Lives of Illustrious Shoemakers Part 5

[Ill.u.s.tration: ROBERT BLOOMFIELD]

Robert Bloomfield,

THE SHOEMAKER WHO WROTE "THE FARMER'S BOY."

"Crispin's sons Have from uncounted time, with ale and buns, Cherished the gift of song, which sorrow quells; And, working single in their low-built cells, Oft cheat the tedium of a winter's night With anthems."

--CHARLES LAMB: _Alb.u.m Verses_, 1830, p. 57.

"I have received many honorable testimonies of esteem from strangers; letters without a name, but filled with the most cordial advice, and almost parental anxiety for my safety under so great a share of public applause. I beg to refer such friends to the great teacher, Time; and hope that he will hereafter give me my deserts, and no more."--_Robert Bloomfield, Preface to "Rural Tales_," Sept. 29, 1801.

"No pompous learning--no parade Of pedantry and c.u.mbrous lore, On thy elastic bosom weigh'd; Instead, were thine, a mazy store Of feelings delicately wrought, And treasures gleaned by silent thought.

"Obscurity, and low-born care, Labor, and want--all adverse things, Combined to bow thee to despair; And of her young untutor'd wings To rob thy Genius.--'Twas in vain: With one proud soar she burst her chain!"

--_Blackwood's Magazine, Sept. 1823._

ROBERT BLOOMFIELD.

We have now to speak of a shoemaker-poet. The name of Robert Bloomfield, the author of the "Farmer's Boy," is known and held in honor wherever the English language is spoken. All cla.s.ses of readers admire his poetry, although it is not of the highest order of merit. It has, however, a genuine quality which no one possessed of poetical taste can fail to recognize. Its chief features are delightful rustic simplicity and naturalness, faithful reflection of the beauties of nature, and the charms which belong to rural occupations. The romantic side of the life of a _farmer's boy_ is given in the poem bearing that name, as we have it nowhere else in all our poetic or prose literature.

Bloomfield, though surrounded by the most unfavorable conditions, as a writer of poetry seems to have experienced no difficulty in executing his task. His was indeed a case in which the adage is well ill.u.s.trated--_poeta nascitur non fit_--a poet is born, not made. He was born with the gift of song. It would have been difficult for him to restrain its exercise. He made poetry, as the song-birds sing, by instinct and irresistible impulse. For him the words are quite as true as they are of the greater poet who wrote them,[30]

"I do but sing because I must, And pipe but as the linnets sing."

[30] Tennyson, "In Memoriam," stanza xxi.

Robert Bloomfield was born and brought up in the lovely neighborhood of Honington, Ixworth and Sapiston, in the northern part of the county of Suffolk. An idea of the quiet beauty of the woodland scenery of Suffolk may be obtained from the paintings of Gainsborough, another notable man whom this county has produced. Gainsborough, as a boy full of yearnings after art, loved to spend his time in the woods and pastures round Sudbury, sketching trees, brooks, meadow-landscapes, cattle, shepherds, or ploughmen at their work in the fields. He was at the height of his fame as a painter when Bloomfield was a farmer's boy at Sapiston, on the Grafton estate. It is interesting to know that these two Suffolk men were contemporary, "the first truly original English painter," who took his lessons direct from nature, and the first genuine poet of the English farm and field.

Bloomfield's father was a tailor at Honington, near Bury St. Edmund's.

Robert was born in 1766. His father died at the end of the following year, leaving Robert and five other children to the care of their mother. She was a worthy, estimable woman, who managed by her own unaided efforts not only to maintain her little family, but to give each of her children the rudiments of an education. This she accomplished by opening a school, and teaching her own children along with the rest.

With the exception of a few months' instruction in writing from a schoolmaster at Ixworth, the future poet learned from his mother all he knew when he left his home to earn his own living. This he did at the age of eleven, his mother, who had married again, being no longer able to keep him at home, or put him to a good school. His maternal uncle, a Mr. Austin of Sapiston, agreed to take him as a boy about the farm, and allow him to live in the house with the rest of the family. He appears to have received no wages, his "board" being the only allowance made for the work he did as a farmer's boy; and this could hardly be much at such an age. He remained in this situation four years, until he was fifteen.

