The Legendary and Poetical Remains of John Roby Part 2

"I have the honor to remain, Sir, With great respect, Your obedient and faithful servant, "FRANCIS PALGRAVE."

The second series, consisting also of two volumes, uniform with the first, was published in 1831, and met with similar success. Both series were reviewed in the most cordial manner by the leading periodicals of the day; more than once quoted, and characterized by Sir Walter Scott, himself a host, as an elegant work. (_See Introduction to the Betrothed._)

When composing, Mr. Roby usually wrote with his family around him; the only restraint he laid upon them, was the prohibition of whispering; from conversation carried on in the ordinary tone he could wholly abstract himself. Seated in a favourite rocking-chair, that common northern luxury, wrapped in a loose study-gown, he wrote for hours with rapidity and pleasure. When invention flagged, and he had to seek an idea, he would fold his arms, and gently rock for a few minutes, then with the air of a person who had found what he sought, return to the page with renewed spirit. Though undisturbed by familiar sounds, which, indeed, he appeared not to perceive, so completely was he absorbed in his ideal world, he yet required all things in order around him before he commenced; objects indiscriminately scattered conveying disturbance through the eye, or even an open door, would so effectually dissipate his thoughts, as to prevent him from writing. His practice was to make himself master of the historical ground-work of the tale, and as far as possible of the manners and customs of the period, and then to commence composition, with Fosbroke's "Encyclopedia of Antiquities" at hand, for accuracy of costume, &c. He always gave the credit of his style, which the Westminster Review termed "a very model of good Saxon," to his native country, the force and energy of whose dialect arises mainly from the prevalence of the Teutonic element. "The thought digs out the word,"

was a favourite saying, when the exact expression he wanted did not at once occur. To his fine ear for musical sound he was much indebted for the flowing ease of his diction.

Though const.i.tuting what is denominated light literature, much careful research was required in the composition of the tales. The aspect of the country in those distant times, the costume and customs of the day, were particulars in which he was scrupulously exact. To secure this truthfulness of detail, long investigations were often needed, even where perhaps they would be little suspected: but always confident that he should succeed at last, he spared no pains in ascertaining the most minute particular, and this very persuasion of success contributed to secure it. By some means or other he invariably commanded the information in due time. Amusing instances of this sometimes occurred.

Once, when out of the reach of any work of reference, he was completely at fault for the blazonry of a particular banner, used five hundred years ago. He did not despair, but left the matter in blank, expecting--though he would have been puzzled to tell whence--the wished-for information would be forthcoming. And so it was: casually looking at a review, it so happened that the very thing he wanted was described with more than ordinary minuteness.

His inexhaustible creative power is conspicuous; about two hundred different characters are introduced, no one of whom reminds the reader of another, nor is invention wanting for abundant diversity of incident and adventure, heroic and comic. A gentleman who had been reading the Traditions for the first time, recently remarked, that for invention he scarcely knew any writer Mr. Roby's equal. It is perhaps worthy of notice, that all the characters are creations, not one an idealized portrait.

Another charm is the fine mould in which his heroines are cast. There is a delicacy, a n.o.bility, or high-minded spirit of self-sacrifice about the more prominent, which, while leaving the characters perfectly distinct, sustains throughout a high ideal of woman. Not one bad character figures as a woman; the only approach to such is in tales of witchcraft, where, indeed, the Arch Evil One, rather than his poor victim, is the criminal, as though he would not even bring the idea of evil athwart the favourite vision of his imagination. It may be deemed not adhering to nature, thus to omit an object she, alas! too often presents; but who would blame the artist for the faultless beauty of his creations? The sculptor may display his skill, by representing the contortions of deformity, but not his highest ideal; may show how clever a copyist with the chisel he can be, but not how deeply he has drunk of the inspiration common to all art, how near he has approached to the Fountain of all Beauty. The clearness of his conceptions, and the way in which he threw himself into his characters, are evinced by the dramatic action of even the shortest story. While writing he appeared actually to feel as he would have done, had he been in the situations he described; he felt the perplexity, the sense of danger, and the exultation of escape; for the time he seemed to have a double life, at once sharing the existence of his hero, and sympathizing as a spectator. It was in a tone that he would have used, had she been a living being, that he said of one of his heroines, under very peculiar circ.u.mstances of danger[C], "_I could not_ let her perish." His plan was to commence his tale, bring his characters into strange or perilous situations, realize their danger in its full extent, without the slightest idea of how he should extricate them; and then, when the means of escape presented themselves to his imagination, he would work on, delighted with the suggestion, till to his great regret the tale was finished. He knew when to leave off, but it cost him something to do so; it was like parting company with friends.

