LETTER XXII.

_THE POOR OF THE BOROUGH._

PETER GRIMES.

----Was a sordid soul, Such as does murder for a meed; Who but for fear knows no control, Because his conscience, sear'd and foul, Feels not the import of the deed; One whose brute feeling ne'er aspires Beyond his own more brute desires.

_Scott, Marmion_ [Canto II.].

Methought the souls of all that I had murder'd Came to my tent, and every one did threat----

_Shakspeare. Richard III._ [Act V. Sc. 3, vv. 204-5].

The times have been, That, when the brains were out, the man would die, And there an end; but now they rise again, With twenty mortal murders on their crowns, And push us from our stools.

_Macbeth_ [Act III. Sc. 4. vv. 78-82].

The Father of Peter a Fisherman--Peter's early Conduct--His Grief for the old Man--He takes an Apprentice--The Boy's Suffering and Fate--A second Boy: how he died--Peter acquitted--A third Apprentice--A Voyage by Sea: the Boy does not return--Evil Report on Peter: he is tried and threatened--Lives alone--His Melancholy and incipient Madness--Is observed and visited--He escapes and is taken: is lodged in a Parish-house: Women attend and watch him--He speaks in a Delirium: grows more collected--His Account of his Feelings and visionary Terrors previous to his Death.