Chapter XIV (1)

The city of Dublin, as it stood within its walls in the days of the Protectorate, barely covered ground to the extent of an Irish mile, and was built entirely on the south side of the Liffey. That side, therefore, only of the river was embanked by quays, and not even _that_ in its entirety; the space now occupied by the new custom-house and other buildings, to the extent of several thousand feet, being then mere ooze and swamp, kept thus by the continued overflowing of the tides.

To the north of the Liffey, however, there was a suburb, built, as time went on and the exigencies of an ever-increasing population required, outside the walls of the fortified city. It was called "Ostmantown," now "Oxmantown," and occupied a very insignificant space between Mary's Abbey and Church street; Stoney Batter, Grange Gorman, and Glassmanogue, being merely villages scattered here and there in the open country to a considerable distance northward. A bridge of very ancient date, the bridge of "Dubhgh-all," also at a later period styled the "Old Bridge," formed the sole means of communication (except by boat) between the city and its northern suburb. Built upon four arches, and closed in on the Dublin side by a strong gate-house with turrets and portcullis, the Old Bridge, like all others of similar antiquity, was broad enough and strong enough to form a sort of street within itself; shops being erected upon either side, and traffic as busy and as eager there, as in the more legitimate thoroughfares of the city.

From Old Bridge men passed at once into Bridge street, (_Vicus Pontis_ formerly,) a long, narrow thoroughfare, hemmed in on one side by the city walls, and on the other by a tolerably handsome row of houses. These houses were almost all built in the cage-work fashion of the days of Queen Elizabeth, and roofed in with tiles and shingles. Many of them also possessed inscriptions which, cut deep into the wood above the doorway, stated the name and calling of the owner, with the addition frequently of some pious sentiment or appropriate phrase from Scripture. {603} This custom seems to have been a favorite one in Dublin, and in the more antique portions of the city there existed houses, even to a very recent period of its history, upon which might still be read the names and occupations of the men who, more than two hundred years before, had resided within their walls.

On the day on which we are about to introduce Dublin to our readers, there had been a considerable amount of stir and bustle going on among its inhabitants, and more especially among those of Bridge street. Rumors had, in fact, been rife since early dawn of an expected rising of the rebels (as the king's partisans were then styled by their opponents) in the north; and men speculated in hope and fear, as their secret wishes moved them, on the probability of the report. It received something like confirmation in the afternoon, one or two regiments of recently arrived English soldiers, armed from head to heel, and evidently ready to go into action at a moment's notice, having been marched out of the city and sent northward. Later on in the day, moreover, it became known that the Lord-Deputy himself, Henry Cromwell, the best of Ireland's recent rulers, accompanied by a strong escort, was proceeding in the same direction, and might be looked for at any moment at the "Ormond Gate," which shut out Bridge street on the city side, just as the "Gate-house" closed it on that of the Old Bridge.

But if people stood at their doors and windows to do honor to the coming of their king-deputy, there yet seemed to be another and still stronger attraction for them at the end of the street opposite that by which he was expected to appear. Eyes were cast quite as often, though more furtively, in the direction of the Old Bridge as in that of the Ormond Gate; for, in the midst of other rumors, there had come a whisper, no one knew how or by whom it had been first set agoing, that a person suspected of belonging to the rebel party had just been arrested on the river, having attempted, by means of a boat, to elude the passage of the Old Bridge, and so penetrate unchallenged into the heart of the city.

There followed, as a matter of course, much secret and some anxious speculation as to the rank and real object of the arrested person, but no one ventured to make open inquiry into the matter. Cromwell's brief reign of blood had stricken men dumb with fear. To have shown the smallest interest in persons suspected of belonging to the rebel party, would have been but to have drawn down suspicion on themselves; and suspicion, in those hard times, was too nearly akin to condemnation to be heedlessly incurred. Instead, therefore, of going at once to the Gate-house and ascertaining the real facts of the case from its guardians, people were content, while awaiting the appearance of the military cavalcade from the castle, to question and conjecture among themselves as to the rank and real business of the arrested man. A flourish of trumpets before Ormond Gate put a stop at last to their gossipings. Heads and eyes, if not hearts and good wishes, were instantly turned in that direction; the gate was flung open, and Henry Cromwell, surrounded by a goodly company of officers and private gentlemen, rode at a brisk pace through it. A moment afterward, and he had swept past all the gazers, and pulled up opposite the Old Bridge. The guard at the Gate-house instantly turned out to receive him, the portcullis was drawn up, and he was actually spurring his horse forward to the bridge, when a girl, in the habit of a western peasant, darted through the soldiers and flung herself on her knees before him. {604} The movement was so rapid and unexpected that, if the Lord-Deputy had not reined up his steed until he nearly threw it on its haunches, he must inevitably have ridden over her. A moment of silent astonishment ensued. The girl herself uttered no cry, and said not a syllable as to the nature of her petition; but as she lifted up her head toward the Lord Henry, her hood, falling back upon her shoulders, revealed a face of ashy whiteness, and there was a pleading, agonized expression in the dark eyes she raised to his, which told more than many words, of the inarticulate anguish of the soul within.

Henry Cromwell was not of a nature to be harsh to any one, much less to a woman; but there had been information enough sent in to him that morning to make him suspect a snare, and he turned sternly for explanation to the chief officer of the guard.

