Summer Sun

Great is the sun, and wide he goes
Through empty heaven with repose;
And in the blue and glowing days
More thick than rain he showers his rays.

Though closer still the blinds we pull
To keep the shady parlour cool,
Yet he will find a chink or two
To slip his golden fingers through.

The dusty attic spider-clad
He, through the keyhole, maketh glad;
And through the broken edge of tiles
Into the laddered hay-loft smiles.

Meantime his golden face around
He bares to all the garden ground,
And sheds a warm and glittering look
Among the ivy's inmost nook.

Above the hills, along the blue,
Round the bright air with footing true,
To please the child, to paint the rose,
The gardener of the World, he goes.

- Robert Louis Stevenson, Summer Sun

 

 

I found a new poem today, one by Robert Louis Stevenson that I have not read. I have a beloved, splintered volume of A Child's Garden of Verses which was given to me 50 Christmases ago from my Grandmother. Between that book and my Mother's influence, I grew to love poetry. For a very long time I did not realize that there were more poems than contained in my one volume. And, I keep finding them!

Stevenson was born practically an invalid in Edinburgh, Scotland in on November 13, 1850. When his Child's Garden of Verses was published in 1885 he dedicated it to his childhood nanny, Alison Cunningham. The poetic verses were supposedly written while Stevenson was suffering from a spell of illness when living for a brief time in Florence, Italy. 

Stevenson's poems were published in a variety of collected works between 1885 and into the years following his death in 1894.

Swallows Travel To and Fro 

Swallows travel to and fro,
And the great winds come and go,
And the steady breezes blow,
Bearing perfume, bearing love.
Breezes hasten, swallows fly,
Towered clouds forever ply,
And at noonday, you and I
See the same sunshine above.

Dew and rain fall everywhere,
Harvests ripen, flowers are fair,
And the whole round earth is bare
To the moonshine and the sun;
And the live air, fanned with wings,
Bright with breeze and sunshine, brings
Into contact distant things,
And makes all the countries one.

Let us wander where we will,
Something kindred greets us still;
Something seen on vale or hill
Falls familiar on the heart;
So, at scent or sound or sight,
Severed souls by day and night
Tremble with the same delight -
Tremble, half the world apart

The Vagabond


From Songs 

of Travel (1896)





Give to me the life I love,
Let the lave go by me,
Give the jolly heaven above
And the byway nigh me.
Bed in the bush with stars to see,
Bread I dip in the river -
There's the life for a man like me,
There's the life for ever.

Let the blow fall soon or late,
Let what will be o'er me;
Give the face of earth around
And the road before me.
Wealth I seek not, hope nor love,
Nor a friend to know me;
All I seek, the heaven above
And the road below me.

Or let autumn fall on me
Where afield I linger,
Silencing the bird on tree,
Biting the blue finger.
White as meal the frosty field -
Warm the fireside haven -
Not to autumn will I yield,
Not to winter even!

Let the blow fall soon or late,
Let what will be o'er me;
Give the face of earth around,
And the road before me.
Wealth I ask not, hope nor love,
Nor a friend to know me;
All I ask, the heaven above

And the road below me. 


A Visit From the Sea



From Underwoods (1887)




Far from the loud sea beaches
  Where he goes fishing and crying
Here in the inland garden
  Why is the sea-gull flying?

Here are no fish to dive for;
  Here is the corn and lea;
Here are the green trees rustling.
  Hie away home to sea!

Fresh is the river water
  And quiet among the rushes;
This is no home for the sea-gull,
  But for the rooks and thrushes.

Pity the bird that has wandered!
  Pity the sailor ashore!
Hurry him home to the ocean,
  Let him come here no more!

High on the sea-cliff ledges
  The white gulls are trooping and crying,
Here among the rooks and roses,
  Why is the sea-gull flying?

Underwoods was dedicated to the numerous doctors that tended to Stevenson during his life life of frequent illness.

Requiem (from Underwoods, 1887)

Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I 
live and gladly die,
    And I laid me down with a will.

This be the 
verse you grave for me:Here he lies where he longed to be;
Home is the sailor, home from sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.

Stevenson and his American wife Fanny traveled to all of the European and exotic places that became the settings for his popular fiction. He died while in Somoa, in the South Pacific, and as requested, his tomb stone was engraved with his poem Requiem.

Find these and additional poems by Robert Louis Stevenson at 

www.poetryloverspage.com.

