Poetry > Ballads in the Cumberland dialect

NOTES.
179
and consequently their livelihood, depends upon its
silence.
As soon as one of these strolling sybils arrives at a
village, she is immediately surrounded by a plebian
group, all of them anxious to know “the colour of
their future fateand it is certainly something to
her credit, that instead of adding cruelty to the crime
of imposition, by darkening the perspective with a
train of disasters, she scatters over it roses and sun¬
shine. The laborious rustic, who at present provides
with difficulty for the wants of the day, beholds his
future hours gliding amidst affluence, abundance, and
pleasures: while the village-maid, blushing with
health and love, is gratified by the near approach of
an honourable and opulent marriage. Yet these kind
prophetesses, who lighten the pressure of the present
moment, by making the destinies smile upon the
future, are threatened with gaols, stocks, and pillories!
Kote 11, p. 30.
Now, Kate, full forty years ha’eflovm.
We have here a couple enjoying tranquillity in their
old age, after a severe struggle with the disasters of
life. But though their youth had been pressed down
with many distresses, and had been embarrassed with
many difficulties, they could yet look back upon it
with satisfaction, because it had been innocent, and
recall to mind, without pain, the daily toils they had
undergone, in providing for the wants of an infant
family; because they could behold that family, which
they had cherished with so much affection, acting
their parts with credit on the stage of life, and
repaying with filial piety the numerous favours which
parental affection had conferred upon them.
The example of this aged couple may be proposed
as a model of conduct to that part of the community
whose lot is labour. Under all their necessities,
difficulties, and hardships, let them persevere in a