"What means this unseemly interruption, corporal?" he asked, as the latter was vainly endeavoring to induce Nellie to rise from her knees. "Is this maiden a prisoner? or if not a prisoner, is she distraught, that she thus ventures, bare-headed and dressed in such ungodly play-acting fashion, to rush into our very presence?"

"A prisoner of only half-an-hour's standing is she, may it please your excellency," the soldier answered promptly, "she and her companion! They were seen attempting to cross the river in a boat borrowed from some of the natives on the other side, and as it seemed to me that their purpose must needs be seditious to demand such secrecy, I caused both to be apprehended, and have kept them here to wait your honor's further directions in the matter."

"Ormiston," said the Lord-Deputy, turning to one of the younger of the group of officers behind him, "remain you here, and examine, with Corporal Holdfast, into this business. If there be aught which seems important hid beneath this masquerading folly, follow me at once to Glassmanogue, where I shall have business to detain me for a couple of hours; but if it be only, as I do suspect, the silly freak of a love-sick maiden, in that case I shall not look for you before to-morrow morning, when you will bring me, as I have explained already, the last despatches which may have come from England."

Having thus somewhat summarily despatched poor Nellie's business, but little dreaming of the great service he had done her in appointing young Ormiston her guardian, Henry Cromwell dashed over the bridge, and, followed instantly by his escort, galloped northward. The moment Nellie saw that her efforts to hold speech with the Lord-Deputy himself would prove in vain, she had risen of her own accord, and, the hood once more drawn modestly over her head and face, had stood aside to let him pass, with a calm, sad dignity in her look and bearing which had its due effect upon the rough soldier who had made her captive. He did not again attempt to touch, or even to address her, but standing near her silently and respectfully, seemed to wait until of her own accord she should return with him to the Gate-house. Thus unmolested, Nellie forgot his existence altogether, and equally heedless of the crowd, which, having gathered in the wake of the Lord-Deputy, was now gazing curiously and compassionately upon her, she stood considering what her next move should be, when, in obedience to his orders, Harry Ormiston approached her.

{605}

As he took Corporal Holdfast's place beside her, Nellie lifted her eyes to his face, and recognized him instantly as the young officer who had been riding with Henrietta on the day of their first meeting in the wilderness. A soft cry of joy escaped her lips, and Harry Ormiston broke down in his half-uttered greeting. _He_ also remembered her face--have we not already told our reader that it was by no means one easily to be forgotten?--but of the when or the where that he had seen it, he had no such distinct a recollection. Silently, and with a look of timid hope stealing over that fair face, Nellie drew Henrietta's missive from her bosom and placed it in his hands.

Ormiston glanced at the superscription, and with a flush of honest joy mantling on his features, eagerly tore it open. Scarcely, however, had he read three lines ere the scene among the mountains, which had ended in his quarrel with his betrothed, rose before him like a vision, and instantly remembering Nellie as the fair girl who had been in some measure, albeit unwittingly, its cause, he turned sharply upon Corporal Holdfast.

"How is this, corporal? I fear me you have made some grave mistake! This young maiden whom you hold a prisoner is the bearer to me of a token from one whose zeal and faithfulness in the good cause cannot be suspected--even from a member of the household of that brave and God-fearing Major Hewitson, who has set up his camp on the very edge of the wilderness, and thus made of his small garrison a very tower of strength against the incursions of the enemy."

"Nay, and if your honor says it, it must needs be true," the man--a bluff old soldier, with little pretensions to sanctity in his composition--answered with suppressed impatience; "and therefore I can only marvel that a maiden, known and esteemed by the family of worthy Major Hewitson, should not only have sought to cheat our vigilance by crossing the river privately in a boat, but should have done so in the company of a man whom I myself can testify to having been a chief of some repute in the army of the Irish enemy, having crossed swords with him at the battle of 'Knocknaclashy,' as I think they call it in their barbarous language, where he fought (I needs must own it) with a valor worthy of a better cause."

Major Ormiston turned, gravely but kindly, to Nellie.

"I fear me much," he said, "that you have been but ill-advised in all this business. Why not have presented yourself openly at the bridge if the matter which has brought you hither will bear investigation? and why, more than all the rest, have you come attended by a person whose very company must needs render you suspect yourself?"

"O sir!" said Nellie, weeping sadly, as she began to fear that even Henrietta's recommendation to mercy might perhaps avail her little; "we had not the password, without which we never should have been permitted to enter Dublin by the bridge; and our errand is, alas! of such a nature, that every moment lost is of deep and sad importance."

"_Our_ errand," Ormiston thoughtfully repeated. "This errand, then, is not entirely your own, but is in some way or other interesting also to the man by whom Master Holdfast tells me you are accompanied."

{606}

"He should have said 'a _gentleman_,'" Nellie answered, with a slight rebuking emphasis on the latter word--"a gentleman who, at his own great trouble, and, I fear me, risk, has enabled me to accomplish this journey; in which, however, he has no other interest than such as any kind and noble heart might feel in the sorrows and perils of an unprotected girl."

"Where is he--this other prisoner?" Ormiston asked, turning for information to the corporal.

"In the gate-house, sir, where we have him safe under lock and key; for he was no prisoner to be left at large like this silly maiden, who begged so hard to be allowed to see the Lord-Deputy go by, that I found it not in my heart to deny her so small a favor; for the doing of which, I trust I have not incurred the displeasure either of your honor or of his highness the Lord Henry."

