Wordsworth's Poetical Works, Volume 2: 1802



Edited by William Knight

1896



Table of Contents





1802

The Lyrical Ballads and Sonnets which follow were written in 1802; but during that year Wordsworth continued mainly to work at The Excursion, as the following extracts from his sister's Journal indicate:
"Feb. 1, 1802.—William worked hard at The Pedlar, and tired himself.

2nd Feb.—Wm. worked at The Pedlar. I read aloud the 11th book of Paradise Lost.

Thursday, 4th.—William thought a little about The Pedlar.

5th.—Wm. sate up late at The Pedlar.

7th.—W. was working at his poem. Wm. read The Pedlar, thinking it was done. But lo! ... it was uninteresting, and must be altered."
Similar records occur each day in the Journal from the 10th to the 14th Feb. 1802.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



The Sailor's Mother

Composed March 11th and 12th, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Written in Town-end, Grasmere. I met this woman near the Wishing-gate, on the high road that then led from Grasmere to Ambleside. Her appearance was exactly as here described, and such was her account, nearly to the letter.—I. F.]

One of the "Poems founded on the Affections."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
One morning (raw it was and wet—
A foggy day in winter time)
A Woman on the road I met,
Not old, though something past her prime:
Majestic in her person, tall and straight;
And like a Roman matron's was her mien and gait.

The ancient spirit is not dead;
Old times, thought I, are breathing there;
Proud was I that my country bred
Such strength, a dignity so fair:
She begged an alms, like one in poor estate;
I looked at her again, nor did my pride abate.

When from these lofty thoughts I woke,
"What is it," said I, "that you bear,
Beneath the covert of your Cloak,
Protected from this cold damp air?"
She answered, soon as she the question heard,
"A simple burthen, Sir, a little Singing-bird."

And, thus continuing, she said,
"I had a Son, who many a day
Sailed on the seas, but he is dead;
In Denmark he was cast away:
And I have travelled weary miles to see
If aught which he had owned might still remain for me.

"The bird and cage they both were his:
'Twas my Son's bird; and neat and trim
He kept it: many voyages
The singing-bird had gone with him;
When last he sailed, he left the bird behind;
From bodings, as might be, that hung upon his mind.

"He to a fellow-lodger's care
Had left it, to be watched and fed,
And pipe its song in safety;—there
I found it when my Son was dead;
And now, God help me for my little wit!
I bear [8] it with me, Sir;—he took so much delight in it."



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Variant 1:  
1815
... in ...
 1807
return


Variant 2:  
1836
... I woke,
With the first word I had to spare
I said to her, "Beneath your Cloak
What's that which on your arm you bear?"


1807
"What treasure," said I,"do you bear,
Beneath the covert of your Cloak
Protected from the cold damp air?"


1820
return


Variant 3:  
1807
"I had a Son,—the waves might roar,
He feared them not, a Sailor gay!
But he will cross the waves no more:


1820
... cross the deep ...
 1827
The text of 1832 returns to that of 1807a.
return


Variant 4:  
1827
And I have been as far as Hull, to see
What clothes he might have left, or other property.
 1807
And I have travelled far as Hull, to see
1815
And I have travelled many miles to see
If aught which he had owned might still remain for me.
1820
return


Variant 5:  
1845
This Singing-bird hath gone ...
 1807
... had gone ...
1820
return


Variant 6:  
1827
As it might be, perhaps, from bodings of his mind.
 1807
return


Variant 7:  
1827
Till he came back again; and there
1807
return


Variant 8:  
1827
I trail ...
 1807
return




Sub-Footnote a:   This return, in 1832, to the original text of the poem was due to Barren Field's criticism, the justice of which Wordsworth admitted.—Ed.
return




Note:   In the Wordsworth household this poem went by the name of "The Singing Bird" as well as The Sailor's Mother.
"Thursday (March 11th).—A fine morning. William worked at the poem of The Singing Bird. ..."

"Friday (March 12th).—William finished his poem of The Singing Bird."
(Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal.)—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Alice Fell; or, PovertyA

Composed March 12th and 13th, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Written to gratify Mr. Graham of Glasgow, brother of the author of The Sabbath. He was a zealous coadjutor of Mr. Clarkson, and a man of ardent humanity. The incident had happened to himself, and he urged me to put it into verse, for humanity's sake. The humbleness, meanness if you like, of the subject, together with the homely mode of treating it, brought upon me a world of ridicule by the small critics, so that in policy I excluded it from many editions of my poems, till it was restored at the request of some of my friends, in particular my son-in-law, Edward Quillinan.—I. F.]

It was only excluded from the editions of 1820, 1827, and 1832. In the edition of 1807 it was placed amongst a group of "Poems composed during a Tour, chiefly on foot." In 1815, in 1836, and afterwards, it was included in the group "referring to the Period of Childhood."

In Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal, the following reference to this poem occurs:
"Feb. 16, 1802.—Mr. Graham said he wished William had been with him the other day. He was riding in a post-chaise, and he heard a strange cry that he could not understand. The sound continued, and he called to the chaise-driver to stop. It was a little girl that was crying as if her heart would burst. She had got up behind the chaise, and her cloak had been caught by the wheel, and was jammed in, and it hung there. She was crying after it, poor thing. Mr. Graham took her into the chaise, and her cloak was released from the wheel, but the child's misery did not cease, for her cloak was torn to rags. It had been a miserable cloak before; but she had no other, and it was the greatest sorrow that could befall her. Her name was Alice Fell. She had no parents, and belonged to the next town. At the next town Mr. G. left money to buy her a new cloak."

"Friday (March 12).—In the evening after tea William wrote Alice Fell."

"Saturday Morning (13th March).—William finished Alice Fell...."
Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
The post-boy drove with fierce career,
For threatening clouds the moon had drowned;
When, as we hurried on, my ear
Was smitten with a startling sound.

As if the wind blew many ways,
I heard the sound,—and more and more;
It seemed to follow with the chaise,
And still I heard it as before.

At length I to the boy called out;
He stopped his horses at the word,
But neither cry, nor voice, nor shout,
Nor aught else like it, could be heard.

The boy then smacked his whip, and fast
The horses scampered through the rain;
But, hearing soon upon the blast
The cry, I bade him halt again.

Forthwith alighting on the ground,
"Whence comes," said I, "this piteous moan?"
And there a little Girl I found,
Sitting behind the chaise, alone.

"My cloak!" no other word she spake,
But loud and bitterly she wept,
As if her innocent heart would break;
And down from off her seat she leapt.

"What ails you, child?"—she sobbed "Look here!"
I saw it in the wheel entangled,
A weather-beaten rag as e'er
From any garden scare-crow dangled.

There, twisted between nave and spoke,
It hung, nor could at once be freed;
But our joint pains unloosed the cloak,
A miserable rag indeed!

"And whither are you going, child,
To-night along these lonesome ways?"
"To Durham," answered she, half wild—
"Then come with me into the chaise."

Insensible to all relief
Sat the poor girl, and forth did send
Sob after sob, as if her grief
Could never, never have an end.

"My child, in Durham do you dwell?"
She checked herself in her distress,
And said, "My name is Alice Fell;
I'm fatherless and motherless.

"And I to Durham, Sir, belong."
Again, as if the thought would choke
Her very heart, her grief grew strong;
And all was for her tattered cloak!

The chaise drove on; our journey's end
Was nigh; and, sitting by my side,
As if she had lost her only friend
She wept, nor would be pacified.

Up to the tavern-door we post;
Of Alice and her grief I told;
And I gave money to the host,
To buy a new cloak for the old.

"And let it be of duffil grey,
As warm a cloak as man can sell!"
Proud creature was she the next day,
The little orphan, Alice Fell!



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Variant 1:  
1845
When suddenly I seem'd to hear
A moan, a lamentable sound.
1807
return


Variant 2:  
1845
And soon I heard upon the blast
The voice, and bade ....

1807
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Variant 3:  
1845
Said I, alighting on the ground,
"What can it be, this piteous moan?"

1807
Forthwith alighted on the ground
To learn what voice the piteous moan
Had made, a little girl I found,


C.
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Variant 4:  
1836
"My Cloak!" the word was last and first,
And loud and bitterly she wept,
As if her very heart would burst;

1807
"My cloak, my cloak" she cried, and spake
No other word, but loudly wept,
C.
return


Variant 5:  
1815
... off the Chaise ...
 1807
return


Variant 6:  
1845
'Twas twisted betwixt nave and spoke;
Her help she lent, and with good heed
Together we released the Cloak;


1807
... between ...
 1840
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Variant 7:  
1836
A wretched, wretched rag indeed!
1807
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Variant 8:  
1845
She sate like one past all relief;
Sob after sob she forth did send
In wretchedness, as if her grief


1807
return


Variant 9:  
1836
And then, ...
1807
return


Variant 10:  
1836
... she'd lost ...
 1807
return




Footnote A:   There was no sub-title in the edition of 1807.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   Charles Lamb wrote to Wordsworth in 1815, referring to the revisions of this and other poems:
"I am glad that you have not sacrificed a verse to those scoundrels. I would not have had you offer up the poorest rag that lingered upon the stript shoulders of little Alice Fell, to have atoned all their malice; I would not have given 'em a red cloak to save their souls."
See Letters of Charles Lamb (Ainger), vol. i. p. 283.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Beggars

Composed March 13th and 14th, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. Met, and described to me by my sister, near the quarry at the head of Rydal LakeA, a place still a chosen resort of vagrants travelling with their families.—I. F.]

The following are Dorothy Wordsworth's references to this poem in her Grasmere Journal. They justify the remark of the late Bishop of Lincoln,
"his poems are sometimes little more than poetical versions of her descriptions of the objects which she had seen, and he treated them as seen by himself."
(See Memoirs of Wordsworth, vol. i. pp. 180-1.)
"Saturday (March 13, 1802).—William wrote the poem of the Beggar Woman, taken from a woman whom I had seen in May (now nearly two years ago), when John and he were at Gallow Hill. I sat with him at intervals all the morning, and took down his stanzas. After tea I read W. the account I had written of the little boy belonging to the tall woman: and an unlucky thing it was, for he could not escape from those very words, and so he could not write the poem. He left it unfinished, and went tired to bed. In our walk from Rydal he had got warmed with the subject, and had half cast the poem."

"Sunday Morning (March 14). —William had slept badly. He got up at 9 o'clock, but before he rose he had finished the Beggar Boy."
The following is the "account" written in her Journal on Tuesday, May 23, 1800:
"A very tall woman, tall much beyond the measure of tall women, called at the door. She had on a very long brown cloak, and a very white cap, without bonnet. Her face was brown, but it had plainly once been fair. She led a little barefooted child about two years old by the hand, and said her husband, who was a tinker, was gone before with the other children. I gave her a piece of bread. Afterwards, on my road to Ambleside, beside the bridge at Rydal, I saw her husband sitting at the roadside, his two asses standing beside him, and the two young children at play upon the grass. The man did not beg. I passed on, and about a quarter of a mile farther I saw two boys before me, one about ten, the other about eight years old, at play, chasing a butterfly. They were wild figures, not very ragged, but without shoes and stockings. The hat of the elder was wreathed round with yellow flowers; the younger, whose hat was only a rimless crown, had stuck it round with laurel leaves. They continued at play till I drew very near, and then they addressed me with the begging cant and the whining voice of sorrow. I said, 'I served your mother this morning' (the boys were so like the woman who had called at our door that I could not be mistaken). 'O,' says the elder, 'you could not serve my mother, for she's dead, and my father's in at the next town; he's a potter.' I persisted in my assertion, and that I would give them nothing. Says the elder, 'Come, let's away,' and away they flew like lightning. They had, however, sauntered so long in their road that they did not reach Ambleside before me, and I saw them go up to Mathew Harrison's house with their wallet upon the elder's shoulder, and creeping with a beggar's complaining foot. On my return through Ambleside I met, in the street, the mother driving her asses, in the two panniers of one of which were the two little children, whom she was chiding and threatening with a wand with which she used to drive on her asses, while the little things hung in wantonness over the pannier's edge. The woman had told me in the morning that she was of Scotland, which her accent fully proved, and that she had lived (I think at Wigtown); that they could not keep a house, and so they travelled."
This was one of the "Poems of the Imagination."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
She had a tall man's height or more;
Her face from summer's noontide heat
No bonnet shaded, but she wore
A mantle, to her very feet
Descending with a graceful flow,
And on her head a cap as white as new-fallen snow.

Her skin was of Egyptian brown:
Haughty, as if her eye had seen
Its own light to a distance thrown,
She towered, fit person for a Queen
To lead those ancient Amazonian files;
Or ruling Bandit's wife among the Grecian isles.

Advancing, forth she stretched her hand
And begged an alms with doleful plea
That ceased not; on our English land
Such woes, I knew, could never be;
And yet a boon I gave her, for the creature
Was beautiful to see—a weed of glorious feature.

I left her, and pursued my way;
And soon before me did espy
A pair of little Boys at play,
Chasing a crimson butterfly;
The taller followed with his hat in hand,
Wreathed round with yellow flowers the gayest of the land.

The other wore a rimless crown
With leaves of laurel stuck about;
And, while both followed up and down,
Each whooping with a merry shout,
In their fraternal features I could trace
Unquestionable lines of that wild Suppliant's face.

Yet they, so blithe of heart, seemed fit
For finest tasks of earth or air:
Wings let them have, and they might flit
Precursors to Aurora's car,
Scattering fresh flowers; though happier far, I ween,
To hunt their fluttering game o'er rock and level green.

They dart across my path—but lo,
Each ready with a plaintive whine!
Said I, "not half an hour ago
Your Mother has had alms of mine."
"That cannot be," one answered—"she is dead:"—
I looked reproof—they saw—but neither hung his head.

"She has been dead, Sir, many a day."—
"Hush, boys! you're telling me a lie;
It was your Mother, as I say!"
And, in the twinkling of an eye,
"Come! come!" cried one, and without more ado,
Off to some other play the joyous Vagrants flew!



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Variant 1:  
1845
She had a tall Man's height, or more;
No bonnet screen'd her from the heat;
A long drab-colour'd Cloak she wore,
A Mantle reaching to her feet:
What other dress she had I could not know;
Only she wore a Cap that was as white as snow.




1807
Before me as the Wanderer stood,
No bonnet screened her from the heat;
Nor claimed she service from the hood
Of a blue mantle, to her feet
Depending with a graceful flow;
Only she wore a cap pure as unsullied snow.





1827
Before my eyes a Wanderer stood;
Her face from summer's noon-day heat
Nor bonnet shaded, nor the hood
Of that blue cloak which to her feet
Depended with a graceful flow;
Only she wore a cap as white as new-fallen snow.




1832
No bonnet shaded, nor the hood
Of the blue cloak ...

1836
She had a tall man's height or more;
And while, 'mid April's noontide heat,
A long blue cloak the vagrant wore,
A mantle reaching to her feet,
No bonnet screened her lofty brow,
Only she wore a cap as white as new-fallen snow.





C.
She had a tall man's height or more;
A garment for her stature meet,
And for a vagrant life, she wore
A mantle reaching to her feet.
Nor hood, nor bonnet screened her lofty brow,





C.
return


Variant 2:  
1827
In all my walks, through field or town,
Such Figure had I never seen:
Her face was of Egyptian brown:
Fit person was she for a Queen,


1807
Such figure had I never seen
In all my walks through field or town,
Fit person seemed she for a Queen,

C.
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Variant 3:  
1836
To head ...
1807
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Variant 4:  
1845
Before me begging did she stand,
Pouring out sorrows like a sea;
Grief after grief:—on English Land
Such woes I knew could never be;


1807
Her suit no faltering scruples checked;
Forth did she pour, in current free,
Tales that could challenge no respect
But from a blind credulity;


1827
She begged an alms; no scruple checked
The current of her ready plea,
Words that could challenge ...

1832
Before me begging did she stand
And boldly urged a doleful plea,
Grief after grief, on English land
Such woes I knew could never be.



C.
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Variant 5:  
1807
With yellow flowers around, as with a golden band.
 C.
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Variant 6:  
1827
And they both ...
 1807
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Variant 7:  
1820
Two Brothers seem'd they, eight and ten years old;
And like that Woman's face as gold is like to gold.

1807
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Variant 8:  
This stanza was added in the edition of 1827.
return


Variant 9:  
1836
Precursors of ...
1827
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Variant 10:  
1827
They bolted on me thus, and lo!
1807
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Variant 11:  
1827
"Nay but I gave her pence, and she will buy you bread."
 1807
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Variant 12:  
1845
"Sweet Boys, you're telling me a lie;
1807
... Heaven hears that rash reply;
1827
The text of 1807 was resumed in 1836.
return


Variant 13:  
1827
... they both together flew.
1807
... the thoughtless vagrants flew.
C.
return




Footnote A:   The spot is easily identified, as the quarry still exists.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:   In the MS. of this poem (1807) the words, "a weed of glorious feature," are placed within inverted commas. The quotation is from Spenser's Muiopotmos (The Fate of the Butterflie), stanza 27; and is important, as it affects the meaning of the phrase. It is curious that Wordsworth dropped the commas in his subsequent editions.—Ed.
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Footnote C:   In Wordsworth's letter to Barron Field, of 24th October 1828 (see the volumes containing his correspondence), a detailed account is given of the reasons which had led him to alter the text of this poem.—Ed.
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Contents 1802
Main Contents



Sequel to the Foregoing

Composed Many Years After

Composed 1817.—Published 1827

In the edition of 1840 the year assigned to this Sequel is 1817. It does not occur in the edition of 1820, but was first published in 1827. It was one of the "Poems of the Imagination."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Where are they now, those wanton Boys?
For whose free range the dædal earth
Was filled with animated toys,
And implements of frolic mirth;
With tools for ready wit to guide;
And ornaments of seemlier pride,
More fresh, more bright, than princes wear;
For what one moment flung aside,
Another could repair;
What good or evil have they seen
Since I their pastime witnessed here,
Their daring wiles, their sportive cheer?
I ask—but all is dark between!

