4 



The Ski,// of the Poet Crabbe. 



about to narrate. Indeed, the only reference I can find to the poet, 

 at all, in the Magazine^ relates to his collection of fossils, and other 

 memorials of him which were exhibited in the temporary Museum, 

 in the County Hall, Trowbridge, in August, 1872, at the nineteenth 

 Meeting of the Society {Wilts Arch. Mag., vol. xiii., p. 315). 



The Dean of Salisbury, the Very Eev. G. D. Boyle, however, 

 chose Crabbe as the first subject for his pen in a series of articles 

 on " Wiltshire Worthies," in the quarterly magazine known as 

 Warminster Work, vol. iv., No. 1, pp. 1 — 5, for April, 1893, and 

 he writes thus of the only poem of Crabbe's which can be reckoned 

 as a Wiltshire work : — 



" In the ' Tales of the Hall ' there are passages of great beauty, that show 

 how thoroughly and completely the poet had imbibed the true spirit of English 

 scenery, and the true character of the working men of England." 



The standard life of Crabbe is that by his son, the Rev. George 

 Crabbe, prefixed to the collected edition of the poet's works in eight 

 volumes, published in 1834, and afterwards issued complete, in one 

 volume, by Murray, in 1847, and subsequently ; and to that, those 

 who wish to read the story of his strange and interesting career 

 should turn. A handy little " Life " by T. E. Kebbel, in the 

 " Great Writers" series, was published in 1888, and this has a 

 bibliography by J. P. Anderson, of the British Museum. 



Crabbe's connection with Wiltshire began in 1814, in which 

 year, on March 18th, he was instituted by the then Bishop of 

 Salisbury, John Fisher, D.D., to the Rectory of St. James, 

 Trowbridge, on the presentation of John Henry, fifth Duke of 

 Rutland — who was the poet's generous and unvarying patron — 

 the benefice being vacant by the cession of the Rev. Gilbert 

 Beresford. His induction to the benefice, which was then a 

 peculiar of the Bishop's, did not take place until June 3rd, 1814, 

 and he remained rector until his death on February 3rd, 1832, 

 aged 77. 



Crabbe's literary work — his last, after his coming to Trowbridge, 

 consisted in his Tales of the Hall, written in the years 1817-18, 

 and published in two vols. 8vo, in June, 1819. For this, and for 



