"Cease thy sorrow, NIL DESPERANDUM. For to-morrow With to-day Grief and suffering; All bliss enshroud. The sun will shine again, Will come-be patient, then. 'T will soon be past, All sorrows have an end; And sweetest influence lend. Some of DR. ROBINSON's largest poems have appeared in the Methodist Quarterly: from one of those, "The Deluge, a Fragment," the following admirable lines are taken on that arch-curse of man, War: "The mighty chiefs Their savage course of warfare still pursued, Of founding mighty empires, waded through Hath gain'd upon our race,—that man, design'd Which God's kind providence hath spread around And, when their sojourn on this earth is o'er, Hath for their endless bliss a heaven prepared, f 66 Where, from all earthly grief and sorrow free, Of the arch fiend, and by the fearful scourge Of war, bring death and desolation vast Upon the earth, where peace and joy should dwell,— And in the same poem he remarks :— "The Christian knows his Father will not put Work for his present good, and future bliss." But DR. ROBINSON has evidently "the pen of a ready writer," and all the productions of his muse are cheerful, flowing, and pure, as all poetry should be. His last poem is entitled Esther, or the Origin of the Feast of Purim," and was contributed to the Methodist Quarterly for June, 1869. The story of Esther is so beautifully told in the Bible, that one is bad to please with any other version, and cannot, at first sight, see the good Doctor's object in putting it into blank verse. the oftener the poem is read, the more the reader likes it,a sufficient proof of merit. At first perusal, one is apt to ask, why the poet did not tax his own feelings for some additional touches of tenderness, and his imagination for scenes, not described in Holy Writ; but, on second thought, we approve his strict adherence to the Scripture narrative, so touching in its truthful simplicity, and I am only sorry that space prevents me from giving this excellent poem either in whole or in part. Dr. Robinson is a writer of whom Yorkshire has no cause to be ashamed, and an earnest labourer for many a good object. God has work for us all to do; and happy is he who is "careful to perform his allotted task while it is yet day!" JAMES CLEPHAN. "His leisure only to the Muse he gives; By writing prose, not singing verse, he lives." PETER PROLETARIUS. Though belonging more to North Durham than to the immediate district to which this work is devoted, yet James Clephan has a claim to be noticed in its pages. Born March 17th, 1805, at Monkwearmouth Shore, Mr. Clephan's schoolboy days and his apprenticeship as a printer were both spent at Stockton-on-Tees; and several of his pretty verses are on South Durham and Cleveland topics. After leaving Stockton, Mr. Clephan spent some years in Edinburgh, London, and Leicester; and in 1838, he left the Leicester Chronicle to undertake the editorship of the Gateshead Observer, with which he was connected until 1860, when he was presented with a handsome silver inkstand, and a purse containing two hundred and fifty pounds, as a substantial token of public esteem, on retiring from the paper. At present he is one of the able staff of contributors engaged on the Newcastle Chronicle. During Mr. Clephan's editorship of the Gateshead Observer, the people in the north of England had their minds violently agitated by many subjects; perhaps the most trivial of all, for the amount of interest it caused beyond the district where it took place, was the row between Baron Platt, one of the judges of assize, and Sir Horace Saint Paul, high sheriff of Northumberland, July 31st, 1851, which drew from M. Clephan the following humorous verses in the Observer of August 9th, of that year : ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE EXTRAORDINARY, THE JUDGE'S CHARGE AGAINST ST. PAUL. Letter from Dick Thompson, Driver of the Old Highflyer, to Harry Allright, the Guard. "Dear Harry, have you heard about The row in our Moot Hall, Between old Baron Platt, the Judge, And black-avised St. Paul? Sir Horace, as you know, this year Through every lane and street, Their horns a thundering blast, To pick him up drew nigh, No 'hammercloth' the coachman had, The 'indignity' was 'keenly felt' By Mr. Baron Platt. No coat of arms upon the doors The coach and horse were deck'd; 'No javelinmen-no trumpeters Outriders none' were there; No grandeur to delight the eye, No noise to rend the air. The learned Judge his anger nursed With our teetotal Sheriff, who'd And when he got upon the bench, His rank and station; for that he Respect to Queen and Judge. 'Considerably perturb'd,' St. Paul That may be true, 'Lord 'Size' rejoin'd; This altercation quite a stir And short-hand writers snapp'd it up, The Baron, vex'd, a message sent The trumpeters to tell, To take their instruments and run Along the streets pell-mell, That they might catch Judge Williams, and, With long and lusty peal, Escort him for the honour of Old England's commonweal. But ah! these local Koenigs, Hal, One had a dingy black surtout, clad In seedy blue dress-coat, * See the Times, and other newspapers, Harry, for my quotations." |