They met me in a genial hour,
When universal nature breathed
As with the breath of one sweet flower,—
A time to overrule the power
Of discontent, and check the birth
Of thoughts with better thoughts at strife,
The most familiar bane of life
Since parting Innocence bequeathed
Mortality to Earth!
Soft clouds, the whitest of the year,
Sailed through the sky—the brooks ran clear;
The lambs from rock to rock were bounding;
With songs the budded groves resounding;
And to my heart are still endeared
The thoughts with which it then was cheered;
The faith which saw that gladsome pair
Walk through the fire with unsinged hair.
Or, if such faith must needs deceive—
Then, Spirits of beauty and of grace,
Associates in that eager chase;
Ye, who within the blameless mind
Your favourite seat of empire find—
Kind Spirits! may we not believe
That they, so happy and so fair
Through your sweet influence, and the care
Of pitying Heaven, at least were free
From touch of deadly injury?
Destined, whate'er their earthly doom,
For mercy and immortal bloom?



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Variant 1:  
Spirits of beauty and of grace!
Associates in that eager chase;
Ye, by a course to nature true,
The sterner judgment can subdue;
And waken a relenting smile
When she encounters fraud or guile;
And sometimes ye can charm away
The inward mischief, or allay,
Ye, who within the blameless mind
Your favourite seat of empire find!
The above is a separate stanza in the editions of 1827 and 1832. Only the first two and the last two lines of this stanza were retained in the edition of 1836, and were then transferred to the place they occupy in the final text.—Ed.
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Variant 2:  
1836
And to my heart is still endeared
The faith with which ...

1827
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Variant 3:  
1836
... such thoughts ...
 1827
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Footnote A:   This and the three following lines were placed here in the edition of 1836. See note to the previous page.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Contents 1802
Main Contents



To a Butterfly (1)

Composed March 14, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Written in the Orchard, Town-end, Grasmere. My sister and I were parted immediately after the death of our mother, who died in 1778, both being very young.—I. F.]

One of the "Poems referring to the Period of Childhood." —Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Stay near me—do not take thy flight!
A little longer stay in sight!
Much converse do I find in thee,
Historian of my infancy!
Float near me; do not yet depart!
Dead times revive in thee:
Thou bring'st, gay creature as thou art!
A solemn image to my heart,
My father's family!

Oh! pleasant, pleasant were the days,
The time, when, in our childish plays,
My sister Emmeline and I
Together chased the butterfly!
A very hunter did I rush
Upon the prey:—with leaps and springs
I followed on from brake to bush;
But she, God love her! feared to brush
The dust from off its wings.



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Footnote A:   In the MS. for the edition of 1807 the transcriber (not W. W.) wrote "Dorothy." This, Wordsworth erased, putting in "Emmeline."—Ed.
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Note:   The text of this poem was never changed. It refers to days of childhood spent at Cockermouth before 1778. "My sister Emmeline" is Dorothy Wordsworth. In her Grasmere Journal, of Sunday, March 14, 1802, the following occurs:
"While we were at breakfast he" (William) "wrote the poem To a Butterfly. He ate not a morsel, but sate with his shirt neck unbuttoned, and his waistcoat open when he did it. The thought first came upon him as we were talking about the pleasure we both always felt at the sight of a butterfly. I told him that I used to chase them a little, but that I was afraid of brushing the dust off their wings, and did not catch them. He told me how he used to kill all the white ones when he went to school, because they were Frenchmen. Mr. Simpson came in just as he was finishing the poem. After he was gone, I wrote it down, and the other poems, and I read them all over to him.... William began to try to alter The Butterfly, and tired himself."
Compare the later poem To a Butterfly (2) (April 20), p. 297. —Ed.


Contents 1802
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The Emigrant Mother

Composed March 16th and 17th, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Suggested by what I have noticed in more than one French fugitive during the time of the French Revolution. If I am not mistaken the lines were composed at Sockburn when I was on a visit to Mary and her brothers.—I. F.]

In the editions of 1807 and 1815, this poem had no distinctive title; but in the Wordsworth circle, it was known from the year 1802 as The Emigrant Mother, and at least one copy was transcribed with this title in 1802. It was first published under that name in 1820. It was revised and altered in 1820, 1827, 1832, 1836, and more especially in 1845.

In Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal the following entries occur:
"Tuesday (March 16).—William went up into the orchard, and wrote a part of The Emigrant Mother."

"Wednesday.—William went up into the orchard, and finished the poem.... I went and sate with W., and walked backwards and forwards in the orchard till dinner-time. He read me his poem."
This poem was included among those "founded on the Affections."—Ed.




The Poem


stanza text variant footnote line number
Once in a lonely hamlet I sojourned
In which a Lady driven from France did dwell;
The big and lesser griefs with which she mourned,
In friendship she to me would often tell.
This Lady, dwelling upon British ground,
Where she was childless, daily would repair
To a poor neighbouring cottage; as I found,
For sake of a young Child whose home was there.		 1 / 2
3		 5
Once having seen her clasp with fond embrace
This Child, I chanted to myself a lay,
Endeavouring, in our English tongue, to trace
Such things as she unto the Babe might say:
And thus, from what I heard and knew, or guessed,
My song the workings of her heart expressed.


4
5
10
I "Dear Babe, thou daughter of another,
One moment let me be thy mother!
An infant's face and looks are thine
And sure a mother's heart is mine:
Thy own dear mother's far away,
At labour in the harvest field:
Thy little sister is at play;—
What warmth, what comfort would it yield
To my poor heart, if thou wouldst be
One little hour a child to me!		 15




20
II "Across the waters I am come,
And I have left a babe at home:
A long, long way of land and sea!
Come to me—I'm no enemy:
I am the same who at thy side
Sate yesterday, and made a nest
For thee, sweet Baby!—thou hast tried,
Thou know'st the pillow of my breast;
Good, good art thou:—alas! to me
Far more than I can be to thee.		 25




30
III "Here, little Darling, dost thou lie;
An infant thou, a mother I!
Mine wilt thou be, thou hast no fears;
Mine art thou—spite of these my tears.
Alas! before I left the spot,
My baby and its dwelling-place;
The nurse said to me, 'Tears should not
Be shed upon an infant's face,
It was unlucky'—no, no, no;
No truth is in them who say so!		 35




40
IV "My own dear Little-one will sigh,
Sweet Babe! and they will let him die.
'He pines,' they'll say, 'it is his doom,
And you may see his hour is come.'
Oh! had he but thy cheerful smiles,
Limbs stout as thine, and lips as gay,
Thy looks, thy cunning, and thy wiles,
And countenance like a summer's day,
They would have hopes of him;—and then
I should behold his face again!		 45




50
V "'Tis gone—like dreams that we forget;
There was a smile or two—yet—yet
I can remember them, I see
The smiles, worth all the world to me.
Dear Baby! I must lay thee down;
Thou troublest me with strange alarms;
Smiles hast thou, bright ones of thy own;
I cannot keep thee in my arms;
For they confound me;—where—where is
That last, that sweetest smile of his?
6




7


8		 55




60
VI "Oh! how I love thee!—we will stay
Together here this one half day.
My sister's child, who bears my name,
From France to sheltering England came;
She with her mother crossed the sea;
The babe and mother near me dwell:
Yet does my yearning heart to thee
Turn rather, though I love her well:
Rest, little Stranger, rest thee here!
Never was any child more dear!


9



10

 65




70
VII "—I cannot help it; ill intent
I've none, my pretty Innocent!
I weep—I know they do thee wrong,
These tears—and my poor idle tongue.
Oh, what a kiss was that! my cheek
How cold it is! but thou art good; So
Thine eyes are on me—they would speak,
I think, to help me if they could.
Blessings upon that soft, warm face,
My heart again is in its place!






11
12
 75




80
VIII "While thou art mine, my little Love,
This cannot be a sorrowful grove;
Contentment, hope, and mother's glee,
I seem to find them all in thee:
Here's grass to play with, here are flowers;
I'll call thee by my darling's name;
Thou hast, I think, a look of ours,
Thy features seem to me the same;
His little sister thou shalt be;
And, when once more my home I see,
I'll tell him many tales of Thee."



Contents 1802
Main Contents

13
14






 85




90




95





Variant 1:  
1807
This Mother ...
 MS.
return


Variant 2:  
1845
... English ...
1807
return


Variant 3:  
1827
... did ...
1807
return


Variant 4:  
1845
Once did I see her clasp the Child about,
And take it to herself; and I, next day,
Wish'd in my native tongue to fashion out
Such things as she unto this Child might say:



1807
Once did I see her take with fond embrace
This Infant to herself; and I, next day,
Endeavoured in my native tongue to trace
Such things as she unto the Child might say:



1820
Once, having seen her take with fond embrace
This Infant to herself, I framed a lay,
Endeavouring, in my native tongue, to trace


1827
return


Variant 5:  
1845
And thus, from what I knew, had heard, and guess'd,
1807
return


Variant 6:  
1820
'Tis gone—forgotten—let me do
My best—there was a smile or two,
 1807
return


Variant 7:  
1827
... sweet ...
1807
return


Variant 8:  
1836
For they confound me: as it is,
I have forgot those smiles of his.

1807
For they bewilder me—even now
His smiles are lost,—I know not how!
1820
By those bewildering glances crost
In which the light of his is losta.

1827
return


Variant 9:  
1827
From France across the Ocean came;
1807
return


Variant 10:  
1845
My Darling, she is not to me
What thou art! though I love her well:
1807
But to my heart she cannot be
 1836
return


Variant 11:  
1807
And I grow happy while I speak,
Kiss, kiss me, Baby, thou art good.

MS.
return


Variant 12:  
1820
... that quiet face,
1807
return


Variant 13:  
1807
A Joy, a Comforter thou art;
Sunshine and pleasure to my heart;
And love and hope and mother's glee,

MS.
return


Variant 14:  
1807
My yearnings are allayed by thee,
My heaviness is turned to glee.

MS.
return




Sub-Footnote a:   In a letter to Barron Field (24th Oct. 1828), Wordsworth says that his substitution of the text of 1827 for that of 1807, was due to the objections of Coleridge.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Contents 1802
Main Contents



To the Cuckoo

Composed 1802.—Published 1807

[Composed in the Orchard at Town-end, 1804.—I. F.]

One of the "Poems of the Imagination."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
O blithe New-comer! I have heard,
I hear thee and rejoice.
O Cuckoo! shall I call thee Bird,
Or but a wandering Voice?

While I am lying on the grass
Thy twofold shout I hear,
From hill to hill it seems to pass,
At once far off, and near.

Though babbling only to the Vale,
Of sunshine and of flowers,
Thou bringest unto me a tale
Of visionary hours.

Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring!
Even yet thou art to me
No bird, but an invisible thing,
A voice, a mystery;

The same whom in my school-boy days
I listened to; that Cry
Which made me look a thousand ways
In bush, and tree, and sky.

To seek thee did I often rove
Through woods and on the green;
And thou wert still a hope, a love;
Still longed for, never seen.

And I can listen to thee yet;
Can lie upon the plain
And listen, till I do beget
That golden time again.

O blessed Bird! the earth we pace
Again appears to be
An unsubstantial, faery place;
That is fit home for Thee!



Note
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1



2




3


A




5





10





15





20






25





30





Variant 1:  
1845
While I am lying on the grass,
I hear thy restless shout:
From hill to hill it seems to pass,
About, and all about!



1807
Thy loud note smites my ear!—
From hill to hill it seems to pass,
At once far off and near!


1815
Thy loud note smites my ear!
It seems to fill the whole air's space,
At once far off and near!


1820
Thy twofold shout I hear,
That seems to fill the whole air's space,
As loud far off as neara.


1827
return


Variant 2:  
1827
To me, no Babbler with a tale
Of sunshine and of flowers,
Thou tellest, Cuckoo! in the vale


1807
I hear thee babbling to the Vale
Of sunshine and of flowers;
And unto me thou bring'st a tale


1815
But unto me ....
1820
return


Variant 3:  
1836
No Bird; but an invisible Thing,
 1807
return




Footnote A:  
"Vox et praterea nihil. See Lipsius 'of the Nightingale.'"
Barron Field.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Sub-Footnote a:   Barron Field remonstrated with Wordsworth about this reading, and he agreed to restore that of 1820; saying, at the same time, that he had "made the change to record a fact observed by himself."—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   In the chronological lists of his poems, published in 1815 and 1820, Wordsworth left a blank opposite this one, in the column containing the year of composition. From 1836 to 1849, the date assigned by him was 1804. But in Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal the following occurs under date Tuesday, 22nd March 1802:
"A mild morning. William worked at the Cuckoo poem.... At the closing in of day, went to sit in the orchard. William came to me, and walked backwards and forwards. W. repeated the poem to me. I left him there; and in 20 minutes he came in, rather tired with attempting to write."

"Friday (March 25).—A beautiful morning. William worked at The Cuckoo."
It is therefore evident that it belongs to the year 1802; although it may have been altered and readjusted in 1804. The connection of the seventh stanza of this poem with the first of that which follows it, "My heart leaps up," etc., and of both with the Ode, Intimations of Immortality (vol. viii.), is obvious.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



"My heart leaps up when I behold"

Composed March 26, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere.—I. F.]

One of the "Poems referring to the Period of Childhood." In 1807 it was No. 4 of the series called "Moods of my own Mind."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;
So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The Child is father of the Man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.



Note
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A



5





Footnote A:   Compare Milton's phrase in Paradise Regained (book iv. l. 220):
'The childhood shews the man,
As morning shews the day.'
Dryden's All for Love, act IV. scene I:
'Men are but children of a larger growth.'
And Pope's Essay on Man, Ep. iv. l. 175:
'The boy and man an individual makes.'
Also Chatterton's Fragment (Aldine edition, vol. 1. p. 132):
'Nature in the infant marked the man.'
Ed.
return to footnote mark







Note:  
"March 26, 1802.—While I was getting into bed he" (W.) "wrote The Rainbow."

"May 14th.— ... William very nervous. After he was in bed, haunted with altering The Rainbow."
(Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal.) This poem was known familiarly in the household as "The Rainbow," although not printed under that title. The text was never changed.

In The Friend, vol. i. p. 58 (ed. 1818), Coleridge writes:
"Men laugh at the falsehoods imposed on them during their childhood, because they are not good and wise enough to contemplate the past in the present, and so to produce that continuity in their self-consciousness, which Nature has made the law of their animal life. Men are ungrateful to others, only when they have ceased to look back on their former selves with joy and tenderness. They exist in fragments."
He then quotes the above poem, and adds:
"I am informed that these lines have been cited as a specimen of despicable puerility. So much the worse for the citer; not willingly in his presence would I behold the sun setting behind our mountains.... But let the dead bury their dead! The poet sang for the living.... I was always pleased with the motto placed under the figure of the rosemary in old herbals:
'Sus, apage! Haud tibi spiro.'"
Compare the passage in The Excursion (book ix. l. 36) beginning:
'... Ah! why in age
Do we revert so fondly, etc.'
also that in The Prelude (book v. l. 507) beginning:
'Our childhood sits.'


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Written in March, while resting on the Bridge at the Foot of Brothers Water

Composed April 16, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Extempore. This little poem was a favourite with Joanna Baillie.—I. F.]

One of the "Poems of the Imagination."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
The Cock is crowing,
The stream is flowing,
The small birds twitter,
The lake doth glitter,
The green field sleeps in the sun;
The oldest and youngest
Are at work with the strongest;
The cattle are grazing,
Their heads never raising;
There are forty feeding like one!

Like an army defeated
The snow hath retreated,
And now doth fare ill
On the top of the bare hill;
The Ploughboy is whooping—anon—anon:
There's joy in the mountains;
There's life in the fountains;
Small clouds are sailing,
Blue sky prevailing;
The rain is over and gone!



Note
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A



5




10




15




20





Footnote A:   This line was an afterthought.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   The text of this poem was never altered. It was not "written in March" (as the title states), but on the 16th of April (Good Friday) 1802. The bridge referred to crosses Goldrill Beck, a little below Hartsop in Patterdale. The following, from Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal, records the walk from Ullswater, over Kirkstone Pass, to Ambleside:
"Friday, 16th April (Good Friday).—... When we came to the foot of Brothers Water, I left William sitting on the bridge, and went along the path on the right side of the lake through the wood. I was delighted with what I saw: the water under the boughs of the bare old trees, the simplicity of the mountains, and the exquisite beauty of the path. There was one grey cottage. I repeated The Glowworm as I walked along. I hung over the gate, and thought I could have stayed for ever. When I returned, I found William writing a poem descriptive of the sights and sounds we saw and heard. There was the gentle flowing of the stream, the glittering lively lake, green fields, without a living creature to be seen on them; behind us, a flat pasture with forty-two cattle feeding; to our left, the road leading to the hamlet. No smoke there, the sun shone on the bare roofs. The people were at work, ploughing, harrowing, and sowing; lasses working; a dog barking now and then; cocks crowing, birds twittering; the snow in patches at the top of the highest hills; yellow palms, purple and green twigs on the birches, ashes with their glittering stems quite bare. The hawthorn a bright green, with black stems under the oak. The moss of the oaks glossy.... As we went up the vale of Brothers Water, more and more cattle feeding, a hundred of them. William finished his poem before we got to the foot of Kirkstone. There were hundreds of cattle in the vale.... The walk up Kirkstone was very interesting. The becks among the rocks were all alive. William shewed me the little mossy streamlet which he had before loved, when he saw its bright green track in the snow. The view above Ambleside very beautiful. There we sate, and looked down on the green vale. We watched the crows at a little distance from us become white as silver, as they flew in the sunshine; and, when they went still farther, they looked like shapes of water passing over the green fields."
Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



The Redbreast chasing the ButterflyA

Composed April 18, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Observed, as described, in the then beautiful orchard, Town-end, Grasmere.—I. F.]

Included among the "Poems of the Fancy."

