No More Learning

. . .

"Why is he wandering on the sea? --
Coleridge should now with Wordsworth be.
By slow degrees he'd steal away
Their woes, and gently bring a ray
(So happily he'd time relief,)
Of comfort from their very grief.
He'd tell them that their brother dead,
When years have passed o'er their head,
Will be remembered with such holy,
True and tender melancholy,
That ever this lost brother John
Will be their heart's companion.
His voice they'll always hear,
His face they'll always see;
There's naught in life so sweet
As such a memory. "

(See 'Final Memorials of Charles Lamb', by Thomas Noon Talfourd, vol.
ii. pp. 233, 234. )--Ed.





* * * * *





"WHEN, TO THE ATTRACTIONS OF THE BUSY WORLD"


Composed 1800 to 1805. --Published 1815


[The grove still exists; but the plantation has been walled in, and is
not so accessible as when my brother John wore the path in the manner
here described.
The grove was a favourite haunt with us all while we
lived at Town-end. --I. F. ]

This was No. VI. of the "Poems on the Naming of Places. " For several
suggested changes in MS. see Appendix I. p. 385. --Ed.




When, to the attractions of the busy world,
Preferring studious leisure, I had chosen
A habitation in this peaceful Vale,
Sharp season followed of continual storm
In deepest winter; and, from week to week, 5
Pathway, and lane, and public road, were clogged
With frequent showers of snow. Upon a hill
At a short distance from my cottage, stands
A stately Fir-grove, whither I was wont
To hasten, for I found, beneath the roof 10
Of that perennial shade, a cloistral place
Of refuge, with an unincumbered floor.
Here, in safe covert, on the shallow snow,
And, sometimes, on a speck of visible earth,
The redbreast near me hopped; nor was I loth 15
To sympathise with vulgar coppice birds
That, for protection from the nipping blast,
Hither repaired. --A single beech-tree grew
Within this grove of firs! and, on the fork
Of that one beech, appeared a thrush's nest; 20
A last year's nest, conspicuously built
At such small elevation from the ground
As gave sure sign that they, who in that house
Of nature and of love had made their home
Amid the fir-trees, all the summer long 25
Dwelt in a tranquil spot.