POEMS BY ANNA SEWARD. EYAM.* For one short week I leave, with anxious heart, To breathe her Handel's soul-exalting lays. * This poem was written August 1788, on a journey through Derbyshire, to a music-meeting at Sheffield. The author's father was then Rector of EYAM, an extensive village, that runs along a mountainous terrace, in one of the highest parts of the Peak. She was born there, and there past the first seven years VOL. III. Pensive I trace the Derwent's amber wave, In scenes paternal, not beheld through years, of her life, and often, in future periods of her youth and riper years, visited the place with her father, on several weeks residence. The middle part of the village is built on the edge of a deep dell, which has very picturesque and beautiful features. 1. 1. Amber wave-From the peculiar nature of the clay on the mountains from which it descends, the river DERWENT has a yellow tint, that well becomes the dark foliage on its banks, and the foam produced by a rocky channel. Distant he droops, and that once gladdening eye Now languid gleams, e'en when his friends are nigh. Through this known walk, where weedy gravel lies, Stray through the darken'd chambers' naked bound, Ere yet 1 go, Now the low beams, with paper garlands hung, 1. 19. Now the low beams-The ancient custom of hanging a garland of white roses, made of writing paper, and a pair of white gloves, over the pew of the unmarried villagers, who die in the flower of their age, is observed to this day in the village of EYAM, and in most other villages and little towns in the Peak, |