"Certainly not, honest Holdfast; you have acted both well and mercifully in all this business. And now lead the way to the gate-house, and trouble not your wits about this young maiden. I myself will be her surety that she attempt not to escape."

He offered his hand very respectfully to Nellie as he finished speaking, 'and she suffered him to lead her in silence toward the bridge. As they entered the gate-house, however, she quietly withdrew her hand and glided from his side to that of Roger.

Ormiston instantly recognized the latter as the dispossessed owner of the "Rath," and an officer, beside, of some standing in the recently disbanded army of the Irish. Courteously saluting him, therefore, he informed him that he had been deputed by the Lord-Deputy to inquire into the nature of the business which had brought him to Dublin, adding an earnest hope on his own part that it might prove to be in no way connected with political affairs.

"That, most assuredly, it is not," said Roger, pleased and touched by the young officer's manner, and satisfied by Henrietta's letter, which Ormiston still held open in his hand, that he was addressing the person for whom it had been intended. "My business is one which solely concerns this young gentlewoman, and concerns her, in fact, so nearly, that if you cannot aid her, as Mistress Hewitson half hinted that you could, I trust, at all events, you will give me as much of my liberty for this one day as may enable me to do so myself. I too am a soldier and an officer. Major Ormiston, and you may trust me that I will not abuse your favor."

"Sir," said Nellie imploringly, "you have not read the letter--if you would but read the letter! Mistress Hewitson half promised that you would help me!"

Thus called upon, Ormiston ran his eyes over Henrietta's letter, which, concluding it to be on matters merely personal to himself, he had been reserving for more private, and therefore more satisfactory perusal.

Nellie watched him anxiously as he read on, and with a spasm of anguish at her heart she saw that, as he gradually took in the nature of its contents, his first look of eager joy disappeared, and was succeeded by one of deep and tender pity--pity which made itself felt in the very accents of his voice, as he exclaimed:

"Young Mistress Netterville! Good God! And I never even dreamed of the relationship! Alas! that you should have come so far, only to find sorrow and disappointment in the end."

"Oh! not dead! not dead!" cried Nellie, terrified by his words and looks. "Say, not dead--not dead--I do entreat you!"

{607}

"No, no!--not dead--_yet_," he answered nervously. He could not bring himself to say that she was to die upon the morrow.

"Nay, Major Ormiston," Roger here interposed, for Nellie was sobbing in speechless anguish, "if not dead all is well--or may at all events yet be well--for this most injured lady. I have hope still--hope in the honor and justice even of our enemy. See this paper! It was writ by the soldier who hath lately received as his share in the Irish spoil the house and lands of Netterville, and who is ready to aver on oath that he took it down word for word from the lips of the very woman who did that deed for which Mrs. Netterville stands condemned to die."

Ormiston glanced rapidly over the papers which Roger had drawn from his bosom and given to him.

"Yes, yes!" he cried joyfully, "I doubt it not in the least. Sergeant Jackson is well known as a man of truth beyond suspicion, and these lines, moreover, do but repeat the defence which the unhappy lady urged over and over again upon her trial, insisting that the accusation against her was an act of private vengeance. But all this can be discussed hereafter. Time presses; and whatever is to be done to save her, must be done at once."

"The Lords Chief-Justices," suggested Roger; but Ormiston shook his head with a little smile of scorn.

"Little likely _they_ to reverse a sentence pronounced in their own courts!" he said. "No, no! it is to the Lord-Deputy we must appeal. I will ride after him at once, and in a couple of hours at the furthest you may look for me with the result. I trust in God that it may be a good one."

He left the room without waiting for an answer, and in another minute they heard him gallop across the bridge. The next two hours were passed by Nellie in an agony of expectation which was painful to behold. She could not stay still a moment. Sometimes she paced the narrow guard-room with rapid and impatient footsteps--sometimes, regardless of the presence of the English soldiery, she flung herself on her knees, weeping and praying almost aloud in her agony. Every stir upon the bridge--every sound from the street beyond, seemed to announce the return of her messenger, and at these moments she would stand up, shivering from head to foot in such a fever of hope and fear, that Roger at last became seriously alarmed, and remonstrated firmly and affectionately with her on her want of self-command. At last, to his inexpressible relief, a bustle at the doorway announced Ormiston's return, and a moment afterward the latter entered the guardroom. Nellie stood up, as white as ashes, and utterly incapable of either speaking or moving toward him. Shocked at the mute anguish of her face, Ormiston took her hand in his; but when she looked at him, expecting him to address her, he hesitated, like one doubtful of the effect of the tidings he was bringing.

"For God's sake, speak at once!" cried Roger. "Anything is better for her than this suspense! Say, is it life or death?"

"Not death, certainly--at least I hope not," said Ormiston, vainly seeking in his own mind for some fitter words by which to convey his meaning.

The blood rushed to Nellie's temples, and the pupils of her eyes dilated, but still she could not answer.

"You _hope?_" Roger repeated sadly. He saw, though Nellie did not, that there still existed some uncertainty in the matter.

{608}

"There is a reprieve at all events," he said, in the same joyless tones in which he had before replied.

