The BROTHERS. *

(* This Poem was intended to be the concluding poem of a series of pastorals, the scene of which was laid among the mountains of Cumberland and Westmoreland. I mention this to apologise for the abruptness with which the poem begins.)

(* This description of the Calenture is sketched from an imperfect recollection of an admirable one in prose, by Mr. Gilbert, Author of the Hurricane.)

LEONARD.

You live, Sir, in these dales, a quiet life:

Your years make up one peaceful family;

And who would grieve and fret, if, welcome come

And welcome gone, they are so like each other,

They cannot be remember’d. Scarce a funeral5

Comes to this church-yard once in eighteen months;

And yet, some changes must take place among you:

And you, who dwell here, even among these rocks

Can trace the finger of mortality,

And see, that with our threescore years and ten10

We are not all that perish.——I remember,

For many years ago I pass’d this road,

There was a foot-way all along the fields

By the brook-side—’tis gone—and that dark cleft!

To me it does not seem to wear the face15

Which then it had.

PRIEST.

Why, Sir, for aught I know,

That chasm is much the same—

LEONARD.

But, surely, yonder—

PRIEST.

Aye, there indeed, your memory is a friend20

That does not play you false.—On that tall pike,

(It is the loneliest place of all these hills)

There were two Springs which bubbled side by side,

As if they had been made that they might be

Companions for each other: ten years back,25

Close to those brother fountains, the huge crag

Was rent with lightning—one is dead and gone,

The other, left behind, is flowing still.——

For accidents and changes such as these,

Why we have store of them! a water-spout30

Will bring down half a mountain; what a feast

For folks that wander up and down like you

To see an acre’s breadth of that wide cliff

One roaring cataract!—a sharp May storm

Will come with loads of January snow,35

And in one night send twenty score of sheep

To feed the ravens; or a Shepherd dies

By some untoward death among the rocks:

The ice breaks up and sweeps away a bridge—

A wood is fell’d:—and then for our own homes!40

A Child is born or christen’d, a Field plough’d,

A Daughter sent to service, a Web spun,

The old House-clock is deck’d with a new face;

And hence, so far from wanting facts or dates

To chronicle the time, we all have here45

A pair of diaries, one serving, Sir,

For the whole dale, and one for each fire-side—

Your’s was a stranger’s judgment: for Historians

Commend me to these vallies.

LEONARD.

Yet your Church-yard50

Seems, if such freedom may be used with you,

To say that you are heedless of the past.

An orphan could not find his mother’s grave:

Here’s neither head nor foot-stone, plate of brass,

Cross-bones or skull, type of our earthly state55

Or emblem of our hopes: the dead man’s home

Is but a fellow to that pasture-field.

PRIEST.

Why there, Sir, is a thought that’s new to me.

The Stone-cutters, ’tis true, might beg their bread

If every English Church-yard were like ours:60

Yet your conclusion wanders from the truth.

We have no need of names and epitaphs;

We talk about the dead by our fire-sides,

And then, for our immortal part ! we want

No symbols, Sir, to tell us that plain tale:65

The thought of death sits easy on the man

Who has been born and dies among the mountains.

LEONARD.

Your Dalesmen, then, do in each other’s thoughts

Possess a kind of second life: no doubt

You, Sir, could help me to the history70

Of half these Graves?

PRIEST.

For eight-score winters past,

With what I’ve witness’d, and with what I’ve heard,

Perhaps I might; and, on a winter’s evening,

If you were seated at my chimney’s nook,75

By turning o’er these hillocks one by one

We two could travel, Sir, through a strange round,

Yet all in the broad high-way of the world.

Now there’s a grave—your foot is half upon it,

It looks just like the rest; and yet that Man80

Died broken-hearted.

LEONARD.

’Tis a common case,

We’ll take another: who is he that lies

Beneath yon ridge, the last of those three graves;—

It touches on that piece of native rock85

Left in the church-yard wall.

PRIEST.

That’s Walter Ewbank.

He had as white a head and fresh a cheek

As ever were produc’d by youth and age

Engendering in the blood of hale fourscore.90

For five long generations had the heart

Of Walter’s forefathers o’erflow’d the bounds

Of their inheritance, that single cottage,

—You see it yonder! and those few green fields.

