remembered hereafter." Montgomery: "Horner lived for his own generation; and it was upon that he sought to make an impression: and he was not unsuccessful. Nor perhaps have I been quite unsuccessful either, so far as the inhabitants of Sheffield are concerned, whatever they may think: and doubtless I have written some things which will long float on the stream of time, like drops of oil upon water."

July 11. Montgomery: "As I was walking down from our door this afternoon, Mr. Stead ran after me to say that my old friend, Mrs. Hofland, had, from Sir Arnold Knight's window, seen me pass, and wished at least to exchange a word or two with me before she left Sheffield, as we might never meet again. She is now as much altered as I am, and looks an old woman. After conversing and parting with her, I could not but reflect how near to the same spot, where we had just parted, the last forty or fifty years of my life had been spent ; and how distant and differently hers! It was, I think, in 1803, that I used to walk on an evening to Attercliffe, where she-then Mrs. Hoole, an interesting young widow was living with her mother-in-law, in order to read, talk over, and correct the poems which I afterwards printed for her. I was then full of poetry and criticism: the spring of my blighted hopes was, as I fancied, already past, and the more fortunate summer flowers of my life were beginning to unfold: I was, though physically feeble, in mental vigour." Holland: "Have you seen the Rev. J. Blackburn since his return to Attercliffe from the Holy Land?" Montgomery: "No: but often, since you mentioned his reading the Liturgy under the oak of Mamret, I have

"POEMS, by Barbara Hoole," published 1805. † p. 166 antè.

ABRAHAM AND SARAH-THE JEWS.

173

been with Abraham in the cave of the field of Machpelah before Mamre.' What a sublime passage is that*, in which the father of the faithful, venerable in age, weeping, and oppressed with recent bereavement, is represented as 'standing up from before his dead,' and bargaining with the sons of Heth for a sepulchre! And how affecting the reason which he urges, that I may bury my dead out of my sight.' There is not a more touching and tender passage in the English language. Sarah, whom Abraham had loved so strongly, not only because she was very fair,' but as the sharer of his trials, the companion of his wanderings, the mother of Isaac, in whom his seed was to be 'called,' she, who had been heretofore during so many years the delight of his eyes, he was now anxious to bury out of his sight. And yet," added the poet playfully, "I am afraid Sarah sometimes scolded her lord." Holland: "Why so?" Montgomery: "Because she had, no doubt, with human feelings and infirmities, personal trials, as well as her husband." Holland: "I have just been reading a curious passage from Wilkie's Journal †, relative to the present state of the Jews in Jerusalem. Every Friday, he says, they repair to the ruins of the temple, where they weep and wail, and kiss and hug the great stones that seem to be part of the ancient wall, and beneath which they believe the original tables of the Law to lie buried: at the same time the priest reads the 137th Psalm. On one occasion, while they were thus engaged, and Wilkie looking on, there came up a man with a robe, which he wished the painter to purchase. If the European artist was at first somewhat surprised by this oriental attempt to drive a bargain at such a moment; he was still more astonished * Genesis, xxiii. 3.

† Life of Sir David Wilkie, iii.

when the priest, turning from the recital of his lesson, began to corroborate the assertion of the trader as to the excellence and cheapness of his merchandise !” Montgomery: "The statement, if true and it is not likely to have been invented—shows into how deep a state of degradation the resident Jews are fallen; and yet," he added, with strong emotion, "although the glory has departed from Israel, it is still reflected upon them from the Bible. There is an interest attached to God's ancient people, wherever or however we see or hear of them, collectively or individually, which, to me at least, is exceedingly affecting." Holland: "They have a history." Montgomery: "Indeed they have!"

At the same time he returned to Mr. Holland Halpin's remarks on Oberon's vision in Shakspeare's Midsummer Night's Dream*, which he had borrowed. Montgomery: "I have read the whole of Mr. Halpin's argument: it is very ingenious, and full of learned research, but to me it is not convincing. That Queen Elizabeth was intended by the fair Vestal throned by the west,' cannot surely be doubted; but I do not believe that Shakspeare would ever have made a married woman, who had been carrying on such a guilty intrigue as that of the Countess of Essex with the Earl of Leicester, the subject of sympathy, if not of admiration, în one of the most delicate and beautifully poetic passages in the language. As a poet, my opinion is that Shakspeare had no such recondite allusion as that contended for in these exquisite lines. I certainly would rather believe that he had not, than willingly identify the sweet little western flower,' which I have so long admired as a flower, with the adulterous Lady Lettice.' I shall, therefore, continue to believe that by

* Published by the "Shakspeare Society." 1843.

SHAKSPEARE'S OBERON.

175

'Love in Idleness' the poet meant nothing more than he says, namely, that the two purple leaves of the pansy derived their colour from the blood which flowed from 'Love's wound.' As to the retention of the old reading in the passage Cupid all-armed,' Mr. Halpin is certainly quite right. Warburton's proposal of alarmed' is ridiculous: besides, what had Cupid to be alarmed at? Nothing. He knew better than to be 'alarmed' at what the critic supposes; and Shakspeare knew better than to represent him as being so."

Montgomery was present, with his neighbours, at a farewell party given by Sir Arnold Knight, who was leaving Sheffield for Liverpool. The poet made a short speech, in the middle of which he was much embarrassed. He afterwards remarked that his thoughts seemed to run away from the words, so that it was only when he talked fast that he could overtake and keep up with them. On taking up a printed report of this speech, with a pencilmark opposite the words

"No snow falls lighter than the snow of age,

And none lies heavier, for it never melts;"

he said, "I see you have marked a quotation of mine; I thought it had been in the Pelican Island,' but on looking there I could not find it." Holland: "I am sure the first line is there, and something very like the second." On his being shown the passage, Part I. Canto vii., lines 70, 71.,

66

(No snow falls lighter than the snow of age,

None with such subtlety benumbs the frame,)

'Aye," said he, "I recollect now the alteration of the lines: the latter form is best suited to the context of the poem; but the former is most convenient for independent quotation.'

CHAP. XCI.

1843.

WESLEYAN CONFERENCE.

MONTGOMERY GOES TO BUXTON. LETTERS TO JOHN HOLLAND AND MISS GALES. GRASS OF PARNASSUS.CONVERSATION. -BIRKS ON PROPHETIC INTERPRETATION. SWALLOWS IN A SNOW-STORM. FREE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND. THE QUEEN AT CHATSWORTH. — MARRIAGE OF HARRIET MONTGOMERY.— OLD SHEFFIELD CUTLERY.- SOUTHEY'S POETRY.

THIS summer the Wesleyan Methodist Conference was held in Sheffield. Montgomery entered less into the active proceedings than on previous occasions; and this not from indifference, but want of resolution to encounter the discomfort of heated and crowded chapels. He dined, however, once or twice, with Drs. Bunting and Newton, and several other ministers of the body; took a seat on the conference platform, on the evening when the young preachers were ordained; and kept a bed ready for Mr. Everett, who, however, was not preHe afterwards went to Buxton*, not for "an out" merely, much less for the sake of the company usually to be met with at that gay place, but for the purpose of bathing, a numbness in one of his arms

sent.

* Before leaving home, he composed for a Juvenile Missionary Association, the simple but expressive verses which have so often been reprinted, beginning,

"A grain of corn, an infant's hand

May plant upon an inch of land," &c.

Orig. Hymns.