Margaret meets Margaret

It was a gray and threatening day up in the attic, but I went up with a mug of tea and a mission. Who was Margaret Elizabeth Sangster?
On the previous evening I was searching for springtime quotes to write in cards I had made to celebrate May Day. A floral card was as close to a May basket as I could fashion for far away family and friends.
I came across this:
'Never yet in springtime have the buds forgotten to bloom.'
Now, I will not suggest that I chose it based on the word 'forgotten' because a lot of us are ageing, albeit with style. It rang true as I thought about all of the blustery weather we have endured this past winter and perhaps secretly thought that spring would never arrive.
The quote was attributed to Margaret Elizabeth Sangster, an American writer born in 1838 in Brooklyn, New York and died in 1912 in Glen Ridge, New Jersey. She wrote novels, short stories, poetry and hymns. She was the editor for Harper's Bazaar for a time as well as contributing to many varied women's and Christian periodicals: Ladies Home Journal, Hearth and Home , Christian Intelligencer, Harper's For Young People.
There are a few online sites that offer her biography and many of her works are available as free online books, one or two even available on Kindle.
So I spent the afternoon reading her Victorian musings on everything from God and Nature to Mothers and Brides. Most was expectantly sappy and I was constantly referred to as Dear Reader. Interestingly, however, I find that so much of the sappy-ness was not only expected to be sound advice, but still is sound advice.
I discovered the poem from which my May Day quote was taken, "Awakening."
Online sites I scoured were poemhunter.com and hathitrust.org and cyberhymnal.org. On the hymnal site are the words she wrote for the hymn 'The Ships Glide in At The Harbor's Mouth' and they are printed for you to sing along with as an organ meters out the melody.
As I was assuming that my quote was from a poem I began reading over the available poem titles. Some intrigued me, like "A Haunted House." It does not sound like a topic for a sappy Victorian poem, let alone an inspirational Christian poem. Perhaps she did not have an editor, or she was the editor. But, I enjoyed the poem at its conclusion.

A Haunted House

It stands neglected, silent, far from the ways of men,
A lonely little cottage beside a lonely glen;
And, dreaming there, I saw it when sunset's golden
rays
Had touched it with the glory of other, sweeter days.

They say the house is haunted, and - well, it is, I
guess,
For every empty window just aches with loneliness;
With loneliness that tortures and memory that flays;
Ah, yes, the house is haunted with ghosts of other
days.

The ghost of childish laughter rings on the narrow
stair,
And, from a silent corner, the murmur of a prayer
Steals out, and then a love song, and then a bugle
call,
And steps that do not falter along the quiet hall.

The story of the old house that stands beside the
glen?
That story is forgotten by every one; but when
The house is touched and softened by sunset's golden
rays,
I know that ghosts must haunt it, the ghosts of
sweeter days.

Yes? Some of her works were quite idyllic featuring the countryside and pastures. Others painted grimy scenes of city sidewalks, but brightened by window boxes of "Scarlet Flowers."

Most anything mentioning the sea attracts my attention:

 

 

The Old Sailor

I've crossed the bar at last, mates,
My longest voyage is done;
And I can sit here, peaceful,
And watch th' setting sun
A-smilin' kind of glad like
Upon the waves so free.
My longest voyage is done, mates,
But oh, the heart of me,
Is out where sea meets skyline!
My longest voyage is done. . . .
But - can I sit, in peace, mates,
And watch the settin' sun?

For what's a peaceful life, mates,
When every breeze so free,
When every gale a-blowin',
Brings messages to me?
And is the sky so shinin',
For all it's golden sun,
To one who loves the sea, mates,
And knows his voyage is done?
And, can a year on land, mates,
Match with one day - at sea?
Ah, every wind a-singin'
Brings memory to me!

I've crossed the bar at last, mates,
My longest voyage is past,
And I must watch the sunset,
Must see it fade, at last.
My steps are not so light, mates,
As they were, years ago;
And sometimes, when I'm tired,
My head droops kind of low -
Yet, though I'm old and - weary,
The waves that dance so free,
Keep callin' to my soul, mates,
And thrill the heart of me!

 

And now Gentle Reader, advice from her practical manual, revised and republished in 1921 after her death, Good Manners for all Occasions: including etiquette of cards, wedding announcements and invitations : December Courts May.

An excerpt:

What is there in common between persons whose age is very far removed from equality? A tiny handful of years makes not much difference. A wife looks up to and adores a husband a few years her senior.