It was during these four years of boyhood he picked up the knowledge of farm-life, and made the observations on the varied phases of nature and the seasons which are delightfully interwoven in the four books of his well-known poem, "The Farmer's Boy." How observant he must have been, how eagerly he must have entered into the pleasures of rural life, how keen must have been his boyish sense of the beautiful and romantic, may be imagined by those who consider the circ.u.mstances in the midst of which, in after-years, he composed that charming poem.

His mother had undertaken to provide him with clothing while with his uncle at the farm; but this small expense was found to be too much for her scanty means. Robert at that time had two brothers, George and Nathaniel, living in London, and working, the one as a journeyman shoemaker, and the other as a tailor. To them the anxious mother applied for help in her difficulties, stating in her letter that Mr. Austin had said Robert was so small and weakly, it was to be feared he would never be able to obtain his living by hard out-door labor. The brothers at once agreed to take him under their care, find him in food and clothing, and teach him the craft of shoemaking until he should be able to obtain his own livelihood. Full of solicitude for his safety and well-being, the good woman took him up to London herself, and handed him over to the guardianship of her two eldest sons, begging them, "as they valued a mother's blessing, to watch over him, to set good examples for him, and never to forget that he had lost his father."

George Bloomfield and his brother were then living at No. 7 Pitcher's Court, Bell Alley, Coleman Street, in a garret which served both as workshop and bedroom. The place was dingy and gloomy, and presented to the bright, thoughtful Suffolk lad a mournful contrast to the pleasant surroundings in the old farm-house at Sapiston. Nor could it have been a very healthy abode, for _five_ workmen occupied the room during the day, "clubbing together," after the fashion of such workmen in those days, to lighten the burden of rent.

At first the new-comer was chiefly employed by the older men as their errand-boy, being rewarded for his trouble by receiving lessons from the workmen in the art of shoemaking. These men, like so many of their craft, were of a thoughtful turn of mind, and very eager for the news of the day. It had been their custom to have the yesterday's paper brought in with their dinner by the pot-boy from a neighboring public-house.

Until Robert came they had been in the habit of reading it by turns, but now, as his time was less valuable than theirs, the office of reader was permanently handed over to him. This duty was of much service to him, for the information he gained by reading disciplined his young mind to close and continuous thought, and enlarged his knowledge of his own language. The simple account, given by his brother George, of these social readings in the cobblers' workroom, and other means of instruction of which Robert availed himself, is full of interest. George Bloomfield says: "He frequently met with words that he was unacquainted with; of this he often complained. I one day happened at a book-stall to see a small dictionary which had been very ill-used. I bought it for him for fourpence. By the help of this he in a little time could read and comprehend the long and beautiful speeches of Burke, Fox, or North." And again: "One Sunday, after a whole day's stroll in the country, we by accident went into a Dissenting meeting-house in the Old Jewry, where a gentleman was lecturing. This man filled Robert with astonishment. The house was amazingly crowded with the most genteel people; and though we were forced to stand in the aisle, and were much pressed, yet Robert always quickened his steps to get into the town on a Sunday evening soon enough to attend this lecture. The preacher's name was Fawcet. His language was just such as the 'Rambler' is written in.... Of him Robert learned to accent what he called hard words, and otherwise to improve himself, and gained the most enlarged notions of Providence."

Bloomfield's reading was not very extensive nor diversified during these early years of his London life, yet it was sufficient to whet his appet.i.te for mental improvement, and give him no small degree of literary taste and skill. The brothers took, in sixpenny numbers, such works as a "History of England," "The British Traveller," and a "Treatise on Geography." These were read aloud to the little company of busy listeners, several hours of the day being occupied with the task.

His first poetic impulse was awakened by the perusal of the _London Magazine_, which found its way at this time into the cobblers' garret.

Robert always read it with zest, carefully scanning the reviews of books, and never failing to look into the "Poets' Corner." One day he surprised his brother by repeating a song which he had composed after the manner of Burns and so many other graceful songsters, "to an old tune." George was as much delighted as surprised at his young brother's smooth and easy verses, and encouraged him to try the experiment of sending them to the editor. This he did with many fears and hopes, and nervously awaited the issue of the next number. To his intense delight, and the pardonable pride of the whole company, the verses appeared in print. As a specimen of his first literary attempt, every youth will deem them worth recording, and will read them with pleasure. They bear the modest t.i.tle "A Village Girl," and are signed with the letters R. B.

"Hail May! lovely May! how replenished my pails, The young dawn o'erspreads the broad east streaked with gold!

