Summary
Vermont, Thursday.—“Do come to the window!” exclaimed M. this morning; “here is the poet.”
She had told me all about him before, as it seems he is a constant visiter and prime pet here. No wonder, for I have seldom met with a more entertaining and original character, than this thoroughly Irish and romantic old man. He is truly a “born poet.” All his expressions are poetical—he talks of common events in an Ossian-like style, and occasionally bursts out into rhyme. He leads a wild rambling life, “here to-day, gone to-morrow, like the bird that cuts the air with its restless wings”—as he said himself; and his reading seems to have been as desultory as his movements, to judge from the scraps and quotations with which his conversation abounds. He asked me my Christian name; and after rubbing his forehead, and taking a turn on the gravelled space before the door, returned to the window, and throwing himself into an attitude, burst out into a long poem composed in my praise. This impromptu effusion was full of extravagant hyperbole, and had several oriental and really most beautiful similes and images.
When I went out to take my afternoon stroll round the garden, I was delighted to spy my old friend, sitting on a bench regaling himself with bread and cider.
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- Rambles in the South of Ireland during the Year 1838 , pp. 147 - 168Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010First published in: 1839