A rosy lass approached my view; I caught her blue eyes' modest beam; The stranger nodded 'How-d'ye-do?' And leaped across the infant stream. The water heedless passed away; With me her glowing image stayed; I strove, from that auspicious day, To meet and bless the lovely maid. I met her where beneath our feet Through downy moss the wild thyme grew; Nor moss elastic, flowers though sweet, Matched Hannah's cheek of rosy hue. I met her where the dark woods wave, Our plighted vows to heaven are flown; [Lines addressed to my Children.] [Occasioned by a visit to Whittlebury Forest, Northamptonshire, in August 1800.] Genius of the forest shades, Lend thy power, and lend thine ear; A stranger trod thy lonely glades, Amidst thy dark and bounding deer; Inquiring childhood claims the verse, O let them not inquire in vain; Be with me while I thus rehearse The glories of thy silvan reign. Thy dells by wintry currents worn, Their honoured leaves the green oaks reared, Hail, greenwood shades, that, stretching far, Defy e'en summer's noontide power, When August in his burning car Withholds the clouds, withholds the shower. The deep-toned low from either hill, Down hazel aisles and arches green- From my charmed heart the numbers sprung, Where human foot had seldom strayed, I read aloud to every hill Sweet Emma's love, 'the Nut-brown Maid.' Shaking his matted mane on high, The gazing colt would raise his head, How would each sweeping ponderous bough How would the prone descending shower But peace was there: no lightnings blazed; Some clouds must dim your coming day; Now, at the dark wood's stately side, My seat was destined to the main. Before your father's father breathed! Perhaps they'll many a conflict brave, 'Genius of the forest shades,' Sweet from the heights of thy domain, When the gray evening shadow fades, To view the country's golden grain; To view the gleaming village spire 'Midst distant groves unknown to meGroves that, grown bright in borrowed fire, Bow o'er the peopled vales to thee. Where was thy elfin train, that play Round Wake's huge oak, their favourite tree, Dancing the twilight hours away? Why were they not revealed to me? Yet, smiling fairies left behind, Affection brought you all to view; To love and tenderness resigned, My heart heaved many a sigh for you. When morning still unclouded rose, Refreshed with sleep and joyous dreams, Where fruitful fields with woodlands close, I traced the births of various streams. From beds of clay, here creeping rills, Unseen to parent Ouse, would steal; Or, gushing from the northward hills, Would glitter through Tove's winding dale. But ah! ye cooling springs, farewell! Lend thy power, and lend thine ear; But dreams still lengthen thy long glades, And bring thy peace and silence here. [Description of a Blind Youth.] For from his cradle he had never seen Fond to excess was he of all that grew; [Banquet of an English Squire.] Then came the jovial day, no streaks of red Had plucked his flowers, and still he held his sway, Nature's own carpet spread the space between, And silence followed as he stretched his hand: At length the damasked cloths were whisked away They viewed him, while his ale was filling round, His cup was full, and where the blossoms bowed May-day with the Muses. [The Soldier's Home.] 'The topic is trite, but in Mr Bloomfield's hands it almost assumes a character of novelty. Burns's Soldier's Return is not, to our taste, one whit superior.'-Professor Wilson.] My untried Muse shall no high tone assume, I tell my feelings in one happy hour: But what an hour was that! when from the main How sweet it was to breathe that cooler air, never; They roll and foam, and roll and foam for ever. But here was peace, that peace which home can nature of his abstruse studies, some specimens of yield; The grasshopper, the partridge in the field, And glory's quagmire, where the brave are lost. JOHN LEYDEN. JOHN LEYDEN, a distinguished oriental scholar as well as poet, was a native of Denholm, Roxburghshire. He was the son of humble parents, but the ardent Borderer fought his way to learning and celebrity. His parents seeing his desire for instruction, determined to educate him for the church, and he was entered of Edinburgh College in 1790, in the fifteenth year of his age. He made rapid progress; was an excellent Latin and Greek scholar, and acquired also the French, Spanish, Italian, and German, besides studying the Hebrew, Arabic, and Persian. He became no mean proscience. Indeed, every difficulty seemed to vanish before his commanding talents, his retentive memory, and robust application. His college vacations were spent at home; and as his father's cottage afforded him little opportunity for quiet and seclusion, he looked out for accommodations abroad. 