Half-hours with the Poets
I.—MR. WORDSWORTH AND THE LITTLE COTTAGE GIRL.
"I met a little cottage girl,She was eight years old she said,Her hair was thick with many a curlThat clustered round her head."WORDSWORTH.
"I met a little cottage girl,
She was eight years old she said,
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered round her head."
WORDSWORTH.
This is what really happened.
Over the dreary downs of his native Cumberland the aged laureate was wandering with bowed head and countenance of sorrow.
Times were bad with the old man.
In the south pocket of his trousers, as he set his face to the north, jingled but a few odd coins and a cheque for St. Leon water. Apparently his cup of bitterness was full.
In the distance a child moved—a child in form, yet the deep lines upon her face bespoke a countenance prematurely old.
The poet espied, pursued and overtook the infant. He observed that apparently she drew her breath lightly and felt her life in every limb, and that presumably her acquaintance with death was of the most superficial character.
"I must sit awhile and ponder on that child," murmured the poet. So he knocked her down with his walking-stick and seating himself upon her, he pondered.
Long he sat thus in thought. "His heart is heavy," sighed the child.
At length he drew forth a note-book and pencil and prepared to write upon his knee. "Now then, my dear young friend," he said, addressing the elfin creature, "I want those lines upon your face. Are you seven?"
"Yes, we are seven," said the girl sadly, and added, "I know what you want. You are going to question me about my afflicted family. You are Mr. Wordsworth, and you are collecting mortuary statistics for the Cottagers' Edition of the Penny Encyclopaedia."
"You are eight years old?" asked the bard.
"I suppose so," answered she. "I have been eight years old for years and years."
"And you know nothing of death, of course?" said the poet cheerfully.
"How can I?" answered the child.
"Now then," resumed the venerable William, "let us get to business. Name your brothers and sisters."
"Let me see," began the child wearily; "there was Rube and Ike, two I can't think of, and John and Jane."
"You must not count John and Jane," interrupted the bard reprovingly; "they're dead, you know, so that doesn't make seven."
"I wasn't counting them, but perhaps I added up wrongly," said the child; "and will you please move your overshoe off my neck?"
"Pardon," said the old man. "A nervous trick, I have been absorbed; indeed, the exigency of the metre almost demands my doubling up my feet. To continue, however; which died first?"
"The first to go was little Jane," said the child.
"She lay moaning in bed, I presume?"
"In bed she moaning lay."
"What killed her?"
"Insomnia," answered the girl. "The gaiety of our cottage life, previous to the departure of our elder brothers for Conway, and the constant field-sports in which she indulged with John, proved too much for a frame never too robust."
"You express yourself well," said the poet. "Now, in regard to your unfortunate brother, what was the effect upon him in the following winter of the ground being white with snow and your being able to run and slide?"
"My brother John was forced to go," answered she. "We have been at a loss to understand the cause of his death. We fear that the dazzling glare of the newly fallen snow, acting upon a restless brain, may have led him to a fatal attempt to emulate my own feats upon the ice. And, oh, sir," the child went on, "speak gently of poor Jane. You may rub it into John all you like; we always let him slide."
"Very well," said the bard, "and allow me, in conclusion, one rather delicate question: Do you ever take your little porringer?"
"Oh, yes," answered the child frankly—
"'Quite often after sunset,When all is light and fair,I take my little porringer'—
"'Quite often after sunset,
When all is light and fair,
I take my little porringer'—
"I can't quite remember what I do after that, but I know that I like it."
"That is immaterial," said Wordsworth. "I can say that you take your little porringer neat, or with bitters, or in water after every meal. As long as I can state that you take a little porringer regularly, but never to excess, the public is satisfied. And now," rising from his seat, "I will not detain you any longer. Here is sixpence—or stay," he added hastily, "here is a cheque for St. Leon water. Your information has been most valuable, and I shall work it, for all I am Wordsworth." With these words the aged poet bowed deferentially to the child and sauntered off in the direction of the Duke of Cumberland's Arms, with his eyes on the ground, as if looking for the meanest flower that blows itself.