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Mary Stanger.
FIELDSIDE, KESWICK, FEBRUARY 5TH, 1890.
Child of the brother to that generous man
Who, vowed to Death, bequeathed his friend release
From trivial care, and gave the Muses ease,
And set laborious Wordsworth in the van—
You knew ‘Nurse Wilsey,’ coaxed old ‘Clogger Dan,’
Climbed unreproved on Southey's genial knees,
Watched for the bard's homecoming through the trees,
And, wreath in hand, to crown the Laureate ran.
Who, vowed to Death, bequeathed his friend release
From trivial care, and gave the Muses ease,
And set laborious Wordsworth in the van—
You knew ‘Nurse Wilsey,’ coaxed old ‘Clogger Dan,’
Climbed unreproved on Southey's genial knees,
Watched for the bard's homecoming through the trees,
And, wreath in hand, to crown the Laureate ran.
Bright shone the sun, the Crosthwaite bells rang clear,
When blue-eyed Sara and that Rydal maid,
The gentle Dora, tended you as bride.
But now another bridal morn is here,
Christ in the heavens has called you to His side,
And all the vale is rolled from sun to shade.
When blue-eyed Sara and that Rydal maid,
The gentle Dora, tended you as bride.
But now another bridal morn is here,
Christ in the heavens has called you to His side,
And all the vale is rolled from sun to shade.
Mary Stanger, only daughter of William Calvert of Windybrow, and niece of Raisley Calvert, Wordsworth's benefactor, remembered well her going down to Greta Hall to welcome Robert Southey on his return from London after his appointment as Laureate and told me how she helped to weave the crown of laurel which his children then placed upon his head. At her marriage Sara Coleridge and Dora Wordsworth were bridesmaids.
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