'In a wild recess,' says Sir Walter Scott, 'in the den or glen which gives name to the village of Denholm, he contrived a sort of furnace for the purpose of such chemical experiments as he was adequate to performing. But his chief place of retirement was the small parish church, a gloomy and ancient building, generally believed in the neighbourhood to be haunted. To this chosen place of study, usually locked during week-days, Leyden made entrance by means of a window, read there for many hours in the day, and deposited his books and specimens in a retired pew. It was a well-chosen spot of seclusion, for the kirk -excepting during divine service-is rather a place of terror to the Scottish rustic, and that of Cavers was rendered more so by many a tale of ghosts and witchcraft, of which it was the supposed scene, and to which Leyden, partly to indulge his humour, and partly to secure his retirement, contrived to make some modern additions. The ficient in mathematics and various branches of natural history, as toads and adders, left exposed in their spirit-phials, and one or two practical jests played off upon the more curious of the peasantry, rendered his gloomy haunt not only venerated by the wise, but feared by the simple of the parish.' From this singular and romantic study, Leyden sallied forth, with his curious and various stores, to astonish his college associates. He already numbered among his friends the most distinguished literary and scientific men of Edinburgh. On the expiration of his college studies, Leyden accepted the situation of tutor to the sons of Mr Campbell of Fairfield, whom he accompanied to the university of St Andrews. There he pursued his own researches connected with oriental learning, and in 1799, published a sketch of the Discoveries and Settlements of the Europeans in Northern and Western Africa. He wrote also various copies of verses and translations from the northern and oriental languages, which he published in the Edinburgh Magazine. In 1800, Leyden was ordained for the church. He continued, however, to study and compose, and contributed to Lewis's Tales of Wonder and Scott's Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border. So ardent was he in assisting the editor of the Minstrelsy, that he on one occasion walked between forty and fifty miles, and back again, for the sole purpose of visiting an old person who possessed an ancient historical ballad. His next publication was a new edition of the Complaynt of Scotland, an ancient work written about 1548, which Leyden enriched with a preliminary dissertation, notes, and a glossary. He also undertook the management, for one year, of the Scots Magazine. His strong desire to visit foreign countries induced his friends to apply to government for some appointment for him connected with the learning and languages of the east. The only situation which they could procure was that of surgeon's assistant; Leyden qualified himself, and obtained his diploma. and in five or six months, by incredible labour, The sudden change of his profession,' says Scott, gave great amusement to some of his friends.' In Christmas fleet of Indiamen, in consequence of his December 1802, Leyden was summoned to join the appointment as assistant-surgeon on the Madras establishment. He finished his poem, the Scenes of Infancy, descriptive of his native vale, and left Scotland for ever. After his arrival at Madras, the health of Leyden gave way, and he was obliged to remove to Prince of Wales Island. He resided there for some time, visiting Sumatra and the Malayan peninsula, and amassing the curious information concerning the language, literature, and descent of the Indo-Chinese tribes, which afterwards enabled him to lay a most valuable dissertation before the Asiatic Society at Calcutta. Leyden quitted Prince of Wales Island, and was appointed a professor in the Bengal College. This was soon exchanged for a more lucrative appointment, namely, that of a judge in Calcutta. His spare time was, as usual, I may die in the attempt,' he wrote to a friend, devoted to oriental manuscripts and antiquities. but if I die without surpassing Sir William Jones a hundredfold in oriental learning, let never a tear for me profane the eye of a Borderer.' The possibility of an early death in a distant land often crossed the mind of the ambitious student. In his Scenes of Infancy, he expresses his anticipation of such an event in a passage of great melody and pathos : The silver moon at midnight cold and still, While large and pale the ghostly structures grow, Is that dull sound the hum of Teviot's stream? In 1811, Leyden accompanied the governorgeneral to Java. 