The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1852-07-29

silent thought, it may be of lonely wretched-
ness. Here he must often have contemplated
his ruined fortunes, and the desolated home OF
his fathers Here surely his passionate heart
often turned with a fond, vain yearning to-
ward the Hills of Annesley her
who was his life,
The ocean to the river of his thoughts
never before 50 deeply felt how passing
mournful was the story of Byron's first and
only love- That Mary ChawOrth returned the
passion of her young poet-lover, have not a
doubt but like the Montagues and Capulets,
the houses of Chaworth and Byron were at
feud. Mary had not the strength and truth of
Juliet, and 80 they were parted-a separation
by far more piteous for her, and more fatal to
him, than death amid the full summer bright
ness Of happy love. This not Shakspeare's
was the true soul-tragedy. Might she not
have taken the helm of his passion-tossed spirit,
and guided it into deeper and calmer waters {!
Night she not have redeemed even his way
ward and erring nature by the divinity of
pure love and steadfast faith But it was
not to be- Mary bestowed her hand upon
man, of whom little better can be said than
that he ranked "among the most eminent
sportsmen of the dayr-lived, it is said, to
weep wild tears over the words which have
linked her name in sorrowful Immortality with
her lovers. and died in broken heartedness, at
Nashville he, grown reckless restless, and de-
faint, the very core of his heart turned to bitter
ashes, forgetting his God and distressing and
despising his brother, swept on his glorious,
shameful, sorrowful, mad, and stormy career,
till the shadows deepened, and the long night
closed in
The village of Hucknall is the most wretch
ed little hamlet have yet seen in England !;
and the small, mean dilapidated old church
above the vault of the Byron family has not
one venerable or picturesque feature.
The tablet raised to the memory of Byron
by his sister Augusta, is plain, and So in ex-
cellent taste As | stood on that rude slab, in
Chat dismal and mouldy old church. | was
struck most painfully with the shameful I'M
fitness of all the surroundings of has tomb, who
loved beauty with a poets intense passion
who was the soul of taste, refinement, and ele-
gance | could not believe that that grand
head, with its clustering dark curls, those eyes
of strange brightness and lips of proud beau
ty-those fair, patrician hands, and that fiery
and princely heart, were dust and darkness at
my feet Better would it have been to have
laid him, where he willed to lie, by his faithful
"Boatswain," in the vault at Newstead
have not spoken as fully of the Abbey and
grounds of Newstead as | should have done
had not believed you familiar with Washing
ton lryings charming account and the notes
of many other tourists must allow myself
to say, however, that the restoration of the
Abbey seems to me a miracle of good taste and
artistic adaptation; that the building now is a
rare combination of antique picturesqueness,
with modern elegance, of cheerful. home-com-
fort, with an almost monastic quiet and seclu-
sion. Colonel Wildman was a schoomate and
friend of Byron, and lovingly, almost religious
ly, preserves every relic and remembrancer of
the poet.
On our way back to Nottingham, gentle
man of our party told me that the carriage in
which we were belonged to a son of Mary
Chaworth 1t seemed to me an odd little CO.
incidence
At Nottingham, | most reluctantly took
leave of my kind new friends whom God love y
and came home to Edgbaston