P. D. Maurice:
"Where, far from smoke or noise of town,
I watch the twilight falling brown
All round a careless ordered garden,
Close to the ridge of a noble down.
You'll have no scandal while you dine,
But honest talk and wholesome wine,
And only hear the magpie gossip
Garrulous under a roof of pine.
For groves of pine on either hand,
To break the blast of winter, stand;
And further on the hoary channel
Tumbles a breaker on chalk and sand."
The poet has sometimes received as well as sent out poetical invitations.
Here is one from Water Savage Landor.
"I entreat you, Alfred Tennyson,
Come and share my haunch of venison,
I have, too, a bin of claret,
Good, but better when you share it.
Though 'tis only a small bin
There's a stock of it within,
And, as sure as I'm a rhymer,
Half a butt of Rudesheimer,
Come, among the sons of men is none
Welcomer than Tennyson?"
THE WOODFIELD OF THE PAST.
"Deambulatio per loca amoena." - Frascatorius
"Unquestionably the most ornate and richly laid-out estate around Quebec
is Woodfield, formerly the elegant mansion of the Honorable Wm.