'His spirit of romantic adventure,' says Scott, 'led him literally to rush upon death; for, with another volunteer who attended the expedition, he threw himself into the surf, in order to be the first Briton of the expedition who should set foot upon Java. When the success of the well-concerted movements of the invaders had given them possession of the town of Batavia, Leyden displayed the same ill-omened precipitation, in his haste to examine a library, or rather a warehouse of books, in which many Indian manuscripts of value were said to be deposited. A library in a Dutch settlement was not, as might have been expected, in the best order; the apartment had not been regularly ventilated, and either from this circumstance, or already affected by the fatal sickness peculiar to Batavia, Leyden, when he left the place, had a fit of shivering, and declared the atmosphere was enough to give any mortal a fever. The presage was too just: he took his bed, and died in three days (August 28, 1811), on the eve of the battle which gave Java to the British empire.' The Poetical Remains of Leyden were published in 1819, with a Memoir of his Life, by the Rev. James Morton. Sir John Malcolm and Sir Walter Scott both honoured his memory with notices of his life and genius. The Great Minstrel has also alluded to his untimely death in his Lord of the Isles: Scarba's Isle, whose tortured shore Scenes sung by him who sings no more, The allusion here is to a ballad by Leyden, entitled The Mermaid, the scene of which is laid at Corrievreckan, and which was published with another, The Cout of Keeldar, in the Border Minstrelsy. His longest poem is his Scenes of Infancy, descriptive of his native vale of Teviot. His versification is soft and musical; he is an elegant rather than a forcible poet. His ballad strains are greatly superior to his Scenes of Infancy. Sir Walter Scott has praised the opening of The Mermaid, as exhibiting a power of numbers which, for mere melody of sound, has seldom been excelled in English poetry. Sonnet on Sabbath Morn. With silent awe I hail the sacred morn, Ode to an Indian Gold Coin. So bright, whom I have bought so dear? The jackal's shriek bursts on mine ear When mirth and music wont to cheer. By Cherical's dark wandering streams, Where loves of youth and friendships smiled, Uncursed by thee, vile yellow slave! Fade, day-dreams sweet, from memory fade! Revives no more in after-time. I haste to an untimely grave; The daring thoughts that soared sublime Are sunk in ocean's southern wave. Slave of the mine! thy yellow light Gleams baleful as the tomb-fire drear. A gentle vision comes by night My lonely widowed heart to cheer: Her eyes are dim with many a tear, That once were guiding stars to mine; Her fond heart throbs with many a fear! I cannot bear to see thee shine. For thee, for thee, vile yellow slave, I left a heart that loved me true! I crossed the tedious ocean-wave, To roam in climes unkind and new. The cold wind of the stranger blew Chill on my withered heart; the grave Dark and untimely met my viewAnd all for thee, vile yellow slave ! Ha! com'st thou now so late to mock A wanderer's banished heart forlorn, Now that his frame the lightning shock Of sun-rays tipt with death was borne? From love, from friendship, country, torn, To memory's fond regrets the prey; Vile slave, thy yellow dross I scorn! Go mix thee with thy kindred clay ! *Jeffrey considered (Edinburgh Review, 1805) that Grahame borrowed the opening description in his Sabbath from the above sonnet by Leyden. The images are common to poetry, besides being congenial to Scottish habits and feelings. The Mermaid. On Jura's heath how sweetly swell The murmurs of the mountain bee! How softly mourns the writhed shell Of Jura's shore, its parent sea! But softer floating o'er the deep, The Mermaid's sweet sea-soothing lay, That charmed the dancing waves to sleep, Before the bark of Colonsay. Aloft the purple pennons wave, As, parting gay from Crinan's shore, From Morven's wars, the seamen brave Their gallant chieftain homeward bore. In youth's gay bloom, the brave Macphail Still blamed the lingering bark's delay: For her he chid the flagging sail, The lovely maid of Colonsay. 'And raise,' he cried, 'the song of love, "When on this ring of ruby red Shall die," she said, "the crimson hue, Know that thy favourite fair is dead, Or proves to thee and love untrue." Now, lightly poised, the rising oar Disperses wide the foamy spray, And echoing far o'er Crinan's shore, Resounds the song of Colonsay: 'Softly blow, thou western breeze, Softly rustle through the sail! Soothe to rest the furrowy seas, Before my love, sweet western gale! 'Where the wave is tinged with red, And the russet sea-leaves grow, Mariners, with prudent dread, Shun the shelving reefs below. 'As you pass through Jura's sound, Bend your course by Scarba's shore; Shun, O shun, the gulf profound, Where Corrievreckan's surges roar ! 'If from that unbottomed deep, With wrinkled form and wreathed train, O'er the verge of Scarba's steep, The sea-snake heave his snowy mane, 'Unwarp, unwind his oozy coils, 'Softly blow, thou western breeze, Softly rustle through the sail! Soothe to rest the furrowed seas, Before my love, sweet western gale!' Thus all to soothe the chieftain's woe, Far from the maid he loved so dear, The song arose, so soft and slow, He seemed her parting sigh to hear. The lonely deck he paces o'er, Impatient for the rising day, And still from Crinan's moonlight shore, He turns his eyes to Colonsay. |