In some editions this poem is assigned to the year 1806; but, in Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal the following occurs, under date "Sunday, 18th" (April 1802):
"A mild grey morning with rising vapours. We sate in the orchard. William wrote the poem on the Robin and the Butterfly.... W. met me at Rydal with the conclusion of the poem to the Robin. I read it to him in bed. We left out some lines."
Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Art thou the bird whom Man loves best,
The pious bird with the scarlet breast,
Our little English Robin;
The bird that comes about our doors
When Autumn-winds are sobbing?
Art thou the Peter of Norway Boors?
Their Thomas in Finland,
And Russia far inland?
The bird, that by some name or other
All men who know thee call their brother,
The darling of children and men?
Could Father Adam open his eyes
And see this sight beneath the skies,
He'd wish to close them again.
—If the Butterfly knew but his friend,
Hither his flight he would bend;
And find his way to me,
Under the branches of the tree:
In and out, he darts about;
Can this be the bird, to man so good,
That, after their bewildering,
Covered with leaves the little children,
So painfully in the wood?

What ailed thee, Robin, that thou could'st pursue
A beautiful creature,
That is gentle by nature?
Beneath the summer sky
From flower to flower let him fly;
'Tis all that he wishes to do.
The cheerer Thou of our in-door sadness,
He is the friend of our summer gladness:
What hinders, then, that ye should be
Playmates in the sunny weather,
And fly about in the air together!
His beautiful wings in crimson are drest,
A crimson as bright as thine own:
Would'st thou be happy in thy nest,
O pious Bird! whom man loves best,
Love him, or leave him alone!



Contents 1802
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1











2
3














4
5
B









C



5




10




15




20





25




30




35





Variant 1:  
1849
... whom ...
1807
... who ...
 1827
return


Variant 2:  
1815
In and out, he darts about;
His little heart is throbbing:
Can this be the Bird, to man so good,
Our consecrated Robin!
That, after ...




1807
... Robin! Robin!
His little heart is throbbing;
Can this ...

MS.
return


Variant 3:  
1832
Did cover ...
1807
return


Variant 4:  
1815
... Like thine own breast
His beautiful wings in crimson are drest,
As if he were bone of thy bone.

MS.
Like the hues of thy breast
His beautiful wings in crimson are drest,
A brother he seems of thine own:

1807
... in the air together!
His beautiful bosom is drest,
In crimson as bright as thine own:


1832
The edition of 1836 resumes the text of 1815.
return


Variant 5:  
1836
If thou would'st be ...
 1807
return




Footnote A:   The title, in the editions 1807 to 1820, was The Redbreast and the Butterfly. In the editions 1827 to 1843 it was The Redbreast and Butterfly. The final title was given in 1845.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:   Compare Cowley:
'And Robin Redbreasts whom men praise,
For pious birds.'
Ed.
return


Footnote C:   See Paradise Lost, book XI., where Adam points out to Eve the ominous sign of the Eagle chasing "two Birds of gayest plume," and the gentle Hart and Hind pursued by their enemy.—W. W. 1815.

The passage in book XI. of Paradise Lost includes lines 185-90.—Ed.
return


Contents 1802
Main Contents



To a Butterfly (2)

Composed April 20, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Written at the same time and place. The Orchard, Grasmere Town-end, 1801.—I. F.]

Included among the "Poems founded on the Affections."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
I've watch'd you now a full half-hour,
Self-poised upon that yellow flower;
And, little Butterfly! indeed
I know not if you sleep or feed.
How motionless!—not frozen seas
More motionless! and then
What joy awaits you, when the breeze
Hath found you out among the trees,
And calls you forth again!

This plot of orchard-ground is ours;
My trees they are, my Sister's flowers;
Here rest your wings when they are weary;
Here lodge as in a sanctuary!
Come often to us, fear no wrong;
Sit near us on the bough!
We'll talk of sunshine and of song,
And summer days, when we were young;
Sweet childish days, that were as long
As twenty days are now.



Note
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2



5




10




15





Variant 1:  
1807
... short ...
 1836
The text of 1845 reverts to the reading of 1807.
return


Variant 2:  
1815
Stop here whenever you are weary,
And rest as in a sanctuary!
1807
And feed ...
MS.
return




Note:   Wordsworth's date, as given to Miss Fenwick, is incorrect. In her Journal, April 20, 1802, Dorothy Wordsworth writes:
"William wrote a conclusion to the poem of The Butterfly, 'I've watch'd you now a full half-hour.'"
This, and the structure of the two poems, makes it probable that the latter was originally meant to be a sort of conclusion to the former (p. 283); but they were always printed as separate poems.

Many of the "flowers" in the orchard at Dove Cottage were planted by Dorothy Wordsworth, and some of the "trees" by William. The "summer days" of childhood are referred to in the previous poem, To a Butterfly, written on the 14th of March 1802.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Foresight

Composed April 28, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Also composed in the Orchard, Town-end, Grasmere.— I. F.]

Included among the "Poems referring to the Period of Childhood."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
That is work of waste and ruin—
Do as Charles and I are doing!
Strawberry-blossoms, one and all,
We must spare them—here are many:
Look at it—the flower is small,
Small and low, though fair as any:
Do not touch it! summers two
I am older, Anne, than you.
Pull the primrose, sister Anne!
Pull as many as you can.
—Here are daisies, take your fill;
Pansies, and the cuckoo-flower:
Of the lofty daffodil
Make your bed, or make your bower;
Fill your lap, and fill your bosom;
Only spare the strawberry-blossom!

Primroses, the Spring may love them—
Summer knows but little of them:
Violets, a barren kind,
Withered on the ground must lie;
Daisies leave no fruit behind
When the pretty flowerets die;
Pluck them, and another year
As many will be blowing here.

God has given a kindlier power
To the favoured strawberry-flower.
Hither soon as spring is fled
You and Charles and I will walk;
Lurking berries, ripe and red,
Then will hang on every stalk,
Each within its leafy bower;
And for that promise spare the flower!



Note
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Main Contents		 1












2










3

4


5



5




10




15




20




25




30





Variant 1:  
1815
That is work which I am rueing—
 1807
return


Variant 2:  
1836
... and ...
1807
return


Variant 3:  
1815
Violets, do what they will,
Wither'd on the ground must lie;
Daisies will be daisies still;
Daisies they must live and die:
Fill your lap, and fill your bosom,
Only spare the Strawberry-blossom!





1807
return


Variant 4:  
This last stanza was added in the edition of 1815.
return


Variant 5:  
1836
When the months of spring are fled
Hither let us bend our walk;
1815
return




Note:   The full title of this poem, in the editions of 1807 to 1832, was Foresight, or the Charge of a Child to his younger Companion, but it was originally known in the household as "Children gathering Flowers." The shortened title was adopted in 1836. The following is from Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal:
"Wednesday, 28th April (1802).—Copied the Prioress's Tale. William was in the orchard. I went to him; he worked away at his poem, though he was ill, and tired. I happened to say that when I was a child I would not have pulled a strawberry blossom; I left him, and wrote out the Manciple's Tale. At dinner time he came in with the poem of Children gathering Flowers, but it was not quite finished, and it kept him long from his dinner. It is now done. He is working at The Tinker."
At an earlier date in the same year,—Jan. 31st, 1802,—the following occurs:
"I found a strawberry blossom in a rock. The little slender flower had more courage than the green leaves, for they were but half expanded and half grown, but the blossom was spread full out. I uprooted it rashly, and I felt as if I had been committing an outrage; so I planted it again. It will have but a stormy life of it, but let it live if it can."
With this poem compare a parallel passage in Marvel's The Picture of T. C. in a Prospect of Flowers:
'But oh, young beauty of the woods,
Whom nature courts with fruits and flowers,
Gather the flowers, but spare the buds;
Lest Flora, angry at thy crime
To kill her infants in their prime,
Should quickly make the example yours;
And, ere we see,
Nip in the blossom all our hopes in thee.'
Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



To the Small CelandineA

Composed April 30, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. It is remarkable that this flower, coming out so early in the spring as it does, and so bright and beautiful, and in such profusion, should not have been noticed earlier in English verse. What adds much to the interest that attends it is its habit of shutting itself up and opening out according to the degree of light and temperature of the air.—I. F.]

One of the "Poems of the Fancy." In the original MS. this poem is called To the lesser Celandine, but in the proof "small" was substituted for "lesser."

In Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal the following occurs, under date April 30, 1802:
"We came into the orchard directly after breakfast, and sat there. The lake was calm, the sky cloudy. William began to write the poem of The Celandine.... I walked backwards and forwards with William. He repeated his poem to me, then he got to work again, and would not give over."
Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Pansies, lilies, kingcups, daisies,
Let them live upon their praises;
Long as there's a sun that sets,
Primroses will have their glory;
Long as there are violets,
They will have a place in story:
There's a flower that shall be mine,
'Tis the little Celandine.

Eyes of some men travel far
For the finding of a star;
Up and down the heavens they go,
Men that keep a mighty rout!
I'm as great as they, I trow,
Since the day I found thee out,
Little Flower!—I'll make a stir,
Like a sage astronomer.

Modest, yet withal an Elf
Bold, and lavish of thyself;
Since we needs must first have met
I have seen thee, high and low,
Thirty years or more, and yet
'Twas a face I did not know;
Thou hast now, go where I may,
Fifty greetings in a day.

Ere a leaf is on a bush,
In the time before the thrush
Has a thought about her nest,
Thou wilt come with half a call,
Spreading out thy glossy breast
Like a careless Prodigal;
Telling tales about the sun,
When we've little warmth, or none.

Poets, vain men in their mood!
Travel with the multitude:
Never heed them; I aver
That they all are wanton wooers;
But the thrifty cottager,
Who stirs little out of doors,
Joys to spy thee near her home;
Spring is coming, Thou art come!

Comfort have thou of thy merit,
Kindly, unassuming Spirit!
Careless of thy neighbourhood,
Thou dost show thy pleasant face
On the moor, and in the wood,
In the lane;—there's not a place,
Howsoever mean it be,
But 'tis good enough for thee.

Ill befal the yellow flowers,
Children of the flaring hours!
Buttercups, that will be seen,
Whether we will see or no;
Others, too, of lofty mien;
They have done as worldlings do,
Taken praise that should be thine,
Little, humble Celandine!

Prophet of delight and mirth,
Ill-requited upon earth;
Herald of a mighty band,
Of a joyous train ensuing,
Serving at my heart's command,
Tasks that are no tasks renewing,
I will sing, as doth behove,
Hymns in praise of what I love!



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35




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45





50




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Variant 1:  
1836
... great ...
 1807
return


Variant 2:  
1832
... it's ...
1807
return


Variant 3:  
1836
Scorn'd and slighted ...
1807
return


Variant 4:  
1836
Singing at my heart's command,
In the lanes my thoughts pursuing,
1807
return




Footnote A:  Common Pilewort.—W. W. 1807.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:  The following stanza was inserted in the editions of 1836-1843:
'Drawn by what peculiar spell,
By what charm for sight or smell,
Do those wingèd dim-eyed creatures,
Labourers sent from waxen cells,
Settle on thy brilliant features,
In neglect of buds and bells
Opening daily at thy side,
By the season multiplied?'
In 1845 it was transferred to the following poem, where it will be found, with a change of text.—Ed.
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Contents 1802
Main Contents



To the Same Flower

Composed May 1, 1802.—Published 1807

One of the "Poems of the Fancy."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Pleasures newly found are sweet
When they lie about our feet:
February last, my heart
First at sight of thee was glad;
All unheard of as thou art,
Thou must needs, I think, have had,
Celandine! and long ago,
Praise of which I nothing know.

I have not a doubt but he,
Whosoe'er the man might be,
Who the first with pointed rays
(Workman worthy to be sainted)
Set the sign-board in a blaze,
When the rising sun he painted,
Took the fancy from a glance
At thy glittering countenance.

Soon as gentle breezes bring
News of winter's vanishing,
And the children build their bowers,
Sticking 'kerchief-plots of mould
All about with full-blown flowers,
Thick as sheep in shepherd's fold!
With the proudest thou art there,
Mantling in the tiny square.

Often have I sighed to measure
By myself a lonely pleasure,
Sighed to think, I read a book
Only read, perhaps, by me;
Yet I long could overlook
Thy bright coronet and Thee,
And thy arch and wily ways,
And thy store of other praise.

Blithe of heart, from week to week
Thou dost play at hide-and-seek;
While the patient primrose sits
Like a beggar in the cold,
Thou, a flower of wiser wits,
Slip'st into thy sheltering hold;
Liveliest of the vernal train
When ye all are out again.

Drawn by what peculiar spell,
By what charm of sight or smell,
Does the dim-eyed curious Bee,
Labouring for her waxen cells,
Fondly settle upon Thee
Prized above all buds and bells
Opening daily at thy side,
By the season multiplied?

Thou art not beyond the moon,
But a thing "beneath our shoon:"
Let the bold Discoverer thrid
In his bark the polar sea;
Rear who will a pyramid;
Praise it is enough for me,
If there be but three or four
Who will love my little Flower.



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... risen ...
1807
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1832
... shelter'd ...
 1807
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Variant 3:  
1845
Bright as any of the train
 1807
return


Variant 4:  
This stanza was added in 1845. (See note, p. 302.)]
return


Variant 5:  
1845
Let, as old Magellen did,
Others roam about the sea;
Build who will a pyramida;


1807
Let, with bold advent'rous skill,
Others thrid the polar sea;
Rear a pyramid who will;

1820
Let the bold Adventurer thrid
In his bark the polar sea;
Rear who will a pyramid;


1827
return




Footnote A:   This may be an imperfect reminiscence of Comus, ll. 634-5.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Sub-Footnote a:   Barron Field asked Wordsworth to restore these lines of 1807, and Wordsworth promised to do so, but never did it.—Ed.
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Note:   The following is an extract from Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal. Saturday, May 1.
"A heavenly morning. We went into the garden, and sowed the scarlet beans about the house. It was a clear sky. I sowed the flowers, William helped me. We then went and sat in the orchard till dinner time. It was very hot. William wrote The Celandine (second part). We planned a shed, for the sun was too much for us."
Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Stanzas written in my Pocket Copy of Thomson's Castle of Indolence

Begun 9th May, finished 11th May, 1802.—Published 1815

The Poem

[Composed in the orchard, Town-end, Grasmere, Coleridge living with us much at this time: his son Hartley has said, that his father's character and habits are here preserved in a livelier way than in anything that has been written about him. I. F.]

One of the "Poems founded on the Affections."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Within our happy Castle there dwelt One
Whom without blame I may not overlook;
For never sun on living creature shone
Who more devout enjoyment with us took:
Here on his hours he hung as on a book,
On his own time here would he float away,
As doth a fly upon a summer brook;
But go to-morrow, or belike to-day,
Seek for him,—he is fled; and whither none can say.

Thus often would he leave our peaceful home,
And find elsewhere his business or delight;
Out of our Valley's limits did he roam:
Full many a time, upon a stormy night,
His voice came to us from the neighbouring height:
Oft could we see him driving full in view
At midday when the sun was shining bright;
What ill was on him, what he had to do,
A mighty wonder bred among our quiet crew.

Ah! piteous sight it was to see this Man
When he came back to us, a withered flower,—
Or like a sinful creature, pale and wan.
Down would he sit; and without strength or power
Look at the common grass from hour to hour:
And oftentimes, how long I fear to say,
Where apple-trees in blossom made a bower,
Retired in that sunshiny shade he lay;
And, like a naked Indian, slept himself away.

Great wonder to our gentle tribe it was
Whenever from our Valley he withdrew;
For happier soul no living creature has
Than he had, being here the long day through.
Some thought he was a lover, and did woo:
Some thought far worse of him, and judged him wrong;
But verse was what he had been wedded to;
And his own mind did like a tempest strong
Come to him thus, and drove the weary Wight along.

With him there often walked in friendly guise,
Or lay upon the moss by brook or tree,
A noticeable Man with large grey eyes,
And a pale face that seemed undoubtedly
As if a blooming face it ought to be;
Heavy his low-hung lip did oft appear,
Deprest by weight of musing Phantasy;
Profound his forehead was, though not severe;
Yet some did think that he had little business here:

Sweet heaven forefend! his was a lawful right;
Noisy he was, and gamesome as a boy;
His limbs would toss about him with delight
Like branches when strong winds the trees annoy.
Nor lacked his calmer hours device or toy
To banish listlessness and irksome care;
He would have taught you how you might employ
Yourself; and many did to him repair,—
And certes not in vain; he had inventions rare.

Expedients, too, of simplest sort he tried:
Long blades of grass, plucked round him as he lay,
Made, to his ear attentively applied,
A pipe on which the wind would deftly play;
Glasses he had, that little things display,
The beetle panoplied in gems and gold,
A mailed angel on a battle-day;
The mysteries that cups of flowers enfold,
And all the gorgeous sights which fairies do behold.

He would entice that other Man to hear
His music, and to view his imagery:
And, sooth, these two were each to the other dear:
No livelier love in such a place could be:
There did they dwell-from earthly labour free,
As happy spirits as were ever seen;
If but a bird, to keep them company,
Or butterfly sate down, they were, I ween,
As pleased as if the same had been a Maiden-queen.