The short vivid descriptions of scenery scattered throughout, are not often equalled. By a few strokes of the pen, not only a perfect picture of the permanent objects of a locality is placed before the reader's eye, but also the temporary lights and shadows which are thrown on the landscape by the ever-shifting skies; the very feeling of the air does not escape him. Each tale is in fact a cabinet picture, combining history and landscape. In the foreground the traditionary group appears in vivid action; beyond, a far-receding distance, faint in the noon-tide haze, or perchance a wood, with its broad shadows, and burst of sunlight across the next glade. An artist might paint from his descriptions. In the case of one of the most effective engravings, that of Rivington Pike, the drawing was made after the artist had read the tale; the accessories of light and shade, and in the original, of colour also, doubtless owe something of their character to this circ.u.mstance.

In his power of depicting the supernatural, Mr. Roby stands pre-eminent; and this not only in little weird touches, that come upon the reader he knows not how, waking a chord within which makes him feel that he has kindred with mysteries more than the eye sees, or the ear hears--but in long-sustained intercourse with beings who people the unseen world, and who seem at certain times, and in certain places, to press upon mortal spirits even to recognition, more, even to hallowed or unhallowed communion. As if there were, time and s.p.a.ce concurring, points of juncture for the two worlds. The ease with which he carries his reader along with him, even in spite of the anti-spiritual prejudices of the present age, cannot be better exemplified than in the tale to which reference has just been made, Rivington Pike, which has been said by a German reviewer to be, "the only authentic tale of demoniacal possession the English have." The composition of the story had a powerful effect on the writer himself. He sat up writing longer than usual after the rest of the family had retired. It was midnight when he had finished; and so completely had the scenes he had been describing, taken possession of his own mind, that he dared not stir from his seat, nor did he, till Mrs. Roby, surprised at his remaining down stairs so long after his accustomed time, entered the room; the sight of a familiar face broke the spell, and dissipated the visionary alarm.

The purity of the morality is such as befits a Christian writer, and there is throughout the work a spirit of reverence for things sacred, and of deference to the supreme source of illumination, which is not always to be found in our lighter literature. The reader, charmed and delighted, is carried away from ordinary scenes into a world of romance.

Nevertheless in that ideal land he finds the same laws of morality which govern his daily life--the same G.o.d looked up to, as the disposer of all things, the Father at once to be loved and obeyed; and he may go back to his duties in common life, without one moral idea having been deranged, or one principle disturbed.

It was at one time Mr. Roby's intention to follow up the "Traditions of Lancashire" with similar ill.u.s.trations of the early history of the county of York. Subjects were chosen, and a few tales written, which appeared in Blackwood's and Frazer's magazines. One, though not of this series, which was published in Frazer, February 1837, under the t.i.tle of "The Smuggler's Daughter," was proposed to be dramatised. The parts were cast, Mrs. Yates or Mrs. Keeley was to have taken that of the heroine, and Mr. Buckstone and Mr. O. Smith were to have engaged in others. From the correspondence on the subject, it appears that Mr. Buckstone's attention being demanded by other and rather perplexing affairs, the representation of the "Smuggler's Daughter" was delayed till after the appearance of the story in the Magazine, and at last suffered to fall to the ground.

