The Express.
London, England, 1859-05-10 00:00:00

LONDON, ILUESDAY WINING, MAY 10, 1859.

THE WORDSWORTH HOUSEHOLD.

Sass days ago a paragraph from a literary jour-
nal was found interesting enough to go the round of
the newspapers; a paragraph which told that the
well-known cottage at Rydal Mount wee to be
thrown open on the bth and 6th inst., for the sale of
the effects of the late Wordsworth household. In
the

midst of the tumult of political talk at such a
moment as the present, this intimation quieted many
minds and silenced many tongues. The ofd maw
lions of Lakeland, with its calm mountains and vales
and its recluse poet, ware to many of us like gross
pastures and still waters to a traveller in a volcanic
wilderness. And It was not • mere revulsion
of feeling, a sodden contrast between the hubbub
of domestic and foreign politics and the tran-
quillity of an opposite region of scenery and of
thought; it was not the sensation of the mo-
ment which created so strong an interest in
an item of literary news; it was the thought that a
remarkable period of our intellectual history was to
be closed on those memorable days.. Wordsworth
himself sympathised by anticipation in our melan-
choly on the occasion of the desertion of the last nest
of the songsters of the region. Some of his friends
smiled at the higentitty of Ms self-affliction when,
fifteen years ago, he was met one sunny morning in
a mood of deep gloom. Just behind him, at the foot
of Brie Mount, the road was encumbered with
leather beds and other household gear. One of the
sales, characteristic of the district, where they con-

add& the chief gathering of the" people fro'm the
dales, was going forward, and it upset the old poet
for the day. It was a sight he could not bear, he
said: be had seen so many--Southey's last; and
there now remained, of those which nearly con-
cerned him, only that "up there"—pointing up the
hill—the Rydal Mount saki, which " most take place
before long." Most man would not have told
their thought that day; but it was true; and
the sympathy with survivors felt so long
ago may have been remembered last week,
when the time for the Rydal Mount sale
had arrived. One incident belonging to it mob
strengthens the sense in many minds that a period et
calm contemplation and thought was closing as a
new scene of warfare and struggle was opening.
Thursday, the first day of the sale, was the forty-
sixth anniversary of the Wordsworth,' entranes
into the abode which was to be immortalised as the
poet's home. They had lived for many years is the
neighbourhood ; but this was the home in which the
world knew the poet, and in which he entertained
the friends who lived near him, and the strangers '
who came from all quarters of the globe to pay their
homage. Through forty idx years that threshold
was crewed by most of the chief men of the century,
as well as by representatives of its egotism, its
vanities, its impertinences, and its fanaticism. The
train was thinned, bat not stopped, by the poet's
death. Not only were old friends constant to her
whom he had left, but strangers came, Prinoes on
their travels, and mechanics out for the day's excur-
sion, to hang about the gate, or steal in to get a
sight of the terraces where the poet meditated his
cantos, or the mount whence he gazed on the mea-
dows below and the lake afar. When his widow
died, the last tie appeared to be broken—the put
was finished and done with; but it seems there was
a mere thorough uprooting yet to be witnessed. The
seared threshold was to be trodden by anybody who
chose : the auctioneer's hammer was to be heard on
the terrace where strangers spoke low in natural
awe: the hospitable dining-room was to be crowded
with thirsty people swallowing tea is the intervals
et the bidding.. The tea-table and its utensils, so
well need in the hospitalities of summer evenings,
were to be bid for by persons who had no SIMIOCIA-
dons with them : and so were the sofa where such
conversations had been held, and the gut:len-seats
where such alma hours had been passed. The
paragraph which circulated last week indicated that
strangers would probably throng to the nale to
obtain relics : but it seer to have been
otherwise managed, for the homely
made up such a Woof as these 114111 i ?Iwo
neighbours show in their own way their sum of
something good and great having gone on at the
Mount; but more as claiming hearty approbation
than reverence. So it appears from the view of one
of them -who said of Mn. Wordsworth, in the
first days of her widowhood, "She's a gay (flue)
clever body, who will carry on the business as well
as any of them." Such were the attendants on
the last uprooting of the old home, dear to the whole
country ! The residents who desired relics from the
goods sold (which we observe did not comprehend
books or pictures), purchased them by commission ;
and thus the aspect of the day and the business
meat have been as homely as the poet's experience
of his humble neighbours throughout those forty-
six yaws.
Them remains only the sale of the least valuable
part of his books a few weeks hence, and that sale at
another place. The uprooting of the home is already
complete ; there remains only the memory, and let it
be reverent. The proprietor of the cottage, Lady Le
Fleming, is understood to decree that the rooms
shall not be altered by any future tenant, and surely
the garden and field will be respected. He himself
told us that in the two vales which his Mount over-
looked many a tree had been spared at his interces-
sion, and many a stone left untouched but by the
adorning elements. We cannot bet remember now
his further words in thinking of his own trees and
rocky nooks:
So la it rest; and time will come
Whew here the testier-hearted
May heave • gentle sigh for bit,
As owl of the departed.

