Then hurry from this place away!
It gives not now the bliss it gave;
For Death has made its charm his prey,
And joy is buried in her grave."

In family relationships, and indeed all others, Crabbe's tenderness was
never wanting, and the verse that follows was found long afterwards
written on a paper in which his wife's wedding-ring, nearly worn through
before she died, was wrapped:

"The ring so worn, as you behold,
So thin, so pale, is yet of gold:
The passion such it was to prove;
Worn with life's cares, love yet was love."

Crabbe was inducted to the living of Trowbridge on the 3rd of June 1814,
and preached his first sermon two days later. His two sons followed him,
as soon as their existing engagements allowed them to leave
Leicestershire. The younger, John, who married in 1816, became his
father's curate, and the elder, who married a year later, became curate
at Pucklechurch, not many miles distant. As Crabbe's old cheerfulness
gradually returned he found much congenial society in the better
educated classes about him. His reputation as a poet was daily
spreading. The _Tales_ passed from edition to edition, and brought him
many admirers and sympathisers. The "busy, populous clothing town," as
he described Trowbridge to a friend, provided him with intelligent
neighbours of a class different from any he had yet been thrown with.
And yet once more, as his son has to admit, he failed to secure the
allegiance of the church-going parishioners. His immediate predecessor,