Ten, fifteen, eighteen, or twenty years of priority on the husband's side are no bar to a perfect marriage.

Bur thirty years or forty years are, of course, inadmissible, and when December with money bags weighing him down, courts May, with roses and lilies and never a cent, or she would not look at the old fossil, the proprieties are hopelessly violated.

... To be happy in marriage people must have many common interests, must be congenial through and through. Therefore, ye who are wise, eschew as you would the adversary himself with his panoply of hoofs and horns, that abominable contract know as THE MARRIAGE OF CONVENIENCE.

Well, I believe I have a great new wealth of information and resources for the fall Friday morning series 'Everything I know I learned over a cup of tea" ...

It was, a delightful afternoon.

 

 

Caskets in The Shop at the Hunter House Victorian Museum

The latest wholesale issue of Victorian Trading Company arrived at the museum last week and all of the volunteers gathered around to see what new items were being offered. The volunteers are some of The Shop's best customers, thanks in part to the discount the museum affords them.




As advertised on the front of their catalog, Victorian Trading Company prides itself in its selection of antique replica gifts, home decoratives and domestics, greetings/stationery, jewelry and accessories. In their jewelry selection this season is a  Victorian Jewelry Casket described as: Intricately detailed, the glass-lidded chamber will harbor your precious baubles while complementing perfume atomizers and other vanity-top lovelies. 6x2."
It does indeed resemble a sarcophagus with a glass lid. The oblong body, no pun intended, is an aged silver color with engraved details and a clasp. The feet appear to be a representation of a fleur-de-lis motif. Some definitions suggest that word casket is a corruption of the French cassette, small box; perhaps that explains the fleur-de-lis emblem that is associated with French royalty. The lily flower is also associated with purity and resurrection. And of course, the feet may not even be a fleur-de-lis at all; the picture in the catalog is rather small!



A casket for jewelry, you might muse. Today's society associates caskets with cemeteries. In earlier years and cultures caskets were containers, repositories for valuables, such as jewels and documents. During the romantic wave that swept over the Victorian Era, death became softened even romanticized. Graveyards, with their puritanical associations, grew into park like cemeteries. The word cemetery comes from a Greek word meaning sleeping space. In this peaceful resting place coffins transformed into caskets, a place to keep the earthly remains of loved ones.


After the discussion about caskets and coffins, graveyards and cemeteries and heaven and .... well, the question remained: do we purchase the jewelry casket for The Shop? And the answer: we haven't decided.
On a related note, the Victorian Era park like cemeteries we have in Norfolk and throughout the Commonwealth are quite lovely spaces and especially at this time of the year. It is not unusual at all to take a drive or a stroll in cemeteries. The art is magnificent. The nature is restorative. Get out of the car or off the bike and wander about to read the stones. Do please obey cemetery rules and regulations. If the cemetery has an office or even a gift shop, stop in for a tour map. If there is a donation box, consider leaving a contribution to help with future conservation and preservation efforts. Enjoy!

Yellow Blooms in the Garden

One of the most pleasant moments of the day is opening the black iron gate into the museum's garden and entering under the trellis of a Lady Banks rose.
The spring garden is sparse, but the new green of leafing trees and rose bushes and grass is complemented by the joy of the yellow marsh marigold, daffodils and forsythia.
I am neither a horticulturist nor a gardener, but I love flowers and trees and have learned many of their names and attributes even if I did not inherit my mother's green thumb to actually cultivate them. My mother always had a yard in bloom and in later years had two yards in bloom, hers and the museum's.
A great deal of what is currently in the museum's garden came either from her garden or was planted by her. The forsythia is a hardy shrub, thankfully, as the one in the garden was traumatized when someone ran into the brick wall from the parking lot a couple of years back. The landscaper rescued it and put it back in place with the hope that it would survive. And survive it has.
The yellow forsythia blooms before it leafs out. The plant was named for the British botanist William Forsyth (1737 - 1804), a founding member of the Royal Horticulture Society in 1804. He has been credited as the royal gardener for the gardens at Kensington Palace and St. James's Palace.
Britain's Queen Anne, who reigned between 1702 and 1714, worked to have the Kensington Palace Gardens established as a public flower garden. Her flower of choice, so it has been noted, was the jonquil.
Jonquil, daffodil, narcissus ... I know, there are 27,000 different daffodils in 13 classes according to The Daffodil Society (UK). I grew up calling these playful flowers jonquils. I read a somewhat amusing note on a gardener's site/page that claimed that the daffodil is only referred to as jonquil in 'the south.' Well, then.
I do not want to get too scientific about this - my apologies to anyone offended - because I just want to enjoy the beauty of the blooms and the spaces they populate. It is always the best of winter surprises when a few pop up and burst into color. Chances are they will be under snow the next week.
Again, my mother always referred to the bulb as the jonquil or narcissus. I knew the name Narcissus from Greek mythology. (Narcissus was a beautiful god who would sit by still pools of water and admire his reflection. Once he went down to embrace his reflection, thinking it was the most handsome of gods, and fell in - drowned - tragic. Thus, people who become enamoured with themselves are often described as narcissistic.)
I do not believe I even heard the term daffodil until I was introduced to William Wordsworth's poem 'I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud.'
 

