Ann Taylor Jane Taylor

Home , Ann Taylor (poet), Isaac Taylor, Jane Taylor (poet)

(1783-1824)

Ann Taylor and her younger sister Jane belonged to the literary family known as the Taylors of Ongar, whose members produced or made substantial con tributions to almost a hundred books, many of them for children. The Taylor sisters were educated at home in astronomy, anatomy, geography, geometry, mechanics, and general history. To save money, in 1786 the family moved from London, where the girls had been born, to Lavenham, in Suffolk; they stayed there until 1796, when they moved to Colchester, where their father was to be the minister of a nonconformist congregation. Beginning in 1797 the sisters worked with their parents and later with their younger siblings at the family business-engraving book illustrations on copper plates, an occu pation Jane, at least, did not relish. Always precocious, Jane once presented her parents with a petition for a garden in five well-crafted stanzas. She later recalled, "I know I have sometimes lived so much in a castle, as almost to forget that I lived in a house." 1 In 1798 Ann bought a copy of the Minor's Pocket Book, jotted down solu tions to the enigma, charade, and other puzzles, and, using the pseudonym "Juvenilia," sent them to the Quaker publisher, William Darton. In each of the following years, Ann, Jane, and their brother Isaac sent solutions in verse, and Darton published several of Ann's compositions. In 1803 Darton accepted Jane's poem "The Beggar Boy" for publication in the 1804 issue and wrote

r. Letter of 24 September 1806, quoted in Isaac Taylor, Memoirs and Poetical Remains of the Late Jane Taylor, 2 vols. (London, 1825), l :6-7, also 2:152.

730 Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 731 to their father asking for more "specimens of easy Poetry for young chil dren. . . . What would be most likely to please little minds must be well known to every one of those who have written such pieces as we have already seen from thy family." He offered to pay in cash or books. The Taylors sent enough poems to fill a volume, which was published early in 1804 as Original Poems, for Infant Minds, by "Several Young Persons." Darton paid ten pounds for the poems. When the book appeared, the Taylors were displeased to find that Darton had included seventeen poems by Adelaide O'Keeffe (1776-1855) and one by Barnard Barton (1784-1849) in addition to the twenty poems by Ann, twenty by Jane, and three by their brother, Isaac Jr., who also en graved the volume's frontispiece. But the book was an immense success. It "awoke the nurseries of England, and those in charge of them," 2 earning en thusiastic praise from Walter Scott, Robert Southey, and Maria Edgeworth. These were among the first original poems in English written specifically for the enjoyment of children rather than primarily for educational or didactic purposes. Original Poems, for Infant Minds went through eighteen English editions in the first fourteen years; by r865 there had been eighty English and American editions, as well as Dutch, French, German, and Russian translations. The poems' influence was enormous. Generations of children, including many future authors, grew up reading, reciting, and singing them. Kate Greenaway illustrated them in 1883; and in 1925 Edith Sitwell introduced a selection. Their success inspired a slew of imitations, including ones by Sara Coleridge and by Charles and Mary Lamb. In November 1804 Darton solicited a second volume of Original Poems from the Taylors, for which they received £15. This volume contained sixteen poems by Adelaide O'Keeffe as well as twenty nine by Ann, twenty-two by Jane, and three by Isaac. The Taylors appear to have earned £440 for their contributions to the various editions of Original Poems by 1844.3 When their next volume was in preparation, Jane acquired her own room in the attic. Her brother Isaac later recalled that the window "commanded a view of the country, and a 'tract of sky' as a field for that nightly soaring of the fancy of which she was so fond." 4 Rhymes for the Nursery, published in 1806,

2 . F. J. Harvey Darton, Children's Books in England: Five Centuries ef Social Life (Cambridge, 1932), 187. 3. The authors of each of the poems in these and other Taylor volumes are identified by Christina Duff Stewart in The Taylors of Ongar: An Analytical Bio-Bibliography, 2 vols. (New York, 1975). Stewart also describes the revisions that took place from one edition to another and the sums received. 4. Isaac Taylor, Memoirs and Poetical Remains ef the Late Jane Taylor, I :86. 732 Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor

included Jane's poem "The Star;' still a staple in our present-day repertoire of poetry for children. Known now by its first line, "Twinkle, twinkle, little star," its opening stanza persists as if it were folklore, the name of its creator now almost entirely forgotten. The first publication of this book brought the Taylors forty pounds; by r88r it had gone through forty-one editions. In 1807, on a visit to London, the young sisters stopped at Newington to meet the elderly Anna Letitia Barbauld and her brother, John Aikin. The sisters' Hymns for Infant Minds, for which Ann engraved the frontispiece, ap peared in 1810. The hymns almost immediately made their way into Sun day school anthologies, often without acknowledgment. Hymns had gone through more than fifty editions in England by the r88os and nearly fifty in America by the r86os. In the first year, the authors earned £150. In r8II the family moved to Ongar, in Essex, and in 1812 Ann and Jane published Original Hymns for Sunday Schools with Josiah Conder. Though the language of these hymns is highly simplified, they were not easy to write. Isaac Jr. re marked that "if one might judge by the appearance of the manuscript copy of these hymns-its intricate interlineations, and multiplied revisions, it would seem that, many of them cost the author more labour than any other of her writings." 5 In December 1813 Ann married the Reverend Joseph Henry Gilbert (1779- 1852), the liberal Congregationalist pastor of the Nether Chapel in Sheffield. She suspended her writing career in the early years of her marriage in order to devote herself to her family, which eventually came to include eight chil dren. Separated now from her older sister, Jane turned to writing a work of fiction. Isaac Jr. later rec~lled, "It was her custom, in a solitary ramble among the rocks, for half an hour after breakfast, to seek that pitch of excitement without which she never took up the pen:-this fever of thought was usually exhausted in two or three hours of writing." 6 In ~ugust 1815 Display. A Tale for Young People appeared. This was the first work Jane had authored alone and also the first work bearing her name on the title page. Her mother could no longer object to her daughter being known publicly as an author, as she had herself the previous year made her own debut in the world of letters, pub lishing now having displaced engraving as the more lucrative family business. Although modern readers find Display overly didactic, it was popular enough in its own time to go through three editions in the first six months. Soon after its publication, Jane began working on a book of poems for an adult audience. Isaac noted that she hesitated to express her opinions on serious

5. Ibid., II6. 6. Ibid., 137. Ann Tcrylor and Jane Taylor 733

subjects in prose, but "in verse, she felt as if sheltered. She therefore deter mined to write what she thought and felt, with less reserve than hitherto; but under the cover of poetry." 7 The result was Essays in Rhyme, on Morals and Manners, published by Taylor and Hessey and Josiah Conder in 1816. John Keats wrote to his fourteen-year-old sister, Fanny, "How do you like Miss Taylor's essays in Rhyme-I just look'd into the Book and it appeared to me suitable to you-especially since I remember your liking for those pleasant little things the Original Poems." 8 The next year Jane collaborated with her mother to pen the daughter's part of Correspondence Between a Mother and Her Daughter at School (1817). This was Jane's last book. Around the time of its publication she discovered the breast cancer that would eventually claim her life. Her physician forbade all writing for fear that excitement would weaken her. Nevertheless, for the next five years, under the signature "Q.Q.," she continued to contribute poems, essays, and stories to the Youth's Magazine. These pieces, including her famous story "How It Strikes a Stranger;' about a visit by a man from another planet, were collected and published shortly after her death on 13 April 1824.9 The Contributions of Q. Q. to a Periodical Work: with Some Pieces Not Before Published had gone through thirteen British editions by 1866. In 1825 Isaac Jr. published a biography of his sister and edited more works in the two-volume Memoirs and Poetical Remains of the Late Jane Taylor: with Extracts from her Correspondence, drawing the silhouette of Jane for the frontispiece to volume r. Though principally occupied with her family, Ann published in 1827 Origi nal Anniversary Hymns and in 1839 The Convalescent; Twelve Letters on Recovery from Sickness, occasioned by the serious illness of her daughter and several others. Isaac Jr. wrote congratulating his sister on the book's publication, ex pressing his "particular pleasure in finding that you have at length returned to your vocation, and left ... the mending of stockings to hands that cannot so well handle a pen." 10 Ann contributed more than one hundred hymns to Leifchild's Original Hymns (1842). In 1843 her youngest son nearly died; she wrote Seven Blessings for Little Children during his illness and recuperation. Family duties and problems and the poor health of her husband kept Ann too busy to publish much for the next decade. Her husband died on 12 December

7. Ibid., 14 7. 8. John Keats, The Letters ef john Keats: 1814-1821, ed. Hyder Edward Rollins, vol. r (Cam bridge, Mass., 1958), 155. 9. Robert Browning borrowed the title for his poem "How It Strikes a Contemporary," used the substance of the story for his poem "Rephan," and modeled Lazarus in "An Epistle" on Taylor's main character (Stewart, 2 :113). ro. Quoted in Stewart, The Taylors ef Ongar, r :540. 734 Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor

1852, and in 1853, at the age of seventy-one, she was forced to give up her house. But as workmen were dismantling her household, she wrote a mem oir of her husband, published as A Biographical Sketch of the Rev. Joseph Gilbert. Ann enjoyed travel and made the journey to Scotland and Devon at the age of eighty-two. She also wrote the preface for her daughter Caroline's book A Child's Walk Through the Year, published in 1858. Ann died in 1866 at the age of eighty-five; her son Josiah Gilbert edited and completed the autobiogra phy she had written for her family and published it in 1874 under the title Autobiography and Other Memorials of Mrs. Gilbert (Formerly Ann Taylor). Although Ann Taylor's "My Mother" became one of the best-known, most frequently imitated and parodied poems of the nineteenth century, Jane is generally considered to be the more significant poet. Her dissenting vision was both democratic and inclusive; those with physical and mental disabili ties, ordinary women, the poor, all inhabit her work. She wrote about and for real, not mythologized or sentimentalized, children, who speak the language of the common child and, like real children, are capable of thoughtlessness, even cruelty. She was a poet unabashedly of and for the British middle class; but just as she was a dissenter in religion, a Congregationalist, so she dissented from some of the most pervasive bourgeois values of her time, despising materialism and its social trappings, along with pretension of any sort. The rising middle class, she believed, was so enmeshed in a self-indulgent quest for more and ever more things that it was in danger of forgetting the moral soil in which it had germinated and of losing its humanity. She would be its social conscience, its minister. Through imaginative sympathy she sought to sensitize readers to the everyday life of the disenfranchised. Her contribu tions to Original Poems include titles such as "Crazy Robert" and "Poverty," and Rhymes for the Nursery contains "The Old Beggar Man;' "The Little Beggar Girl," and "Poor Children." Companion poems such as "One Little Boy" and "Another Little Boy" not only show the dignity and worth of the common laborer's contribution to society while exposing the spiritual sterility of aris tocratic values but also dramatize the mutual contempt of these classes for one another, a theme she revisits for adult readers in "A Pair." Taylor was well aware how women's intellectual and artistic potential fre quently drowned in the menial demands of everyday life and how through subtle coercion women come to embrace the constraints on their lives. Two years after she published "The Cow and the Ass," a poem that explores this issue, she wrote to a friend: "I do believe the reason why so few men, even among the intelligent, wish to encourage the mental cultivation of women, is their excessive love of the good things of this life: they tremble for their dear stomachs, concluding that a woman who could taste the pleasures of poetry Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 735 or sentiment, would never descend to pay due attention to those exquisite flavors in pudding or pie, that are so gratifying to their philosophic palates; and yet ... it is a thousand pities they should be so mistaken." 11

MAJOR WORKS:

Ann Taylor: The Wedding Among the Flowers (London, 1808); Original Anniversary Hymns, Adapted to the Public Services of Sunday Schools and Sunday School Unions (London, 1827); The Convalescent; Twelve Letters on Recovery from Sickness (London, 1839); Seven Blessings for Little Children (London, 1844); A Biographical Sketch of the Rev. Joseph Gilbert. By his Widow. With Recollections of The Discourses of his closing Years, from Notes at the Time, by One of His Sons (London, 1853); Autobiography and Other Memorials of Mrs. Gilbert (formerly Ann Taylor), ed. Josiah Gilbert (London, 1874).

Jane Taylor: Display. A Tale for Young People (London, 1815); Essays in Rhyme, on Morals and Manners (London, 1816); The Contributions of Q.Q. to a Periodical Work: with some Pieces not before Published, 2 vols. (London, 1824); Memoirs and Poetical Remains of the Late Jane Taylor: with Extracts from her Correspondence, ed. Isaac Taylor, 2 vols. (London, 1825).

COLLABORATIVE WORKS: Original Pcems, for Infant Min"ds [Jane Taylor, Ann Taylor, Isaac Taylor Jr., Bernard Barton, and Adelaide O'Keeffe], 2 vols. (London, 1804-5); Rural Scenes: or, A Peep into the Country, for Good Children [Jane Taylor, Ann Taylor, and Isaac Taylor Jr.] (London, 1805); City Scenes: or, A Peep into London, for Good Children [Jane Taylor, Ann Taylor, and Isaac Taylor Jr.] (London, 1806); Rhymes for the Nursery [Jane and Ann Taylor] (London, 1806); Limed Twigs, to Catch Young Birds [Jane and Ann Taylor, illustrations by Isaac Taylor Jr.] (London, 1808); The New Cries of London [Jane Taylor, Ann Taylor, and Isaac Taylor Jr.] (London, 1808); Hymns for Infant Minds [Jane Taylor, Ann Taylor, and Isaac Taylor Jr.] (Bucklersbury, 1810); Signor Topsy-Turvy's Wonderful Magic Lantern; or, The World Turned Upside Down [Jane Taylor, Ann Taylor, and Rev. Isaac Taylor] (London, 1810); The Mother's Fables, In Verse. Designed, Through the Medium of Amusement, to Correct some of the Faults and Follies of Children [Jane Taylor, Ann Tayior, and possibly Isaac Taylor Jr. or Jefferys Taylor] (London, 1812); Original Hymns for Sunday Schools [Jane Taylor and Ann Taylor] (London, 1812); Correspondence between a Mother and her Daughter at School [Jane Taylor and her mother, Mrs. Ann Taylor] (London, 1817); The Linnet's Life. Twelve Poems with a Capper Plate Engraving to Each [Jane Taylor, Ann Taylor, Rev. Isaac Taylor, and possibly Isaac Taylor Jr.] (London, 1822); The Family Pen. Memorials, Biographical and Literary, of the Taylor Family, of Ongar, ed. Rev. Isaac Taylor [with selections from the works of Isaac Taylor Sr., Jane Taylor, Jefferys Taylor, and Ann Taylor], 2 vols. (London, 1867); Meddlesome Matty and Other Poems for Infant Minds, [Jane and Ann Taylor, with an introduction by Edith Sitwell] (London, 1925).