The color faded from Nellie's cheek, and the gladness from her eye. "Only a reprieve--only _that,_" she muttered, in tones so hoarse and changed that the young men could hardly believe it to be hers--"only that!"

"But the rest will follow," said Ormiston, trying to reassure her. "The Lord-Deputy will himself inquire into the business, and--"

"Nay, then, she is safe indeed!" Nellie interrupted him to say. "With that confession, furnished by her chief accuser, her innocence must be clear as daylight. O sir! she is safe--surely she is safe!" she added, trying to reassure herself by the repetition of the word, and yet sorely puzzled by a something in Ormiston's eyes which looked more like pity than sympathy in her joy.

"Safe? I trust so--with all my heart and soul I trust so," he answered gravely. "Nevertheless, my dear young lady, I would counsel you, as a friend, not to suffer your hopes to soar too high, lest any after disappointment should be too terrible for endurance."

"If she is reprieved, she will be pardoned; and if she is pardoned, she will live," Nellie repeated slowly, like one trying yet dreading to discover the hidden meaning of his words.

"She will live," he amended gently; "yes, certainly, if God hath decreed it as well as man."

"Nay, if she is in God's hands only, I am content," said Nellie, with a sudden return to confidence, which somewhat astonished Ormiston. "I also have been in God's hands," she added, with an appealing look toward Roger, "and can tell how much more merciful they are than man's. Sir, I conclude from what you say that she is ailing; may I not go to her at once?"

"If you are strong enough," he was beginning, but she interrupted him with a burst of grief and indignation.

"How? not strong enough? and I have come all this way to see her! O mother, mother!" she sobbed convulsively, "little you dream your child is near, bringing peace and pardon to your prison!"

Roger saw that Ormiston knew more than he liked to tell, and asked in a low voice:

"The poor lady, then, is very ill?"

"Dying!" the other answered curtly.

"Will her daughter be in time to see her, think you?"

"In time; but that is all. She has burst a blood-vessel, as I have just now learned, and this reprieve seems little better than a mockery; for no one dreams that she could have survived for the tragedy of to-morrow."

"Then let Nellie go at once," said Roger promptly. "She has ridden night and day to see her mother, and sad as the meeting may be, it would be sadder still if they met no more. Let her go at once."

And so it was decided.

----------

{609}

Newman's Poems.

BY H. W. Wilberforce.

The little volume of poems published anonymously under this humble title, [Footnote 179] produced an impression immediately on its publication, not only among Catholics but among English readers in general, which could hardly have been caused by a volume of poems from any other writer of the day, with the exception, perhaps, of the Laureate. The explanation is to be found in the initials J. H. N. at the end of the preface--a signature long ago of world-wide celebrity.

[Footnote 179: _Verses on Various Occasions_. London:
Burns, Gates & Co. 1868. For sale at the Catholic Publication
House, 126 Nassau street, New York.]

There may be those who feel surprised to find that a man chiefly known as having been, under God's providence and grace, the main author of the Oxford movement of 1833, should be found to have possessed and exercised extraordinary poetical gifts. It may perhaps be partly a lurking feeling of envy, partly a just perception how rarely any one man combines numerous unconnected powers, which makes the world at large reluctant to admit that any man has greatly distinguished himself in a line far removed from that specially his own. But that feeling, be its origin what it may, does not in reason apply to the case before us, because it would seem that the gifts which specially qualify a man to produce a deep effect upon the hearts and consciences of his fellows, to be the founder and leader of any great school of thought, social, moral, political, or religious, are very much the same as those required for the making of a great poet.

This is at first sight so obvious, that we incline to think the only real argument against it would be, an appeal to experience. It will be said, there is a small class of men who have won among their fellows (as if it were a title of honor formally secured to them) the name of "the poet," and no one of them has been, except in his own special art of poetical composition, among the great leaders of human thought. But this is easily accounted for. A man immersed for years in public affairs of any kind, however richly his mind may have been stored with poetical images, and however natural it may have been to him to have sought for them a poetical expression, can rarely have had leisure to cultivate the merely artistic part of poetical composition to the degree necessary for success as a poet. It is hardly likely that in his case there should combine the many accidental circumstances necessary (over and above the possession of great poetical endowments) for the composition, publication, and general diffusion of any considerable poetical work. And even if all these should happen to meet, the mere fact of being very greatly distinguished in any other line is of itself, we strongly suspect, enough to prevent any man from being chiefly remembered as a great poet. The name of "the poet Cowper" is a household word in every English family. But if "William Cowper, Esq., of the Inner Temple" (as his name stands on the title-page) had risen to the woolsack, we believe that, even though he might have written the same poems, he would never have gained the title. {610} If indeed mediocrity in everything else had sufficed to gain a high and permanent reputation for a man of equal mediocrity in poetical talents, we should now have talked of Cowper's friend as "the poet Hayley." But that the highest poetical genius does not obtain the title for a man otherwise conspicuous, is proved by the example of Shakespeare. Merely because he has left behind him dramatic works to which the world affords no rival, not even the preeminent poetical genius shown in his poems has caused the world at large to speak and think of him as "the poet Shakespeare." Nor would Dryden, despite of his matchless lyric poems, have attained the title, if among his numerous plays he had written Hamlet, Macbeth, and Lear.

