Another Visit to London
Clare had not entirely recovered from this illness, when in May, 1824, he once more accepted the invitation of his publishers to visit London. They were desirous that he should have the benefit of the advice of Dr. Darling, the kind-hearted physician already mentioned. On seeing him in Fleet Street, Dr. Darling ordered that he should be kept perfectly free from excitement of all kinds, but at the end of two or three weeks he was permitted to meet a literary party composed chiefly of contributors to the “London Magazine.” Among the guests were Coleridge, Lamb, De Quincey, Hazlitt, and Allan Cunningham. In the manuscript memoir to which reference has already been made, Clare noted down his impressions of Coleridge and others, and they are embodied in Mr. Martin’s account of this visit. He was a frequent visitor to Mrs. Emmerson, and a few days before he left London was once more thrown into the society of Rippingille, who declared that he had left Bristol solely for the purpose of meeting his friend. Clare, obeying implicitly the injunctions of Dr. Darling, declined all invitations to revelry, and therefore the companionship was less prejudicial to his health and spirits than on the occasion of his former visit. At his publishers, Clare made the acquaintance of Mr.(afterwards Sir Charles) Elton, brother-in-law of Hallam, the historian, and uncle to the subject of “In Memoriam.” Mr. Elton, who was a friend and patron of Rippingille, was much pleased with Clare, and while he was yet in London sent him from Clifton the following metrical epistle, which afterwards appeared in the “London Magazine.” It contains several interesting touches of portraiture:—
So loth, friend John, to quit the town!
’T was in the dales thou won’st renown;
I would not, John, for half a crown,
Have left thee there,
Taking my lonely journey down
To rural air.
The pavement flat of endless street
Is all unsuited to thy feet,
The fog-wet smoke is all unmeet
For such as thou,
Who thought’st the meadow verdure sweet,
But think’st not now.
“Time’s hoarse unfeather’d nightingales” [3]
Inspire not like the birds of vales:
I know their haunts in river dales,
On many a tree,
And they reserve their sweetest tales,
John Clare, for thee.
I would not have thee come to sing
Long odes to that eternal spring
On which young bards their changes ring,
With buds and flowers:
I look for many a better thing
Than brooks and bowers.
’T is true thou paintest to the eye
The straw-thatched roof with elm trees high,
But thou hast wisdom to descry
What lurks below—
The springing tear, the melting sigh,
The cheek’s heart-glow.
The poets all, alive and dead,
Up, Clare, and drive them from thy head!
Forget whatever thou hast read
Of phrase or rhyme,
For he must lead and not be led
Who lives through time.
What thou hast been the world may see,
But guess not what thou still may’st be:
Some in thy lines a Goldsmith see,
Or Dyer’s tone:
They praise thy worst; the best of thee
Is still unknown.
Some grievously suspect thee, Clare:
They want to know thy form of prayer:
Thou dost not cant, and so they stare,
And hint free-thinking:
They bid thee of the devil beware,
And vote thee sinking.
With smile sedate and patient eye,
Thou mark’st the zealots pass thee by
To rave and raise a hue and cry
Against each other:
Thou see’st a Father up on high;
In man a brother.
I would not have a mind like thine
Its artless childhood tastes resign,
Jostle in mobs, or sup and dine
Its powers away,
And after noisy pleasures pine
Some distant day.
And, John, though you may mildly scoff,
That hard, afflicting churchyard cough
Gives pretty plain advice, “Be off,
While yet you can.”
It is not time yet, John, to doff
Your outward man.
Drugs! can the balm of Gilead yield
Health like the cowslip-yellow’d field?
Come, sail down Avon and be heal’d,
Thou Cockney Clare.
My recipe is soon reveal’d—
Sun, sea, and air.
What glue has fastened thus thy brains
To kennel odours and brick lanes?
Or is it intellect detains?
For, faith, I’ll own
The provinces must take some pains
To match the town.
Does Agnus (1) fling his crotchets wild—
“In wit a man,” in heart a child?
Has Lepus (2) sense thine ear beguiled
With easy strain?
Or hast thou nodded blithe, and smiled
At Janus’ (3) vein?
Does Nalla, (4) that mild giant, bow
His dark and melancholy brow?
Or are his lips distending now
With roaring glee
That tells the heart is in a glow—
The spirit free?
Or does the Opium-eater (5) quell
Thy wondering sprite with witching spell?
Read’st thou the dreams of murkiest hell
In that mild mien?
Or dost thou doubt yet fear to tell
Such e’er have been?
And while around thy board the wine
Lights up the glancing eyeballs’ shine,
Seest thou in elbow’d thought recline
The Poet true (6)
Who in “Colonna” seems divine
To me and you?
But, Clare, the birds will soon be flown:
Our Cambridge wit resumes his gown:
Our English Petrarch trundles down
To Devon’s valley:
Why, when our Maga’s out of town,
Stand shilly-shally?
The table-talk of London still
Shall serve for chat by rock and rill,
And you again may have your fill
Of season’d mirth,
But not if spade your chamber drill
Six feet in earth.
Come, then! Thou never saw’st an oak
Much bigger than a wagon spoke:
Thou only could’st the Muse invoke
On treeless fen:
Then come and aim a higher stroke,
My man of men.
The wheel and oar, by gurgling steam,
Shall waft thee down the wood-brow’d stream,
And the red channel’s broadening gleam
Dilate thy gaze,
And thou shalt conjure up a theme
For future lays.
And thou shalt have a jocund cup
To wind thy spirits gently up—
A stoup of hock or claret cup
Once in a way,
And we’ll take notes from Mistress Gupp (8)
That same glad day.
And Rip Van Winkle (9) shall awake
From his loved idlesse for thy sake,
In earnest stretch himself, and take
Pallet on thumb,
Nor now his brains for subjects rake—
John Clare is come!
His touch will, hue by hue, combine
Thy thoughtful eyes, that steady shine,
The temples of Shakesperian line,
The quiet smile,
The sense and shrewdness which are thine,
Withouten guile.
The following key accompanied the letter on its publication:—
1. Agnus = Charles Lamb.
2. Lepus = Julius Hare, author of “Guesses at Truth.”
3. Janus = The writer in the “London Magazine” who signed himself Janus Weathercock.
4. Nalla = Allan Cunningham.
5. Opium-eater = De Quincey, author of “The Confessions of an English Opium-eater.”
6. The Poet true = The writer who assumes the name of Barry Cornwall.
7. The English Petrarch = The Rev. Mr. Strong, translator of Italian sonnets.
8. Mistress Gupp = A lady immortalized by her invention to keep muffins warm on the lid of the tea-urn.
9. Rip Van Winkle = E. V. Rippingille, painter of the “Country Post Office,” the “Portrait of a Bird,” &c.