II. Letter of 2 June 1808, quoted in Isaac Taylor, Memoirs and Poetical Remains of the Late Jane Taylor, 2:I78. Ann Tayl.or and Jane Taylor

TEXTS USED: Texts of "The Little Bird's Complaint to His Mistress" and "The Mis tress's Reply to Her Little Bird," both by Ann Taylor, and "The Cow and the Ass," by Jane Taylor, from The "Original Poems" and Others, ed. E. V. Lucas (London, r903). Text of "The Star," by Jane Taylor, from Rhymes for the Nursery, roth ed. (r8r8). Texts of "Recreation," "The Squire's Pew," and "A Pair," by Jane Taylor, from Essays in Rhyme, on Morals and Manners. Text from "Philip: A Fragment," by Jane Taylor, from Memoirs and Poetical Remains ef the Late Jane Taylor: with Extracts from her Correspondence.

The Little Bird's Complaint to His Mistress

Here in this wiry prison where I sing, And think of sweet green woods, and long to fly, Unable once to try my useless wing, Or wave my feathers in the clear blue sky,

Day after day the selfsame things I see, The cold white ceiling, and this dreary house; Ah! how unlike my healthy native tree, Rocked by the winds that whistled through the boughs.

Mild spring returning strews the ground with flowers, IO And hangs sweet May-buds on the hedges gay, That no kind sunshine cheers my gloomy hours, Nor kind companion twitters in the spray!

Oh! how I long to stretch my listless wings, And fly away as far as eye can see! And from the topmost bough, where Robin sings, Pour my wild songs, and be as blithe as he.

Why was I taken from the waving nest, From flowery fields, wide woods, and hedges green; Torn from my tender mother's downy breast, 20 In this sad prison-house to die unseen?

Why must I hear, in summer evenings fine, A thousand happier birds in merry choirs? And I, poor lonely I, in grief repine, Caged by these wooden walls and golden wires! Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor --- 737 Say not, the tuneful notes I daily pour Are songs of pleasure, from a heart at ease; They are but wailings at my prison door, Incessant cries, to taste the open breeze!

Kind mistress, come, with gentle, pitying hand, Unbar that curious grate, and set me free; 30 Then on the whitethorn bush I'll take my stand, And sing sweet songs to freedom and to thee.. (1805)

The Mistress's Reply to Her Little Bird

Dear little bird, don't make this piteous cry, My heart will break to hear thee thus complain; Gladly, dear little bird, I'd let thee fly, If that were likely to relieve thy pain.

Base was the boy who climbed the tree so high, And took thee, bare and shivering, from thy nest; But no, dear little bird, it was not I, There's more of soft compassion in my breast.

But when I saw thee gasping wide for breath, Without one feather on thy callow skin, IO I begged the cruel boy to spare thy death, Paid for thy little life, and took thee in.

Fondly I fed thee, with the tenderest care, And filled thy gaping beak with nicest food, Gave thee new bread and butter from my share, And then with chickweed green thy dwelling strewed.

Soon downy feathers dressed thy naked wing, Smoothed by thy little beak with beauish care; And many a summer's evening wouldst thou sing, And hop from perch to perch with merry air. 20 Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor

But if I now should loose thy prison door, And let thee out into the world so wide, Unused to such a wondrous place before, Thou'dst want some friendly shelter where to hide.

Thy brother birds would peck thy little eyes, And fright the stranger from their woods away; Fierce hawks would chase thee trembling through the skies, Or crouching pussy mark thee for her prey.

Sad, on the lonely blackthorn wouldst thou sit, 30 Thy mournful song unpitied and unheard; And when the wintry wind and driving sleet Came sweeping o'er, they'd kill my pretty bird.

Then do not pine, my favourite, to be free, Plume up thy wings, and clear that sullen eye; I would not take thee from thy native tree, But now 'twould kill thee soon, to let thee fly. (1805)

The Cow and the Ass

Beside a green meadow a stream used to flow, So clear, one might see the white pebbles below; To this cooling brook the warm cattle would stray, To stand in the shade on a hot summer's day.

A cow, quite oppressed by the heat of the sun, Came here to refresh, as she often had done, And standing quite still, stooping over the stream, Was musing perhaps; or perhaps she might dream.