They toil’d and wrought, and still, from Sire to Son,95

Each struggled, and each yielded as before

A little—yet a little—and old Walter,

They left to him the family heart, and land

With other burthens than the crop it bore.

Year after year the old man still kept up100

A chearful mind, and buffetted with bond,

Interest and mortgages; at last he sank,

And went into his grave before his time.

Poor Walter! whether it was care that spurr’d him

God only knows, but to the very last105

He had the lightest foot in Ennerdale:

His pace was never that of an old man:

I almost see him tripping down the path

With his two Grandsons after him—but You,

Unless our Landlord be your host to-night,110

Have far to travel, and in these rough paths

Even in the longest day of midsummer—

LEONARD.

But these two Orphans!

PRIEST.

Orphans! such they were—

Yet not while Walter liv’d—for, though their Parents115

Lay buried side by side as now they lie,

The old Man was a father to the boys,

Two fathers in one father: and if tears,

Shed when he talk’d of them where they were not,

And hauntings from the infirmity of love,120

Are aught of what makes up a mother’s heart,

This old Man in the day of his old age

Was half a mother to them.—If you weep, Sir,

To hear a Stranger talking about Strangers,

Heaven bless you when you are among your kindred!125

Aye. You may turn that way—it is a grave

Which will bear looking at.

LEONARD.

These Boys—I hope

They lov’d this good old Man—

PRIEST.

They did—and truly:130

But that was what we almost overlook’d,

They were such darlings of each other. For

Though from their cradles they had liv’d with Walter,

The only Kinsman near them in the house,

Yet he being old, they had much love to spare,135

And it all went into each other’s hearts.

Leonard, the elder by just eighteen months,

Was two years taller: ’twas a joy to see,

To hear, to meet them! from their house the School

Was distant three short miles—and in the time140

Of storm and thaw, when every water-course

And unbridg’d stream, such as you may have notic’d

Crossing our roads at every hundred steps,

Was swoln into a noisy rivulet,

Would Leonard then, when elder boys perhaps145

Remain’d at home, go staggering through the fords

Bearing his Brother on his back.—I’ve seen him,

On windy days, in one of those stray brooks,

Aye, more than once I’ve seen him mid-leg deep,

Their two books lying both on a dry stone150

Upon the hither side: and once I said,

As I remember, looking round these rocks

And hills on which we all of us were born,

That God who made the great book of the world

Would bless such piety—155

LEONARD.

It may be then—

PRIEST.

Never did worthier lads break English bread!

The finest Sunday that the Autumn saw,

With all its mealy clusters of ripe nuts,

Could never keep these boys away from church,160

Or tempt them to an hour of sabbath breach.

Leonard and James! I warrant, every corner

Among these rocks and every hollow place

Where foot could come, to one or both of them

Was known as well as to the flowers that grow there.165

Like Roe-bucks they went bounding o’er the hills:

They play’d like two young Ravens on the crags:

Then they could write, aye and speak too, as well

As many of their betters—and for Leonard!

The very night before he went away,170

In my own house I put into his hand

A Bible, and I’d wager twenty pounds,

That, if he is alive, he has it yet.

LEONARD.

It seems, these Brothers have not liv’d to be

A comfort to each other.—175

PRIEST.

That they might

Live to that end, is what both old and young

In this our valley all of us have wish’d,

And what, for my part, I have often pray’d:

But Leonard—180

LEONARD.

Then James still is left among you!

PRIEST.

’Tis of the elder Brother I am speaking:

They had an Uncle, he was at that time

A thriving man, and traffick’d on the seas:

And, but for this same Uncle, to this hour185

Leonard had never handled rope our shroud.

For the Boy lov’d the life which we lead here;

And, though a very Stripling, twelve years old,

His soul was knit to this his native soil.

But, as I said, old Walter was too weak190

To strive with such a torrent; when he died,

The Estate and House were sold, and all their Sheep,

A pretty flock, and which for aught I know,

Had clothed the Ewbanks for a thousand years.

Well—all was gone, and they were destitute.195

And Leonard, chiefly for his Brother’s sake,

Resolv’d to try his fortune on the seas.

’Tis now twelve years since we had tidings from him.