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1836
... did ...
1815
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Variant 2:  
1827
The beetle with his radiance manifold,
1815
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Variant 3:  
1827
And cups of flowers, and herbage green and gold;
1815
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Variant 4:  
1836
And, sooth, these two did love each other dear,
As far as love in such a place could be;

1815
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Footnote A:   Compare
'And oft he traced the uplands to survey,
When o'er the sky advanced the kindling dawn,
The crimson cloud.'
Beattie's Minstrel, book I, st. 20.
'And oft the craggy cliff he loved to climb
When all in mist the world below was lost.'
Book I. st. 21. '
And of each gentle, and each dreadful scene
In darkness, and in storm, he found delight.'
Book I. st. 22. Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:   Compare the stanza in A Poet's Epitaph (p. 77), beginning
'He is retired as noontide dew.'
Ed.
return


Footnote C:  Many years ago Canon Ainger pointed out to me a parallel between Beattie's description of The Minstrel and Wordsworth's account of himself in this poem. It is somewhat curious that Dorothy Wordsworth, writing to Miss Pollard from Forncett in 1793, quotes the line from The Minstrel, book I. stanza 22,
"In truth he was a strange and wayward wight,"
and adds
"That verse of Beattie's Minstrel always reminds me of him, and indeed the whole character of Edwin resembles much what William was when I first knew him after leaving Halifax."
Mr. T. Hutchinson called the attention of Professor Dowden to the same resemblance between the two pictures. With lines 35, 36, compare in Shelley's Adonais, stanza xxxi.:
'And his own thoughts, along that rugged way,
Pursued, like raging hounds, their father and their prey.'
Ed.
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Note:   There can now be no doubt that, in the first four of these Stanzas, Wordsworth refers to himself; and that, in the last four, he refers to Coleridge. For a time it was uncertain whether in the earlier stanzas he had Coleridge, or himself, in view; and whether, in the later ones, some one else was, or was not, described. De Quincey, quoting (as he often did) in random fashion, mixes up extracts from each set of the stanzas, and applies them both to Coleridge; and Dorothy Wordsworth, in her Journal, gives apparent (though only apparent) sanction to a reverse order of allusion, by writing of "the stanzas about C. and himself" (her brother). The following are her references to the poem in that Journal:
"9th May (1802).-After tea he (W.) wrote two stanzas in the manner of Thomson's Castle of Indolence, and was tired out.

"10th May.—William still at work, though it is past ten o'clock ... William did not sleep till three o'clock."

"11th May.—William finished the stanzas about C. and himself. He did not go out to-day. ... He completely finished his poem. He went to bed at twelve o'clock."
From these extracts two things are evident,
  1. who the persons are described in the stanzas, and
  2. the immense labour bestowed upon the poem.
In the Memoirs of Wordsworth, by the late Bishop of Lincoln, there is a passage (vol. ii. chap. li. p. 309) amongst the "Personal Reminiscences, 1836," in which the Hon. Mr. Justice Coleridge virtually decides the question of the identity of the two persons referred to, in his record of a conversation with the poet. It is as follows:
"October 10th.—I have passed a great many hours to-day with Wordsworth in his home. I stumbled on him with proof sheets before him. He read me nearly all the sweet stanzas written in his copy of the Castle of Indolence, describing himself and my uncle; and he and Mrs. W. both assured me the description of the latter at that time was perfectly accurate; and he was almost as a great boy in feelings, and had all the tricks and fancies there described. Mrs. W. seemed to look back on him, and those times, with the fondest affection."
I think "the neighbouring height" referred to is the height of White Moss Common, behind the Fir-Grove, where Wordsworth was often heard murmuring out his verses," booing" as the country folks said: and the
'driving full in view
At midday when the sun was shining bright,'
aptly describes his habits as recorded in his sister's Journal, and elsewhere. The "withered flower," the "creature pale and wan," are significant of those terrible reactions of spirit, which followed his joyous hours of insight and inspiration. Stanzas IV. to VII. of Resolution and Independence (p. 314), in which Wordsworth undoubtedly described himself, may be compared with stanza III. of this poem. The lines
'Down would he sit; and without strength or power
Look at the common grass from hour to hour,'
are aptly illustrated by such passages in his sister's Journal, as the following, of 29th April 1802:
"We went to John's Grove, sate a while at first; afterwards William lay, and I lay in the trench, under the fence—he with his eyes closed, and listening to the waterfalls and the birds. There was no one waterfall above another—it was a kind of water in the air—the voice of the air. We were unseen by one another."
Again, April 23rd,
"Coleridge and I pushed on before. We left William sitting on the stones, feasting with silence."
And this recalls the first verse of Expostulation and Reply, written at Alfoxden in 1798;
Why, William, on that old grey stone,
Thus for the length of half a day,
Why, William, sit you thus alone,
And dream your time away?'
The retreat where "apple-trees in blossom made a bower," and where he so often "slept himself away," was evidently the same as that described in the poem The Green Linnet:
'Beneath these fruit-tree boughs that shed
Their snow white blossoms on my head.'
On the other hand, the "low-hung lip" and "profound" forehead of the other, the "noticeable Man with large grey eyes," mark him out as S. T. C.; "the rapt One, of the god-like forehead," described in the Extempore Effusion upon the Death of James Hogg. The description "Noisy he was, and gamesome as a boy," is verified by what the poet and his wife said to Mr. Justice Coleridge in 1836. In addition, Mr. Hutchinson of Kimbolton tells me he "often heard his father say that Coleridge was uproarious in his mirth."

Matthew Arnold wrote me an interesting letter some years ago about these stanzas, from which I make the following extract:
"When one looks uneasily at a poem it is easy to fidget oneself further, and neither the Wordsworth nor the Coleridge of our common notions seem to be exactly hit off in the Stanzas; still, I believe that the first described is Wordsworth and that the second described is Coleridge. I have myself heard Wordsworth speak of his prolonged exhausting wanderings among the hills. Then Miss Fenwick's notes show that Coleridge is certainly one of the two personages of the poem, and there are points in the description of the second man which suit him very well. The profound forehead is a touch akin to the god-like forehead in the mention of Coleridge in a later poem.

"I have a sort of recollection of having heard something about the inventions rare, and Coleridge is certain to have dabbled, at one time or other, in natural philosophy."
In 1796 Coleridge wrote to his friend Cottle from Nether Stowey:
" ... I should not think of devoting less than 20 years to an Epic Poem: ten to collect materials and warm my mind with universal science. I would be a tolerable Mathematician, I would thoroughly know Mechanics, Hydrostatics, Optics, and Astronomy, Botany, Metallurgy, Fossilism, Chemistry, Geology, Anatomy, Medicine—then the mind of man—then the minds of men—in all Travels, Voyages, and Histories. So I would spend ten years—the next five to the composition of the poem—and the last five to the correction of it. So would I write, haply not unhearing of the divine and rightly whispering Voice," etc.
Mr. T. Hutchinson (Dublin) writes in The Athenæum, Dec. 15, 1894:
"I take it for granted these lines were written, not only on the fly-leaf of Wordsworth's copy of the Castle of Indolence, but also by way of Supplement to that poem; i. e. as an addendum to the descriptive list of the denizens of the Castle given in stanzas LVII-LXIX of Canto I.; that, in short, they are meant to be read as though they were an after-thought of James Thomson's. Their author, therefore, has rightly imparted to them the curiously blended flavour of romantic melancholy and slippered mirth, of dreamlike vagueness and smiling hyperbole, which forms the distinctive mark of Thomson's poem; and thus the Poet and the Philosopher-Friend of Wordsworth's stanzas, like Thomson's companion sketches of the splenetic Solitary, the bard more fat than bard beseems, and the little, round, fat, oily Man of God, are neither more nor less than gentle caricatures."
It has been suggested by Coleridge's grandson that Wordsworth was describing S. T. C. in all the stanzas of this poem; that he drew two separate pictures of him; in the first four stanzas a realistic "character portrait," and in the last four a "companion picture, figuring the outward semblance of Coleridge, but embodying characteristics drawn from a third person"; so that we have a "fancy sketch" mixed up with a real one. I cannot agree with this. The evidence against it is
  1. Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal;
  2. the poet's and his wife's remarks to Mr. Justice Coleridge;
  3. the fact that Wordsworth was not in the habit of "passing from realism into artistic composition," except where he distinctly indicated it, as in the case of the Hawkshead Schoolmaster, in the "Matthew" poems. Such composite or conglomerate work was quite foreign to Wordsworth's genius.
Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Resolution and Independence

Begun May 3, finished July 4, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. This old man I met a few hundred yards from my cottage; and the account of him is taken from his own mouth. I was in the state of feeling described in the beginning of the poem, while crossing over Barton Fell from Mr. Clarkson's, at the foot of Ullswater, towards Askham. The image of the hare I then observed on the ridge of the Fell.—I. F.]

This poem was known in the Wordsworth household as "The Leech-Gatherer," although it never received that name in print. An entry in Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal of Friday, 3rd October 1800, may preface what she wrote in 1802 about the composition of the poem.
"When William and I returned from accompanying Jones, we met an old man almost double. He had on a coat thrown over his shoulders above his waistcoat and coat. Under this he carried a bundle, and had an apron on, and a night-cap. His face was interesting. He had dark eyes, and a long nose. John, who afterwards met him at Wytheburn, took him for a Jew. He was of Scotch parents, but had been born in the army. He had had a wife, 'and a good woman, and it pleased God to bless him with ten children.' All these were dead but one, of whom he had not heard for many years, a sailor. His trade was to gather leeches; but now leeches were scarce, and he had not strength for it. He lived by begging, and was making his way to Carlisle where he would buy a few books to sell. He said leeches were very scarce, partly owing to this dry season; but many years they had been scarce. He supposed it was owing to their being much sought after; that they did not breed fast; and were of slow growth. Leeches were formerly 2s. 6d. the 100; now they were 30s. He had been hurt in driving a cart, his leg broken, his body driven over, his skull fractured. He felt no pain till he recovered from his first insensibility. It was late in the evening, when the light was just going away."
It is most likely that this walk of William and Dorothy Wordsworth "accompanying Jones," was on the day of Jones's departure from Dove Cottage, viz. 26th September.

The Journal continues:
"Tuesday, 4th May, 1802.—Though William went to bed nervous and jaded in the extreme, he rose refreshed. I wrote out The Leech-Gatherer for him, which he had begun the night before, and of which he wrote several stanzas in bed this morning...."

(They started to walk up the Raise to Wytheburn.)

"It was very hot; we rested several times by the way, read, and repeated The Leech-Gatherer."

"Friday, 7th May.—William had slept uncommonly well, so, feeling himself strong, he fell to work at The Leech-Gatherer; he wrote hard at it till dinner time, then he gave over, tired to death—he had finished the poem."

"Sunday morning, 9th May.—William worked at The Leech-Gatherer almost incessantly from morning till tea-time. I copied The Leech-Gatherer and other poems for Coleridge. I was oppressed and sick at heart, for he wearied himself to death."

"Sunday, 4th July.—... William finished The Leech-Gatherer to-day."

"Monday, 5th July.—I copied out The Leech-Gatherer for Coleridge, and for us."
From these extracts it is clear that Dorothy Wordsworth considered the poem as "finished" on the 7th of May, and on the 9th she sent a copy to Coleridge; but that it was not till the 4th of July that it was really finished, and then a second copy was forwarded to Coleridge. It is impossible to say from which of the two MSS. sent to him Coleridge transcribed the copy which he forwarded to Sir George Beaumont. From that copy of a copy (which is now amongst the Beaumont MSS. at Coleorton) the various readings given, on Coleridge's authority, in the notes to the poem, were obtained some years ago.

The Fenwick note to the poem illustrates Wordsworth's habit of blending in one description details which were originally separate, both as to time and place. The scenery and the incidents of the poem are alike composite. As he tells us that he met the leech-gatherer a few hundred yards from Dove Cottage, the "lonely place" with its "pool, bare to the eye of heaven," at once suggests White Moss Common and its small tarn; but he adds that, in the opening stanzas of the poem, he is describing a state of feeling he was in, when crossing the fells at the foot of Ullswater to Askam, and that the image of the hare "running races in her mirth," with the glittering mist accompanying her, was observed by him, not on White Moss Common, but in one of the ridges of Moor Divock. To H. C. Robinson he said of the "Leech-Gatherer" (Sept. 10, 1816), that "he gave to his poetic character powers of mind which his original did not possess." (Robinson's Diary, etc., vol. ii. p. 24.)

One of the "Poems of the Imagination."—Ed.




The Poem


stanza text variant footnote line number
I There was a roaring in the wind all night;
The rain came heavily and fell in floods;
But now the sun is rising calm and bright;
The birds are singing in the distant woods;
Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove broods;
The Jay makes answer as the Magpie chatters;
And all the air is filled with pleasant noise of waters.



5
II All things that love the sun are out of doors;
The sky rejoices in the morning's birth;
The grass is bright with rain-drops;—on the moors
The hare is running races in her mirth;
And with her feet she from the plashy earth
Raises a mist; that, glittering in the sun,
Runs with her all the way, wherever she doth run.




1

10
III I was a Traveller then upon the moor;
I saw the hare that raced about with joy;
I heard the woods and distant waters roar;
Or heard them not, as happy as a boy:
The pleasant season did my heart employ:
My old remembrances went from me wholly;
And all the ways of men, so vain and melancholy.		 15




20
IV But, as it sometimes chanceth, from the might
Of joy in minds that can no further go,
As high as we have mounted in delight
In our dejection do we sink as low;
To me that morning did it happen so;
And fears and fancies thick upon me came;
Dim sadness—and blind thoughts, I knew not, nor could name.


25
V I heard the sky-lark warbling in the sky;
And I bethought me of the playful hare:
Even such a happy Child of earth am I;
Even as these blissful creatures do I fare;
Far from the world I walk, and from all care;
But there may come another day to me—
Solitude, pain of heart, distress, and poverty. 		2


3
30




35
VI My whole life I have lived in pleasant thought,
As if life's business were a summer mood;
As if all needful things would come unsought
To genial faith, still rich in genial good;
But how can He expect that others should
Build for him, sow for him, and at his call
Love him, who for himself will take no heed at all?


4





A



40
VII I thought of Chatterton, the marvellous Boy,
The sleepless Soul that perished in his pride;
Of Him who walked in glory and in joy
Following his plough, along the mountain-side:
By our own spirits are we deified:
We Poets in our youth begin in gladness;
But thereof come in the end despondency and madness.
5

6


7

45
VIII Now, whether it were by peculiar grace,
A leading from above, a something given,
Yet it befel, that, in this lonely place,
When I with these untoward thoughts had striven,
Beside a pool bare to the eye of heaven
I saw a Man before me unawares:
The oldest man he seemed that ever wore grey hairs.
[12]		 8

9

10
11

12		 50




55
IX As a huge stone is sometimes seen to lie
Couched on the bald top of an eminence;
Wonder to all who do the same espy,
By what means it could thither come, and whence;
So that it seems a thing endued with sense:
Like a sea-beast crawled forth, that on a shelf
Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun itself;

13


14


60
X Such seemed this Man, not all alive nor dead,
Nor all asleep—in his extreme old age:
His body was bent double, feet and head
Coming together in life's pilgrimage;
As if some dire constraint of pain, or rage
Of sickness felt by him in times long past,
A more than human weight upon his frame had cast.


15


16
65




70
XI Himself he propped, limbs, body, and pale face,
Upon a long grey staff of shaven wood:
And, still as I drew near with gentle pace,
Upon the margin of that moorish flood
Motionless as a cloud the old Man stood,
That heareth not the loud winds when they call;
And moveth all together, if it move at all. 		17


18


19
20



75
XII At length, himself unsettling, he the pond
Stirred with his staff, and fixedly did look
Upon the muddy water, which he conned,
As if he had been reading in a book:
And now a stranger's privilege I took;
And, drawing to his side, to him did say,
"This morning gives us promise of a glorious day."



21

80
XIII A gentle answer did the old Man make,
In courteous speech which forth he slowly drew:
And him with further words I thus bespake,
"What occupation do you there pursue?
This is a lonesome place for one like you."
Ere he replied, a flash of mild surprise
Broke from the sable orbs of his yet-vivid eyes.


22
23

24





B		 85




90
XIV His words came feebly, from a feeble chest,
But each in solemn order followed each,
With something of a lofty utterance drest—
Choice word and measured phrase, above the reach
Of ordinary men; a stately speech;
Such as grave Livers do in Scotland use,
Religious men, who give to God and man their dues.
25
26
27


95
XV He told, that to these waters he had come
To gather leeches, being old and poor:
Employment hazardous and wearisome!
And he had many hardships to endure:
From pond to pond he roamed, from moor to moor;
Housing, with God's good help, by choice or chance;
And in this way he gained an honest maintenance.		 28


29
100




105
XVI The old Man still stood talking by my side;
But now his voice to me was like a stream
Scarce heard; nor word from word could I divide;
And the whole body of the Man did seem
Like one whom I had met with in a dream;
Or like a man from some far region sent,
To give me human strength, by apt admonishment.
30




31



110
XVII My former thoughts returned: the fear that kills;
And hope that is unwilling to be fed;
Cold, pain, and labour, and all fleshly ills;
And mighty Poets in their misery dead.
—Perplexed, and longing to be comforted,
My question eagerly did I renew,
"How is it that you live, and what is it you do?"
32


33

34

115
XVIII He with a smile did then his words repeat;
And said, that, gathering leeches, far and wide
He travelled; stirring thus about his feet
The waters of the pools where they abide.
"Once I could meet with them on every side;
But they have dwindled long by slow decay;
Yet still I persevere, and find them where I may."


35


36		 120




125
XIX While he was talking thus, the lonely place,
The old Man's shape, and speech—all troubled me:
In my mind's eye I seemed to see him pace
About the weary moors continually,
Wandering about alone and silently.
While I these thoughts within myself pursued,
He, having made a pause, the same discourse renewed.


130
XX And soon with this he other matter blended,
Cheerfully uttered, with demeanour kind,
But stately in the main; and when he ended,
I could have laughed myself to scorn to find
In that decrepit Man so firm a mind.
"God," said I, "be my help and stay secure;
I'll think of the Leech-gatherer on the lonely moor!"