But soon a brown ass, of respectable look, IO Came trotting up also, to taste of the brook, And to nibble a few of the daisies and grass: "How d'ye do?" said the cow; "How d'ye do?" said the ass. Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 739

"Take a seat," said the cow, gently waiving her hand; "By no means, dear madam," said he, "while you stand." Then stooping to drink, with a complaisant bow, "Ma'am, your health," said the ass:-"Thank you, sir," said the cow.

When a few of these compliments more had been passed, They laid themselves down on the herbage at last; And waiting politely (as gentlemen must), The ass held his tongue, that the cow might speak first. 20

Then, with a deep sigh, she directly began, "Don't you think, Mr. Ass, we are injured by man? 'Tis a subject which lies with a weight on my mind: We really are greatly oppressed by mankind.

"Pray what is the reason (I see none at all) That I always must go when Jane chooses to call? Whatever I'm doing ('tis certainly hard) I'm forced to leave off, to be milked in the yard.

"I've no will of my own, but must do as they please, And give them my milk to make butter and cheese; 30 Sometimes I endeavour to kick down the pail, Or give her a box on the ear with my tail."

"But, Ma'am," said the ass, "not presuming to teach Oh dear, I beg pardon -pray finish your speech; Excuse my mistake," said the complaisant swain, "Go on, and I'll not interrupt you again."

"Why, sir, I was just then about to observe, Those hard-hearted tyrants no longer I'll serve; But leave them for ever to do as they please, And look somewhere else for their butter and cheese." 40

Ass waited a moment, his answer to scan, And then, "Not presuming to teach," he began, "Permit me to say, since my thoughts you invite, I always saw things in a different light. Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor ------"That you afford man an important supply, No ass in his senses would ever deny: But then, in return, 'tis but fair to allow, They are of some service to you, Mistress Cow.

" 'Tis their pleasant meadow in which you repose, 50 And they find you a shelter from wintery snows. For comforts like these, we're indebted to man; And for him, in return, should do all that we can."

The cow, upon this, cast her eyes on the grass, Not pleased to be schooled in this way by an ass: "Yet," said she to herself, "though he's not very bright, I really believe that the fellow is right."· (1805)

•In later editions of Original Poems for Infant Minds, the volume in which "The Cow and the Asstt first appeared, the poem's last two lines were revised to read," 'Yet,' thought she, 'I'm determin'd I'll benefit by 't, /For I really believe that the fellow is right.' " Ann Taylor may well have been responsible for this revision.

The Star

Twinkle, twinkle, little star, How I wonder what you are! Up above the world so high, Like a diamond in the sky.

When the blazing sun is gone, When he nothing shines upon, Then you show your little light, Twinkle, twinkle, all the night.

Then the trav'ller in the dark, IO Thanks you for your tiny spark: He could not see which way to go, If you did not twinkle so. Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 741

In the dark blue sky you keep, And often through my curtains peep, For you never shut your eye, 'Till the sun is in the sky.

As your bright and tiny spark, Lights the trav'ller in the dark, - Though I know not what you are, Twinkle, twinkle, little star. 20 (1806)

Recreation

" - We took our work, and went, you see, To take an early cup of tea. We did so now and then, to pay The friendly debt, and so did they. Not that our friendship burnt so bright That all the world could see the light; 'Twas of the ordinary genus, And little love was lost between us: We lov'd, I think, about as true, As such near neighbours mostly do. IO

At first, we all were somewhat dry; Mamma felt cold, and so did I: Indeed, that room, sit where you will, Has draught enough to turn a mill. "I hope you're warm," says Mrs. G. "O, quite so," says mamma, says she; "I'll take my shawl off by and by." - "This room is always warm," says I.

At last the tea came up, and so, With that, our tongues began to go. 20 Now, in that house you're sure of knowing The smallest scrap of news that's going; 742 Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor

We find it there the wisest way, To take some care of what we say.

-Says she, "there's dreadful doings still In that affair about the will; For now the folks in Brewer's Street, Don't speak to ]ames's, when they meet. Poor Mrs. Sam sits all alone, 30 And frets herself to skin and bone. For months she manag'd, she declares, All the old gentleman's affairs; And always let him have his way, And never left him night nor day; Waited and watch'd his every look, And gave him every drop he took. Dear Mrs. Sam, it was too bad! He might have left her all he had."

"Pray ma'am," says I, "has poor Miss A. 40 Been left as handsome as they say?" "My dear," says she, " 'tis no such thing, She'd nothing but a mourning ring. But is it not uncommon mean, To wear that rusty bombazeen!" "She had," says I, "the very same, Three years ago, for-what's his name?" - "The Duke of Brunswick, -very true, And has not bought a thread of new, I'm positive," said Mrs. G. - 50 So then we laugh' d, and drank our tea.

"So," says mamma, "I find it's true What Captain P. intends to do; To hire that house, or else to buy-" "Close to the tan-yard, ma'am," says I; "Upon my word it's very strange, I wish they mayn't repent the change!"

