Part 3

'But for a' he was a distant man, they war weel spoken on, mind ye, at the Mount,' continued my voluble friend. 'They stood high, and he was a man as paid his way and settled verra reglar; not that his potry brought him in much, a deal wasn't made up in beuks till efter he was dead. Ay, and they lived weel. Many's the time, when I was a lad, and I went wid butter, I could ha' been weel content to be let aloan for a bit i' t' pantry. 'Ticing things there, mind ye. And they kep' three sarvants. I kent t' cook and t' housemaid weel, and yan they called Dixon, smart lile chap as iver was seen in these parts, but ter'ble given over to cauld watter and temperance--he woz. Coomed out of a "union," but verra neat, and always a word for onybody, and a verra quiet man, particlar quiet, nivver up to nea mischief, and always sat at heam wi' t' lasses a mending and sewing o' evenings, ye kna.'

I didn't know, but guessed at once the sort of simple stay-at-home ways and happy-family style of quiet domestic service, known to the circle of maidens, who, after their day's work, {41} sat with their needles and thread entertaining the guileless Dixon.

'And what is your memory of Mrs. Wordsworth?'

'Well, every Jack mun have his Jen, as t' saying is, and they was much of a mak. She was a stiff little lady, nowt verra pleasant in her countenance neyther.' I soon found out that the word unpleasant was being used in a double sense, and was intended to convey rather an over-seriousness of expression perhaps than any disagreeable look or ill-tempered face. 'Ye're weel awar',' continued the former hostel-keeper, 'that we mun a' hev troubles, times is not a' alike wi' t' best on us; we hev our worrits and our pets, but efter yan on 'em, yan's countenance comes agean, and Wudsworth's didn't, nor noan o' t' family's, as I ivver seed.'

'Did you ever see Mr. Wordsworth out walking--round Pelter-bridge way?'

'Ay, ay, scores and scores o' times. But he was a lonely man, fond o' goin' out wi' his family, and saying nowt to noan of 'em. When a man goes in a family way he keeps together wi' 'em and chats a bit wi' 'em, but many's a time I've seed him a takkin' his family out in a string, and niver geein' the {42} deariest bit of notice to 'em; standin' by hissel' and stoppin' behint agapin', wi' his jaws warkin' the whoal time; but niver no cracking wi' 'em, nor no pleasure in 'em,--a desolate-minded man, ye kna. Queer thing that, mun, but it was his hobby, ye kna. It was potry as did it. We all hev our hobbies--somes for huntin', some cardin', some fishin', some wrustlin'. He never followed nowt nobbut a bit o' skating, happen. Eh, he was fond of going on in danger times;--he was always furst on t' Rydal howiver; but his hobby, ye mun kna, was potry. It was a queer thing, but it would like eneuf cause him to be desolate; and I'se often thowt that his brain was that fu' of sic stuff, that he was forced to be always at it whether or no, wet or fair, mumbling to hissel' along t' roads.'

'Do you think,' I asked, 'that he had any friends among the shepherds?'

'Naay, naay, he cared nowt about fwoak, nor sheep, nor dogs (he hed a girt fine yan, weighed nine stone, to guard t' hoose) not nea mair than he did aboot t' claes he hed on--his hobby was potry.'

'How did he generally dress?'

'Well, in my time them swallow-lappeted yans was in vogue, but he kep' to all-round {43} plain stuff, and I mind hed a cap wi' a neb tull it. He wore that maist days.'

'Did you ever read his poetry, or see any books about it in the farm-houses?' I asked.

'Ay, ay, time or two. But ya're weel aware there's potry and potry. There's potry wi' a li'le bit pleasant in it, and potry sec as a man can laugh at or t' childer understand, and some as taks a deal o' mastery to mak' oot what's said, and a deal of Wudsworth's was this sort, ye kna. You cud tell fra t' man's faace his potry wad nivver hev nea laugh in it.

'His potry was quite different wark frae li'le Hartley. Hartley wad gang runnin' beside o' t' becks and mak his, and gang in t' furst open deur and write what he hed gittin' on t' paper. But Wudsworth's potry was real hard stuff, and bided a deal of makkin', and he'd keep it in his head for lang eneuf. Eh, but it's queer, mon, different ways fwoaks hes of makkin' potry now. Fowks gaes a deal to see whar he's interred; but for my part I'd walk twice distance ower t' Fells to see whar Hartley lies. Not bit what Mr. Wudsworth didn't stand verra high, and was a weel-spoken man eneuf, but quite yan to hissel. Well, well, good-day.' And so we {44} rose to go; he to his farm, I to my note-book.