A book containing sketches of the different localities he intended to ill.u.s.trate, and memoranda of the traditions attached to them, made during excursions into Yorkshire for this purpose, show the spirit with which he entered on his task, and it is much to be regretted that anything should have been allowed to set it aside. About this time he commenced the study of botany in good earnest. In the same book are notes of a first botanical tour, a few extracts from which may not be uninteresting: they are certainly characteristic. While pursuing the details of science, he was in no danger of falling under the poet's malediction on him,

"Whose mind is but the mind of his own eyes."

They appear to have been written on the spot, whenever any fresh object presented itself.

"Off to Wetherby.--Resolve to dissipate the mind. Round Hey.

Trees, &c., all green, yet how beautifully diversified--cool, warm, half tints--Dr. Johnson, chaise traveller. What is that purple tuft?--Elegant! _Vicia cracca_.... What is that like a diminutive fir tree? _Equisetum_, quite a puzzle for a beginner; never mind, learn soon. Clover, I know; but where can it be cla.s.sed? Honeysuckle too--rushes and all, I suppose, though they would puzzle to find a flower. Clouds, the soul of landscape.

What sky most beautiful? Never see a dandelion, but thoughts the most intense that never die.--Where slumbering--where the great reservoir?" No flower had the power to revive early a.s.sociations like this. His first recollections of it, were as growing in a field near his father's house where he played in infancy. "Yellow flowers among the green wheat: Cherlock. Limestone district.--How delightful any occupation that keeps the mind from preying on itself. Want of employment similar to hunger.--Gastric juice eats the stomach if no food.... What a delicious smell! b.u.t.terfly orchis.... Foxglove unknown in some of the southern counties, here how luxuriant! Localities of plants, soil, &c., wants explanation. Poppy, sand, coltsfoot, clay. Furze, Linnaeus.

Flowers, all made after one model, never change the generic characters in whatever part of the world; proof, where there no other, of an all-wise designer.... Briony, spiral spring. _Orchis morio_. Something about this tribe mysterious. Children in a field playing, _enjoyment_. With what different eyes do I now look on nature. What should possess me to learn botany, all my life laughing at it. Arrangement, b.u.mp of order I suppose.

Distant view of the wolds. York Minster--what a host of recollections!... _Iris pseudacorus_. Inoculated even the post-boy. The operation, the power of mind over mind, what is it?

Country churches. People would write much better books if they would take individualities, instead of generalities, to sermons.... The numbers three and five, how predominant in botany. _Geum urbanum_.--Lutford. Jacka.s.ses on a common--patience personified. Why should _Jack_ be a diminutive, a lowering of any thing. Jack snipe, _Osmunda regalis_.--Windmills always a.s.sociate with country quiet; the monotonous turn of the sails. Retreat.

Lunatics: mankind all so in one respect or another, but a great difference. Lunatics lose their reasoning powers, and jumble ideas,--take those for real which are only reflection and memory, while those counted sane, with correct ideas, act diametrically opposite to their knowledge.... Gravel-field, famous place for plants. Set out. Roman antiquities--a Roman burying place evidently,--continually digging out broken urns of baked clay, very fragile.... Cats without tails, a breed of them here; supposed originally from the Isle of Man. Style of face in different parts. Query, Is it caught? Lower part of the mouth formed by its owner." The notes continue, but are almost exclusively botanical.

In the spring of 1837, Mr. Roby made a rapid tour on the Continent, the notes and ill.u.s.trative sketches of which were published in two volumes by Messrs. Longman and Co., under the t.i.tle of "Seven Weeks in Belgium, Switzerland, Lombardy, Piedmont, Savoy, &c." His quickness, and clearness of observation, and power of placing before the reader's eye, in a few words, the objects which met his own, render the book delightful and refreshing to those whom duty detains at home. Notes were taken on the spot, and but slightly amplified, so that the narrative has all the freshness of a youthful description of a day's pleasure. If the road branches off in two directions, and the driver hardly knows which to take, the reader himself feels puzzled, and thinks with apprehension of the nearness of the sun to the horizon, and the miles yet to be traversed; if the traveller is sailing down the lake listlessly drinking in the beauty around him, the reader, too, feels the calm repose of the still expanse of waters, and the softened grandeur of the panorama of mountains. Even "the dry hard names" of rare plants--music to the botanist--followed as they are here by their more familiar synonyms, enhance the charm of the book: we look up from the sunny surface of the glacier to the crimson flowers of the _Azalea proc.u.mbens_ (trailing Azalea) starring the barren rock. Graphic description alternates with personal adventure and amusing anecdote, marked alike by vivacity of style, and the buoyant spirit of the author. Charming as a narrative of continental travel, it at the same time has been said, "as a guide book to the continent," to be "the best that was ever written,"--the sight-seer, the lover of scenery, and the botanist may use it to equal advantage. It shows how much may be secured by a really active and inquisitive mind, in a few weeks, while the full particulars respecting pa.s.sports, routes, distances, moneys, exchanges, &c., puts the reader in the way of enjoying as much himself, when it falls to his lot to take the same route. The pictures of nature are in Mr. Roby's own effective style. The start from the Custom-house, termed by the "Literary Gazette"