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

 

Just a few years ago I walked through parts of the Lake Country in England where William and his sister Dorothy lived. It was late spring, but there were some end of the season blooms weathering it out. I felt as though I had arrived at the end of a pilgrimage of sorts.

The daffodil has been named as the birth flower for the month of March. (Who gets to name birthstones and state reptiles and such?) In various sources noting the language of flowers, the daffodil means respect, regard, the flower of death, and the most poetic, ' you are an angel.'

I picked up a beautiful old post card at an antique store several years ago (probably longer than that now as the price penciled on the back is $2.00); it depicts a bouquet of daffodils with the sentiment:

Daffodils (Regard) 

That come before

The swallow dares,

And take

The winds of March

With beauty.

 

Now, to the most exciting information I read just today: The Daffodil Society (UK) Established in 1898 as the specialist society of Great Britain for all who are interested in the Genus Narcissus, is holding its Annual Show in Coughton Court, Warwickshire - just outside of Stratford upon Avon - on April 19 and 20th. The official website for the society refers to the event as 'Yellow Fever;' which is a little ominous for folks in Tidewater, but ...

AND volunteers are needed to help with the weekend's events.

AND, according to the website's information: No Daffodil Society show is complete without the traditional fish and chip/ chicken and chip supper on  Friday night.  We are delighted that the NT is prepared to provide this for us at 7pm on Friday 18 April. Numbers are critical so ensure that you book with the Society Secretary well in advance and no later than Thursday 17 April 2014. Prices are being finalised and will be on the website shortly.

 

www.thedaffodilsociety.com/wordpress.  Check it out. I think we've still got time, and we've still  time to reserve a fish and chip dinner!

The Pleasure of Your Company ...

Our website, our blog, our everything is undergoing change, hard for traditionalists like me. Call it spring cleaning, if you will.
The museum re-opens for the new season (number 26)  this Wednesday, April 2. Often on April Fools Day we offer free admission; this season we are offering an Open House on Saturday April 5 and Sunday April 6. There is no admission fee. We want you to be our guest and enjoy the beauty and splendor of the Hunter's Home. Please visit with us on Saturday between 10 AM and 3:30 PM or Sunday between 12:30 PM and 3:30 PM.
The Shop at the Hunter House Victorian Museum has been replenished with lovely spring inspired items in the season's soft pastels. There are only a few Easter items, but they are as sweet as can be; think foil covered chocolate bunnies and chicks, only these are not chocolate. They would be delightful at place settings on your spring dining or tea table, or sitting in your windowsill, or in a floral arrangement, or peeping out of an Easter basket. Use your imagination!
Spring is for the birds, and not just Robin Red Breast and Jenny Wren. You'll find bird cages adapted for pillar candles (or whatever else you fancy), matching plates and mugs with depictions of familiar backyard birds, hummingbird ornaments that have far more uses than simply hanging on a Christmas tree (although, feel free to buy ahead for the holidays), tea towels and hand towels.
Introduce spring into the dining room with cheerful yellow or blissful blue table runners adorned with white embroidered butterflies.
Fairies ~ they are everywhere you look! Sweet, whimsical, imaginative.
Of course, there are new items for the tea table, along with our signature Miss Eloise's Afternoon Tea blend and Hunter House's Cottage Rose Whipping Cream Scone mix.
The Shop at the Hunter House Victorian Museum is open for shopping anytime that the museum is open for touring, Monday through Saturday from 10 AM until 3:30 PM and on Sundays from 12:30 PM until 3:30 PM. Simply ring the front door bell and ask to be shown to The Shop.
If you are not on our mailing list but would like to receive fliers with the museum's special events, please send us an email or call us: 757-623-9814. You can also check the website, since you are already here; but do check back often as there are special events all through the year.
I have been working on a creative writing project that only allows the use of lists in answers to the prompts. One prompt last week was: Where do you take your out-of-town guests? You know my answer!
Another prompt this weekend was: List Your Favorite Home Town Businesses. Hmmm ... The Hunter House Victorian Museum certainly is home town, established by Norfolk's Eloise Dexter Hunter. It stands practically at the entrance of the Historic Freemason District, where you can stroll and admire dozens of other 'historic' homes. And the museum's gift shop is also home town.
Do join us soon as we celebrate the Victorian Era in our 26th season.