I pass over sundry interviews of minor import, and will detail as accurately as I can the result of several conversations with one who as a boy lived as page, or butler's assistant, at Rydal Mount, and now himself in total eclipse (for he is blind) delights to handle and show with pride the massy, old-fashioned square glazed hand-lantern, that lighted his master the poet on his favourite evening walks.

We go through Ambleside to reach his house, and call for a moment at the shop of a man for whom on his wedding-day Hartley Coleridge wrote the touching sonnet in which he describes himself as

Untimely old, irreverendly grey,

and he will tell us that Mr. Wordsworth was not a man of very outgoing ways with folk, a plain man, a very austere man, and one who was ponderous in his speech. That he called very often at his shop, and would talk, 'but not about much,' just passing the day. He will tell us that Mrs. Wordsworth was a very plain-faced lady, but will add that, 'for {45} aw that, Mr. Wordsworth and she were very fond of one another.'

There is, as one would expect, a sort of general feeling among the dalesmen that it was rather a strange thing that two people so austere and uncomely in mere line of feature or figure should be so much in love, and so gentle and considerate in their lives. I say as we should expect, for the men of Lakeland and the women of Lakeland are notably comely, their features notably regular. I do not myself know of a single instance of a really ugly married woman among the peasants that I have met with in Westmoreland. But at the same time we must remember that the word 'plain,' whether applied to dress or feature, in Westmoreland, means for the most part simple, homely, unpretending, unassuming, and is often a term of honour rather than dispraise.

We shall, perhaps, as we near the village where our blind friend lives, meet with an old man who will tell us that he helped to bear both the poet and his wife to the grave, but he will add that he was not 'over weel acquent wi' 'em, though he knas the room they both died in,' and that the time he saw most of the poet was the occasion {46} when he conducted Queen Adelaide 'to see the Rydal Falls, and all about.'

We have got to the end of our walk, and here, picking his way by means of his trusty sounding-staff backwards and forwards in the sunshine he feels, but cannot see, is the old man, or rather old gentleman who in former times 'took sarvice along of Mr. Wudsworth,' and was 'so well pleased with his master that he could verra weel hev ended his days at t' Mount,' but found it was over quiet, and, wanting to see the world beyond the charmed circle of the hills, left a good place, but not before he had formed his opinion of both master and mistress, and obtained indelible impressions of their several personalities, and had conceived along with these an affection for them which glows in his words as he talks to us of them. 'Mr. Wudsworth was a plaain-feaced man, and a mean liver.' The description, as I hinted in the preface, would have staggered a philo-Wordsworthian unaccustomed to the native dialect. 'But he was a good master and kind man; and as for Mrs. Wudsworth, she was a downright cliver woman, as kep' accounts, and was a reg'lar manasher. He {47} never know'd, bless ye, what he hed, nor what he was wuth, nor whether there was owt to eat in t' house, nivver.'

'But you say,' I interposed, 'that he didn't care much whether there was or was not food in the house.'

'Nay, nay, Wudsworth was a man as was fond of a good dinner at times, if you could get him to it, that was t' job; not but what he was a very temperate man i' all things, vara, but they was all on 'em mean livers, and in a plain way. It was poddish for t' breakfast, and a bit o' mutton to t' dinner, and poddish at night, with a bit of cheese happen to end up wi'.'

'You said it was hard to get him to his meals: what did you mean?' I asked.

'Weel, weel, it was study as was his delight: he was aw for study; and Mrs. Wudsworth would say, "Ring the bell," but he wouldn't stir, bless ye. "Goa and see what he's doing," she'd say, and we wad goa up to study door and hear him a mumbling and bumming through it. "Dinner's ready, sir," I'd ca' out, but he'd goa mumbling on like a deaf man, ya see. And sometimes Mrs. Wudsworth 'ud say, "Goa and brek a bottle, or let a dish fall just outside door {48} in passage." Eh dear, that maistly wad bring him out, wad that. It was nobbut that as wad, howivver. For ye kna he was a verra careful man, and he couldn't do with brekking t' china.'