Note
Contents 1802
Main Contents		 37

38
135




140





Variant 1:  
1827
... which, ...
1807
And in MS. letter from Coleridge to Sir George Beaumont, 1802a.
return


Variant 2:  
1820
... singing ...
1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 3:  
1807
... happy ...
MS. 1802.
return


Variant 4:  
1807
And they who lived in genial faith found nought
that grew more willingly than genial good;
MS. 1802.
return


Variant 5:  
1815
... who perished in his pride;
MS. 1802.
... that perished in its pride;
 1807
return


Variant 6:  
1820
Behind his plough, upon the mountain-side:
 1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 7:  
1836
... comes ...
1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 8:  
1807
... was ...
 MS. 1802.
return


Variant 9:  
1807
... that ...
 MS. 1802.
return


Variant 10:  
1820
When up and down my fancy thus was driven,
And I with these untoward thoughts had striven,

1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 11:  
1807
I spied ...
MS. 1802.
return


Variant 12:  
date
My course I stopped as soon as I espied
The Old Man in that naked wilderness:
Close by a Pond, upon the further side,i
He stood alone: a minute's space I guess
I watch'd him, he continuing motionless:
To the Pool's further margin then I drew;
He being all the while before me full in view.ii





1807
This stanza, which appeared in the editions of 1807 and 1815, was, on Coleridge's advice, omitted from subsequent ones.
return


Variant 13:  
1807
... that ...
MS. 1802.
return


Variant 14:  
1820
... which ...
1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 15:  
1820
... in their pilgrimage
 And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 16:  
1807
... his age ...
MS. 1802.
return


Variant 17:  
1836
Himself he propp'd, both body, limbs, and face,
 MS. 1802.
... his body, ...
1807
return


Variant 18:  
1820
Beside the little pond or moorish flood
 1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 19:  
date
... moves ...
 MS. 1802.
return


Variant 20:  
He wore a Cloak the same as women wear
As one whose blood did needful comfort lack;
His face look'd pale as if it had grown fair;
And, furthermore he had upon his back,
Beneath his cloak, a round and bulky Pack;
A load of wool or raiment as might seem.
That on his shoulders lay as if it clave to him.





This stanza appeared only in MS. 1802.
return


Variant 21:  
1820
And now such freedom as I could I took;
 1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 22:  
1820
"What kind of work is that which you pursue?
 1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 23:  
1807
... for such as ...
MS.
return


Variant 24:  
1836
He answer'd me with pleasure and surprize;
And there was, while he spake, a fire about his eyes.

1807 and MS. 1802
He answered, while a flash of mild surprise
Broke from the sable orbs of his yet-vivid eyes.
1820
return


Variant 25:  
1820
Yet ...
 1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 26:  
1807
... pompous ....
 MS. 1802.
return


Variant 27:  
1807
...words ...
MS.
...beyond ...
MS. 1802.
return


Variant 28:  
1827
He told me that he to the pond had come
 MS. 1802.
... this pond ...
 1807
return


Variant 29:  
1807
This was his calling, better far than some,
Though he had ...
MS. 1802.
return


Variant 30:  
1807
But soon ...
 MS. 1802.
return


Variant 31:  
1827
... and strong admonishment.
 1807
... by strong admonishment.
 1820
return


Variant 32:  
1815
The ...
 1807
And MS. 1802.
return


Variant 33:  
1820
And now, not knowing what the Old Man had said,
1807 and MS. 1802
But now, perplex'd by what the Old Man had said,
1815
return


Variant 34:  
1807
... live? what is it that you do?"
 MS. 1802.
return


Variant 35:  
1827
And said, that wheresoe'er they might be spied
He gather'd Leeches, stirring at his feet
The waters in the Ponds ...


MS. 1802
And said, that, gathering Leeches, far and wide
He travelled; stirring thus about his feet
The waters of the Ponds ...
1807
return


Variant 36:  
1807
Once he could meet with them on every side;
But fewer they became from day to day,
And so his means of life before him died away.


MS. 1802.
return


Variant 37:  
1807
And now ...
 MS. 1802.
return


Variant 38:  
1807
Which he delivered with demeanour kind,
Yet stately ...

MS. 1802.
return




Sub-Variant i:  
... hither side,
 MS. 1802.
return


Sub-Variant ii:  
He all the while before me being full in view.
MS. 1802.
return




Footnote A:   Some have thought that Wordsworth had S.T.C. in his mind, in writing this stanza. I cannot agree with this. The value and interest of the poem would be lessened by our imagining that Wordsworth's heart never failed him; and that, when he appears to moralise at his own expense, he was doing so at Coleridge's. Besides, the date of this poem, taken in connection with entries in the Grasmere Journal of Dorothy Wordsworth, makes it all but certain that Coleridge was not referred to.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:   Compare in The Matron of Jedborough and her Husband, p. 417, ll. 66-69:
'Some inward trouble suddenly
Broke from the Matron's strong black eye—
A remnant of uneasy light,
A flash of something over-bright!'
Ed.
return




Sub-Footnote a:   Additional variants obtained from this source are inserted as "MS. 1802."—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   The late Bishop of Lincoln, in the Memoirs of his uncle (vol. i. pp. 172, 173), quotes from a letter, written by Wordsworth "to some friends, which has much interest as bearing on this poemC. The following are extracts from it:
"It is not a matter of indifference whether you are pleased with his figure and employment, it may be comparatively whether you are pleased with this Poem; but it is of the utmost importance that you should have had pleasure in contemplating the fortitude, independence, persevering spirit, and the general moral dignity of this old man's character." Again, "I will explain to you, in prose, my feelings in writing that poem.... I describe myself as having been exalted to the highest pitch of delight by the joyousness and beauty of nature; and then as depressed, even in the midst of those beautiful objects, to the lowest dejection and despair. A young poet in the midst of the happiness of nature is described as overwhelmed by the thoughts of the miserable reverses which have befallen the happiest of all men, viz. poets. I think of this till I am so deeply impressed with it, that I consider the manner in which I was rescued from my dejection and despair almost as an interposition of Providence. A person reading the poem with feelings like mine will have been awed and controlled, expecting something spiritual or supernatural. What is brought forward? A lonely place, 'a pond, by which an old man was, far from all house or home:' not stood, nor sat, but was—the figure presented in the most naked simplicity possible. This feeling of spirituality or supernaturalness is again referred to as being strong in my mind in this passage. How came he here? thought I, or what can he be doing? I then describe him, whether ill or well is not for me to judge with perfect confidence; but this I can confidently affirm, that though I believe God has given me a strong imagination, I cannot conceive a figure more impressive than that of an old man like this, the survivor of a wife and ten children, travelling alone among the mountains and all lonely places, carrying with him his own fortitude and the necessities which an unjust state of society has laid upon him. You speak of his speech as tedious. Every thing is tedious when one does not read with the feelings of the author. The Thorn is tedious to hundreds; and so is The Idiot Boy to hundreds. It is in the character of the old man to tell his story, which an impatient reader must feel tedious. But, good heavens! such a figure, in such a place; a pious, self-respecting, miserably infirm and pleased old man telling such a tale!"
Ed.




Footnote C:   It is unfortunate that in this, as in many other similar occasions in these delightful volumes by the poet's nephew, the reticence as to names—warrantable perhaps in 1851, so soon after the poet's death—has now deprived the world of every means of knowing to whom many of Wordsworth's letters were addressed. Professor Dowden asks about it—and very naturally:
"Was it the letter to Mary and Sara" (Hutchinson) "about The Leech-Gatherer, mentioned in Dorothy's Journal of 14th June 1802?"
Ed.
return





Contents 1802
Main Contents



"I grieved for Buonaparté"

Composed May 21, 1802.—Published 1807A

The Poem

[In the cottage of Town-end, one afternoon in 1801, my sister read to me the sonnets of Milton. I had long been well acquainted with them, but I was particularly struck on that occasion with the dignified simplicity and majestic harmony that runs through most of them—in character so totally different from the Italian, and still more so from Shakespeare's fine sonnets. I took fire, if I may be allowed to say so, and produced three sonnets the same afternoon, the first I ever wrote, except an irregular one at school. Of these three the only one I distinctly remember is 'I grieved for Buonaparté, etc.'; one of the others was never written down; the third, which was I believe preserved, I cannot particularise.—I. F.]

One of the "Sonnets dedicated to Liberty," afterwards called "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty." From the edition of 1815 onwards, it bore the title 1801.—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
I grieved for Buonaparté, with a vain
And an unthinking grief! The tenderest mood
Of that Man's mind—what can it be? what food
Fed his first hopes? what knowledge could he gain?
'Tis not in battles that from youth we train
The Governor who must be wise and good,
And temper with the sternness of the brain
Thoughts motherly, and meek as womanhood.
Wisdom doth live with children round her knees:
Books, leisure, perfect freedom, and the talk
Man holds with week-day man in the hourly walk
Of the mind's business: these are the degrees
By which true Sway doth mount; this is the stalk
True Power doth grow on; and her rights are these.



Note
Contents 1802
Main Contents
1



5




10





Variant 1:  
1837
        grief! the vital blood
Of that man's mind, what can it be? What food
Fed his first hopes? what knowledge could he gain?

1802
       ... grief! for, who aspires
To genuine greatness but from just desires,
And knowledge such as He could never gain?


1815
return


Footnote A:  It had twice seen the light previously in The Morning Post, first on September 16, 1802, unsigned, and again on January 29, 1803, when it was signed W. L. D.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   Wordsworth's date 1801, in the Fenwick note, should have been 1802. His sister writes, in her Journal of 1802:
"May 21.—W. wrote two sonnets on Buonaparte, after I had read Milton's sonnets to him."
The "irregular" sonnet, written "at school," to which Wordsworth refers, is probably the one published in the European Magazine. in 1787, vol. xi. p. 202, and signed Axiologus.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



A Farewell

Composed May 29, 1802.—Published 1815

The Poem

[Composed just before my Sister and I went to fetch Mrs. Wordsworth from Gallow-hill, near Scarborough.—I. F.]

This was one of the "Poems founded on the Affections." It was published in 1815 and in 1820 without a title, but with the sub-title 'Composed in the Year 1802'. In 1827 and 1832 it was called 'A Farewell', to which the sub-title was added. The sub-title was omitted in 1836, and afterwards.—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Farewell, thou little Nook of mountain-ground,
Thou rocky corner in the lowest stair
Of that magnificent temple which doth bound
One side of our whole vale with grandeur rare;
Sweet garden-orchard, eminently fair,
The loveliest spot that man hath ever found,
Farewell!—we leave thee to Heaven's peaceful care,
Thee, and the Cottage which thou dost surround.

Our boat is safely anchored by the shore,
And there will safely ride when we are gone;
The flowering shrubs that deck our humble door
Will prosper, though untended and alone:
Fields, goods, and far-off chattels we have none:
These narrow bounds contain our private store
Of things earth makes, and sun doth shine upon;
Here are they in our sight—we have no more.

Sunshine and shower be with you, bud and bell!
For two months now in vain we shall be sought;
We leave you here in solitude to dwell
With these our latest gifts of tender thought;
Thou, like the morning, in thy saffron coat,
Bright gowan, and marsh-marigold, farewell!
Whom from the borders of the Lake we brought,
And placed together near our rocky Well.

We go for One to whom ye will be dear;
And she will prize this Bower, this Indian shed,
Our own contrivance, Building without peer!
—A gentle Maid, whose heart is lowly bred,
Whose pleasures are in wild fields gathered,
With joyousness, and with a thoughtful cheer,
Will come to you; to you herself will wed;
And love the blessed life that we lead here.

Dear Spot! which we have watched with tender heed,
Bringing thee chosen plants and blossoms blown
Among the distant mountains, flower and weed,
Which thou hast taken to thee as thy own.
Making all kindness registered and known;
Thou for our sakes, though Nature's child indeed,
Fair in thyself and beautiful alone,
Hast taken gifts which thou dost little need.

And O most constant, yet most fickle Place,
That hast thy wayward moods, as thou dost show
To them who look not daily on thy face;
Who, being loved, in love no bounds dost know,
And say'st, when we forsake thee, "Let them go!"
Thou easy-hearted Thing, with thy wild race
Of weeds and flowers, till we return be slow,
And travel with the year at a soft pace.

Help us to tell Her tales of years gone by,
And this sweet spring, the best beloved and best;
Joy will be flown in its mortality;
Something must stay to tell us of the rest.
Here, thronged with primroses, the steep rock's breast
Glittered at evening like a starry sky;
And in this bush our sparrow built her nest,
Of which I sang one song that will not die.

O happy Garden! whose seclusion deep
Hath been so friendly to industrious hours;
And to soft slumbers, that did gently steep
Our spirits, carrying with them dreams of flowers,
And wild notes warbled among leafy bowers;
Two burning months let summer overleap,
And, coming back with Her who will be ours,
Into thy bosom we again shall creep.



Note
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Main Contents









1
2





















3
4












5













6




























































A



5





10




15





20





25




30





35




40





45





50




55





60





Variant 1:  
1836
And safely she will ride ...
 1815
... will she ...
 1832
return


Variant 2:  
1836
... that decorate our door
 1815
return


Variant 3:  
1820
She'll come ...
 1815
return


Variant 4:  
1827
... which ...
 1815
return


Variant 5:  
1827
... in ...
1815
return


Variant 6:  
1832
... sung ...
1815
return




Footnote A:  See The Sparrow's Nest, p. 236.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:  
"May 29.—William finished his poem on going for Mary. I wrote it out. A sweet day. We nailed up the honeysuckle and hoed the scarlet beans."
She added on the 31st,
"I wrote out the poem on our departure, which he seemed to have finished;"
and on June 13th,
"William has been altering the poem to Mary this morning."
The "little Nook of mountain-ground" is in much the same condition now, as it was in 1802. The "flowering shrubs" and the "rocky well" still exist, and "the steep rock's breast" is "thronged with primroses" in spring. The "bower" is gone; but, where it used to be, a seat is now erected.

The Dove Cottage orchard is excellently characterised in Mr. Stopford Brooke's pamphlet describing it (1890). See also The Green Linnet, p. 367, with the note appended to it, and Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal, passim.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



"The sun has long been set"

Composed June 8, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[This Impromptu appeared, many years ago, among the Author's poems, from which, in subsequent editions, it was excludedA. It is reprinted, at the request of the Friend in whose presence the lines were thrown off.—I. F.]

One of the "Evening Voluntaries."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
The sun has long been set,
The stars are out by twos and threes,
The little birds are piping yet
Among the bushes and trees;
There's a cuckoo, and one or two thrushes,
And a far-off wind that rushes,
And a sound of water that gushes,
And the cuckoo's sovereign cry
Fills all the hollow of the sky.

Who would go "parading"
In London, "and masquerading,"
On such a night of June
With that beautiful soft half-moon,
And all these innocent blisses?
On such a night as this is!



Note
Contents 1802
Main Contents


1


2










B



5





10




15





Variant 1:  
1807
... and the trees;
 1836
The edition of 1837 returns to the text of 1807.
return


Variant 2:  
1835
And a noise of wind that rushes,
With a noise of water that gushes;
1807
return




Footnote A:   It appeared in 1807 as No. II. of "Moods of my own Mind," and not again till the publication of "Yarrow Revisited" in 1835.—Ed.
return to footnote mark

Footnote B:  Compare:
'At operas and plays parading,
Mortgaging, gambling, masquerading.'
Burns, The Two Dogs, a Tale, II. 124-5.—Ed.
return




Note:  
"June 8th (1802).—After tea William came out and walked, and wrote that poem, The sun has long been set, etc. He walked on our own path, and wrote the lines; he called me into the orchard and there repeated them to me."
(Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal.) The "Friend in whose presence the lines were thrown off," was his sister.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802

Composed July 31, 1802.—Published 1807

[Written on the roof of a coach, on my way to France.—I. F.]

One of the "Miscellaneous Sonnets."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Earth has not any thing to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth, like a garment, wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!



Note
Contents 1802
Main Contents
1



5




10





Variant 1:  
1807
... heart ...
MS.
return




Footnote A:   This is an error of date. Saturday, the day of their departure from London, was the 31st of July.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   The date which Wordsworth gave to this sonnet on its first publication in 1807, viz. September 3, 1803,—and which he retained in all subsequent editions of his works till 1836,—is inaccurate. He left London for Dover, on his way to Calais, on the 31st of July 1802. The sonnet was written that morning as he travelled towards Dover. The following record of the journey is preserved in his sister's Journal:
"July 30.A—Left London between five and six o'clock of the morning outside the Dover coach. A beautiful morning. The city, St. Paul's, with the river—a multitude of little boats, made a beautiful sight as we crossed Westminster Bridge; the houses not overhung by their clouds of smoke, and were hung out endlessly; yet the sun shone so brightly, with such a pure light, that there was something like the purity of one of Nature's own grand spectacles."
This sonnet underwent no change in successive editions.

In illustration of it, an anecdote of the late Bishop of St. David's may be given, as reported by Lord Coleridge.
"In the great debate on the abolition of the Irish Establishment in 1869, the Bishop of St. David's, Dr. Thirlwall, had made a very remarkable speech, and had been kept till past daybreak in the House of Lords, before the division was over, and he was able to walk home. He was then an old man, and in failing health. Some time after, he was asked whether he had not run some risk to his health, and whether he did not feel much exhausted. 'Yes,' he said, 'perhaps so; but I was more than repaid by walking out upon Westminster Bridge after the division, seeing London in the morning light as Wordsworth saw it, and repeating to myself his noble sonnet as I walked home.'"
This anecdote was told to the Wordsworth Society, at its meeting on the 3rd of May 1882, after a letter had been read by the Secretary, from Mr. Robert Spence Watson, recording the following similar experience:
"... As confirming the perfect truth of Wordsworth's description of the external aspects of a scene, and the way in which he reached its inmost soul, I may tell you what happened to me, and may have happened to many others. Many years ago, I think it was in 1859, I chanced to be passing (in a pained and depressed state of mind, occasioned by the death of a friend) over Waterloo Bridge at half-past three on a lovely June morning. It was broad daylight, and I was alone. Never when alone in the remotest recesses of the Alps, with nothing around me but the mountains, or upon the plains of Africa, alone with the wonderful glory of the southern night, have I seen anything to approach the solemnity—the soothing solemnity—of the city, sleeping under the early sun:
'Earth has not any thing to show more fair.'
"How simply, yet how perfectly, Wordsworth has interpreted it! It was a happy thing for us that the Dover coach left at so untimely an hour. It was this sonnet, I think, that first opened my eyes to Wordsworth's greatness as a poet. Perhaps nothing that he has written shows more strikingly the vast sympathy which is his peculiar dower."
Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Composed by the Sea-side, near Calais, August, 1802

Composed August, 1802.—Published 1807

One of the "Sonnets dedicated to Liberty"; re-named in 1845, "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Fair Star of evening, Splendour of the west,
Star of my Country!—on the horizon's brink
Thou hangest, stooping, as might seem, to sink
On England's bosom; yet well pleased to rest,
Meanwhile, and be to her a glorious crest
Conspicuous to the Nations. Thou, I think,
Should'st be my Country's emblem; and should'st wink,
Bright Star! with laughter on her banners, drest
In thy fresh beauty. There! that dusky spot
Beneath thee, that is England; there she lies.
Blessings be on you both! one hope, one lot,
One life, one glory!—I, with many a fear
For my dear Country, many heartfelt sighs,
Among men who do not love her, linger here.



