Legends and Lyrics-1 [1]
poor words of remembrance of their lamented child, strikingly
illustrates the honesty, independence, and quiet dignity, of the
lady's character. I had known her when she was very young; I had
been honoured with her father's friendship when I was myself a
young aspirant; and she had said at home, "If I send him, in my own
name, verses that he does not honestly like, either it will be very
painful to him to return them, or he will print them for papa's
sake, and not for their own. So I have made up my mind to take my
chance fairly with the unknown volunteers."
Perhaps it requires an editor's experience of the profoundly
unreasonable grounds on which he is often urged to accept
unsuitable articles--such as having been to school with the
writer's husband's brother-in-law, or having lent an alpenstock in
Switzerland to the writer's wife's nephew, when that interesting
stranger had broken his own--fully to appreciate the delicacy and
the self-respect of this resolution.
Some verses by Miss Procter had been published in the Book of
Beauty, ten years before she became Miss Berwick. With the
exception of two poems in the Cornhill Magazine, two in Good Words,
and others in a little book called A Chaplet of Verses (issued in
1862 for the benefit of a Night Refuge), her published writings
first appeared in Household Words, or All the Year Round. The
present edition contains the whole of her Legends and Lyrics, and
originates in the great favour with which they have been received
by the public.
Miss Procter was born in Bedford Square, London, on the 30th of
October, 1825. Her love of poetry was conspicuous at so early an
age, that I have before me a tiny album made of small note-paper,
into which her favourite passages were copied for her by her
mother's hand before she herself could write. It looks as if she
had carried it about, as another little girl might have carried a
doll. She soon displayed a remarkable memory, and great quickness
of apprehension. When she was quite a young child, she learned
with facility several of the problems of Euclid. As she grew
older, she acquired the French, Italian, and German languages;
became a clever pianoforte player; and showed a true taste and
sentiment in drawing. But, as soon as she had completely
vanquished the difficulties of any one branch of study, it was her
way to lose interest in it, and pass to another. While her mental
resources were being trained, it was not at all suspected in her
family that she had any gift of authorship, or any ambition to
become a writer. Her father had no idea of her having ever
attempted to turn a rhyme, until her first little poem saw the
light in print.
When she attained to womanhood, she had read an extraordinary
number of books, and throughout her life she was always largely
adding to the number. In 1853 she went to Turin and its
neighbourhood, on a visit to her aunt, a Roman Catholic lady. As
Miss Procter had herself professed the Roman Catholic Faith two
years before, she entered with the greater ardour on the study of
the Piedmontese dialect, and the observation of the habits and
manners of the peasantry. In the former, she soon became a
proficient. On the latter head, I extract from her familiar
letters written home to England at the time, two pleasant pieces of
description.
A BETROTHAL
"We have been to a ball, of which I must give you a description.
Last Tuesday we had just done dinner at about seven, and stepped
out into the balcony to look at the remains of the sunset behind
the mountains, when we heard very distinctly a band of music, which
rather excited my astonishment, as a solitary organ is the utmost
that toils up here. I went out of the room for a few minutes, and,
on my returning, Emily said, 'Oh! That band is playing at the
farmer's near here. The daughter is fiancee to-day, and they have
a ball.' I said, 'I wish I was going!' 'Well,' replied she, 'the
farmer's wife did call to invite us.' 'Then I shall certainly go,'
I exclaimed. I applied