Poetry By English Women

by R. E. ; Pritchard

  The first flowers of the year,

  Culled from the precincts of our home,

  From nooks to memory dear.

  With some sad thoughts the work was done,

  Unprompted and unbidden,

  But joy it brought to my hidden life,

  To consciousness no longer hidden. [40]

  I felt a power unfelt before,

  Controlling weakness, languor, pain;

  It bore me to the terrace walk

  I trod the hills again; –

  No prisoner in this lonely room,

  I saw the green banks of the Wye,

  Recalling thy prophetic words,

  Bard, brother, friend from infancy!

  No need of motion, or of strength,

  Or even the breathing air: [50]

  – I thought of Nature’s loveliest scenes;

  And with memory I was there.

  JANE TAYLOR 1783–1824

  Her father was Isaac Taylor, of Ongar, an engraver who became a Nonconformist minister in Colchester; her elder sister, Ann Gilbert, was also a successful writer. From 1812, lived with her brother; wrote mostly children’s and religious verse (‘Twinkle, twinkle, little star’), but frequently displays a dry humour and social observation.

  Essays in Rhyme, on Morals and Manners (London, 1816).

  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 loved, I think, about as true,

  As such near neighbours mostly do. [10]

  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;

  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 James’s, when they meet.

  Poor Mrs. Sam sits all alone,

  And frets herself to skin and bone. [30]

  For months she managed, she declares,

  All the old gentleman’s affairs;

  And always let him have his way,

  And never left him night nor day;

  Waited and watched 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.

  Been left as handsome as they say?” [40]

  “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 bombazine!”

  “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. –

  So then we laughed, and drank our tea. [50]

  “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!”

  “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! O, 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 coming down [80]

  Is quite a blessing to the town.”

  At that our hostess fetched 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 maybe 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.

  Some innuendos more had passed,

  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.

  Perhaps it’s false – I hope it may, [100]

  – But let it go no farther, 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;

  We, panting every breath between, [110]

  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.

  Indeed, ’twas more than time to go, [120]

  Our boy had been an hour below.

  So, warmly pressing Mrs. G.

  To fix a day to come to tea,

  We muffled up in cloak and plaid,

  And trotted home behind the lad.’

  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.

  How since these trappings first were new,


  How many a cloudless day,

  To rob the velvet of its hue,

  Has come and passed away! [10]

  How many a setting sun has made

  That curious lattice-work of shade!

  Crumbled beneath the hillock green,

  The cunning hand must be,

  That carved 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 broidered 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]

  – 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.

  Outstretched together, are expressed

  He and my lady fair;

  With hands uplifted on the breast,

  In attitudes of prayer; [40]

  Long visaged, clad in armour, he,

  With ruffled 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

  But generations new, [50]

  In regular descent from him,

  Have filled the stately pew;

  And in the same succession go,

  To occupy the vault below.

  And now, the polished, 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,

  As ’twas so many years ago. [60]

  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.

  The feathered 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 through

  To join the final rendez-vous.

  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.

  FELICIA DOROTHEA HEMANS 1793–1835

  She met the tempest, meekly brave,

  Then turn’d o’erwearied to the grave.

  Perhaps the most popular woman poet throughout the century. ‘The Homes of England’ has now effectively disappeared into Noel Coward’s exuberant parody – ‘The stately homes of England, / How beautiful they stand, / To prove the upper classes / Have still the upper hand …’ Born Felicia Dorothea Browne, in Liverpool, fifth child of a successful Irish merchant. In 1807 her first volume of poems was printed; in 1812 married an army officer, Captain Hemans, by whom she had five sons before he left her in 1818. Wrote profusely, over a wide range, dealing with Biblical and historical material (Byron derided her writings on Greece); William Rossetti later criticized her poetry for its ‘cloying flow of right-minded perceptions of moral and material beauty’. An exponent of the developing Victorian myth of the pure, long-suffering woman, her Records of Woman provided a series of moral-sentimental stories of virtuous female suffering.

  Works of Felicia Dorothea Hemans (London, 1839).

  The Homes of England

  The stately homes of England,

  How beautiful they stand,

  Amidst their tall ancestral trees,

  O’er all the pleasant land!

  The deer across their greensward bound,

  Through shade and sunny gleam;

  And the swan glides past them with the sound

  Of some rejoicing stream.

  The merry homes of England!

  Around their hearths by night, [10]

  What gladsome looks of household love

  Meet in the ruddy light!