44 bombazeen] A twilled dress material composed of silk and worsted, cotton and worsted, or worsted alone. Black bombazeen was frequently worn for mourning. Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 743

"My dear," says she, "'tis very well You know, if they can bear the smell."

"Miss F." says I, "is said to be A sweet young woman, Mrs. G." 60 "O, excellent! I hear," she cried; "O, truly so!" mamma replied. "How old should you suppose her, pray? She's older than she looks, they say." "Really," says I, "she seems to me Not more than twenty-two or three." "O, then you're wrong," says Mrs. G. "Their upper servant told our Jane, She'll not see twenty-nine again." "Indeed, so old! I wonder why 70 She does not marry, then;' says I; "So many thousands to bestow, And such a beauty, too, you know." ''A beauty! 0, my dear Miss B. You must be joking, now," says she; "Her .figure's rather pretty," -- ''Ah! That's what I say;' replied mamma.

"Miss F." says I, "I've understood, Spends all her time in doing good: The people say her corning down 80 Is quite a blessing to the town." At that our hostess fetch' d a sigh, And shook her head; and so, says I, "It's very kind of her, I'm sure, To be so generous to the poor." "No doubt," says she, "'tis very true; Perhaps there may be reasons too: - You know some people like to pass For patrons with the lower class."

And here I break my story's thread, 90 Just to remark, that what she said, Although I took the other part, Went like a cordial to my heart. 744 Ann Tayl.or and Jane Taylor

Some inuendos more had pass'd, Till out the scandal came at last. "Come then, I'll tell you something more;' Says she, - "Eliza, shut the door. - I would not trust a creature here, For all the world, but you, my dear. IOO Perhaps it's false- I wish it may, - But let it go no further, pray!" "O," says mamma, "You need not fear, We never mention what we hear." "Indeed we shall not, Mrs. G." Says I, again, impatiently: And so, we drew our chairs the nearer, And whispering, lest the child should hear her, She told a tale, at least too long, To be repeated in a song; IIO We, panting every breath between, With curiosity and spleen. And how we did enjoy the sport! And echo every faint report, And answer every candid doubt, And turn her motives inside out, And holes in all her virtues pick, Till we were sated, almost sick.

- Thus having brought it to a close, In great good humour, we arose. I20 Indeed, 'twas more than time to go, Our boy had been an hour below. So, warmly pressing Mrs. G. To fix a day to come to tea, We mufHed up in cloke and plaid, And trotted home behind the lad." (1816) Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 745

The Squire's Pew

A slanting ray of evening light Shoots through the yellow pane; It makes the faded crimson bright, And gilds the fringe again: The window's gothic frame-work falls In oblique shadow on the walls.

And since those trappings first were new, How many a cloudless day, To rob the velvet of its hue, Has come and pass'd away! IO How many a setting sun hath made That curious lattice-work of shade!

Crumbled beneath the hillock green, The cunning hand must be, That carv'd this fretted door, I ween, Acorn, and fleur-de-lis; And now the worm hath done her part, In mimicking the chisel's art.

- In days of yore (as now we call) When the first James was king; 20 The courtly knight from yonder hall, Hither his train did bring; All seated round in order due, With broider'd suit and buckled shoe.

On damask cushions, set in fringe, All reverently they knelt: Prayer-books, with brazen hasp and hinge, In ancient English spelt, Each holding in a lily hand, Responsive at the priest's command. 30

20 When the first James was king] James I (1566-1625) was the first Stuart king of England, succeeding Queen Elizabeth in 1603. Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor ------Now, streaming down the vaulted aisle, The sunbeam, long and lone, Illumes the characters awhile Of their inscription stone; And there, in marble hard and cold, The knight and all his train behold.

Outstretch'd together, are express'd He and my lady fair; With hands uplifted on the breast, 40 In attitude of prayer; Long visag'd, clad in armor, he, With ruffied arm and bodice, she.

Set forth, in order as they died, The numerous offspring bend; Devoutly kneeling side by side, As though they did intend For past omissions to atone, By saying endless prayers in stone.

Those mellow days are past and dim, 50 But generations new, In regular descent from him, Have fill'd the stately pew; And in the same succession go, To occupy the vault below.

And now, the polish'd, modern squire, And his gay train appear; Who duly to the hall retire, A season, every year; And fill the seats with belle and beau, 60 As 'twas so many years ago.

Perchance, all thoughtless as they tread The hollow sounding floor, Of that dark house of kindred dead, Which shall, as heretofore, In turn, receive, to silent rest, Another, and another guest. Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 747 ------The feather'd hearse and sable train, In all its wonted state, Shall wind along the village lane, And stand before the gate; 70 - Brought many a distant county thro', To join the final rendezvous.