Note
Contents 1802
Main Contents








1



5




10





Variant 1:  
1837
... it is England; there it lies.
 1807
return




Note:   This sonnet, and the seven that follow it, were written during Wordsworth's residence at Calais, in the month of August, 1802. The following extract from his sister's Journal illustrates it:
"We arrived at Calais at four o'clock on Sunday morning the 31st of July. We had delightful walks after the heat of the day was passed—seeing far off in the west the coast of England, like a cloud, crested with Dover Castle, the evening Star, and the glory of the sky; the reflections in the water were more beautiful than the sky itself; purple waves brighter than precious stones, for ever melting away upon the sands."
Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Calais, August, 1802

Composed August 7, 1802—Published 1807A

One of the "Sonnets dedicated to Liberty"; re-named in 1845, "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Is it a reed that's shaken by the wind,
Or what is it that ye go forth to see?
Lords, lawyers, statesmen, squires of low degree,
Men known, and men unknown, sick, lame, and blind,
Post forward all, like creatures of one kind,
With first-fruit offerings crowd to bend the knee
In France, before the new-born Majesty.
'Tis ever thus. Ye men of prostrate mind,
A seemly reverence may be paid to power;
But that's a loyal virtue, never sown
In haste, nor springing with a transient shower:
When truth, when sense, when liberty were flown,
What hardship had it been to wait an hour?
Shame on you, feeble Heads, to slavery prone!



Contents 1802
Main Contents






1



5




10





Variant 1:  
1807
Thus fares it ever. Men of prostrate mind!
1803
return




Footnote A:  This sonnet was first published in The Morning Post, Jan. 29, 1803, under the signature W. L. D., along with the one beginning, "I grieved for Buonaparté, with a vain," and was afterwards printed in the 1807 edition of the Poems. Mr. T. Hutchinson (Dublin) suggests that the W. L. D. stood either for Wordsworthius Libertatis Defensor, or (more likely) Wordsworthii Libertati Dedicatunt (carmen).—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Composed near Calais, on the Road leading to Ardres, August 7, 1802A

Composed August, 1802.—Published 1807

One of the "Sonnets dedicated to Liberty"; re-named in 1845, "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Jones! as from Calais southward you and I
Went pacing side by side, this public Way
Streamed with the pomp of a too-credulous day,
When faith was pledged to new-born Liberty:
A homeless sound of joy was in the sky:
From hour to hour the antiquated Earth,
Beat like the heart of Man: songs, garlands, mirth,
Banners, and happy faces, far and nigh!
And now, sole register that these things were,
Two solitary greetings have I heard,
"Good morrow, Citizen!" a hollow word,
As if a dead man spake it! Yet despair
Touches me not, though pensive as a bird
Whose vernal coverts winter hath laid bare.



Note
Contents 1802
Main Contents		 1


2

3
4






5

B



5




10





Variant 1:  
1837
... when ...
 1807
... while ...
1820
return


Variant 2:  
1837
Travell'd on foot together; then this Way,
Which I am pacing now, was like the May
With festivals of new-born Liberty:


1807
Where I am walking now ...
 MS.
Urged our accordant steps, this public Way
Streamed with the pomp of a too-credulous day,
When faith was pledged to new-born Liberty:


1820
return


Variant 3:  
1845
The antiquated Earth, as one might say,
 1807
The antiquated Earth, hopeful and gay,
1837
return


Variant 4:  
1845
... garlands, play,
 1807
return


Variant 5:  
1827
I feel not: happy am I as a Bird:
Fair seasons yet will come, and hopes as fair.

1807
I feel not: jocund as a warbling Bird;
 1820
return




Footnote A:   In the editions of 1807 to 1837 this is a sub-title, the chief title being To a Friend. In the editions of 1840-1843, the chief title is retained in the Table of Contents, but is erased in the text.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:  14th July 1790.—W. W. 1820.
return


Footnote C:   See p. 208.—Ed.
return




Note:   This sonnet, originally entitled To a Friend, composed near Calais, on the Road leading to Ardres, August 7th, 1802, was addressed to Robert Jones, of Plas-yn-llan, near Ruthin, Denbighshire, a brother collegian at Cambridge, and afterwards a fellow of St. John's College, and incumbent of Soulderne, near Deddington, in Oxfordshire. It was to him that Wordsworth dedicated his Descriptive Sketches, which record their wanderings together in Switzerland; and it is to the pedestrian tour, undertaken by the two friends in the long vacation of 1790, that he refers in the above sonnet. The character of Jones is sketched in the poem written in 1800, beginning:
'I marvel how Nature could ever find space,'C
and his parsonage in Oxfordshire is described in the sonnet:
'Where holy ground begins, unhallowed ends,
Is marked by no distinguishable line.'
The following note on Jones was appended to the edition of 1837:
"This excellent Person, one of my earliest and dearest friends, died in the year 1835. We were under-graduates together of the same year, at the same college; and companions in many a delightful ramble through his own romantic Country of North Wales. Much of the latter part of his life he passed in comparative solitude; which I know was often cheered by remembrance of our youthful adventures, and of the beautiful regions which, at home and abroad, we had visited together. Our long friendship was never subject to a moment's interruption,—and, while revising these volumes for the last time, I have been so often reminded of my loss, with a not unpleasing sadness, that I trust the Reader will excuse this passing mention of a Man who well deserves from me something more than so brief a notice. Let me only add, that during the middle part of his life he resided many years (as Incumbent of the Living) at a Parsonage in Oxfordshire, which is the subject of one of the Miscellaneous Sonnets."
Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Calais, August 15, 1802

Composed August 15, 1802.—Published 1807A

One of the "Sonnets dedicated to Liberty"; re-named in 1845, "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Festivals have I seen that were not names:
This is young Buonaparte's natal day,
And his is henceforth an established sway—
Consul for life. With worship France proclaims
Her approbation, and with pomps and games.
Heaven grant that other Cities may be gay!
Calais is not: and I have bent my way
To the sea-coast, noting that each man frames
His business as he likes. Far other show
My youth here witnessed, in a prouder time;
The senselessness of joy was then sublime!
Happy is he, who, caring not for Pope,
Consul, or King, can sound himself to know
The destiny of Man, and live in hope.



Contents 1802
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1

2



5




10





Variant 1:  
1807
... this ...
 1803
return


Variant 2:  
1827
... Another time
That was, when I was here twelve years ago.

1803
... long years ago:
 1807
... Far different time
That was, which here I witnessed, long ago;

1820
return




Footnote A:   It had appeared in The Morning Post, February 26, 1803, under the initials W. L. D.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Contents 1802
Main Contents



"It is a beauteous evening, calm and free"

Composed August, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[This was composed on the beach near Calais, in the autumn of 1802.—I. F.]

One of the "Miscellaneous Sonnets." In 1807 it was No. 19 of that series.—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
It is a beauteous evening, calm and free,
The holy time is quiet as a Nun
Breathless with adoration; the broad sun
Is sinking down in its tranquillity;
The gentleness of heaven broods o'er the Sea:
Listen! the mighty Being is awake,
And doth with his eternal motion make
A sound like thunder—everlastingly.
Dear Child! dear Girl! that walkest with me here,
If thou appear untouched by solemn thought,
Thy nature is not therefore less divine:
Thou liest in Abraham's bosom all the year;
And worshipp'st at the Temple's inner shrine,
God being with thee when we know it not.



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3



4







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B



5




10





Variant 1:  
1807
Air sleeps,—from strife or stir the clouds are free;
 1837
A fairer face of evening cannot be;
 1840
The text of 1845 returns to that of 1807.
return


Variant 2:  
1837
... is on the Sea:
 1807
return


Variant 3:  
date
But list! ...
1837
The text of 1840 returns to that of 1807.
return


Variant 4:  
1845
Dear Child! dear Girl! that walkest with me here,
If thou appear'st untouch'd by solemn thought,

1807
Dear Child! dear happy Girl! if thou appear
Heedless—untouched with awe or serious thought,

1837
Heedless-unawed, untouched with serious thought,
 1838
The text of 1840 returns to that of 1807.
return




Footnote A:   I thought, for some time, that the "girl" referred to was Dorothy Wordsworth. Her brother used to speak, and to write, of her under many names, "Emily," "Louisa," etc.; and to call her a "child" in 1802—a "child of Nature" she was to the end of her days—or a "girl," seemed quite natural. However, a more probable suggestion was made by Mr. T. Hutchinson to Professor Dowden, that it refers to the girl Caroline mentioned in Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal.
"We arrived at Calais at four o'clock on Sunday morning, the 3rd of July.... We found out Annette and C., chez Madame Avril dans la rue de la Tête d'or. The weather was very hot. We walked by the shore almost every evening with Annette and Caroline, or William and I alone.... It was beautiful on the calm hot night to see the little boats row out of harbour with wings of fire, and the sail-boats with the fiery track which they cut as they went along, and which closed up after them with a hundred thousand sparkles and streams of glowworm light. Caroline was delighted."
I have been unable to discover who Annette and Caroline were. Dorothy Wordsworth frequently records in her Grasmere Journal that either William, or she, "wrote to Annette," but who she was is unknown to either the Wordsworth or the Hutchinson family. —Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:   Compare:
'The Child is father of the Man, etc.'
p. 292.

Also S. T. C. in The Friend, iii. p. 46:
'The sacred light of childhood,'
and The Prelude, book v. l. 507. Ed.
return


Contents 1802
Main Contents



On the Extinction of the Venetian Republic

Composed August, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

This and the following ten sonnets were included among the "Sonnets dedicated to Liberty"; re-named in 1845, "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Once did She hold the gorgeous east in fee;
And was the safeguard of the west: the worth
Of Venice did not fall below her birth,
Venice, the eldest Child of Liberty.
She was a maiden City, bright and free;
No guile seduced, no force could violate;
And, when she took unto herself a Mate,
She must espouse the everlasting Sea.
And what if she had seen those glories fade,
Those titles vanish, and that strength decay;
Yet shall some tribute of regret be paid
When her long life hath reached its final day:
Men are we, and must grieve when even the Shade
Of that which once was great, is passed away.



Note
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A



5




10





Footnote A:   Compare Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (canto iv. II):
'The spouseless Adriatic mourns her lord.'
Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:  
"Once did She hold the gorgeous east in fee."
The special glory of Venice dates from the conquest of Constantinople by the Latins in 1202. The fourth Crusade—in which the French and Venetians alone took part—started from Venice, in October 1202, under the command of the Doge, Henry Dandolo. Its aim, however, was not the recovery of Palestine, but the conquest of Constantinople. At the close of the crusade, Venice received the Morea, part of Thessaly, the Cyclades, many of the Byzantine cities, and the coasts of the Hellespont, with three-eighths of the city of Constantinople itself, the Doge taking the curious title of Duke of three-eighths of the Roman Empire.
"And was the safeguard of the west."
This may refer to the prominent part which Venice took in the Crusades, or to the development of her naval power, which made her mistress of the Mediterranean for many years, and an effective bulwark against invasions from the East.
"The eldest Child of Liberty."
The origin of the Venetian State was the flight of many of the inhabitants of the mainland—on the invasion of Italy by Attila—to the chain of islands that lie at the head of the Adriatic.
"In the midst of the waters, free, indigent, laborious, and inaccessible, they gradually coalesced into a republic: the first foundations of Venice were laid in the island of Rialto.... On the verge of the two empires the Venetians exult in the belief of primitive and perpetual independence."
Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chap. lx.
"And, when she took unto herself a Mate,
She must espouse the everlasting Sea."
In 1177, Pope Alexander III. appealed to the Venetian Republic for protection against the German Emperor. The Venetians were successful in a naval battle at Saboro, against Otho, the son of Frederick Barbarossa. In return, the Pope presented the Doge Liani with a ring, with which he told him to wed the Adriatic, that posterity might know that the sea was subject to Venice, "as a bride is to her husband."

In September 1796, nearly six years before this sonnet was written, the fate of the old Venetian Republic was sealed by the treaty of Campo Formio. The French army under Napoleon had subdued Italy, and, having crossed the Alps, threatened Vienna. To avert impending disaster, the Emperor Francis arranged a treaty which extinguished the Venetian Republic. He divided its territory between himself and Napoleon, Austria retaining Istria, Dalmatia, and the left bank of the Adige in the Venetian State, with the "maiden city" itself; France receiving the rest of the territory and the Ionian Islands. Since the date of that treaty the city has twice been annexed to Italy.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



The King of Sweden

Composed August, 1802.—Published 1807





The Poem


text variant footnote line number
The Voice of song from distant lands shall call
To that great King; shall hail the crownèd Youth
Who, taking counsel of unbending Truth,
By one example hath set forth to all
How they with dignity may stand; or fall,
If fall they must. Now, whither doth it tend?
And what to him and his shall be the end?
That thought is one which neither can appal
Nor cheer him; for the illustrious Swede hath done
The thing which ought to be; is raised above [2]
All consequences: work he hath begun
Of fortitude, and piety, and love,
Which all his glorious ancestors approve:
The heroes bless him, him their rightful son.



Note
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1







2



5




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Variant 1:  
1807
... bold ...
In 1838 only.
return


Variant 2:  
1845
... He stands above
1807
return


Footnote A:   See the sonnet beginning "Call not the royal Swede unfortunate," vol. iv. p. 224.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   The following is Wordsworth's note to this sonnet, added in 1837:
"In this and a succeeding Sonnet on the same subject, let me be understood as a Poet availing himself of the situation which the King of Sweden occupied, and of the principles Avowed in His Manifestos; as laying hold of these advantages for the purpose of embodying moral truths. This remark might, perhaps, as well have been suppressed; for to those who may be in sympathy with the course of these Poems, it will be superfluous; and will, I fear, be thrown away upon that other class, whose besotted admiration of the intoxicated despot hereafter placedA in contrast with him, is the most melancholy evidence of degradation in British feeling and intellect which the times have furnished."
The king referred to is Gustavus IV., who was born in 1778, proclaimed king in 1792, and died in 1837. His first public act after his accession was to join in the coalition against Napoleon, and dislike of Napoleon was the main-spring of his policy. It is to this that Wordsworth refers in the sonnet:
'... the illustrious Swede hath done
The thing which ought to be ...'
It made him unpopular, however, and gave rise to a conspiracy against him, and to his consequent abdication in 1809. He "died forgotten and in poverty."—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



To Toussaint L'Ouverture

Composed August, 1802.—Published 1807A





The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Toussaint, the most unhappy man of men!
Whether the whistling Rustic tend his plough
Within thy hearing, or thy head be now
Pillowed in some deep dungeon's earless den;—
O miserable Chieftain! where and when
Wilt thou find patience? Yet die not; do thou
Wear rather in thy bonds a cheerful brow:
Though fallen thyself, never to rise again,
Live, and take comfort. Thou hast left behind
Powers that will work for thee; air, earth, and skies;
There's not a breathing of the common wind
That will forget thee; thou hast great allies;
Thy friends are exultations, agonies,
And love, and man's unconquerable mind.



Note
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1




2
 B












C



5




10





Variant 1:  
1827
Whether the rural milk-maid by her cow
Sing in thy hearing, or thou liest now
Alone in some deep dungeon's earless den,


1803
Whether the all-cheering sun be free to shed
His beams around thee, or thou rest thy head
Pillowed in some dark dungeon's noisome den,

1815
Whether the whistling Rustic tend his plough
Within thy hearing, or Thou liest now
Buried in some deep dungeon's earless den;—


1820
return


Variant 2:  
1807
... Yet die not; be thou
Life to thyself in death; with chearful brow
Live, loving death, nor let one thought in ten
Be painful to thee ...


1803
return




Footnote A:   But previously printed in The Morning Post of February 2, 1803, under the signature W. L. D.—Ed.
return to footnote mark

Footnote B:  Compare Massinger, The Bondman, act I. scene iii. l. 8:
'Her man of men, Timoleon.'
Ed.
return


Footnote C:   Compare Rowe's Tamerlane, iii. 2:
'But to subdue the unconquerable mind.'
Also Gray's poem The Progress of Poesy, ii. 2, l. 10:
'Th' unconquerable Mind, and Freedom's holy flame.'
Ed.
return




Note:   François Dominique Toussaint (who was surnamed L'Ouverture), the child of African slaves, was born at St. Domingo in 1743. He was a Royalist in political sympathy till 1794, when the decree of the French convention, giving liberty to the slaves, brought him over to the side of the Republic. He was made a general of division by Laveux, and succeeded in taking the whole of the north of the island from the English. In 1796 he was made chief of the French army of St. Domingo, and first the British commander, and next the Spanish, surrendered everything to him. He became governor of the island, which prospered under his rule. Napoleon, however, in 1801, issued an edict re-establishing slavery in St. Domingo. Toussaint professed obedience, but showed that he meant to resist the edict. A fleet of fifty-four vessels was sent from France to enforce it. Toussaint was proclaimed an outlaw. He surrendered, and was received with military honours, but was treacherously arrested and sent to Paris in June 1802, where he died, in April 1803, after ten months' hardship in prison. He had been two months in prison when Wordsworth addressed this sonnet to him.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Composed in the Valley near Dover, on the Day of Landing

Composed August 30, 1802.—Published 1807





The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Here, on our native soil, we breathe once more.
The cock that crows, the smoke that curls, that sound
Of bells;—those boys who in yon meadow-ground
In white-sleeved shirts are playing; and the roar
Of the waves breaking on the chalky shore;—
All, all are English. Oft have I looked round
With joy in Kent's green vales; but never found
Myself so satisfied in heart before.
Europe is yet in bonds; but let that pass,
Thought for another moment. Thou art free,
My Country! and 'tis joy enough and pride
For one hour's perfect bliss, to tread the grass
Of England once again, and hear and see,
With such a dear Companion at my side.