My glad heart beats time to the laugh of the vales, And Colin's voice rings through the wood from the fold,

The wood to the mountain submissively bends, Whose blue misty summit first glows with the sun; See! thence a gay train by the wild rill descends To join the mixed sports:--Hark! the tumult's begun.

Be cloudless, ye skies! and be Colin but there; Not dew-spangled bents on the wide level dale, Nor morning's first smile can more lovely appear, Than his looks,--since my wishes I cannot conceal.

Swift down the mad dance, whilst blest health prompts to move, We'll count joys to come, and exchange vows of truth; And haply, when age cools the transports of love, Decry, like good folks, the vain follies of youth."

Another piece called "The Sailor's Return" found a place in the "Poets'

Corner." These efforts were enough to prove his taste and gifts as a versifier. The poetic power was latent in his mind, and only needed sufficient stimulus to bring it into full exercise. This stimulus came, as was natural, from the reading of poetry itself. A copy of Thomson's "Seasons" and Milton's "Paradise Lost" fell into his hands when he was about seventeen years of age. They belonged to a Scotchman who lived and worked at a house in Bell Alley, to which the shoemakers removed about this time. The eager youth read them with the pa.s.sion of a born poet; and, as he read, the fire burned within. His imagination was now fairly awakened, and it was plain to all who watched him intelligently at this time, that melodies were being awakened in his heart that sooner or later must find their expression in song. The "Seasons" was his favorite poem. He read and re-read its glowing descriptions of nature, committed favorite portions to memory, and never tired of recounting its beauties in the hearing of his sympathetic friends. The "Seasons" struck the key-note of the "Farmer's Boy," though Bloomfield was no imitator of Thomson, nor of any one else, in either matter or manner. The thought and style of these two poets of nature are as unlike as their kindred subjects would allow them to be. Thomson's music is that of a majestic and stately oratorio, while Bloomfield sings a sweet and simple pastoral symphony.

But the young poet was not yet to enter on his great task. Fourteen years pa.s.sed away before his first and best published poem, the "Farmer's Boy," saw the light. During this time several important events in his history occurred. In his eighteenth year, in consequence of certain disputes in the shoe-makers' trade about the legality of employing boys who had not been bound as apprentices, he went back again to Suffolk for a short time, and was taken into the home of his uncle and former master, Mr. Austin of Sapiston. Here for two months of happy leisure he roamed the fields where he spent so much of his time as a boy, reviving old impressions, and deepening in his mind that keen sense of the beautiful which city life and the imprisonment of a shoemaker's occupation had not been sufficient to destroy. His companion at this time was still the favorite "Seasons," from which, in the presence of the very charms which Thomson describes, the ardent youth derived new pleasure and inspiration.

The trade difficulty was got over by his becoming an apprentice for the remaining three years of his minority to a Mr. Duddridge, brother to George's former landlord. At the age of twenty he was left alone in London, George having removed to Bury St. Edmund's in his own county, and Nathaniel having married and gone into housekeeping. Robert now took to the study of music, and became an expert player on the violin. At the age of twenty-four he married the daughter of a boat-builder at Woolwich named Church. "I have sold my fiddle and got a wife," he humorously writes to his brother. At first his home was in furnished lodgings, but by dint of hard work and strict economy he managed in a short time to furnish _one_ room on the first floor of a house in Bell Alley, Coleman Street, the old quarters to which he had come fresh from the country on his first becoming a shoemaker. His landlord kindly allowed him the free use of a garret to work in during the day. "In this garret," says his brother, "amid six or seven other workmen, his active mind employed itself in composing the 'Farmer's Boy.'" How long his mind was occupied in this task we cannot tell. One could hardly wonder if the process of composition was slow in the midst of such distracting and unfavorable circ.u.mstances. The marvel is that it should have been composed at all under such uncongenial and difficult conditions. So hard pressed for time was the poor poet-shoemaker, and so unable to find the proper materials for writing, that he is said to have made up and kept in his mind no less than 600 lines, that is, about the _half_ of his poem, before he could manage to write it down. And when he did this, he was glad to lay hold of any odd sc.r.a.p of paper for the purpose; the back of a letter or a printed bill, the margin of newspapers, pieces of pattern-paper, were seized as they came to hand and covered with writing, and then hidden away in cupboards, and occasionally even in some c.h.i.n.k in the wall, until they could be collected and arranged for a fair copy, suitable to go into the hands of the printer. It was indeed a wonderful exhibition of mental abstraction and retentive memory. Few, even among poets, could have wrought to any purpose amid the din and conversation of a shoemakers' workroom, and still fewer, even if the excitement of poetic thought had enabled them to compose, could have treasured up their productions in the memory until they amounted to 600 lines. A friend of Bloomfield named Swan, writing to Mr. Capel Lofft, says, "Bloomfield, either from the contracted state of his pecuniary resources to purchase paper, or for other reasons, composed the latter part of 'Autumn' and the whole of 'Winter' in his head, without committing one line to paper! This cannot fail to surprise the literary world, who are well acquainted with the treacherousness of memory, and how soon the most happy ideas, for want of sufficient quickness in writing down, are lost in the rapidity of thought. But this is not all--he went a step further; he not only composed and committed that part of his work to his faithful and retentive memory; but he _corrected_ it all in his head!!!--and, as he said, when it was thus prepared, 'I had nothing to do but to write it down.' By this new and wonderful mode of composition, he studied and completed his 'Farmer's Boy,' in a garret, among six or seven of his fellow-workmen, without their ever once suspecting or knowing anything of the matter!"[31]