"a Calcott picture in a few lines," is an instance. "It was a calm grey morning, the population were hardly astir, the river with its wilderness of masts seemed hardly awake; and the very water having been suffered to rest untroubled for a s.p.a.ce, looked dull and drowsy." The impressions made by the first sight of Alpine scenery on a mind like his, are, as it may be expected, vividly told. It was of this part of the work, that a lady, who had been familiar with good English scenery all her life, and did justice to it both by pen and pencil, remarked, "That book taught me to look at mountains."

In 1840 Mr. Roby again visited the Continent by a different route, adhering to his custom of making notes and sketches of what he saw. At the close of the same year his attention was engaged by the preparation of a new edition of the "Traditions of Lancashire," in a less expensive form, so as to bring it within the reach of general readers. It was published in three volumes by Colburn, as the first of a series of Popular Traditions of England.

Mr. Roby's delight was as great in imparting as in imbibing knowledge, and he took a warm interest in all inst.i.tutions for its diffusion. The princ.i.p.al literary occupation of the next four years appears to have been the preparation and delivery of lectures in connexion with societies of this kind, in which his native county so eminently abounds.

His early efforts, while yet residing at Wigan, and the welcome reception they met with, have been before noticed; quite as acceptable were the matured results of reading and research now offered to larger and more mixed audiences. In the early autumn of 1838 he gave a course of ten lectures in the theatre, Rochdale, in aid of the Philosophic and Literary Society of that town, on botany; comprising both cla.s.sification and physiology, ill.u.s.trated by large diagrams painted in distemper. They were afterwards delivered at Manchester, accompanied by some beautiful experiments, made with the aid of Dr. Warwick's oxy-hydrogen microscope, kindly superintended by that gentleman, and subsequently at the Collegiate Inst.i.tution, Liverpool.

The subjects of other lectures were various. A course of four, on Tradition, as connected with, and ill.u.s.trating history, antiquities, and Romance, were delivered at Rochdale. Drawings executed in a bold style in black and red chalks, many of them thrown off at the time, ill.u.s.trated either the localities where the various legends had birth, or the costumes, style of building, &c. of the period. One set of lectures which the writer has been so happy as to find fully written out, manifests not only his taste for art, but his knowledge of its principles. They are on painting, embracing light and shade, composition, colour, and perspective; and when delivered, were copiously ill.u.s.trated, occasionally by pictures of the old masters in his possession. He was never more at home, than when ministering to the instruction or gratification of others. His talents, information, acquisitions of various kinds, whatever he might happen to possess, that could at all contribute to the purpose, were put in requisition; and when the idea he wished to convey, or ill.u.s.trate, was caught by his audience, or in private by his listening friends, his countenance became radiant with pleasure; the belief that he had been of use in any way to others, was one of his highest gratifications.

Among his MSS. are some lectures on architecture, commencing with the rude huts of barbarous tribes, and then proceeding to the structures, as far as they are known, of the ancient nations. Gothic architecture finds its place in the fifth lecture; but from the abruptness with which it breaks off in the middle of a sentence, it appears that the lectures were not completed. There are also, memoranda and rough diagrams for distinct lectures on baronial architecture.