'And was he continually at study in-doors, or did he rise early, go out for a walk before breakfast, and study, as I have heard, mostly in the open air?' I asked.

My friend answered at once. 'He was always at it, ye kna, but it was nowt but what he liked, and not much desk-wark except when he had a mind tul it. Noa, noa, he was quite a open-air man was Wudsworth: studied a deal aboot t' roads. He wasn't particlar fond of gitten up early, but did a deal of study efter breakfast, and a deal efter tea. Walked t' roads efter dark, he wad, a deal, between his tea and supper, and efter. Not a verra conversable man, a mumblin' and stoppin', and seein' nowt nor neabody.'

'And what were his favourite roads?' I asked, in an innocent way.

'Well, he was verra partial to ganging up to Tarn Foot in Easedale, and was fondest o' walking by Red Bank and round by Barber's (the late Miss Agar's house), or else {49} t'other way about and home by Clappersgate and Brankers, under Loughrigg. Never was nowt of a mountaineer, and Miss Dorothy 'companied him. Eh dear, many time I've watched him coming round wi' t' lantern and her efter a walk by night. You've heard tell of Miss Dorothy, happen. Well, fwoaks said she was cliverest mon of the two at his job, and he allays went to her when he was puzzelt. Dorothy hed t' wits, tho' she went wrang, ye kna.'

'Then,' said I, 'Mrs. Wordsworth did not help the poet in writing his verses?'

'Naay, naay. Why, she was a manasher, niver a studier, but for a' that there's nea doot he and she was truly companionable, and they wer terr'ble fond o' yan anudder. But Dorothy hed t' wits on 'em boath.'

'And he was very devoted to his children,' I put in.

'Ay, ay, he was fond of children like eneuf, but children was nivver verra fond o' him. Ye see he was a man 'o moods, nivver nea certainty aboot him; and I'se not sea sure he was fond of other fowk's bairns, but he was verra fond o' his ain wi'out a doot.'

'And was he very popular among the folk hereabouts?'

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'There's nea doot but what he was fond of quality, and quality was very fond o' him, but he niver exed fowk aboot their wark, nor noticed t' flocks nor nowt: not but what he was a kind man if fwoaks was sick and taen badly. But farming, nor beast, nor sheep, nor fields wasn't in his way, he exed nea questions about flocks or herds, and was a distant man, not what you might call an outward man by noa means. And he was verra close, verra close indeed, fra curious men. He'd gang t' other side o' t' road rather than pass a man as exed questions a deal.'

It was a mercy, I thought to myself, that no Wordsworth Society had invited me to collect and write down the results of a cross-question tour in those days.

'But surely,' I said, 'he had some particular cottage or farm where he would go and have a crack.'

'Naay, naay. He would go times or two to farm Dungeon Ghyll way, but he wasn't a man for friends. He had some, neah doubt, in his walk of life; he was ter'ble friends with the Doctor (Arnold) and Muster Southey, and Wilson of Elleray and Hartley Coleridge. I'se seen him many a time takkin' him out arm i' arm for a talking. But he {51} was specially friendly with Professor. I mind one time when we was driving, me and Mrs. Wudsworth and Miss Wudsworth, to Kendal, and Professor Wilson was superintending making o' a bye road up by Elleray there, and he was in his slippers. Nowt wud do but Wudsworth must git down and fall to talkin', and we went on; but he didn't come, and Mrs. Wudsworth said, 'Ye mun drive on; he'll pick us up at Kendal: no knowing what's got him now Professor is wi' 'im.' Well, well, she was right. For after putting up at Kendal, who should walk in but Wudsworth and Professor wi'out any shoes to his feet neather, for Wilson was in his slippers, and 'ad walk'd hissel' to his stockin' feet, and left his stockin' on t' road an aw' far eneuf before they got to Kendal.'

'But it was strange,' I said again in a suggestive way, 'that Mr. Wordsworth should be so well "acquaint" with Professor Wilson, for he was a great cock-fighting and wrestling man, was he not, in his day?'

'Ay, ay, biggest hereaboot,' my old friend replied. 'It's queer, but it was along o' his study, ye kna. Wudsworth was nivver nea cock-fyhter nor wrestler, no gaming man at all, and not a hunter, and as for fishing {52} he hedn't a bit o' fish in him, hedn't Wudsworth--not a bit of fish in him.'