[31] "Lives of Eminent Englishmen." Fullarton & Co., 1838. Vol. viii. p. 245. See also "Views Ill.u.s.trative of Works of Robert Bloomfield," by E. W. Brayley. London: 1806, p. 17.

Bloomfield was thirty-two years of age when his poem was complete and attempts were being made to find a printer and publisher. These attempts were for a time fruitless. One after another the publishers rejected the "copy" of the unknown writer. At length, it was sent by George Bloomfield, who always had full confidence in Robert's powers, to a gentleman of literary tastes living at Troston Hall, near Bury, in Suffolk--Mr. Capel Lofft. This gentleman had the good sense at once to perceive the genuine merits of the poem submitted to his judgment, and to recommend its publication. By his kind influence and aid a publisher was soon found. Messrs. Vernon & Hood paid the poet 50 for his copy, and afterward, when the poem proved a success, honorably advanced an additional 200, besides giving the author an interest in his copyright.

The success of the poem was immediate and complete. It was warmly received by the public, and praised in all quarters as a masterpiece of natural poetic simplicity and beauty. Twenty-six thousand copies were sold in the first three years of its issue, seven editions having been called for. The position secured by the "Farmer's Boy" on its first publication has been held until the present day. All lovers of poetry read it with delight. It is natural and graceful as the song of a bird "warbling his native woodnotes wild." When the English song-bird sings in captivity there seems to be a touch of pathos in his note; and one can hardly resist the same impression in reading these sweet rustic melodies in verse which came from the lips of the shoemaker-poet imprisoned in a London garret. Yet there is something much more stimulating in Bloomfield's lines than this. They are sweet and joyous, and full of that glowing enthusiasm for beauty which all fine natures feel. Besides the editions sent forth in this country, the "Farmer's Boy" was printed at Leipsic, and was translated into French, Italian, and Latin.

Bloomfield now had many friends as well as admirers. The Duke of Grafton, on whose estate he had been employed as a boy, settled upon him a small annuity, and used his influence to obtain for him a post at the seal-office at 1s. per day. In addition to this, Bloomfield received frequent presents from the n.o.bility, and even from members of the royal family. To the poor shoemaker, accustomed to the utmost obscurity, all this success, and popularity, and patronage "appeared," to use his own language, "like a dream."

In after-years he issued a number of small volumes of poetry, in which are found several shorter pieces of great merit, such as the two descriptive or ballad pieces "Richard and Kate," "The Fakenham Ghost,"

or the exquisitely simple piece called "The Soldier's Return." The first of these is one of the best modern ballads in the language, as it is certainly among the most, if it be not the most, spirited and original of his compositions. Of the last of the three just mentioned, Professor Wilson says: "The topic is trite, but in Mr. Bloomfield's hands it almost a.s.sumes a character of novelty. Burns' 'Soldier's Return' is not, to our taste, one whit superior."

The t.i.tles of the volumes that followed that by which his fame was established are "Rural Tales," published in 1801; "The Banks of the Wye," 1811; "Wild Flowers," and "May Day with the Muses," 1822.