A friend of Mr. Roby's, who was also for many years a neighbour, has kindly favoured the writer with the following recollections of some of his lectures.

"The cheerful alacrity with which on several occasions Mr. Roby yielded to the solicitations of his fellow-townsmen, by giving gratuitous lectures to a.s.sist their Inst.i.tution, was evidence of his often-expressed wish to raise his less fortunate countrymen in the scale of intellectual and social life. I often came in contact with him in connexion with the Rochdale Literary and Philosophic Society, for which he gave several lectures on Tradition, Botany, and some other subjects. His lectures on the Linnaean system of Botany, and another series on the Physiology of Plants, given before our society, were of the very first character; displaying an amount of research, and a power of a.n.a.lysis, combined with most felicitous modes of ill.u.s.tration, rarely meeting in the same individual. The colored drawings used on these occasions, executed by himself and his son, would have done honour to any artist. Such was the popularity of the two botanical courses, that, by request, they were repeated in Manchester, and some other neighbouring towns. In ill.u.s.trating the lectures on Tradition, the rapidity with which he could throw off the gable or window of an old manor-house or any object of a similar character, was, to me, perfectly marvellous--a few touches, and the effect was produced."

The most popular of the lectures were those on the peculiarities of the Lancashire dialect. They were delivered to crowded audiences at several literary inst.i.tutions, connected with different large towns in the county. In a tolerably full abstract, given by the "Preston Pilot," and in the original notes, there is ample proof of the highly interesting character of these lectures. Ethnological inquiries, full of attraction to the lovers of that science, formed the introduction, while, to a Lancashire audience, the charm of the whole must have been irresistible, and have furnished an entertainment second only to "Mathews at Home."

The fund of anecdote, the rich racy humour which sparkled through the lecture, the inimitable wit of "Tummus and Meary," and the equally inimitable tones of the voice which then gave it utterance, are still fresh in the recollection of many. Had the lectures been fully written out, they would have made a charming little Christmas book, fascinating alike from the information contained, and the mirth it would provoke.

The anecdotes are all indicated in the notes by the princ.i.p.al word or sentence, and go far to prove what the lecturer a.s.serted, that a Lancashire man would at any time equal an Irishman in wit.

These lectures were last delivered at Preston, in March, 1844. Having commenced the series, Mr. Roby, with characteristic determination, persisted in carrying it through, though suffering from a severe attack of influenza, which he kept at bay by force of will. Immediately on his return home his health gave way. Mischief had been going on for years, but the activity of his mind, and that indomitable spirit, which would bear extreme suffering before it complained, even to itself, had prevented his heeding any indications of disease, till it had pervaded the whole system. The disorder baffled medical skill; change of scene was tried in vain: as months rolled on his sufferings increased; and, though still striving to attend to professional duties, he was utterly unfit to cope with care and anxiety of any kind. Physical pain rendered him incapable of deriving pleasure from any of those sources which had heretofore afforded such rich enjoyment. Society, art, intellectual pursuits, became not only insipid but distasteful, and with this suffering a new element mingled, deep mental distress. Holy Writ speaks of such a thing as the heart not being "right in the sight of G.o.d," and a fearful consciousness that such was his own case, now became as "the arrow of the Almighty, the poison whereof drinketh up the spirit." An increasingly vivid apprehension of the just claims of the Being who demands of His creatures, the love of "heart and mind, and soul, and strength," a deepening insight into his own nature, augmented the torturing sense of his own deficiency. In a life without reproach, spent in the discharge of duty, and in refined and enn.o.bling pursuits, there was nothing on which self-observation, while it looked at the outward, could detect a stain. Life had hitherto been too busy, time too fully and pleasantly occupied, to afford leisure for self-inspection; but now the ordinary routine of pursuit had been broken, and involuntary retirement induced; the eye was turned within, and the result was a conviction that G.o.d had not thus been loved with heart, and soul, and strength; and the spirit which had so long been partially under the power of great principles, now awoke to feel that it must incorporate them with its very life--or die. Little wonder that, on a spirit whose sensibilities were at once quick and strong, and on whom impressions once made were singularly permanent, such discoveries should work agony so intense, or that those who understood not the cause of the distress, should think that reason herself was giving way. Such has often been said of others, who were pa.s.sing through the same crisis of their mental history, not inaptly termed "the everlasting No!" His mind had too much play to lose its balance. A more stolid mind, or a brain like "the gentle" Cowper's, predisposed to malady, would in all probability have given way, as month after month, year after year, rolled away and brought no relief. It was a suffering no friends could soothe; his mental conformation peculiar,--none seemed to meet its emergencies.