  There woman’s voice flows forth in song,

  Or childhood’s tale is told,

  Or lips move tunefully along

  Some glorious page of old.

  The blessed homes of England!

  How softly on their bowers

  Is laid the holy quietness

  That breathes from Sabbath hours! [20]

  Solemn, yet sweet, the church-bell’s chime

  Floats through their woods at morn;

  All other sounds, in that still time,

  Of breeze and leaf are born.

  The cottage homes of England!

  By thousands on her plains,

  They are smiling o’er the silvery brooks,

  And round the hamlet fanes.

  Through glowing orchards forth they peep,

  Each from its nook of leaves; [30]

  And fearless there the lowly sleep,

  As the bird beneath their eaves.

  The free fair homes of England!

  Long, long in hut and hall,

  May hearts of native proof be reared

  To guard each hallowed wall!

  And green for ever be the groves,

  And bright the flowery sod,

  Where first the child’s glad spirit loves

  Its country and its God!

  The Indian Woman’s Death Song

  Down a broad river of the western wilds,

  Piercing thick forest-glooms, a light canoe

  Swept with the current: fearful was the speed

  Of the frail bark, as by a tempest’s wing

  Borne leaf-like on to where the mist of spray

  Rose with the cataract’s thunder. Yet within,

  Proudly, and dauntlessly, and all alone,

  Save that a babe lay sleeping at her breast,

  A woman stood! Upon her Indian brow

  Sat a strange gladness, and her dark hair waved [10]

  As if triumphantly. She pressed her child,

  In its bright slumber, to her beating heart,

  And lifted her sweet voice, that rose awhile

  Above the sound of waters, high and clear,

  Wafting a wild proud strain – a song of death.

  ‘Roll swiftly to the spirits’ land, thou mighty stream and free!

  Father of ancient waters, roll! and bear our lives with thee!

  The weary bird that storms have tossed would seek the sunshine’s calm,

  And the deer that hath the arrow’s hurt flies to the woods of balm.

  ‘Roll on! – my warrior’s eye hath looked upon another’s face, [20]

  And mine hath faded from his soul, as fades a moonbeam’s trace:

  My shadow comes not o’er his path, my whisper to his dream –

  He flings away the broken reed. Roll swifter yet, thou stream!

  ‘The voice that spoke of other days is hushed within his breast,

  But mine its lonely music haunts, and will not let me rest;

  It sings a low and mournful song of gladness that is gone –

  I cannot live without that light. Father of waves! roll on!<
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  ‘Will he not miss the bounding step that met him from the chase?

  The heart of love that made his home an ever-sunny place? [30]

  The hand that spread the hunter’s board, and decked his couch of yore? –

  He will not! Roll, dark foaming stream, on to the better shore!

  ‘Some blessed fount amidst the woods of that bright land must flow,

  Whose water from my soul may lave the memory of this woe;

  Some gentle wind must whisper there, whose breath may waft away

  The burden of the heavy night, the sadness of the day.

  ‘And thou, my babe! though born, like me, for woman’s weary lot,

  Smile! – to that wasting of the heart, my own! I leave thee not;

  Too bright a thing art thou to pine in aching love away –

  Thy mother bears thee far, young fawn! from sorrow and decay.

  She bears thee to the glorious bowers where none are heard to weep, [40]

  And where th’unkind one hath no power again to trouble sleep;

  And where the soul shall find its youth, as wakening from a dream:

  One moment, and that realm is ours. On, on, dark-rolling stream!’

  ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 1806–1861

  ‘One of those rare writers who risk themselves adventurously and disinterestedly in an imaginative life’ (Virginia Woolf). Eldest of eleven children of Mary Graham Clarke and Edward Moulton Barrett, whose wealth derived from Jamaican sugar plantations; he encouraged her warmly, publishing her Battle of Marathon in 1820. From childhood suffered from pulmonary troubles (possibly partly psychosomatic), becoming a persistent invalid, reclining in a darkened room. Father was notoriously possessive; her Poems of 1844 brought an admiring letter from Robert Browning (‘I love your verses with all my heart, dear Miss Barrett’); after a secret courtship, they eloped and married in 1846 (her father never forgave her). Settled in Florence; in 1849 bore a son; in 1851 published Casa Guidi Windows on the Italian Risorgimento, and in 1856 her verse novel, Aurora Leigh, a succès de scandale, a romance on the role of woman and the problems of the poet; in her later years developed spiritualist tastes. At one time she was proposed as Poet Laureate, but her reputation collapsed by the end of the century; a revival seems under way.