In the Memoirs of William Wordsworth by his nephew (the late Bishop of Lincoln) vol. i. chap. xxx. the following occurs as an addendum transferred to the footnotes:--
"The first six lines of an epitaph in Grasmere Church were also his composition. The elegant marble tablet on which they were engraved was designed by Sir Francis Chantry, and prepared by Allan Cunningham,1822. It is over the chancel door."
The following is the Inscription:--
In the Burial Ground
of this Church are deposited the remains of
JEMIMA ANNE DEBORAH,
second daughter of
Sir Egerton Brydges, of Denton Court, Kent, Bart.
She departed this life at the Ivy Cottage, Rydal,
May 25th 1822, aged 28 years.
This memorial is erected by her husband
EDWARD QUILLINAN.
The entire sonnet, of which Wordsworth wrote the "first six lines," is as follows:--
These vales were saddened with no common gloom
When good Jemima perished in her bloom;
When, such the awful will of heaven, she died
By flames breathed on her from her own fireside.
On earth we dimly see, and but in part
We know, yet faith sustains the sorrowing heart;
And she, the pure, the patient and the meek,
Might have fit epitaph could feelings speak;
If words could tell and monuments record,
How Treasures lost are inwardly deplored,
No name by grief's fond eloquence adorned
More than Jemima's would be praised and mourned.
The tender virtues of her blameless life,
Bright in the daughter, brighter in the wife,
And in the cheerful mother brightest shone,--
That light hath past away--the will of God[394] be done.
[394]
... of Heaven ...
MS.
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THE POETICAL WORKS OF WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, VOL. 8 (Completed)
PoetryThe Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Vol. 8. Edited by William Knight