It seems to us that these considerations are enough to answer the objection from experience, which might perhaps be urged against our opinion, that the qualities which qualify a man to exercise a deep influence on his fellows and make him a leader of the souls of men, are in fact the same as those which qualify him for success as a poet.

We think this volume will convince most of those who read it that we are right. The weighty and touching thoughts of these poems bear the stamp of the same mint from which issued those volumes of sermons, which, far more than any other work, have impressed a permanent stamp upon the generation of English readers which is now tending, as Dr. Newman says of himself, "toward the decline of life." It is impossible to read them without feeling that, if his life had been one of mere literary leisure, his chosen employment would probably have been poetry. As it is, he has evidently resorted to it, not when he was thinking of others, but when he sought to relieve the fulness of his own soul. In this world he has written in prose; his poetry has been the record of his inner struggles and emotions, and has been written for himself and his God.

As long as any memory of the English nation and the English language remains among men. Dr. Newman, we doubt not, will be remembered and reverenced; not indeed as one of the few whom poetry has made great, but as one of the great men who have written poetry. And so far from deeming it strange that such should be the case with the great author of the movement of 1833, we, for our part, should have thought it strange if, in a man of the highest literary culture, the intense feelings in which that movement originated had not relieved themselves by poetical expression. We believe, indeed, that few if any great moral movements have taken place in which something more or less of the same kind has not been found. Perhaps the most remarkable exception was the change of religion in England in the sixteenth century; the leaders in which not only produced no great poetical work, but did not leave behind them so much as a hymn. This was a striking contrast, not only to the contemporary movement in Germany, and to that of the Methodists in the eighteenth century, but also to that of the earlier Lollards. The explanation, however, is not far to seek. Lord Macaulay says, "Ridley was perhaps the only person who had any important share in the English Reformation, who did not consider it as a mere political job." Now, attractive as jobbing is to many very clever men, it is hardly qualified to inspire any poetical afflatus. Cranmer was too busy getting what he could for himself, to be musing over poetical images. {611} Besides, the Reformation in England appealed not so much to men's deeper feelings, as to their natural and reasonable dislike to have their property confiscated and themselves imprisoned, hanged, and cut up alive; and this last kind of appeal neither needed nor encouraged poetical powers.

To return to the volume before us, the poems were so evidently written only for the author himself that it is our signal good fortune that they have ever been published. The greater part of them first appeared in a series called the _Lyra Apostolica_, in many successive numbers of the _British Magazine_, edited by the late Hugh James Rose, in which several of Dr. Newman's earliest prose writings were originally published. It was afterward issued in the form of a small volume, the first edition of which appeared in 1836. By far the greater part of it was supplied by Dr. Newman; the other poems, by five of his intimate friends. [Footnote 180]

[Footnote 180: These were John Bowden, "with whom" (Dr.
Newman writes in the _Apologia_) "I spent almost
exclusively my undergraduate years." He died just before Dr.
Newman became a Catholic. His two sons are now fathers in the
London Oratory.--Hurrell, Froude, whose noble character and
high gifts Dr. Newman has sketched with admirable force,
truth, and beauty, in three pages of the _Apologia_,
which he sums up by saying: "It is difficult to enumerate the
precise additions to my theological creed which I derived
from a friend to whom I owe so much. He made me look with
admiration toward the Church of Rome, and in the same degree
dislike the Reformation. He fixed on me the idea of devotion
to the Blessed Virgin, and he led me gradually to believe in
the Real Presence." He died February 29th, 1836,
"prematurely," says Dr. Newman, "and in the conflict and
transition-state of opinion. His religious views never
reached their ultimate conclusion, by the very reason of
their multitude and their depth."--John Keble, the author of
_The Christian Year_, of whom Dr. Newman writes
(_Apologia_, edition i. p. 75) words expressing deep
feelings shared by many who are now, by God's grace, members
of the Catholic Church. He died in 1865, and at this moment,
on his birthday, April 27th, the first stone of a new college
at Oxford, erected as a testimonial to him, and bearing his
name, is being laid by the Archbishop of Canterbury.--Robert
Isaac Wilberforce, second son of William Wilberforce. From
his earliest years his character seemed made up of truth,
purity, unselfishness, tenderness of affection, and
indefatigable diligence. As his great powers developed, they
showed themselves perhaps the more remarkable from their
combination with a degree of humility so extraordinary as to
be his chief characteristic. After a university career of
unusual distinction, he was elected fellow of Oriel College,
on the same day with Hurrell Froude, with whom he is classed
by Dr. Newman, in the _Apologia_, as one with whom he
was, "in particular, intimate and affectionate." He became a
country clergyman, and afterward archdeacon; and in 1838
published (in combination with the present Bishop of Oxford)
the _Life of William Wilberforce_. His theological works
were all of later date. It is characteristic that he always
declared he would never have undertaken any of them if Mr.
Newman had not left the field unoccupied. In the opinion of
most persons, except himself, his equal in learning and
ability was not then left in the Church of England. In 1854,
he became a member of the Catholic Church, and died in 1857,
while studying at Rome for the priesthood.--Isaac Williams
was fellow of Trinity College, Oxford. He remained much
longer in Oxford, sharing Mr. Newman's intercourse and
counsels. In 1840, Mr. Newman dedicated the beautiful volume
on _The Church of the Fathers_ "to my dear and much
admired Isaac Williams, the sight of whom carries back his
friends to ancient, holy, and happy times." He is, perhaps,
best known by his published poems; but he has also published
a series of devotional commentaries on the gospels, of great
beauty and to which many are deeply indebted. He died in
1865. Dr. Newman went to visit him in his country retirement
only a few days before. Our readers, we think, will feel an
interest in this brief memorial of a group of men so closely
connected with the collection in which many of these poems
originally appeared.]

