Volume 7 — CHARLES STUART CALVERLEY

The auld wife sat at her ivied door, (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) A thing she had frequently done before; And her spectacles lay on her aproned knees. The piper he piped on the hill-top high, (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) Till the cow said "I die," and the goose asked "Why?" And the dog said nothing, but searched for fleas. The farmer he strode through the square farmyard; (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) His last brew of ale was a trifle hard— The connection of which with the plot one sees. The farmer's daughter hath frank blue eyes; (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) She hears the rooks caw in the windy skies, As she sits at her lattice and shells her peas. The farmer's daughter hath ripe red lips; (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) If you try to approach her, away she skips Over tables and chairs with apparent ease. The farmer's daughter hath soft brown hair; (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) And I've met with a ballad, I can't say where, Which wholly consisted of lines like these. She sat with her hands 'neath her dimpled cheeks, (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) And spake not a word. While a lady speaks There is hope, but she didn't even sneeze. She sat with her hands 'neath her crimson cheeks; (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) She gave up mending her father's breeks, And let the cat roll on her best chemise. She sat with her hands 'neath her burning cheeks, (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) And gazed at the piper for thirteen weeks; Then she followed him out o'er the misty leas. Her sheep followed her, as their tails did them. (Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese) And this song is considered a perfect gem, And as to the meaning, it's what you please.

In moss-prankt dells which the sunbeams flatter, (And heaven it knoweth what that may mean; Meaning, however, is no great matter) When woods are a-tremble, with rifts atween; Thro' God's own heather we wonned together, I and my Willie (O love my love): I need hardly remark it was glorious weather, And flitterbats wavered alow, above; Boats were curtseying, rising, bowing, (Boats in that climate are so polite,) And sands were a ribbon of green endowing, And O the sun-dazzle on bark and bight! Thro' the rare red heather we danced together, (O love my Willie!) and smelt for flowers: I must mention again it was gorgeous weather, Rhymes are so scarce in this world of ours:— By rises that flushed with their purple favors, Thro' becks that brattled o'er grasses sheen, We walked or waded, we two young shavers, Thanking our stars we were both so green. We journeyed in parallels, I and Willie, In fortunate parallels! Butterflies, Hid in weltering shadows of daffodilly Or marjoram, kept making peacock eyes: Song-birds darted about, some inky As coal, some snowy, I ween, as curds; (Or rosy as pinks, or as roses pinky—) They reek of no eerie To-come, those birds! But they skim over bents which the mill-stream washes, Or hang in the lift 'neath a white cloud's hem; They need no parasols, no goloshes; And good Mrs. Trimmer she feedeth them. Then we thrid God's cowslips (as erst his heather) That endowed the wan grass with their golden blooms; And snapt (it was perfectly charming weather)— Our fingers at Fate and her goddess-glooms: And Willie 'gan sing (O his notes were fluty; Wafts fluttered them out to the white-winged sea)— Something made up of rhymes that have done much duty, Rhymes (better to put it) of "ancientry": Bowers of flowers encountered showers In William's carol—(O love my Willie!) When he bade sorrow borrow from blithe to-morrow I quite forget what—say a daffodilly. A nest in a hollow, "with buds to follow," I think occurred next in his nimble strain; And clay that was "kneaden," of course in Eden,— A rhyme most novel, I do maintain: Mists, bones, the singer himself, love-stories, And all at least furlable things got "furled"; Not with any design to conceal their glories, But simply and solely to rhyme with "world." Oh, if billows and pillows and hours and flowers, And all the brave rhymes of an elder day, Could be furled together, this genial weather, And carted or carried in wafts away, Nor ever again trotted out—ay me! How much fewer volumes of verse there'd be!

