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Page 49
The room usually occupied by Miss M., and where we found her on the
evening of our arrival, is rather small and lighted by two large
windows. The walls of this room were also decorated with prints and
pictures, and on the mantle-shelf were some models in _terra cottia_ of
Italian groups. On a circular table lay casts, medallions, and some very
choice water-colour drawings. Under the south window stood a small table
covered with newly opened letters, a portfolio and several new books,
with here and there a page turned down, and one with a paper knife
between its leaves as if it had only been half read. I took up the last
mentioned, and it proved to be the "Life and Poetry of Hartly
Coleridge," son of S.T. Coleridge. It was just from the press, and had,
a day or two before, been forwarded to her by the publisher. Miss M. is
very deaf and always carries in her left hand a trumpet; and I was not a
little surprised on learning from her that she had never enjoyed the
sense of smell, and only on one occasion the sense of taste, and that
for a single moment. Miss M. is loved with a sort of idolatry by the
people of Ambleside, and especially the poor, to whom she gives a
course of lectures every winter gratuitously. She finished her last
course the day before our arrival. She was much pleased with Ellen
Craft, and appeared delighted with the story of herself and husband's
escape from slavery, as related by the latter--during the recital of
which I several times saw the silent tear stealing down her cheek, and
which she tried in vain to hide from us.
When Craft had finished, she exclaimed, "I would that every woman in the
British Empire, could hear that tale as I have, so that they might know
how their own sex was treated in that boasted land of liberty." It seems
strange to the people of this county, that one so white and so lady-like
as Mrs. Craft, should have been a slave and forced to leave the land of
her nativity and seek an asylum in a foreign country. The morning after
our arrival, I took a stroll by a circuitous pathway to the top of
Loughrigg Fell. At the foot of the mount I met a peasant, who very
kindly offered to lend me his donkey, upon which to ascend the mountain.
Never having been upon the back of one of these long eared animals, I
felt some hesitation about trusting myself upon so diminutive looking a
creature. But being assured that if I would only resign myself to his
care and let him have his own way, I would be perfectly safe, I mounted,
and off we set. We had, however, scarcely gone fifty rods, when, in
passing over a narrow part of the path and overlooking a deep chasm, one
of the hind feet of the donkey slipped, and with an involuntary shudder,
I shut my eyes to meet my expected doom; but fortunately the little
fellow gained his foothold, and in all probability saved us both from a
premature death. After we had passed over this dangerous place, I
dismounted, and as soon as my feet had once more gained _terra firma_, I
resolved that I would never again yield my own judgment to that of any
one, not even to a donkey.
It seems as if Nature has amused herself in throwing these mountains
together. From the top of the Loughrigg Fell, the eye loses its power in
gazing upon the objects below. On our left, lay Rydal Mount, the
beautiful seat of the late poet Wordsworth. While to the right, and away
in the dim distance, almost hidden by the native trees, was the cottage
where once resided Mrs. Hemans. And below us lay Windermere, looking
more like a river than a lake, and which, if placed by the side of our
own Ontario, Erie or Huron, would be lost in the fog. But here it looks
beautiful in the extreme, surrounded as it is by a range of mountains
that have no parallel in the United States for beauty. Amid a sun of
uncommon splendour, dazzling the eye with the reflection upon the water
below, we descended into the valley, and I was soon again seated by the
fireside of our hospitable hostess. In the afternoon of the same day, we
took a drive to the "Dove's Nest," the home of the late Mrs. Hemans.
We did not see the inside of the house, on account of its being occupied
by a very eccentric man, who will not permit a woman to enter the house,
and it is said that he has been known to run when a female had
unconsciously intruded herself upon his premises. And as our company was
in part composed of ladies, we had to share their fate, and therefore
were prevented from seeing the interior of the Dove's Nest. The
exhibitor of such a man would be almost sure of a prize at the great
Exhibition.
At the head of Grassmere Lake, and surrounded by a few cottages, stands
an old gray, antique-looking Parish Church, venerable with the lapse of
centuries, and the walls partly covered with ivy, and in the rear of
which is the parish burial-ground. After leaving the Dove's Nest, and
having a pleasant ride over the hills and between the mountains, and
just as the sun was disappearing behind them, we arrived at the gate of
Grassmere Church; and alighting and following Miss M., we soon found
ourselves standing over a grave, marked by a single stone, and that,
too, very plain, with a name deeply cut. This announced to us that we
were standing over the grave of William Wordsworth. He chose his own
grave, and often visited the spot before his death. He lies in the most
sequestered spot in the whole grounds, and the simplicity and beauty of
the place was enough to make one in love with it, to be laid so far from
the bustle of the world, and in so sweet a place. The more one becomes
acquainted with the literature of the old world, the more he must love
her poets. Among the teachers of men, none are more worthy of study than
the poets; and, as teachers, they should receive far more credit than is
yielded to them. No one can look back upon the lives of Dante,
Shakspere, Milton, Goethe, Cowper, and many others that we might name,
without being reminded of the sacrifices which they made for mankind,
and which were not appreciated until long after their deaths. We need
look no farther than our own country to find men and women wielding the
pen practically and powerfully for the right. It is acknowledged on all
hands in this country, that England has the greatest dead poets, and
America the greatest living ones. The poet and the true Christian have
alike a hidden life. Worship is the vital element of each. Poetry has in
it that kind of utility which good men find in their Bible, rather than
such convenience as bad men often profess to draw from it. It ennobles
the sentiments, enlarges the affections, kindles the imagination, and
gives to us the enjoyment of a life in the past, and in the future, as
well as in the present. Under its light and warmth, we wake from our
torpidity and coldness, to a sense of our capabilities. This impulse
once given, a great object is gained. Schiller has truly said, "Poetry
can be to a man, what love is to a hero. It can neither counsel him nor
smite him, nor perform any labour for him, but it can bring him up to be
a hero, can summon him to deeds, and arm him with strength for all he
ought to be." I have often read with pleasure the sweet poetry of our
own Whitfield of Buffalo, which has appeared from time to time in the
columns of the _North Star_. I have always felt ashamed of the fact that
he should be compelled to wield the razor instead of the pen for a
living. Meaner poets than James M. Whitfield, are now living by their
compositions; and were he a white man he would occupy a different
position.
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