To these are added, in the present volume, a few of earlier and a good many of later date. All of them seem equally to have been composed without any view to publication, and considering that their illustrious author has always been remarkable for a dislike to put himself forward, and for an almost extreme susceptibility of feeling, some persons may wonder that he has ever been able to persuade himself to give them to the world. We do not share their wonder; for we long ago came to the conclusion that it is by men of the greatest natural reserve that the fullest confidences of their inner feelings are not unfrequently made. In the common intercourse of society such men display least of their real feeling. But being distinguished from others by the depth and strength of their thoughts and affections, more lasting convictions and emotions, and greater self-knowledge, they can, upon any call of duty, speak out most unreservedly and sincerely; and the pain it gives them to make any revelation of their inner selves is such that, to do it completely, costs them little, if anything, more than to speak of themselves at all. {612} This, all the world sees, has been exemplified in the _Apologia_, and in its measure it has been the same with the _Lyra Apostolica_, and with the present volume. The poems in the _Lyra_ were, nearly all of them, the expression of the thoughts which crowded into the mind of Dr. Newman during a tour in the Mediterranean, between December, 1832, and July, 1833. The present volume adds very greatly to their interest by giving the place and day of their composition. Thus, the poem headed "Angelic Guidance" was written on the day on which he left Oxford. In our days, in which a very few hours upon the Great Western takes Oxford men to Falmouth without trouble or fatigue, the date, "Whitchurch, December 3d, 1832," is interesting. Whitchurch is a somewhat dreary and secluded village, at which the direct road from Oxford to Southampton intersected the mail road from London to Exeter and Falmouth. There was in those days a coach to Southampton, to the top of which Mr. Newman mounted, (the present writer and other Oriel friends standing in the street, in front of the Angel Inn, to see the last of him.) Before midday he reached Whitchurch, and there had to wait till night for the Falmouth mail. We should be curious to know what has become of the large inn at Whitchurch which was maintained by this sort of traffic. It must long ago have been shut up. Mr. Newman's life had hitherto been almost entirely confined to one or two places, and now he was starting alone for distant lands, and began by waiting many hours at a lonely and (_crede experto_) sufficiently dreary inn. His thoughts turned to the guardian angel who, as he already believed, bore him company. The _Apologia_ tells us how early in life his thoughts had run upon angels and their ministrations. He says of these lines: "They speak of 'the vision' that haunted me. That vision is more or less brought out in the whole series of these compositions." We need hardly say how much these circumstances add to the interest of the poem, which appeared in the _Lyra_ without any explanation of the circumstances under which it was composed.

It is impossible to read these poems without feeling how much a man takes with him from home of the thoughts which are called out even by the most striking and memorable scene. The events going on in England--the evident decay of what he still believed to be the "reformed church"--formed the coloring medium through which he looked at all he saw. Thus, at sea, the day he left Gibraltar, he wrote the lines headed "England:"

"Tyre of the West, and glorying in the name
More than in Faith's pure fame!
O trust not crafty fort, nor rock renown'd
Earn'd upon hostile ground;
Wielding Trade's master-keys, at thy proud will
To lock or loose its waters, England! trust not still.

"Dread thine own power! Since haughty Babel's prime.
High towers have been man's crime.
Since her hoar age, when the huge moat lay bare,
Strongholds have been man's snare.
Thy nest is in the crags; ah! refuge frail!
Mad counsel in its hour, or traitors, will prevail.

"He who scann'd Sodom for his righteous men
Still spares thee for thy ten;
But, should vain tongues the Bride of Heaven defy,
He will not pass thee by;
For, as earth's kings welcome their spotless guest,
So gives he them by turn, to suffer or be blest."

The _Apologia_ tells us that the golden lines, "Lead, kindly light," were composed when the "orange-boat" in which the author sailed from Palermo to Marseilles was becalmed in the straits of Bonifacio. {613} It is not mentioned, we think, that it was in the darkness of the night. They are here headed, "The Pillar of the Cloud:'

"Lead, Kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom,
Lead Thou me on!
The night is dark, and I am far from home--
Lead Thou me on!
Keep Thou my feet: I do not ask to see
The distant scene,--one step enough for me.

"I was not ever thus, nor prayed that Thou
Should'st lead me on.
I loved to choose and see my path; but now
Lead Thou me on!
I loved the garish day, and, spite of fears.
Pride ruled my will: remember not past years.

"So long Thy power hath blest me, sure it still
Will lead me on.
O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till
The night is gone;
And with the morn those angel faces smile
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile."

"Off Algiers," in sight of the grave of that great African church which produced St. Augustine, St. Cyprian, and Tertullian, is the date of "The Patient Church," in which, in spite of all appearances to the contrary, the writer, relying on the promise of Christ, looked forward to the ultimate victory of the church, and which begins:

"Bide thou thy time!
Watch with meek eyes the race of pride and crime;
Sit in the gate and be the heathen's jest.
Smiling and self-possest,
O thou, to whom is pledged a victor's sway,
Bide thou the victor's day!"

