Oh well I remember that old easy chair,
And my grandmother sitting upon it;
How she dozed and she nodded and rested her there,
With her head in her scuttle-shaped bonnet.

There is nothing of splendour about the said chair
'Tis a rickety, rusty, and patched-up old thing;
But then ‘twas my grandmother rested her there,
And she was just like it, a homely old thing.

In fact to have seen the old lady and chair,
They were twins, in a sense, you could easily see,
And she was just made to fit into the chair,
And the chair as made to fit her to a T.

Oft to it I’ve stolen, and dozed in a minute,
And cosied, and oft myself comforted there;
There was something of softness and witchery in it,
That was sure to come over me in the old chair.

Since then I have lolled in the halls of the great,
Have lounged on their ottomans, splendid and rare,
But nothing that’s mixed up with grandeur and state
Could rival a nap in that old easy chair.

And I sat at her knee while she rested her there,
A wild little fellow in mischief so strong,
And heard the grave counsel she gave from her chair,
But often I thought the old woman was wrong.

Since then I have learnt it: what fell from her then
Was the wisdom that age and experience taught;
And yet more have I learnt, how ere we are men,
We may profit by wisdom our grandmothers bought.

For though like her chair she was worn out and done,
She still, like the magnet, to duty was true,
And told of the follies her neighbours had run,
And pointed the paths we in life should pursue.

There was something about her just like the old chair,
As large and as cosy, as soft and as kind;
A fulness of heart and affection was there,
Which the boy with his grandmother closely entwined.

And for me when she spread it - the butter and bread,
Or upon it the sugar she piled up so thick!
Or the treacle, - it fairly just bothered her head,
To get all the spoonfuls she put on to stick!

And her tarts were such tarts as no mortal has seen,
The jelly was running - aye fairly all over;
No boy than myself was more happy I ween,
For I beat all the cows among sweet-scented clover.

And now that I’m fifty I often look back
To the time when my grandmother sat in her chair,
And her kind bony hand was patting the back
Of a small little rogue with soft ringlets and fair.

And I think can it be that the spirit is dead
That once for that loved one at all times could spare,
And that all of the dearest old woman is fled,
Save the rickety, rusty, and worn-out arm chair.

No, no! though I’m fifty her spirit comes back,
And tonight in communion most kind,
She tells me that when the whole world is a wrack
Her spirit in Heaven I’ll find.

[This poem is without doubt a reference to the poet’s grandmother Anne ORTON, nee THOMPSON, the widow of Reginald Orton, the Rector of Hauxwell, Yorkshire, from 1799 to 1803. Born in Bombay, India in 1810, young Reginald Orton was sent home to England by his parents, to be under the care of his grandmother still living in Hauxwell, and to be educated at the Richmond Grammar School.]