And when the race is swept away, All to their dusty beds; Still shall the mellow evening ray Shine gaily o'er their heads: While other faces, fresh and new, Shall occupy the squire's pew. (1816)

A Pair

There was a youth-but woe is me! I quite forget his name, and he Without some label round his neck, Is like one pea among a peck. Go search the country up and down, Port, city, village, parish, town, And, saving just the face and name, You shall behold the very same, Wherever pleasure's train resorts, From the Land's-End to johnny Groats'; IO And thousands such have swell'd the herd, From William, down to George the Third.

To life he started-thanks to fate, In contact with a good estate: Provided thus, and quite at ease, He takes for granted all he sees; Ne'er sends a thought, nor lifts an eye,

r2 From William, down to George the Third] From William the Conqueror (c. 1027-87) to George III (1738-1820), i.e., from the earliest English king to the most recent. Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor

To ask what am I? where? and why? All that is no affair of his, 20 Somehow he came-and there he is! Without such prosing, stupid stuff, Alive and well, and that's enough.

Thoughts! why, if all that crawl like trains Of caterpillars through his brains, With every syllable let fall, Bon mot, and compliment, and all, Were melted down in furnace fire, I doubt if shred of golden wire, To make, amongst it all would linger, 30 A ring for Tom Thumb's little finger. Yet, think not that he comes below The modern, average ratio - The current coin of fashion's mint - The common, ball-room-going stint. Of trifling cost his stock in trade is, Whose business is to please the ladies; Or who to honours may aspire, Of a town beau or country squire. The cant of fashion and of vice To learn, slight effort will suffice; And he was furnish'd with that knowledge, Even before he went to college. And thus, without the toil of thought, Favour and flattery may be bought. No need to win the laurel, now, For lady's smile or vassal's bow; To lie exposed in patriot camp, Or study by the midnight lamp.

Nature and art might vainly strive 50 To keep his intellect alive. - 'Twould not have forc'd an exclamation, Worthy a note of admiration, If he had been on Gibeon's hill,

53 Gibeon's hill) The hill overlooking the town of Gibeon, not far from Jerusalem, is mentioned in 2 Samuel 2:13 for having a famous spring on its southeast side. Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 749

And seen the sun and moon stand still. What prodigy was ever known, To raise the pitch of fashion's tone! Or make it yield, by any chance, That studied air of nonchalance, Which after all, however grac'd, Is apathy, and want of taste. 60

The vulgar every station fill, St. Giles' or]ames's-which you will; Spruce drapers in their masters'• shops, Rank with right honorable fops; No real distinction marks the kinds The raw material of their minds. But mind claims rank that cannot yield To blazon'd arms and crested shield: Above the need and reach it stands, Of diamond stars from royal hands; Nor waits the nod of courtly state, To bid it be, or not be great. The regions where it wings its way, Are set with brighter stars than they: With calm contempt it thence looks down On fortune's favour or its frown; Looks down on those, who vainly try, By strange inversion of the eye, From that poor mole-hill where they sit, To cast a downward look on it: 80 As robin, from his pear-tree height, Looks down upon the eagle's flight.

Before our youth had learnt his letters, They taught him to despise his betters; And if some things have been forgot, That lesson certainly has not. The haunts his genius chiefly graces, Are tables, stables, taverns, races;- The things of which he most afraid is, Are tradesmen's bills, and learned ladies: 90 He deems the first a grievous bore, But loathes the latter even more Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor

Than solitude or rainy weather, Unless they happen both together.

Soft his existence rolls away, To-morrow plenteous as today: He lives, enjoys, and lives anew, - And when he dies, -what shall we do! ~-~- Down a close street, whose darksome shops display, 100 Old clothes and iron on both sides the way; Loathsome and wretched, whence the eye in pain, Averted turns, nor seeks to view again; Where lowest dregs of human nature dwell, More loathsome than the rags and rust they sell; A pale mechanic rents an attic floor; By many a shatter'd stair you gain the door: 'Tis one poor room, whose blacken'd walls are hung With dust that settled there when he was young. The rusty grate two massy bricks displays, uo To fill the sides and make a frugal blaze. The door unhing'd, the window patch'd and broke; The panes obscur'd by half a century's smoke: There stands the bench at which his life is spent; Worn, groov'd, and bor'd, and worm-devour'd, and bent: Where daily, undisturb'd by foes or friends, In one unvaried attitude he bends. His tools, long practis'd, seem to understand Scarce less their functions, than his own right hand. With these he drives his craft with patient skill; r20 Year after year would find him at it still: The noisy world around is changing all, War follows peace, and kingdoms rise and fall; France rages now, and Spain, and now the Turk; Now victory sounds;-but there he sits at work! A man might see him so, then bid adieu, - Make a long voyage to China or Peru; There traffic, settle, build; at length might come, Alter'd, and old, and weather-beaten home, And find him on the same square foot of floor, 130 On which he left him twenty years before. Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 751

- The self same bench, and attitude, and stool, The same quick movement of his cunning tool; The very distance 'twixt his knees and chin, As though he had but stepp'djust out and in.