On December 28th, 1832, Mr. Newman caught his first sight of a Greek shore. It is highly characteristic that the first thought which it inspired to the most finished classical scholar of his day in Oxford, was not of Thucydides, not even of Homer, but of "the Greek fathers:"

"Let heathens sing thy heathen praise,
Fall'n Greece! the thought of holier days
In my sad heart abides;
For sons of thine in truth's first hour.
Were tongues and weapons of his power.
Born of the Spirit's fiery shower.
Our fathers and our guides.

"All thine is Clement's varied page;
And Dionysius, ruler sage,
In days of doubt and pain;
And Origen with eagle eye;
And saintly Basil's purpose high
To smite imperial heresy,
And cleanse the altar's stain.

"From thee the glorious Preacher came,
With soul of zeal and lips of flame,
A court's stern martyr-guest;
And thine, O inexhaustive race!
Was Nazianzen's heaven-taught grace;
And royal-hearted Athanase,
With Paul's own mantle blest."

At Corfu, the narrative of Thucydides brought to his mind the thought which he worked out in the sermon on "The Individuality of the Soul," published six years later; and in which he says: "All who have ever gained a name in the world, all the mighty men of war that ever were, all the great statesmen, all the crafty counsellors, all the scheming aspirants, all the reckless adventurers, all the covetous traders, all the proud voluptuaries, are still in being, though helpless and unprofitable. Balaam, Saul, Joab, Ahitophel, good and bad, wise and ignorant, rich and poor, each has his separate place, each dwells by himself in that sphere of light or darkness which he has provided for himself here. What a view this sheds upon history! We are accustomed to read it as a tale or a fiction, and we forget that it concerns immortal beings who cannot be swept away, who are what they were, however this earth may change." The germ of that sermon is contained in the lines headed "Corcyra," January 7th, 1833.

The _Lyra_ contains some beautiful and well-known lines:

"Did we but see,
When life first open'd, how our journey lay
Between its earliest and its closing day.
Or view ourselves as we one day shall be,
Who strive for the high prize, such sight would break
The youthful spirit, though bold for Jesus' sake.

"But thou, dear Lord!
While I traced out bright scenes which were to come,
Isaac's pure blessings, and a verdant home,
Didst spare me, and withhold thy fearful word;
Willing me year by year, till I am found
A pilgrim pale, with Paul's sad girdle bound."

They are headed, "Our Future. What I do, thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter." It gives them a new interest to find that they were composed at Tre Fontane, the spot of the martyrdom of St. Paul.

{614}

The verses called "Day Laborers," composed while waiting at Palermo for a passage home, (as is described in the _Apologia_,) show the author's deep sense of having a work to do. They are headed, "And He said. It is finished:"

"One only, of God's messengers to man,
Finished the work of grace which he began;
......
List, Christian warrior! thou whose soul is fain
To rid thy mother of her present chain;--
Christ will avenge his bride; yea, even now
Begins the work, and thou
Shalt spend in it thy strength; but, ere he save,
Thy lot shall be the grave."

We have insisted on the peculiar value of the poems written during this short tour, (the only one of the kind in which the illustrious author has ever indulged himself,) because it adds a new and special interest to compositions which, even when published without any such interest, attained a wide and deserved celebrity. He seems at the time to have felt that that tour was to be the only distraction of the kind in a life of toil; and that he was enriching himself with images of beauty (worthy, as he says, in itself rather of angelic than mortal eyes) which were to last him for many a long year:

"Store them in heart! Thou shalt not faint
'Mid coming pains and fears.
As the third heaven once nerved a saint
For fourteen trial years."

That the remembrance has been fresh and keen, we see in the lines on "Heathen Greece" written in 1856, and first published in that exquisite volume _Calista_:

"Where are the islands of the blest?
They stud the AEgean sea;
And where the deep Elysian rest?
It haunts the vale where Peneus strong
Pours his incessant stream along,
While craggy ridge and mountain bare
Cut keenly through the liquid air.
And, in their own pure tints arrayed.
Scorn earth's green robes which change and fade.
And stand in beauty undecay'd.
Guards of the bold and free."

It is worth notice that the pregnant lines on "The Sign of the Cross" were written before the author left Oxford, and while he was as yet, as he expressly tells us, so ignorant of Catholic doctrine that even when waiting at Palermo, just before he returned home, he says: "I began to visit the churches, and they calmed my impatience, though I did not attend any services. I knew nothing of the presence of the blessed sacrament there."

We might linger equally upon many poems which equally deserve it, but pass on to those written since the author was a Catholic. Among these are not to be reckoned the translations from the Latin Hymns of the Breviary, which were made "in 1836-8." There are a few which bear the date "Littlemore," a date full of touching recollections to the friends of the author. It is a hamlet locally separated from the parish of St. Mary's, of which he was vicar, but belonging to it. He had built a church there for the use of his parishioners, and retired there from time to time for his own as well as their benefit. When he gave up his connection with the Oxford movement, (as the _Apologia_ shows,) he retired there altogether, and staid there till he became a Catholic in 1845. Of those written since the author became a Catholic the best known, probably, are "The Pilgrim Queen," and "The Queen of the Seasons." It is indeed cheering to find a great genius, who had so long been more or less crippled by the chill, stiff system of Anglicanism, opening out, like a flower beneath the spring sun--beneath the genial teaching of the Catholic Church:

{615}

"But I know one work of his infinite hand.
Which special and singular ever must stand;
So perfect, so pure, and of gifts such a store,
That even Omnipotence ne'er shall do more.

