience to endure the things

Which I behold at home.” It would have grieved

Your very heart to see her. Sir, I feel

The story linger in my heart. I fear

’Tis long and tedious, but my spirit clings

To that poor woman: so familiarly

Do I perceive her manner, and her look

And presence, and so deeply do I feel

Her goodness, that not seldom in my walks

A momentary trance comes over me;

And to myself I seem to muse on one

By sorrow laid asleep or borne away,

A human being destined to awake

To human life, or something very near

To human life, when he shall come again

For whom she suffered. Sir, it would have grieved

Your very soul to see her: evermore

Her eye-lids drooped, her eyes were downward cast;

And when she at her table gave me food

She did not look at me. Her voice was low,

Her body was subdued. In every act

Pertaining to her house-affairs appeared

The careless stillness which a thinking mind

Gives to an idle matter – still she sighed,

But yet no motion of the breast was seen,

No heaving of the heart. While by the fire

We sate together, sighs came on my ear;

I knew not how, and hardly whence they came.

I took my staff, and when I kissed her babe

The tears stood in her eyes. I left her then

With the best hope and comfort I could give;

She thanked me for my will, but for my hope

It seemed she did not thank me.

                                        I returned

And took my rounds along this road again

Ere on its sunny bank the primrose flower

Had chronicled the earliest day of spring.

I found her sad and drooping; she had learned

No tidings of her husband: if he lived

She knew not that he lived; if he were dead

She knew not he was dead. She seemed the same

In person [         ] appearance, but her house

Bespoke a sleepy hand of negligence;

The floor was neither dry nor neat, the hearth

Was comfortless [                                  ],

The windows too were dim, and her few books,

Which, one upon the other, heretofore

Had been piled up against the corner-panes

In seemly order, now with straggling leaves

Lay scattered here and there, open or shut

As they had chanced to fall. Her infant babe

Had from its mother caught the trick of grief

And sighed among its playthings. Once again

I turned towards the garden-gate and saw

More plainly still that poverty and grief

Were now come nearer to her: the earth was hard,

With weeds defaced and knots of withered grass;

No ridges there appeared of clear black mould,

No winter greenness: of her herbs and flowers

It seemed the better part were gnawed away

Or trampled on the earth; a chain of straw

Which had been twisted round the tender stem

Of a young apple-tree lay at its root;

The bark was nibbled round by truant sheep.

Margaret stood near, her infant in her arms,

And seeing that my eye was on the tree

She said, “I fear it will be dead and gone

Ere Robert come again.” Towards the house

Together we returned, and she inquired

If I had any hope. But for her Babe

And for her little friendless Boy, she said,

She had no wish to live, that she must die

Of sorrow. Yet I saw the idle loom

Still in its place. His Sunday garments hung

Upon the self-same nail, his very staff

Stood undisturbed behind the door. And when

I passed this way beaten by Autumn winds

She told me that her little babe was dead

And she was left alone. That very time,

I yet remember, through the miry lane

She walked with me a mile, when the bare trees

Trickled with foggy damps, and in such sort

That any heart had ached to hear her begged

That wheresoe’er I went I still would ask

For him whom she had lost. We parted then,

Our final parting, for from that time forth

Did many seasons pass ere I returned

Into this tract again.

                                        Five tedious years

She lingered in unquiet widowhood,

A wife and widow. Needs must it have been

A sore heart-wasting. I have heard, my friend,

That in that broken arbour she would sit

The idle length of half a sabbath day –

There, where you see the toadstool’s lazy head –

And when a dog passed by she still would quit

The shade and look abroad. On this old Bench

For hours she sate, and evermore her eye

Was busy in the distance, shaping things

Which made her heart beat quick. Seest thou that path?

(The green-sward now has broken its grey line)

There to and fro she paced through many a day

Of the warm summer, from a belt of flax

That girt her waist spinning the long-drawn thread

With backward steps. – Yet ever as there passed

A man whose garments shewed the Soldier’s red,

Or crippled Mendicant in Sailor’s garb,

The little child who sate to turn the wheel

Ceased from his toil, and she with faltering voice,

Expecting still to learn her husband’s fate,

Made many a fond inquiry; and when they

Whose presence gave no comfort were gone by,

Her heart was still more sad. And by you gate

Which bars the traveller’s road she often stood

And when a stranger horseman came, the latch

Would lift, and in his face look wistfully,

Most happy if from aught discovered there

Of tender feeling she might dare repeat

The same sad question. Meanwhile her poor hut