       George Eliot may sound like a male name; however, it’s actually the pen name of a female Victorian author. Mary Anne Evans (a.k.a. George Eliot) was one of the leading authors of the Victorian Era. Even though women authors had started publishing works under their own names, Mary Anne Evans persisted in using a male pseudonym. Her reasons behind doing this are unknown, but there are theories as to the use of a pen name. The first is that she believed the works of female authors were never taken seriously as most women wrote frivolous romances. The second is her want of privacy due to her somewhat unusual life. George Eliot lived for over 20 years with a married man and conducted herself as his wife. Later, after her life partner had died, she married another man who was nearly 20 years her junior. Some people say that she believed her private life would affect the sales of her novels.

       Throughout her career, George Eliot translated several works, wrote poetry, and published seven novels. Her first novel, “Adam Bede”, became a favorite of both Princess Louise and Queen Victoria. In fact, the Queen was so impressed by the beautiful scenes in the novel, that she commissioned an artist to paint a serious of scenes from the book. Queen Victoria became an avid reader of George Eliot’s works and eventually George Eliot was introduced to the Queen in 1877.

       Eliot’s novel “Adam Bede” became one of the most widely read novels of the Victorian Era. She was praised by critics for using a rural setting and writing with a political view. In “Adam Bede” she tells the story of a love triangle played out against the background of infanticide. The trial in the book was met with rave reviews for its realism. All of her subsequent novels became hits as well.

       Today, George Eliot novels are read in high school and college courses throughout multiple nations. Each of her novels has been developed for film or television.

The Victorian King Arthur

Have you ever heard someone say “Tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all”? This is a quote from Alfred Lord Tennyson. Tennyson served as Queen Victoria’s Poet Laureate from 1850 until his death in 1892 (the longest tenure of any poet laureate). In fact, he was the first person ever to be elevated to the British peerage for accomplishments in writing. Some of his most popular works include “The Charge of the Light Brigade”, “The Lady of Shalott”, and “Mariana”. The work that has had the most impact on any Post-Victorian Era is “The Idylls of the King”, which chronicles the events of the infamous King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table. Published between 1856 and 1885, these poems replaced all previous versions of the story in popularity and became one of the quintessential works on the subject.

Tennyson’s work is the first to develop all the characters related to the story. He sought to create King Arthur as a gentleman that any Victorian man could strive to live up to. He included the Victorians’ renewed interest in courtly love or the idea of “pure” love, as well as his belief that it was difficult or near impossible to achieve. This he symbolized through the love of Arthur for Guinevere. Idylls shows the unconditional love that Arthur has for Guinevere. She is ultimately unable to return this type of love and flees to a convent after having an affair with Lancelot; though Arthur forgave her. Tennyson also goes on to develop poems dedicated to every knight that sits at the round table and how they came to be there. The amount of work Tennyson put into Idylls created an epic that authors of every age since have looked to as the source for their own version of these tales.

In the past 20 years alone, there have been multiple works of fiction along with movies and television shows that have used Tennyson as their starting point for King Arthur. Readers may enjoy Nancy McKenzie, Marion Zimmer Bradley Rosalind Miles or Stephen Lawhead. If you prefer films, there is First Knight; The Mists of Avalon; or Excalibur. Even Disney has done a few Arthurian movies. They have done The Sword in the Stone; A Kid in King Arthur’s Court; and Avalon High. Channel Stations have now started developing their own series. Starz has Camelot and BBC has Merlin.

On a side note: Archaeologists believe the man on whom the legends of King Arthur are based was a Briton/Roman general who lived in the 4th or 5th century.  The general Artorius helped the Britons drive out the Saxons and served as a counselor to the kings, but never became king.