"The freshness of May, and the sweetness of June,
And the fire of July in its passionate noon.
Munificent August, September serene,
Are together no match for my glorious Queen.

"O Mary! all months and all days are thine own.
In thee lasts their joyousness, when they are gone;
And we give to thee May, not because it is best.
But because it comes first, and is pledge of the rest."

Apart from the freedom of thought which the author has gained from the Church, ("Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free,") there seems to us an ease and flow about the very language and metre of these Catholic hymns which we do not find equalled in the author's earlier poems, sublime as are their conceptions. But it is remarkable that the poem which unites both these qualities in the highest measure, is that which was composed last, "The Dream of Gerontius." Like the others it seems to have been written for the author alone, and to have been published merely as an act of friendship to the editor of _The Month_. Is it too much to hope that the high sense of its exceeding depth and beauty which has been shown by the whole English world may not only encourage the author, as he tells us it did, to publish his collected poems in the volume before us, but to compose more? For it is plain that as yet at least his arms are not dimmed or his force abated.

"The Dream of Gerontius" begins with the thoughts of one who feels himself at the gate of death and the prayers of the assistants by his bedside. Then Gerontius says:

"Novissima hora est; and I fain would sleep.
The pain has wearied me. ... Into thy hands,
Lord, into thy hands. ..."

And the priest says the commendation. Then follows:

Soul Of Gerontius.

"I went to sleep; and now I am refreshed--
A strange refreshment: for I feel in me
An inexpressive lightness, and a sense
Of freedom, as I were at length myself.
And ne'er had been before. How still it is!
I hear no more the busy beat of time,
No, nor my fluttering breath, nor struggling pulse;
Nor does one moment differ from the next.
I had a dream; yes, some one softly said,
'He's gone;' and then a sigh went round the room.
And then I surely heard a priestly voice
Say, 'Subvenite;' and they knelt in prayer.
I seem to hear him still; but thin and low."
......

He does not yet know whether he is living or dead. Then he finds himself held,

"Not by a grasp
Such as they use on earth, but all around
Over the surface of my subtle being.
As though I were a sphere, and capable
To be accosted thus, a uniform
And gentle pressure tells me I am not
Self-moving, but borne forward on my way.
And hark! I hear a singing; yet in sooth
I cannot of that music rightly say.
Whether I hear, or touch, or taste the tones.
Oh! what a heart-subduing melody."

Then follow the songs of the guardian angel over the soul which he was set to tend. After a long while Gerontius takes courage and says:

Soul.

"I will address him. Mighty one, my Lord,
My guardian spirit, all hail!

Angel.

"All hail, my child!
My child and brother, hail! what wouldest thou?

......

Soul.

"I ever had believed
That on the moment when the struggling soul
Quitted its mortal case, forthwith it fell
Under the awful presence of its God,
There to be judged and sent to its own place.
What lets me now from going to my Lord?

Angel.

"Thou art not let; but with extremest speed
Art hurrying to the just and holy Judge;
For scarcely art thou disembodied yet.
Divide a moment, as men measure time.
Into its million-million-millionth part.
Yet even less than that the interval
Since thou didst leave the body; and the priest
Cried 'Subvenite,' and they fell to prayer;
Nor scarcely yet have they begun to pray."

We must not linger on the converse between the soul and its guardian angel, nor at the marvellous description of the demons in "the middle region," their impotent rage--impotent against one who has now no traitor within. {616} Then he comes within the reach of the heavenly choirs. We have the hymns of the successive choirs. At length, as they approach "the veiled presence" of God, the soul hears again the voices it left on earth, for in that presence the voices of prayer are heard:

Soul.

"I go before my Judge. Ah! ....

Angel.

.... "Praise to his name!
The eager spirit has darted from my hold.
And, with the intemperate energy of love,
Flies to the dear feet of Emmanuel;
But, ere it reach them, the keen sanctity
Which with its effluence, like a glory, clothes
And circles round the Crucified, has seized.
And scorch'd, and shrivell'd it; and now it lies
Passive and still before the awful throne.
O happy, suffering soul! for it is safe,
Consumed, yet quickened by the glance of God.

Soul.

"Take me away, and in the lowest deep
There let me be.
And there in hope the lone night-watches keep,
Told out for me.
There, motionless and happy in my pain,
Lone, not forlorn,
There will I sing my sad, perpetual strain.
Until the morn.
There will I sing, and soothe my stricken breast,
Which ne'er can cease
To throb, and pine, and languish, till possest
Of its sole peace.
There will I sing my absent Lord and love;--
Take me away.
That sooner I may rise, and go above,
And see him in the truth of everlasting day."

Then follow the words of the angel, and those of the souls in purgatory. At length the angel concludes:

"Angels, to whom the willing task is given,
Shall tend, and nurse, and lull thee, as thou liest;
And masses on the earth, and prayers in heaven,
Shall aid thee at the throne of the Most Highest.