"my native village." 193 



He perished ere his prime ; but they who know 



What ^tis to battle with a world of woe, 



From youth to elder manhood, feel too well 



That grief at last within the deepest cell 



Of the poor heart will bring decay, and shake 



So fierce the soul — that Care like Age will make 



* The grasshopper a burden/ Slowly came 



The mortal stroke, but to the end the flame 



Of Poesy burnt bright. With feeble hand 



He touched his harp, but not at his command 



Came now the rich, old music. Faintly fell 



On his pained ear the strains he loved so well 



And then his heart was broken. ^Neath yon sward. 



Flower-sprinkled now, rests Harewood's peasant bard ; 



While power and opulence with senseless prate, 



And useless pity, seem to mourn his fate ; 



With fulsome epitaph insult his grave. 



And eulogize the man they would not save/' p.p. 13, to 16. 



It has been argued that Carrington gave too frequent 

 repetitions of the individual elements of landscape, 

 but no one has suggested what ought to be done 

 instead ; he sang of Nature — and Nature, in the cir- 

 cumscribed field to which the poet was confined, pre- 

 sented similar elements in different scenes, so that the 

 utmost he could do was to present varied combinations 

 of the several charms before him, and this he has done 

 with, at least, very good effect. 



Objections have also been raised to Carrington's 

 frequent use of compound epithets, and verbs with 

 prefixed prepositions ; we know that Gifford abused 

 Keats in good set terms for the same thing, and that 

 Wordsworth has entered his protest against all such 

 expressions ; but with due deference to the opinions of 

 such great men, we must say that Carrington had pre- 

 cedents in Milton, Byron, Wilson, Moore, and some 

 few others, who were or are reputed to possess a little 

 knowledge of poetical language : in the use of such words 

 he has certainly not erred — and the question, did he 

 use them too often ? cannot be well answered until 

 some canon has been established by critics, and recog- 

 nized by poets, stating the exact number allowable in 

 a given series of lines. 



VOL. II.— 1833. a2 