If there was one among us who had heard

That Leonard Ewbank was come home again,200

From the great Gavel*, down by Leeza’s Banks,

And down the Enna, far as Egremont,

The day would be a very festival,

And those two bells of ours, which there you see

Hanging in the open air—but, O good Sir!205

This is sad talk—they’ll never sound for him

Living or dead—When last we heard of him

He was in slavery among the Moors

Upon the Barbary Coast—’Twas not a little

That would bring down his spirit, and, no doubt,210

Before it ended in his death, the Lad

(* The Great Gavel, so called, I imagine, from its resemblance to the Gable end of a house, is one of the highest of the Cumberland mountains. It stands at the head of the several vales of Ennerdale, Wastdale, and Borrowdale.

The Leeza is a River which flows into the Lake of Ennerdale: on issuing from the Lake, it changes its name, and is called the End, Eyne, or Enna. It falls into the sea a little below Egremont.)

LEONARD.

If that day

Should come, ’twould needs be a glad day for him;

He would himself, no doubt, be happy then

As any that should meet him—215

PRIEST.

Happy! Sir—

LEONARD.

You said his kindred all were in their graves,

And that he had one Brother—

PRIEST.

That is but

A fellow tale of sorrow. From his youth220

James, though not sickly, yet was delicate,

And Leonard being always by his side

Had done so many offices about him,

That, though he was not of a timid nature,

Yet still the spirit of a Mountain Boy225

In him was somewhat check’d; and, when his Brother

Was gone to sea and he was left alone,

The little colour that he had was soon

Stolen from his cheek, he droop’d, and pin’d and pin’d—

LEONARD.

But these are all the graves of full-grown men!230

PRIEST.

Aye, Sir, that pass’d away: we took him to us.

He was the Child of all the dale—he liv’d

Three months with one, and six months with another;

And wanted neither food, nor clothes, nor love:

And many, many happy days were his.235

But, whether blithe or sad, ’tis my belief

His absent Brother still was at his heart.

And, when he liv’d beneath our roof, we found

(A practice till this time unknown to him)

That often, rising from his bed at night,240

He in his sleep would walk about, and sleeping

He sought his Brother Leonard—You are mov’d!

Forgive me, Sir: before I spoke to you,

I judg’d you most unkindly.

LEONARD.

But this Youth,245

How did he die at last?

PRIEST.

One sweet May morning,

It will be twelve years since, when Spring returns,

He had gone forth among the new-dropp’d lambs,

With two or three Companions whom it chanc’d250

Some further business summon’d to a house

Which stands at the Dale-head. James, tir’d perhaps,

Or from some other cause, remain’d behind.

You see yon Precipice—it almost looks

Like some vast building made of many crags;255

And in the midst is one particular rock

That rises like a column from the vale,

Whence by our Shepherds it is call’d, the Pillar.

James, pointed to its summit, over which

They all had purpos’d to return together,260

And told them that he there would wait for them:

They parted, and his Comrades pass’d that way

Some two hours after, but they did not find him

Upon the Pillar—at the appointed place.

Of this they took no heed: but one of them, 265

Going by chance, at night, into the house

Which at that time was James’s home, there learn’d

That nobody had seen him all that day:

The morning came, and still, he was unheard of:

The neighbours were alarm’d, and to the Brook270

Some went, and some towards the Lake; ere noon

They found him at the foot of that same Rock—

Dead, and with mangled limbs. The third day after

I buried him, poor Lad, and there he lies.

LEONARD.

And that then is his grave!—Before his death275

You said that he saw many happy years?

PRIEST.

Aye, that he did—

LEONARD.

And all went well with him—

PRIEST.

If he had one, the Lad had twenty homes.

LEONARD.

And you believe then, that his mind was easy—280

PRIEST.

Yes, long before he died, he found that time

Is a true friend to sorrow; and unless

His thoughts were turn’d on Leonard’s luckless fortune,

He talk’d about him with a chearful love.

LEONARD.

He could not come to an unhallow’d end!285

PRIEST.

Nay, God forbid! You recollect I mention’d

A habit which disquietude and grief

Had brought upon him; and we all conjectur’d

That, as the day was warm, he had lain down

Upon the grass, and, waiting for his comrades290

He there had fallen asleep; that in his sleep

He to the margin of the precipice

Had walk’d, and from the summit had fallen head-long,

And so no doubt he perish’d: at the time,

We guess, that in his hands he must have had295

His Shepherd’s staff; for midway in the cliff,

It had been caught; and there for many years

It hung—and moulder’d there.