"Hazelwood Hall, a Village Drama, in Three Acts," was published 1823, the year of his death. All these poems have since been issued in one volume, to which is attached a short sketch of the poet's life, and the circ.u.mstances which attended the publication of "The Farmer's Boy." This account, given by Mr. Capel Lofft, Bloomfield's kind friend and patron, is full of interest. It serves to show the value of a judicious friend to a young aspirant for literary fame, whose talents deserve recognition, but whose position in life prevents him taking the necessary steps to become known to the world.

The last twenty years of Bloomfield's life were embittered by affliction and misfortunes in business. He did not long retain his position at the Seal Office, being obliged to abandon it through continual ill-health.

After resuming the trade of a shoemaker for a short time, he was induced to open a shop as a bookseller, but this speculation brought him only disappointment and loss. His son, who was a printer, states that about this time the poets Rogers and Southey took a deep interest in the welfare of their poor suffering brother poet. Rogers, it seems, tried to obtain him a government pension, but without success. At length he removed from London to try the effect of the fresh air and quietude of country life. His last years were spent as a shoemaker at Shefford-c.u.m-Campton, Bed's. Toward the close of his life he was in great want and distress, having reaped little permanent gain from his numerous and popular poems. So intense was the strain of mind he endured from overwork, ill-health, and anxiety, that his friends entertained grave fears of his becoming insane. Death was preferable to such a life the death which is for men of Christian faith and character, like Bloomfield, the gate to a higher and happier life. Providentially for him, that gate was opened when life here had become a burden too grievous to be borne. He died at Shefford, in the fifty-seventh year of his age, August 19th, 1823, and was buried in the Campton churchyard.

Bloomfield's character, unlike that of many of the more celebrated poets of his own day, exhibited a fair and lovely type of moral excellence. He was genuinely modest, affectionate, industrious, and pious. None regarded him with more respect and love than those who knew him most intimately. This fact speaks strongly for his real worth. His own brothers held him in the greatest esteem, and felt the most generous and hearty pleasure in his literary success. His generosity to his needy relatives, who were very numerous, often crippled his resources, and, indeed, left him at times as poor as those he had befriended. We have noticed how much he owed in early life to the loving care and good sense of an excellent mother. Bloomfield never lost sight of this fact. Like all good men, men whose lives are worth study and imitation, he was deeply attached to his mother; and it is well deserving of record that, like Buckle, the eminent philosophical writer, the young poet felt a more exquisite pleasure in placing his first published work in the hands of his mother than in the antic.i.p.ation of any fame or advantage it might secure for himself as the author. When the first edition was issued a copy of it was sent to his mother, accompanied by these simple lines, which faithfully reflect at once the character of the true mother and the devoted son:

"' To peace and virtue still be true,'

An anxious mother ever cries, Who needs no _present_ to renew Parental love--which never dies."

Many tributes of esteem, both in prose and verse, were paid to Bloomfield during his life and after his death. None of these was of more value than the brief sentence written by his constant friend and first literary patron, Mr. Capel Lofft, who says, "It is much to be a poet, such as he will be found: it is much more to be such a man." The lines which appeared in _Blackwood's Magazine_, the month after Bloomfield's death, exactly describe the chief features of the poet's life and work:

"No pompous learning--no parade Of pedantry, and c.u.mbrous lore, On thy elastic bosom weighed; Instead, were thine a mazy store Of feelings delicately wrought, And treasures gleaned by silent thought.

Obscurity, and low born care, Labor, and want--all adverse things, Combined to bow thee to despair; And of her young untutored wings To rob thy genius. 'Twas in vain: With one proud soar she burst her chain!

The beauties of the building spring; The glories of the summer's reign; The russet autumn triumphing In ripened fruits and golden grain; Winter with storms around his shrine, Each, in their turn, were themes of thine.

And lowly life, the peasant's lot, Its humble hopes and simple joys; By mountain-stream the shepherd's cot, And what the rustic hour employs; White flocks on Nature's carpet spread; Birds blithely carolling o'erhead;

These were thy themes, and thou wert blessed-- Yes, blessed beyond the wealth of kings.

Calm joy is seated in the breast Of the rapt poet as he sings, And all that Truth or Hope can bring Of Beauty, gilds the muse's wing.

And, Bloomfield, thine were blissful days, (If flowers of bliss may thrive on earth); Thine were the glory and the praise Of genius linked with modest worth; To wisdom wed, remote from strife, Calmly pa.s.sed o'er thy stormless life."