Such is his fate-and yet you might descry A latent spark of meaning in his eye. - That crowded shelf beside his bench, contains One old, worn, volume that employs his brains: With algebraic lore its page is spread, Where a and b contend with x and z: Sold by some student from an Oxford hall, - Bought by the pound upon a broker's stall. On this it is his sole delight to pore, Early and late, when working time is o'er: But oft he stops, bewilder'd and perplex'd, At some hard problem ill the learned text; Pressing his hand upon his puzzled brain, At what the dullest school-boy could explain.

From needful sleep the precious hour he saves, To give his thirsty mind the stream it craves: 150 There, with his slender rush beside him plac'd, He drinks the knowledge in with greedy haste. At early morning, when the frosty air Brightens Orion and the northern Bear, His distant window mid the dusky row, Shews a dim light to passenger below. -A light more dim is flashing on his mind, That shows its darkness, and its views confin'd. Had science shone around his early days, How had his soul expanded in the blaze! 160 But penury bound him, and his mirid in vain Struggles and writhes beneath her iron chain.

-At length the taper fades, and distant cry Of early sweep bespeaks the mornillg nigh; Slowly it breaks, - and that rejoicing ray, That wakes the healthful country illto day, Tips the green hills, slants o'er the level plain, 752 Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor

Reddens the pool, and stream, and cottage pane, And field, and garden, park, and stately hall, - Now darts obliquely on his wretched wall. He knows the wonted signal; shuts his book, Slowly consigns it to its dusty nook; Looks out awhile, with fut and absent stare, On crowded roofs, seen through the foggy air; -Stirs up the embers, takes his sickly draught, Sighs at his fortunes, and resumes his craft. (r8r6)

* In the original this read "masters."

from "Philip-A Fragment"

Peggy, his sole domestic, slowly grew To be, in fact, his sole companion too. When first she came she never thought-nor he With her odd master she could make so free: - She was not pert:-he wished not to confer With any living-doubtless, not with her. But man is social, e'en against his will; And woman kind, whatever rank she fill. Her master came a lonely stranger here; IO Feeble, dejected, friendless- 'twould appear. She pitied;-woman does; nor pitied less, For knowing not the cause of his distress. She was not young; and had her troubles known; So that she felt his sorrows with her own; And soon resolved to labour, all she could, To cheer his spirits, and to do him good.

Though few and mean the attainments she could boast, Peggy had passed her life upon the coast; And she could thoughts and sentiments disclose, Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor 753

Such as the inland peasant rarely knows. 20 On squally nights, or when it blew a gale, Long she would stand, recounting tale on tale, Of wreck or danger, or of rescue bold, That she had witnessed, or her kindred told; Bringing each long-lost circumstance to mind: And genuine feeling taught her where to find Terms more expressive, though of vulgar use, Than hours of patient study will produce. Her native eloquence would place in view The very scene, and all its terrors too. 30 Meantime, to excuse her stay, she used to stand, The tidy hearth still trimming-brush in hand: Till he, with kind, though not familiar air, Would interrupt with - "Peggy, take a chair." A chair she took;-less easy when she had; But soon resumed her tale, and both were glad. Thus she became, at length, a parlour guest; And he was happier, though 'twas ne'er confessed: Rocks, sea, and hills, were here his friends by choice; - But there is music in the human voice. 40

So passed their evenings oft; but now and then, As the mood seized him, he would take a pen; Wherewith, though slowly, into form was cast A brief unfinished record of the past. Whene'er for this her master gave the word, His faithful Peggy neither spoke nor stirred: She took her knitting-chose a distant seat, And there she sat so still, and looked so neat, 'Twas quite a picture;-there was e'en a grace In the trim border round her placid face. 50

When Philip wrote he never seemed so well, - Was startled even if a cinder fell, And quickly worried;-Peggy saw it all, And felt the shock herself, if one did fall. Of knowledge, she had little in her head; But a nice feeling often serves instead; And she had more than many better bred. 754 Ann Taylor and Jane Taylor

But now he felt, like men of greater note, The harmless wish of reading what he wrote:- 60 Not to the world;-no, that he could not bear; But here sat candid Peggy, in her chair: And so it was, that he, whose inward woe Was much too sacred for mankind to know, He - so refined, mysterious, and so proud, To a poor servant read his life aloud. How weak is man, amused with things like these! Or else, how vain are writers! which you please.

All Peggy heard she deemed exceeding good; But chiefly praised the parts she understood. 70 At these, by turns, she used to smile or sigh; And, with full credit, pass the other by: While he, like men and wits of modern days, Felt inly flattered by her humble praise. Yet vigour failed to accomplish the design; And 'twas but seldom he would add a line: But when he died-some years ago at Lea, Old Peggy sent the manuscript to me.