'I have read in his books,' said I, 'things that make me feel he was kind to dumb animals.'

'Naay, naay,' my friend broke in, 'Wrudsworth was nea dog fancier; and as for cats, he couldn't abide them; and he didn't care for sheep, or horses, a deal, but if he was fond of owt, it was of t' _li'le ponies_. He was a man of fancies, ye kna. It was a fancy of his. He was fond of li'le ponies, nivver rode a horse in his life, nivver.'

'But he went over a deal of ground in his time. Was he always on his feet?' I said.

'He went ower a deal mair ground nor ever he saw, for he went a deal by night, but he was a man as took notice, ye kna, nivver forgat what he saw, and he went slow.'

'But,' said I, 'how did he cover so much ground; was he never on wheels?'

'Ay, ay, wheels, to be sure, he druv a' times, ye kna, in t' cart. He, and Mrs. Wudsworth, and Dorothy and me, we went a deal by cart Penrith way, and Borradale and Keswick way, and Langdale way at times.'

'What sort of a cart?' I inquired.

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'Dung cart, to be sure. Just a dung cart, wi' a seat-board in t' front, and bit of bracken in t' bottom, comfortable as owt. We cud ga that way for days, and far eneuf. Ye kna in them days tubs wasn't known. Low-wood was nobbut a cottage, and there was never abuv six or seven ponies for hiring at Ambleside. Tubs we ca' t' covered carriages, tubs wasn't known in these parts. But happen there was a tub or two at Kendal.'

'And you must have gone precious slowly,' I said.

'Ay, ay, slow eneuf, but that was Mr. Wudsworth's fancy, and he'd git in and go along, and then he git down into t' road and walk a bit, and mak a bit, and then he git oop and hum a bit to himsel, and then he'd stop and hev a leuk here and there for a while. He was a man as noticed a deal o' steans and trees, verra particler aboot t' trees, or a rock wi' ony character in it. When they cut down coppy woods in these parts they maistly left a bit of t' coppy just behint wall to hide it for him, he was a girt judge in sic things, and noticed a deal.'

'And would he,' I asked, 'tell you as you jogged along in the cart, which mountain {54} he was fondest off, or bid you look at the sunset?'

'Ay, ay, times he would say, "Now isn't that beautiful?" and times he would hum on to himself. But he wasn't a man as would give a judgment agean ony mountain. I've heard girt folks 'at com to t' Mount say, "Now, Mr. Wudsworth, we want to see finest mountain in t' country," and he would say, "Ivery mountain is finest." Ay, that's what he would say.'

'But I have been told that his voice was very deep,' I put in, in a happy-go-lucky way. 'Had he a loud laugh now?'

'I don't mind he iver laughed in his life, he'd smile times or two. Ay, ay, his voice was deep one; bit I mind at t' family prayers in t' morning he'd read a bit o' _the_ Scripture to us, and he was a verra articulate, particlar good reader, was Mr. Wudsworth, always hed family prayer in the morning, and went to church wi' prayer-book under his arm, verra regular yance upon the Sunday, he did.' My friend added, 'He was quite a serious-minded man, and a man of moods.'

Here ended my talk with the old retainer at the Mount. But I was not allowed to go {55} off until I had seen and handled the old-fashioned candle lattern by which, as my kind informant put it, the poet 'did a deal of his study aboot t' roads efter dark.'

And so must end my plain unvarnished tale. I leave my indulgent readers to form their own conclusions; merely suggesting that the collected evidence points to a simple plainness and homeliness of life such as remains indelibly impressed upon the men of Westmoreland, whose own lives are less simple in these latter days, when ostentation and vulgar pride of wealth in a class above them have climbed the hills and possessed the valleys.

The testimony of the witnesses I have been fortunate enough to bring before you seems to agree in depicting Wordsworth as he painted himself, a plain man, continually murmuring his undersong as he passed along by brook and woodland, pacing the ground with unuplifted eye, but so retired, that even the North country peasant, who does even yet recognise the social differences of class and caste that separate and divide 'the unknown little from the unknowing great,' was unable to feel at home with him. 'Not a very companionable man at the best of times' was their verdict. But I think all the while {56} these dalesmen seem to have felt that if the poet was not of much count as a worldly-wise farm or shepherd authority, nor very convivial and free and easy as li'le Hartley was, nor very athletic and hearty as Professor Wilson, there was a something in the severe-faced, simply habited man 'as said nowt to neabody' that made him head and shoulders above the people, and bade them listen and remember when he spoke, if it was only on the lopping of a tree or the building of a chimney-stack. 'He was a man of a very practical eye, and seemed to see everything,' was the feeling.