Note
Contents 1802
Main Contents		 1

2

3


A



5




10





Variant 1:  
1827
Dear fellow Traveller! here we are once more.
1807
return


Variant 2:  
1820
... that ...
1807
return


Variant 3:  
1815
In white sleev'd shirts are playing by the score,
And even this little River's gentle roar,

1807
return




Footnote A:   At the beginning of Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal of a Tour on the Continent in 1820, she writes (July 10, 1820):
"When within a mile of Dover saw crowds of people at a cricket match, the numerous combatants dressed in 'white-sleeved shirts;' and it was in the very same field, where, when we 'trod the grass of England once again,' twenty years ago, we had seen an assemblage of youths, engaged in the same sport, so very like the present that all might have been the same. (See my brother's sonnet.)"
Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   Dorothy Wordsworth writes in her Journal,
"On Sunday, the 29th of August, we left Calais, at twelve o'clock in the morning, and landed at Dover at one on Monday the 30th. It was very pleasant to me, when we were in the harbour at Dover, to breathe the fresh air, and to look up and see the stars among the ropes of the vessel. The next day was very hot, we bathed, and sat upon the Dover Cliffs, and looked upon France with many a melancholy and tender thought. We could see the shores almost as plain as if it were but an English lake. We mounted the coach, and arrived in London at six, the 30th August."
Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



September 1, 1802

Composed September 1, 1802.—Published 1807A

The Poem

Among the capricious acts of Tyranny that disgraced these times, was the chasing of all Negroes from France by decree of the Government: we had a Fellow-passenger who was one of the expelled.—W. W. 1827.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
We had a female Passenger who came
From Calais with us, spotless in array,
A white-robed Negro, like a lady gay,
Yet downcast as a woman fearing blame;
Meek, destitute, as seemed, of hope or aim
She sate, from notice turning not away,
But on all proffered intercourse did lay
A weight of languid speech, or to the same
No sign of answer made by word or face:
Yet still her eyes retained their tropic fire,
That, burning independent of the mind,
Joined with the lustre of her rich attire
To mock the Outcast—O ye Heavens, be kind!
And feel, thou Earth, for this afflicted Race!



Note
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2
3
4
5

6






7



5




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Variant 1:  
1845
We had a fellow-passenger that came
1803
... who ...
 1807
Driven from the soil of France, a Female came
 1807
The edition of 1838 returns to the text of 1807, but the edition of 1840 reverts to that of 1827.
return


Variant 2:  
1845
... gaudy ...
 1803
... brilliant ...
 1827
return


Variant 3:  
1845
A negro woman, ...
 1803
return


Variant 4:  
1827
Yet silent ...
 1803
return


Variant 5:  
1827
Dejected, downcast, meek, and more than tame:
 1803
Dejected, meek, yea pitiably tame,
 1807
return


Variant 6:  
1827
But on our proffer'd kindness still did lay
 1803
return


Variant 7:  
1845
... or at the same
Was silent, motionless in eyes and face.
She was a negro woman, out of France,
Rejected, like all others of that race:
Not one of whom may now find footing there.
What is the meaning of this ordinance?
Dishonour'd Despots, tell us if ye dare.






1803
... driv'n from France,
Rejected like all others of that race,
Not one of whom may now find footing there;
This the poor Out-cast did to us declare,
Nor murmur'd at the unfeeling Ordinance.




1807
Meanwhile those eyes retained their tropic fire,
Which, burning independent of the mind,
Joined with the lustre of her rich attire
To mock the outcast—O ye Heavens, be kind!
And feel, thou Earth, for this afflicted Race!




1827
Yet still those eyes retained their tropic fire,
 1837
return




Footnote A:   First printed in The Morning Post, February 11, 1803, under the title of The Banished Negroes, and signed W. L. D.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   It was a natural arrangement which led Wordsworth to place this sonnet, in his edition of 1807, immediately after the one addressed To Toussaint L'Ouverture.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



September, 1802, near DoverA

Composed September, 1802.—Published 1807





The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Inland, within a hollow vale, I stood;
And saw, while sea was calm and air was clear,
The coast of France—the coast of France how near!
Drawn almost into frightful neighbourhood.
I shrunk; for verily the barrier flood
Was like a lake, or river bright and fair,
A span of waters; yet what power is there!
What mightiness for evil and for good!
Even so doth God protect us if we be
Virtuous and wise. Winds blow, and waters roll,
Strength to the brave, and Power, and Deity;
Yet in themselves are nothing! One decree
Spake laws to them, and said that by the soul
Only, the Nations shall be great and free.



Note
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B



5




10





Footnote A:   From 1807 to 1843 the title was September, 1802; "near Dover" appeared in the "Sonnets" of 1838, but did not become a permanent part of the title until 1845.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:   Compare in S. T. Coleridge's Ode to the Departing Year, stanza vii.:
'And Ocean 'mid his uproar wild
Speaks safety to his island-child.'
Ed.
return




Note:   In The Friend (ed. 1818, vol. i. p. 107), Coleridge writes: "The narrow seas that form our boundaries, what were they in times of old? The convenient highway for Danish and Norman pirates. What are they now? Still, but a 'Span of Waters.' Yet they roll at the base of the Ararat, on which the Ark of the Hope of Europe and of Civilization rested!" He then quotes this sonnet from the line "Even so doth God protect us if we be."

The note appended to the sonnet, Composed in the Valley near Dover, on the day of Landing (p. 341), shows that this one refers to the same occasion; and that while "Inland, within a hollow vale," Wordsworth was, at the same time, on the Dover Cliffs; the "vale" being one of the hollow clefts in the headland, which front the Dover coast-line. The sonnet may, however, have been finished afterwards in London.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



Written in London, September, 1802

Composed September, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[This was written immediately after my return from France to London, when I could not but be struck, as here described, with the vanity and parade of our own country, especially in great towns and cities, as contrasted with the quiet, and I may say the desolation, that the Revolution had produced in France. This must be borne in mind, or else the reader may think that in this and the succeeding Sonnets I have exaggerated the mischief engendered and fostered among us by undisturbed wealth. It would not be easy to conceive with what a depth of feeling I entered into the struggle carried on by the Spaniards for their deliverance from the usurped power of the French. Many times have I gone from Allan Bank in Grasmere Vale, where we were then residing, to the top of Raise-gap, as it is called, so late as two o'clock in the morning, to meet the carrier bringing the newspapers from Keswick. Imperfect traces of the state of mind in which I then was may be found in my tract on the Convention of Cintra, as well as in these Sonnets.—I. F.]




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
O Friend! I know not which way I must look
For comfort, being, as I am, opprest,
To think that now our life is only drest
For show; mean handy-work of craftsman, cook,
Or groom!—We must run glittering like a brook
In the open sunshine, or we are unblest:
The wealthiest man among us is the best:
No grandeur now in nature or in book
Delights us. Rapine, avarice, expense,
This is idolatry; and these we adore:
Plain living and high thinking are no more:
The homely beauty of the good old cause
Is gone; our peace, our fearful innocence,
And pure religion breathing household laws.



Note
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Main Contents		 1
 A












B



5




10





Variant 1:  
1807
O thou proud City! which way shall I look
 1838
The text of 1840 returns to that of 1807.
return




Footnote A:  The "Friend" was Coleridge. In the original MS. it stands "Coleridge! I know not," etc. Wordsworth changed it in the proof stage.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:   Compare—in Hartley Coleridge's Lives of Distinguished Northerners—what is said of this sonnet, in his life of Anne Clifford, where the passing cynicism of Wordsworth's poem is pointed out.—Ed.
return




Note:   Wordsworth stayed in London from August 30th to September 22nd 1802.—Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



London, 1802

Composed September, 1802.—Published 1807





The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Milton! thou should'st be living at this hour:
England hath need of thee: she is a fen
Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen,
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower,
Have forfeited their ancient English dower
Of inward happiness. We are selfish men;
Oh! raise us up, return to us again;
And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power.
Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart:
Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea:
Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free,
So didst thou travel on life's common way,
In cheerful godliness; and yet thy heart
The lowliest duties on herself did lay.



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1











A



5




10





Variant 1:  
1820
... itself ...
1807
return




Footnote A:   In old English "yet" means "continuously" or "always"; and it is still used in Cumberland with this signification.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Contents 1802
Main Contents



"Great men have been among us; hands that penned"

Composed September, 1802.—Published 1807





The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Great men have been among us; hands that penned
And tongues that uttered wisdom—better none:
The later Sidney, Marvel, Harrington,
Young Vane, and others who called Milton friend.
These moralists could act and comprehend:
They knew how genuine glory was put on;
Taught us how rightfully a nation shone
In splendour: what strength was, that would not bend
But in magnanimous meekness. France, 'tis strange,
Hath brought forth no such souls as we had then.
Perpetual emptiness! unceasing change!
No single volume paramount, no code,
No master spirit, no determined road;
But equally a want of books and men!



Contents 1802
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1


A



5




10





Variant 1:  
1807
But to ...
MS.
return




Footnote A:   See Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, book iii.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Contents 1802
Main Contents



"It is not to be thought of that the Flood"

Composed September, 1802.—Published 1807A





The Poem


text variant footnote line number
It is not to be thought of that the Flood
Of British freedom, which, to the open sea
Of the world's praise, from dark antiquity
Hath flowed, "with pomp of waters, unwithstood,"
Roused though it be full often to a mood
Which spurns the check of salutary bands,
That this most famous Stream in bogs and sands
Should perish; and to evil and to good
Be lost for ever. In our halls is hung
Armoury of the invincible Knights of old:
We must be free or die, who speak the tongue
That Shakespeare spake; the faith and morals hold
Which Milton held.—In every thing we are sprung
Of Earth's first blood, have titles manifold.



Contents 1802
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1




2


B



5




10





Variant 1:  
1827
... unwithstood,
Road by which all might come and go that would,
And bear out freights of worth to foreign lands;


1803
return


Variant 2:  
1807
... must live ...
 1803
return




Footnote A:   It was first printed in The Morning Post, April 16. 1803, and signed W. L. D.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:   Compare Daniel's Civil War, book ii. stanza 7.—Ed.
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Contents 1802
Main Contents



"When I have borne in memory what has tamed"

Composed September, 1802.—Published 1807A





The Poem


text variant footnote line number
When I have borne in memory what has tamed
Great Nations, how ennobling thoughts depart
When men change swords for ledgers, and desert
The student's bower for gold, some fears unnamed
I had, my Country!—am I to be blamed?
Now, when I think of thee, and what thou art,
Verily, in the bottom of my heart,
Of those unfilial fears I am ashamed.
For dearly must we prize thee; we who find
In thee a bulwark for the cause of men;
And I by my affection was beguiled:
What wonder if a Poet now and then,
Among the many movements of his mind,
Felt for thee as a lover or a child!



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2

3



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Variant 1:  
1845
But,...
 1803
return


Variant 2:  
1807
I of those fears of mine am much ashamed.
 1803
return


Variant 3:  
1845
But dearly do I prize thee for I find
In thee a bulwark of the cause of men;
1803
But dearly must we prize thee; we who find
 1807
... for the cause of men;
 1827
Most dearly
1838
The text of 1840 returns to that of 1827.
return




Footnote A:   But printed previously in The Morning Post, September 17, 1803, under the title England, and signed W. L. D. Also, see Coleridge's Poems on Political Events, 1828-9.—Ed.
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Contents 1802
Main Contents



Composed after a Journey across the Hambleton Hills, YorkshireA

Composed October 4, 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Composed October 4th, 1802, after a journey over the Hambleton Hills, on a day memorable to me—the day of my marriage. The horizon commanded by those hills is most magnificent. The next day, while we were travelling in a post-chaise up Wensleydale, we were stopped by one of the horses proving restive, and were obliged to wait two hours in a severe storm before the post-boy could fetch from the inn another to supply its place. The spot was in front of Bolton Hall, where Mary Queen of Scots was kept prisoner, soon after her unfortunate landing at Workington. The place then belonged to the Scroops, and memorials of her are yet preserved there. To beguile the time I composed a Sonnet. The subject was our own confinement contrasted with hers; but it was not thought worthy of being preserved.—I. F.]

One of the "Miscellaneous Sonnets."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Dark and more dark the shades of evening fell;
The wished-for point was reached—but at an hour
When little could be gained from that rich dower
Of prospect, whereof many thousands tell.
Yet did the glowing west with marvellous power
Salute us; there stood Indian citadel,
Temple of Greece, and minster with its tower
Substantially expressed—a place for bell
Or clock to toll from! Many a tempting isle,
With groves that never were imagined, lay
'Mid seas how steadfast! objects all for the eye
Of silent rapture; but we felt the while
We should forget them; they are of the sky,
And from our earthly memory fade away.



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Variant 1:  
1837
Ere we had reach'd the wish'd-for place, night fell:
We were too late at least by one dark hour,
And nothing could we see of all that power
Of prospect, ...



1807
Dark, and more dark, the shades of Evening fell;
The wish'd-for point was reach'd—but late the hour;
And little could we see of all that power


1815
And little could be gained from all that dower
 1827
return


Variant 2:  
1837
The western sky did recompence us well
With Grecian Temple, Minaret, and Bower;
And, in one part, a Minster with its Tower
Substantially distinct, a place for Bell
Or Clock to toll from. Many a glorious pile
Did we behold, sights that might well repay
All disappointment! and, as such, the eye
Delighted in them; but we felt, the while,







1807
Substantially expressed—...
1815
Did we behold, fair sights that might repay
1815
Yet did the glowing west in all its power
1827
The text of 1827 is otherwise identical with that of 1837.
return




Footnote A:   Called by Wordsworth, "The Hamilton Hills" in the editions from 1807 to 1827.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   The following extract from Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal indicates, as fully as any other passage in it, the use which her brother occasionally made of it. We have the "Grecian Temple," and the "Minster with its Tower":
"Before we had crossed the Hambleton Hill and reached the point overlooking Yorkshire it was quite dark. We had not wanted, however, fair prospects before us, as we drove along the flat plain of the high hill; far, far off from us, in the western sky, we saw shapes of castles, ruins among groves—a great, spreading wood, rocks, and single trees—a Minster with its Tower unusually distinct, Minarets in another quarter, and a round Grecian Temple also; the colours of the sky of a bright grey, and the forms of a sober grey, with a dome. As we descended the hill there was no distinct view, but of a great space, only near us, we saw the wild (and as the people say) bottomless Tarn in the hollow at the side of the hill. It seemed to be made visible to us only by its own light, for all the hill about us was dark."
Wordsworth and his sister crossed over the Hambleton (or Hamilton) Hills, on their way from Westmoreland to Gallow Hill, Yorkshire, to visit the Hutchinsons, before they went south to London and Calais, where they spent the month of August, 1802. But after his marriage to Mary Hutchinson, on the 4th of October, Wordsworth, his wife, and sister, recrossed these Hambleton Hills on their way to Grasmere, which they reached on the evening of the 6th October. The above sonnet was composed on the evening of the 4th October, as the Fenwick note indicates.—Ed.


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To H. C.

Six Years Old

Composed 1802.—Published 1807

One of the "Poems referring to the Period of Childhood."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
O thou! whose fancies from afar are brought;
Who of thy words dost make a mock apparel,
And fittest to unutterable thought
The breeze-like motion and the self-born carol;
Thou faery voyager! that dost float
In such clear water, that thy boat
May rather seem
To brood on air than on an earthly stream;
Suspended in a stream as clear as sky,
Where earth and heaven do make one imagery;
O blessed vision! happy child!
Thou art so exquisitely wild,
I think of thee with many fears
For what may be thy lot in future years.

I thought of times when Pain might be thy guest,
Lord of thy house and hospitality;
And Grief, uneasy lover! never rest
But when she sate within the touch of thee.
O too industrious folly!
O vain and causeless melancholy!
Nature will either end thee quite;
Or, lengthening out thy season of delight,
Preserve for thee, by individual right,
A young lamb's heart among the full-grown flocks.
What hast thou to do with sorrow,
Or the injuries of to-morrow?
Thou art a dew-drop, which the morn brings forth,
Ill fitted to sustain unkindly shocks,
Or to be trailed along the soiling earth;
A gem that glitters while it lives,
And no forewarning gives;
But, at the touch of wrong, without a strife
Slips in a moment out of life.



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That ...
 1807
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Variant 2:  
1827
Not doom'd to jostle with ...
1807
Not framed to undergo ...
1815
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Footnote A:   See Carver's Description of his Situation upon one of the Lakes of America.—W. W. 1807.
return to footnote mark




Note:   These stanzas were addressed to Hartley Coleridge. The lines,
'I think of thee with many fears
For what may be thy lot in future years,'
taken in connection with his subsequent career, suggest the similarly sad "presentiment" with which the Lines composed above Tintern Abbey conclude. The following is the postscript to a letter by his father, S. T. C., addressed to Sir Humphry Davy, Keswick, July 25, 1800:
"Hartley is a spirit that dances on an aspen leaf; the air that yonder sallow-faced and yawning tourist is breathing, is to my babe a perpetual nitrous oxide. Never was more joyous creature born. Pain with him is so wholly trans-substantiated by the joys that had rolled on before, and rushed on after, that oftentimes five minutes after his mother has whipt him he has gone up and asked her to whip him again."
(Fragmentary Remains, Literary and Scientific, of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart., pp. 78, 79.)—Ed.


