John Reed Appleton.

John Reed Appleton.

 “Scoff not at antiquarian research,
As useless in results; for it throws light
Upon the darkness of the past to aid
Humanity along its devious way”.

‘Peter Proletarius’   - George Markham Tweddell
[ Bards and Authors , p.201]

............................
Note: This poem was written as an intro to a chapter on John Reed Appleton for Tweddell's Bards and Authors of Cleveland and South Durham 1872

Bards and Authors can be downloaded free (with the chapter in) from the Tweddell hub here http://georgemarkhamtweddell.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/bards-and-authors-of-cleveland-and.html

John Reed Appleton was a writer and close walking companion of Tweddell.
More to be added here!

And another poem on him from the Illustrated Annual.


John Reed Appleton, F.R.A.
Poet and antiquary, both combined!
Why not? All truth is beautiful; and truth
Must circulate through all the poet’s soul,
E’en as the blood through arteries and veins,
Past, present, future, to the bard are one 5
Unending circle of humanity:
And the true antiquary loves the past
For all its teachings in the search for truth.
Peter Proletarius
[Tweddell’s North of England Illustrated Annual for 1879-1880, p. 5]



Sonnet to John Appleton of Durham, F.S.A.

Oft, as I muse beside my winter’s fire,
The scene where we have rambled rise to view
In all their beauty: in fancy I review
Our sea-side visits; nor do I desire
A purer pleasure than we two enjoy’d 5
By bosky streams—on mountains—or beside
Ruins of fabrics once our country’s pride,—
Castles and monasteries: never cloy’d
Their histories and legends to our taste;
And now I half rehear the genial talk 10
Which we enjoy’d in many a rustic walk,
To shorten which we never felt in haste.
These rambles serve me for a glorious theme,
And linger in my brain as if a pleasant dream.

Rose Cottage, Stokesley George Markham Tweddell
[Tweddell’s Illustrated Annual 1881-1882, p. 8]


To a Young Friend

On his being articled as an Attorney-at-law
ALFRED! thine is a truly noble name!
It has been borne by one who was a king
In thought and deed, both on and off the throne;
And whoso bears that name should prize its fame.
With thee I’ve rambled o’er our Cleveland hills, 5
And mark’d thy young eyes sparkle with delight
To view these scenes thy sire* so well has sung.
To-day thou enters on the tedious path
Of legal studies;—tedious to the drone
Whose servile soul ne’er soars above the fees 10
Which future years, he hopes, will pluck from fools
That knaves like him may feed and batten on.
But to the pure of heart, my Alfred dear!
The study of the law can nerve the soul
To shield the innocent, and strike down Wrong; 15
Corruption to weed out, and rear a pile
Of Strength and Beauty, Justice makes her home.
Be it thine, brave youth (though others waste their time
In vain frivolity), to master all
Highways and byways of thy country’s laws, 20
Both past and present, in true student mood;
And thy wilt find in ev’ry task a pleasure
That Ignorance wots not of. And in time
Thy manly voice may thunder in our courts,
Demanding justice for the wrong’d, when I 25
Am dust below the sod.

Stokesley, Sept. 2nd 1871 George Markham Tweddell
*John Reed Appleton, F.S.A. &c., whose fine blank verse upon
Cleveland (forming No. 1 of the North of England Tractates), is a
valuable addition to our local literature. G. M. T.
Tweddell’s Middlesbrough Miscellany (1871), p. 83
Woodcut