In lone Glenartney's thickets lies couched the lordly stag, The dreaming terrier's tail forgets its customary wag; And plodding plowmen's weary steps insensibly grow quicker, As broadening casements light them on toward home, or home-brewed liquor. It is—in brief—the evening: that pure and pleasant time, When stars break into splendor, and poets into rhyme; When in the glass of Memory the forms of loved ones shine— And when, of course, Miss Goodchild is prominent in mine. Miss Goodchild—Julia Goodchild!—how graciously you smiled Upon my childish passion once, yourself a fair-haired child: When I was (no doubt) profiting by Dr. Crabb's instruction, And sent those streaky lollipops home for your fairy suction. "She wore" her natural "roses, the night when first we met,"— Her golden hair was gleaming neath the coercive net: "Her brow was like the snawdrift," her step was like Queen Mab's, And gone was instantly the heart of every boy at Crabb's. The parlor-boarder chasséed tow'rds her on graceful limb; The onyx decked his bosom—but her smiles were not for him: With me she danced—till drowsily her eyes "began to blink," And I brought raisin wine, and said, "Drink, pretty creature, drink!" And evermore, when winter comes in his garb of snows, And the returning schoolboy is told how fast he grows; Shall I—with that soft hand in mine—enact ideal Lancers, And dream I hear demure remarks, and make impassioned answers. I know that never, never may her love for me return— At night I muse upon the fact with undisguised concern— But ever shall I bless that day!—I don't bless, as a rule, The days I spent at "Dr. Crabb's Preparatory School." And yet we two may meet again,—(Be still, my throbbing heart!) Now rolling years have weaned us from jam and raspberry-tart. One night I saw a vision—'twas when musk-roses bloom, I stood—we stood—upon a rug, in a sumptuous dining-room: One hand clasped hers—one easily reposed upon my hip— And "Bless ye!" burst abruptly from Mr. Goodchild's lip: I raised my brimming eye, and saw in hers an answering gleam— My heart beat wildly—and I woke, and lo! it was a dream.

I know not why my soul is racked; Why I ne'er smile, as was my wont I only know that, as a fact, I don't. I used to roam o'er glen and glade, Buoyant and blithe as other folk, And not unfrequently I made A joke. A minstrel's fire within me burned; I'd sing, as one whose heart must break, Lay upon lay—I nearly learned To shake. All day I sang; of love and fame, Of fights our fathers fought of yore, Until the thing almost became A bore. I cannot sing the old songs now! It is not that I deem them low; 'Tis that I can't remember how They go. I could not range the hills till high Above me stood the summer moon: And as to dancing, I could fly As soon. The sports, to which with boyish glee I sprang erewhile, attract no more: Although I am but sixty-three Or four. Nay, worse than that, I've seemed of late To shrink from happy boyhood—boys Have grown so noisy, and I hate A noise. They fright me when the beech is green, By swarming up its stem for eggs; They drive their horrid hoops between My legs. It's idle to repine, I know; I'll tell you what I'll do instead: I'll drink my arrowroot, and go To bed.

'Tis but a box, of modest deal; Directed to no matter where: Yet down my cheek the teardrops steal— Yes, I am blubbering like a seal; For on it is this mute appeal, "With care." I am a stern cold man, and range Apart: but those vague words "With care" Wake yearnings in me sweet as strange: Drawn from my moral Moated Grange, I feel I rather like the change Of air. Hast thou ne'er seen rough pointsmen spy Some simple English phrase—"With care" Or "This side uppermost"—and cry Like children? No? No more have I. Yet deem not him whose eyes are dry A bear. But ah! what treasure hides beneath That lid so much the worse for wear? A ring perhaps—a rosy wreath— A photograph by Vernon Heath— Some matron's temporary teeth Or hair! Perhaps some seaman, in Peru Or Ind, hath stowed herein a rare Cargo of birds'-eggs for his Sue; With many a vow that he'll be true, And many a hint that she is too— Too fair. Perhaps—but wherefore vainly pry Into the page that's folded there? I shall be better by-and-by: The porters, as I sit and sigh, Pass and repass—I wonder why They stare!

Forever! 'Tis a single word! Our rude forefathers deemed it two; Can you imagine so absurd A view? Forever! What abysms of woe The word reveals, what frenzy, what Despair! For ever (printed so) Did not. It looks, ah me! how trite and tame; It fails to sadden or appall Or solace—it is not the same At all. O thou to whom it first occurred To solder the disjoined, and dower Thy native language with a word Of power: We bless thee! Whether far or near Thy dwelling, whether dark or fair Thy kingly brow, is neither here Nor there. But in men's hearts shall be thy throne, While the great pulse of England beats: Thou coiner of a word unknown To Keats! And nevermore must printer do As men did long ago; but run "For" into "ever," bidding two Be one. Forever! passion-fraught, it throws O'er the dim page a gloom, a glamour: It's sweet, it's strange; and I suppose It's grammar. Forever! 'Tis a single word! And yet our fathers deemed it two: Nor am I confident they erred;— Are you?