I like a fire of wood; there is a kind
Of artless poetry in all its ways:
When first 'tis lighted, how it roars and plays,
And sways to every breath its flames, refined
By fancy to some shape by life confined.
And then how touching are its latter days;
When, all its strength decayed, and spent the blaze
Of fiery youth, grey ash is all we find.
Perhaps we know the tree, of which the pile
Once formed a part, and oft beneath its shade
Have sported in our youth; or in quaint style
Have carved upon its rugged bark a name
Of which the memory doth alone remain
A memory doomed, alas! in turn to fade.
Bad enough as verse, the critic will say; refined, confined,
find - what poor rhymes are these! and he will think me wrong
to draw these frailties from their forgotten abode. But I
like to think of the solitary old man sitting by his wood
fire in the old house, not brooding bitterly on his frustrate
life, but putting his quiet thoughts into the form of a
sonnet. The other is equally good - or bad, if the critic
will have it so: -
The clock had just struck five, and all was still
Within my house, when straight I open threw
With eager hand the casement dim with dew.
Oh, what a glorious flush of light did fill
That old staircase! and then and there did kill
All those black doubts that ever do renew
Their civil war with all that's good and true
Within our hearts, when body and mind are ill
From this slight incident I would infer
A cheerful truth, that men without demur,
In times of stress and doubt, throw open wide
The windows of their breast; nor stung by pride
In stifling darkness gloomily abide;
But bid the light flow in on either side.
A "slight incident" and a beautiful thought. But all I have
so far said about the little book is preliminary to what I
wish to say about another sonnet which must also be quoted.
It is perhaps, as a sonnet, as ill done as the others, but the
subject of it specially attracted me, as it happened to be one
which was much in my mind during my week's stay at Norton.
That remote little village without a squire or any person of
means or education in or near it capable of feeling the
slightest interest in the people, except the parson, an old
infirm man who was never seen but once a week - how wanting in
some essential thing it appeared! It seemed to me that the
one thing which might be done in these small centres of rural
life to brighten and beautify existence is precisely the thing
which is never done, also that what really is being done is of
doubtful value and sometimes actually harmful.
Leaving Norton one day I visited other small villages in the
neighbourhood and found they were no better off.