Bodily disease no doubt aggravated mental agony, but as

"No wounds like those a wounded spirit feels"

So

"No cure for such, till G.o.d who makes them heals."

For a long time the only relief of which his mind was susceptible, arose from his acquaintance with one in some respects similar to his own, one which understood his sufferings perfectly, for it had known the same both in kind and in degree. The moral element in each, which recoiled from the divine requirements, must have taken precisely the same form of action. Beautiful, even from the very contrasts it presented, was the true and faithful friendship that ensued, between minds sympathising in one point of overpowering interest, though in training and pursuits widely dissimilar; and warm was the grat.i.tude with which he ever held in remembrance those unwearied efforts to pour consolation into his tortured spirit.

To trace the mental history for three or four years, from the commencement of the illness, would be too painful, even were the subject not too sacred. Increasing physical disease, wearing trial of other kinds, asked for a spirit vigorous and happy in the Christian's strength, to bear up against them; but instead of that the mind had at the same time woes of its own to sustain. Left to feel as it had never before felt, its own inwrought sinfulness and utter helplessness, it was borne down, crushed, only rising again to suffer anew, and again to sink. If the promises of G.o.d shone out as the stars in a cloudy night, it was only a momentary gleam, and dense darkness covered the face of heaven as before. Most touching are some private papers and letters, written during this period. In the former, particularly, intense yearning for the consciousness of a personal share in the Saviour's love, earnest longings to be able with appropriating faith to say "_My_ Father," are expressed with an emphasis, that renders them an embodiment of mental suffering in all its reality and severity. Afterwards, when the time of trial was past, and he could look back on it and trace its effects, he frequently remarked, that he believed no other than the severe discipline he then underwent, could have brought a spirit like his to entire self-renunciation. Cant or religious pretence was alike repugnant to his nature, and to his cultivated taste; but in those days of suffering he gained such insight into himself, as led him, pure as his outward life had been, fully to appropriate the strongest expressions, by which the scriptures indicate the sinfulness of human nature. He then recognised in this period of mental conflict and distress, the direct acting of the Spirit of G.o.d, revealing those things which "the natural man knoweth not." What were dimly apprehended before, as little more than objects of intellectual belief--the extent of the moral derangement of his own nature, the mystery of personal connexion with the atonement of our Lord Jesus Christ--had now become matters of cordial faith. Thus, raised by His power into a full partic.i.p.ation of those things, only to be understood by such partic.i.p.ation, his became a new existence. The secret spring of daily actions was changed. Never living entirely without the _fear_ of G.o.d as a _controlling_ principle, he now became sensible of _love_ to Him as an _impelling_ principle, causing him to seek to serve Him to whom he owed so much, and to follow His will in all the pursuits of life.

Having so long tried in vain the various measures prescribed by the best medical advice, both at home, and in different places he visited, Mr.

Roby turned as a last resource to the Water Cure. He went to Malvern in the spring of 1847; looking up, as he afterwards said, to those beautiful hills, as he approached them, with the thought "I shall never walk there--I am only coming to die." Encouragement being given him, to expect ultimate recovery, and finding the process of cure would be very slow, he at once broke up his establishment at Rochdale, and fixed his residence for the time at Malvern. His own medical attendant considered him past hope when he left the north; nor was it in the power of medicine to effect a cure. When he commenced the trial of Hydropathy, Dr. Gully p.r.o.nounced the sheath of every nerve to be in a state of active inflammation. Almost every aliment he took increased the irritation; medicine only added fuel to the flame. He pursued the water treatment vigorously for some months, before he perceived any benefit, and to his own indomitable perseverance in following the prescribed directions he owed, under the blessing of G.o.d, his surprising restoration. A remarkably good const.i.tution, unimpaired by excesses of any kind, gave every advantage to remedial measures in combating disease, and in the end his case proved an instance of the perfect success of those measures.