And turning from the poet to his wife, whilst one can see how the household need of economy in early Town End days gave her to the last the practical power of household management that had almost passed into a proverb, one can see also how true was that picture of the

Being breathing thoughtful breath, * * * * * A perfect woman, nobly planned, To warn, to comfort, and command.

'He never knawed, they say, what he was wuth, nor what he hed i' t' house.' She did it all. Then, too, it is touching to {57} notice how deep and true the constant love between man and wife was seen to be, how truly companions for life they were, and that, too, in the eyes of a class of people who never saw that

Beauty born of murmuring sound Had passed into her face,

and half marvelled that the spirit wed with spirit was so marvellously closer than fleshly bond to flesh.

Upright, the soul of honour, and for that reason standing high with all; just to their servants; well meaning and quiet in their public life; full of affection in their simple home life; so it seems the poet and his wife lived and died. Thought a deal of for the fact that accounts were strictly met at the tradesmen's shops, they were thought more of because they were ever ready to hear the cry of the suffering, and to enter the doors of those ready to perish.

I do not think I have been able to tell the world anything new about the poet or his surroundings. But the man 'who hedn't a bit of fish in him, and was no mountaineer,' seems to have been in the eyes of the people always at his studies; 'and that because he couldn't help it, because it was his hobby,' {58} for sheer love, and not for money. This astonished the industrious money-loving folk, who could not understand the doing work for 'nowt,' and perhaps held the poet's occupation in somewhat lighter esteem, just because it did not bring in 'a deal o' brass to the pocket.' I think it is very interesting, however, to notice how the woman part of the Rydal Mount family seemed to the simple neighbourhood to have the talent and mental ability; and there must have been, both about Dorothy Wordsworth and the poet's daughter Dora, a quite remarkable power of inspiring the minds of the poor with whom they came in contact, with a belief in their intellectual faculties and brightness and cleverness. If Hartley Coleridge was held by some to be Wordsworth's helper, it was to Dorothy he was supposed by all to turn if 'ivver he was puzzelt.' The women had 'the wits, or best part of 'em,'--this was proverbial among the peasantry, and, as having been an article of rural faith, it has been established out of the mouths of all the witnesses it has been my lot to call.

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WITH THE BLACK-HEADED GULLS IN CUMBERLAND.

There is no part of the Cumberland coast so full of witchery and romance as the point where Muncaster Fell comes down to the sea. The rivers of Irt, Mite and Esk, with their memories of the pearl-fisheries of olden time, swirl down toward the ancient harbour of the mythic 'King Aveling's Town.' One cannot look across the pool at full tide without thought of how the Vikings pushed their ships ashore here, when they came from Mona's Isle to harry Cumberland.

But the sound of earlier civilisations is in our ears as one gazes across the Ravenglass sand-dunes; for here beside us is the great cavern of ancient oaken-logs and earth, wherein the Cymri buried their dead in prehistoric time, and there within a stone's throw still upstands the seaside residence of some great Roman {60} general, who was determined apparently to enjoy a well-heated house, and to do honour to the _genius loci_. No one who visits 'Walls' Castle, as it is called, but must be struck with the remains of the 'tepidarium,' and the little niche that held the statue of the tutelary god, or a bust of the presiding Cæsar, within the ample hall.

Away at our back rises the Muncaster Fell with its grey beacon-tower, its herd of deer, its wind-blown oaks, its primrose and bluebell haunted woods, that slope towards the Vale of Esk. Further inland, sheltered by its magnificent wall of forestry, stands rose-red one of the most interesting of our northern castles, with its long terrace-lawn of quite unequalled grace and loveliness. There in sheltered combe the rhododendrons bloom from earliest spring, and the air will to-day be honeysweet from laurel-flower far and wide.

But I was bent on seeing an older people than Cymri, Roman, Viking, or Castle-Lord, albeit the line of Pennington reached far into the past, and suited well his ancient castle hold. I had come in the last week of April, by courteous invitation, to renew acquaintance with that fast-growing colony of black-headed gulls that make the dunes of Ravenglass famous.

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