THE NEW COETOCATios.—The write for the new
convocation of the province of Canterbury, conssqueut an
the tisesortien of parliament, have boon trued and ere te-
rmer* as the let of .I re. For the diocese of=
the chip of the erehdaecoary of Middlesex are s
to most at B*. Pater church, Covent. garden, to sleet two
proctor. The of of the entsdeemar of Lesion see
smarmed kw the same purpose te M. lepuiehrle, Snow-
Kt. The aeries of the ermilemsa adested by the clergy
will he eabedtted to the Mho% who wM erne re from
seek tresieraary es the strunntatives of the Dooms.
The eleogy of the ercalleeerry of Bane, en rummosed
Is meet of St. Sseiser's, !.Wert, I. shone one ;roo-
ter, sad the ppthee= WNW wilt be the repressor-
live, tadepetriatly of any choke ea the part of the
Bishop of Winner. The same principle will
to adopted fa the rrdiresery of Winchester, the .1".
of whir will peedpeedpeedto Oak dram in the cathedral %
the dimness of Oxford, lure, Oraerter Peterborough,
Weeks, Wormers., end ilerfard, the Ira Illele Is
diorassair end char trio proctor, the pin some
mess pr . and In others the chanoellor. In ths
dioceses of bickerer, Salisbury. Noewish, Rochester,
sad Lioltileld, the clergy meet te rehdreewriee, end
I. some of them the whole et the error's Ward by
the versos areriereorice emetable sad *sees from soon
themselves who shall be the proton he the dimes. 1.
sew cern the clew erred ire arkled to sees In mama-
boa or the wire of arliketearre, without may
father la the deed* af restore far convene-
Elea tore le Ifrl settled plea, may Doom- s having whirr of
their era white &lir elherdme Item others Present sp-
erm to Wires thee la way quarters tree will
reueTr• oppesides, the=lier party in the church
hiving expeaterd a to the Navin] of the
soden &KW of coas=m, end to the Formes which
erne to ben besa made daubs the lose tow year la
that dlerdan. The preozalcetore der the metropoltra
diocese-41m Rey. Dr. Id verse el at. Hager the
Martyr, Leaden-bridge, end I fee. R. O. Berm ALL,
vicar ef FaUmsa—ere Miry to Is resiZatri. la the
Dore of Crehenter, the flaw. Sr
vier of Fret, are Tunbridge-war , who repose.lijrb;
dew laths lot ervocrien, le L. eppeso& by the Rev.
WM= Airbag Fitz-Hugh, 11. k , rector of Street, are
Hursepitspert.
60VT16 lesenterom eirszem.—Doriog the week
wag 7th May, 16.59, the visitors ben bra r &Iron :
gr Oa Waday, Turd oy, and Petunia, dap), 4,066 ;or
Woodsy and Tared., (fres eventer), kb. Os the three
students' days (itionitsiou to the dd.), 1,076; one
traders' emir (Waimea!). I • iksgetwevoling
IMO, Mieresorioal Beeletr-tea4ll,lllll. Fame operas
. of dip meelek, 696.4 K