Distinct as was his mental suffering in its true cause from the physical malady, they aggravated each other, and in recovery their mutual action was observable. Faith and Hope by slow degrees gained strength; the spirit insensibly grew calmer, the SON of G.o.d was seen walking on the waves, and the tempest was hushed. The burning anxiety within now quenched in the sense of reconciliation with G.o.d, "My Father" being at last the delighted cry of the spirit; there was no longer a latent impediment to the complete restoration of health.

The first palpable symptom of general improvement, was the gradual return of his love for botany, and pleasure in the pursuit. This was nurtured by his excellent wife, who, with a delight which can only be imagined by those who have watched the returning health of some beloved one, induced him to make a botanical object for their daily drives. The Flora of the neighbourhood contained many rare plants only known to him, through Sowerby's figures or dried specimens. By degrees, amendment became more decidedly marked, his native flow of spirits began to return, though at first feebly: and she who through those years of suffering--a period almost as painful to the patient's friends as to himself--had nursed him with the tenderest care, and unwearied affection, now realized the sentiment of the poet,

"Sweet when the winter of disease is past, And the glad spring of health returns at last, On a loved cheek long bloomless, to behold Its first faint leaf the trembling rose unfold.

"Oh, doubly blest, who then can trusting view The buoyant step, the vigour-beaming hue; And love's fond cares recall'd, with joy divine Can whisper to his heart,--That work is mine!

"_Lines addressed to Mr. Wedgewood by Dr. Thomas Brown, Late Prof. Mor. Phil. in the Univers. of Edinb._"

She had her reward--she lived long enough to see the object of her affectionate solicitude restored to health, the powers of mind and body returning in full force, and was then herself prostrated by an illness before which her const.i.tution gave way. She died peacefully and happily, in the faith and hope of the Gospel, just as a new year was opening with all its promise on others. A blow so sudden and unexpected, was bewildering; the companion of years was gone, the bereaved one was alone, and in new scenes. His efforts at cheerfulness in the society of casual acquaintance, compared with the mastery feeling would gain over him, when he entered into the home society of nearer friends, attested the severity of this new trial. But happily for the mourner, he could recur to the calm and peace of those last moments, they seemed to be to him, the most precious of earthly recollections.

He once more turned to his pen, and sought a healthy solace for his lonely hours in mental occupation, first obtaining leave of his physician, who a.s.sured him that the wish to write, intimated he might do so with safety. During the ensuing summer and autumn he gave what leisure the imperative claims of "the cure," permitted, to literary occupation of various kinds. But still _home_ was not the same, there was a kind of dislocation in the social life (if the expression may be allowed) he could not write as he was wont to do. He persevered, and as months rolled on regained his usual facility of composition. A tale of considerable length, founded on the characteristics of modern life, occupied him during the winter. Though lacking the romance of the olden time, it was not deficient in stirring incident and spirited dialogue.

It appeared in "Hogg's Weekly Instructor," from May to August 1850.

The following lines, composed after he had recommenced writing, are among the few which, bearing a date, allow of insertion in the right place. They are now garnered among life's precious things, having been addressed to a family group of whom the writer of this sketch was one:

"Ye came across my path In life's dark lonely way, A gleam upon its dreary track, A bright but transient ray; Or like some vivid meteor-light, Which dazzling, leaves a deeper night!

"Or like an evening gleam Athwart some stormy sky, On rocks, woods, waves the radiance breaks In glory and in joy.

Ere all is wrapt in doubt and gloom, And darkness falls o'er daylight's tomb.

"Like memories of the past, When life's young morn was bright; And all the glowing future, one Wide atmosphere of light.

Ere gathering clouds the skies o'erspread And early hope's brief sunshine fled.