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Main Contents



To the Daisy

Composed 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

"HerA divine skill taught me this,
That from every thing I saw
I could some instruction draw,
And raise pleasure to the height
Through the meanest object's sight.
By the murmur of a spring,
Or the least bough's rustelling;
By a Daisy whose leaves spread
Shut when Titan goes to bed;
Or a shady bush or tree;
She could more infuse in me
Than all Nature's beauties can
In some other wiser man."

G. Wither.1
[Composed in the orchard, Town-end, Grasmere.—I. F.]

One of the "Poems of the Fancy."—Ed.



The Poem


text variant footnote line number
In youth from rock to rock I went,
From hill to hill in discontent
Of pleasure high and turbulent,
Most pleased when most uneasy;
But now my own delights I make,—
My thirst at every rill can slake,
And gladly Nature's love partake,
Of Thee, sweet Daisy!

Thee Winter in the garland wears
That thinly decks his few grey hairs;
Spring parts the clouds with softest airs,
That she may sun thee;
Whole Summer-fields are thine by right;
And Autumn, melancholy Wight!
Doth in thy crimson head delight
When rains are on thee.

In shoals and bands, a morrice train,
Thou greet'st the traveller in the lane;
Pleased at his greeting thee again;
Yet nothing daunted,
Nor grieved if thou be set at nought:
And oft alone in nooks remote
We meet thee, like a pleasant thought,
When such are wanted.

Be violets in their secret mews
The flowers the wanton Zephyrs choose;
Proud be the rose, with rains and dews
Her head impearling,
Thou liv'st with less ambitious aim,
Yet hast not gone without thy fame;
Thou art indeed by many a claim
The Poet's darling.

If to a rock from rains he fly,
Or, some bright day of April sky,
Imprisoned by hot sunshine lie
Near the green holly,
And wearily at length should fare;
He needs but look about, and there
Thou art!—a friend at hand, to scare
His melancholy.

A hundred times, by rock or bower,
Ere thus I have lain couched an hour,
Have I derived from thy sweet power
Some apprehension;
Some steady love; some brief delight;
Some memory that had taken flight;
Some chime of fancy wrong or right;
Or stray invention.

If stately passions in me burn,
And one chance look to Thee should turn,
I drink out of an humbler urn
A lowlier pleasure;
The homely sympathy that heeds
The common life, our nature breeds;
A wisdom fitted to the needs
Of hearts at leisure.

Fresh-smitten by the morning ray,
When thou art up, alert and gay,
Then, cheerful Flower! my spirits play
With kindred gladness:
And when, at dusk, by dews opprest
Thou sink'st, the image of thy rest
Hath often eased my pensive breast
Of careful sadness.

And all day long I number yet,
All seasons through, another debt,
Which I, wherever thou art met,
To thee am owing;
An instinct call it, a blind sense;
A happy, genial influence,
Coming one knows not how, nor whence,
Nor whither going.

Child of the Year! that round dost run
Thy pleasant course,—when day's begun
As ready to salute the sun
As lark or leveret,
Thy long-lost praise thou shalt regain;
Nor be less dear to future men
Than in old time;—thou not in vain
Art Nature's favourite.



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Variant 1:   The extract from Wither was first prefixed to this poem in the edition of 1815. The late Mr. Dykes Campbell was of opinion that Charles Lamb had suggested this motto to Wordsworth, as The Shepherd's Hunting was Lamb's "prime favourite" amongst Wither's poems. It may be as well to note that his quotation was erroneous in two places. His "instruction" should be "invention" (l. 3), and his "the" (in l. 4) should be "her."—Ed.
return


Variant 2:  
1807
To gentle sympathies awake,
MS.
return


Variant 3:  
1807
And Nature's love of Thee partake,
Her much-loved Daisy!
1836
Of her sweet Daisy.
 C.
The text of 1840 returns to the reading of 1807.
return


Variant 4:  
1836
When soothed a while by milder airs,
Thee Winter in the garland wears
That thinly shades his few grey hairs;
Spring cannot shun thee;



1807
When Winter decks his few grey hairs
Thee in the scanty wreath he wears;
Spring parts the clouds with softest airs,
That she may sun thee;



1827
return


Variant 5:  
1836
... in the lane;
If welcome once thou count'st it gain;
Thou art not daunted,
Nor car'st if thou be set at naught;


1807
If welcom'd ...
1815
The text of 1827 returns to that of 1807.
return


Variant 6:  
1820
He need ...
1807
return


Variant 7:  
1807
... some chance delight;
MS.
return


Variant 8:  
1807
Some charm ...
C.
return


Variant 9:  
1807
And some ...
MS.
return


Variant 10:  
1836
When, smitten by the morning ray,
I see thee rise alert and gay,
Then, chearful Flower! my spirits play
With kindred motion:



1807
With kindred gladness:
1815
Then Daisy! do my spirits play,
With cheerful motion.

MS.
return


Variant 11:  
1815
At dusk, I've seldom mark'd thee press
The ground, as if in thankfulness
Without some feeling, more or less,
Of true devotion.



1807
The ground in modest thankfulness
 MS.
return


Variant 12:  
1807
But more than all I number yet
O bounteous Flower! another debt
Which I to thee wherever met
Am daily owing;



MS.
return


Variant 13:  
1836
Child of the Year! that round dost run
Thy course, bold lover of the sun,
And chearful when the day's begun
As morning Leveret,
Thou long the Poet's praise shalt gain;
Thou wilt be more belov'd by men
In times to come; thou not in vain






1807
Thy long-lost praise thou shalt regain;
Dear shalt thou be to future men
As in old time;—


1815
Dear thou shalt be
1820
The text of 1827 returns to that of 1815.
return




Footnote A:   His Muse.—W. W. 1815.

The extract is from The Shepherds Hunting, eclogue fourth, ll. 368-80.—Ed.
return to footnote mark


Footnote B:   See, in Chaucer and the elder Poets, the honours formerly paid to this flower.—W. W. 1815.
return


Footnote C:   This Poem, and two others to the same Flower, which the Reader will find in the second Volume, were written in the year 1802; which is mentioned, because in some of the ideas, though not in the manner in which those ideas are connected, and likewise even in some of the expressions, they bear a striking resemblance to a Poem (lately published) of Mr. Montgomery, entitled, A Field Flower. This being said, Mr. Montgomery will not think any apology due to him; I cannot however help addressing him in the words of the Father of English Poets:
'Though it happe me to rehersin—
That ye han in your freshe songis saied,
Forberith me, and beth not ill apaied,
Sith that ye se I doe it in the honour
Of Love, and eke in service of the Flour.'
W. W. 1807.

In the edition of 1836, the following variation of the text of this note occurs: "There is a resemblance to passages in a Poem."—Ed.
return




Note:   For illustration of the last stanza, see Chaucer's Prologue to The Legend of Good Women.
'As I seyde erst, whanne comen is the May,
That in my bed ther daweth me no day,
That I nam uppe and walkyng in the mede,
To seen this floure agein the sonne sprede,
Whan it up rysith erly by the morwe;
That blisful sight softneth al my sorwe,
So glad am I, whan that I have presence
Of it, to doon it alle reverence,
As she that is of alle floures flour.'
...
To seen this flour so yong, so fresshe of hewe,
Constreynde me with so gredy desire,
That in myn herte I feele yet the fire,
That made me to ryse er yt wer day,
And this was now the firste morwe of May,
With dredful hert, and glad devocioun
For to ben at the resurreccion
Of this flour, whan that yt shulde unclose
Agayne the sonne, that roos as rede as rose
...
And doune on knes anoon ryght I me sette,
And as I koude, this fresshe flour I grette,
Knelying alwey, til it unclosed was,
Upon the smale, softe, swote gras.
Again, in The Cuckoo and the Nightingale, after a wakeful night, the Poet rises at dawn, and wandering forth, reaches a "laund of white and green."
'So feire oon had I nevere in bene,
The grounde was grene, y poudred with daysé,
The floures and the gras ilike al hie,
Al grene and white, was nothing elles sene.'
Ed.


Contents 1802
Main Contents



To the Same FlowerA

Composed 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Composed in the orchard, Town-end, Grasmere.—I. F.]

One of the "Poems of the Fancy."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
With little here to do or see
Of things that in the great world be,
Daisy! again I talk to thee,
For thou art worthy,
Thou unassuming Common-place
Of Nature, with that homely face,
And yet with something of a grace,
Which Love makes for thee!

Oft on the dappled turf at ease
I sit, and play with similes,
Loose types of things through all degrees,
Thoughts of thy raising:
And many a fond and idle name
I give to thee, for praise or blame,
As is the humour of the game,
While I am gazing.

A nun demure of lowly port;
Or sprightly maiden, of Love's court,
In thy simplicity the sport
Of all temptations;
A queen in crown of rubies drest;
A starveling in a scanty vest;
Are all, as seems to suit thee best,
Thy appellations.

A little cyclops, with one eye
Staring to threaten and defy,
That thought comes next—and instantly
The freak is over,
The shape will vanish—and behold
A silver shield with boss of gold,
That spreads itself, some faery bold
In fight to cover!

I see thee glittering from afar—
And then thou art a pretty star;
Not quite so fair as many are
In heaven above thee!
Yet like a star, with glittering crest,
Self-poised in air thou seem'st to rest;—
May peace come never to his nest,
Who shall reprove thee!

Bright Flower! for by that name at last,
When all my reveries are past,
I call thee, and to that cleave fast,
Sweet silent creature!
That breath'st with me in sun and air,
Do thou, as thou art wont, repair
My heart with gladness, and a share
Of thy meek nature!



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1845
Sweet Daisy! oft I talk to thee,
1807
Yet once again I talk ...
 1836
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Variant 2:  
1820
Oft do I sit by thee at ease,
And weave a web of similies,

1807
return


Variant 3:  
1827
... seem ...
1807
return


Variant 4:  
1836
Sweet Flower!....
 1807
return




Footnote A:   The two following Poems were overflowings of the mind in composing the one which stands first in the first Volume (i.e. the previous Poem),—W. W. 1807.
return to footnote mark




Note:   In his editions 1836-1849 Wordsworth gave 1805 as the year in which this poem was composed, but the Fenwick note prefixed to it renders this impossible. It evidently belongs to the same time, and "mood," as the previous poem.—Ed.


Contents 1802
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To the Daisy (2)

Composed 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[This and the other Poems addressed to the same flower were composed at Town-end, Grasmere, during the earlier part of my residence there. I have been censured for the last line but one—"thy function apostolical"—as being little less than profane. How could it be thought so? The word is adopted with reference to its derivation, implying something sent on a mission; and assuredly this little flower, especially when the subject of verse, may be regarded, in its humble degree, as administering both to moral and to spiritual purposes.—I. F.]

This was included among the "Poems of the Fancy" from 1815 to 1832. In 1837 it was transferred to the "Poems of Sentiment and Reflection."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Bright Flower! whose home is everywhere,
Bold in maternal Nature's care,
And all the long year through the heir
Of joy and sorrow.
Methinks that there abides in thee
Some concord with humanity,
Given to no other flower I see
The forest thorough!

Is it that Man is soon deprest?
A thoughtless Thing! who, once unblest,
Does little on his memory rest,
Or on his reason,
And Thou would'st teach him how to find
A shelter under every wind,
A hope for times that are unkind
And every season?

Thou wander'st the wide world about,
Uncheck'd by pride or scrupulous doubt,
With friends to greet thee, or without,
Yet pleased and willing;
Meek, yielding to the occasion's call,
And all things suffering from all,
Thy function apostolical
In peace fulfilling.



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Bright Flower, whose home is every where!
A Pilgrim bold in Nature's care,
And all the long year through the heir


1807
Bright flower, whose home is every where!
A Pilgrim bold in Nature's care,
And oft, the long year through, the heir


1827
Confiding Flower, by Nature's care
Made bold,—who, lodging here or there,
Art all the long year through the heir


1837
return


Variant 2:  
1850
... or ...
1807
return


Variant 3:  
1807
Communion ...
 1837
The text of 1840 returns to that of 1807.
return


Variant 4:  
1807
And wherefore? Man is soon deprest;
1827
The text of 1837 returns to that of 1807.
return


Variant 5:  
1807
But ...
1827
The text of 1837 returns to that of 1807.
return


Variant 6:  
1807
This stanza was omitted in the editions of 1827 and 1832, but replaced in 1837.
return




Note:   The three preceding poems 'To the Daisy' evidently belong to the same time, and are, as Wordsworth expressly says, "overflowings of the mind in composing the one which stands first." Nevertheless, in the revised edition of 1836-7, he gave the date 1802 to the first, 1803 to the third, and 1805 to the second of them. In the earlier editions 1815 to 1832, they are all classed among the "Poems of the Fancy," but in the edition of 1837, and afterwards, the last, "Bright Flower! whose home is everywhere," is ranked among the "Poems of Sentiment and Reflection." They should manifestly be placed together. Wordsworth's fourth poem To the Daisy, which is an elegy on his brother John, and belongs to a subsequent year— having no connection with the three preceding poems, will be found in its chronological place.—Ed.


Contents 1802
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Louisa

After Accompanying Her on a Mountain Excursion

Composed 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Town-end 1805.—I. F.]

One of the "Poems founded on the Affections." From 1807 to 1832 the title was simply Louisa.—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
I met Louisa in the shade,
And, having seen that lovely Maid,
Why should I fear to say
That, nymph-like, she is fleet and strong,
And down the rocks can leap along
Like rivulets in May?

She loves her fire, her cottage-home;
Yet o'er the moorland will she roam
In weather rough and bleak;
And, when against the wind she strains,
Oh! might I kiss the mountain rains
That sparkle on her cheek.

Take all that's mine "beneath the moon,"
If I with her but half a noon
May sit beneath the walls
Of some old cave, or mossy nook,
When up she winds along the brook
To hunt the waterfalls.



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Variant 1:  
1807
Though, by a sickly taste betrayed,
Some will dispraise the lovely Maid,
With fearless pride I say



1836
The text of 1845 returns to that of 1807.
return


Variant 2:  
1845
That she is ruddy, fleet, and strong;
1807
That she is healthful, ...
1836
return


Variant 3:   In the editions of 1807 to 1843 occurs the following verse, which was omitted from subsequent editions:
And she hath smiles to earth unknown;
Smiles, that with motion of their own
Do spread, and sink, and rise;
That come and go with endless play,
And ever, as they pass away,
Are hidden in her eyes.
return


Variant 4:  
1807
When she goes barefoot up the brook
 MS.
return




Footnote A:   Compare Young's Night Thoughts, where the phrase occurs three times. See also Lear, act IV. scene vi. l. 26:
'For all beneath the moon.'
Haywood, The English Traveller, v. 1:
'All things that dwell beneath the moon.'
It was also used by William Drummond, in one of his sonnets,
'I know that all beneath the moon decays.'
Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   Wordsworth gave as the date of the composition of this poem the year 1805; but he said of the following one, To a Young Lady, who had been Reproached for taking Long Walks in the Country— "composed at the same time" and "designed to make one piece"—that it was written in 1803.

But it is certain that these following lines appeared in The Morning Post, on Feb. 12, 1802, where they are headed To a beautiful Young Lady, who had been harshly spoken of on account of her fondness for taking long walks in the Country. There is difficulty, both in ascertaining the exact date of composition, and in knowing who "Louisa" or the "Young Lady" was. Mrs. Millicent G. Fawcett wrote to me several years ago, suggesting, with some plausibility, a much earlier date, if Dorothy Wordsworth was the lady referred to. She referred me to Dorothy's letter to her aunt, Mrs. Crackenthorpe, written from Windybrow, Keswick, in 1794, when staying there with her brother; and says
"What inclined me to think that the poem was written earlier than 1805 was that it anticipates Dorothy's marriage, and this would more naturally be present as a probable event in W. W.'s mind in 1794 or thereabouts than in 1805, after Dorothy had dedicated her life to her brother, to the exclusion of all wish to make a home of her own by marriage. The expression 'Healthy as a shepherd boy' is also more applicable to a girl of twenty-two than to a woman of thirty-three. Do you think it possible that the poem may have been written in 1794, and not published till later, when its application would be less evident to the family circle?"
Dorothy Wordsworth's letter will be quoted in full in a later volume, but the following extract from it may be given now:
"I cannot pass unnoticed that part of your letter in which you speak of my 'rambling about the country on foot.' So far from considering this as a matter for condemnation I rather thought it would have given my friends pleasure that I had courage to make use of the strength with which Nature has endowed me, when it not only procured me infinitely more pleasure than I should have received from sitting in a post-chaise, but was also the means of saving me at least thirty shillings."
I do not think the date of composition can be so early as 1794. What may be called internal, or structural, evidence is against it. Wordsworth never could have written these two poems till after his settlement at Dove Cottage. Besides, in 1794, he could have no knowledge of a possible "nest in a green dale, a harbour and a hold"; while at that time his sister had certainly no "cottage home." I believe they were written after he took up his residence at Town-end (the date being uncertain); and that they refer to his sister, and not to his wife. It has been suggested by Mr. Ernest Coleridge (see The Athenæum, Oct. 21, 1893) that they refer to Mary Hutchinson: but there is no evidence of Wordsworth taking long country walks with her before their marriage, or that she was "nymph-like," "fleet and strong," that she loved to "roam the moorland," "in weather rough and bleak," or that she "hunted waterfalls." The reference to his sister is confirmed by the omission of the delightful second stanza of the poem in the last edition revised by the poet, that of 1849, when she was a confirmed invalid at Rydal Mount. Those "smiles to earth unknown," had then ceased for ever. The reason why Wordsworth erased so delightful and wonderful a stanza, is to me only explicable on the supposition, that it was his sister he referred to, she who had accompanied him in former days, in so many of his "long walks in the country." His wife never did this; she had not the physical strength to do it; and, if she had been the person referred to, Wordsworth would hardly, in 1845, have erased such a description of her, as occurs in the stanza written in 1802, when she was still so vigorous. Besides, Mary Wordsworth was in no sense "a Child of Nature," as Dorothy was: while the testimony of the Wordsworth household is explicit, that it was to his sister, and not to his wife, that the poet referred. I find no difficulty in the allusion made in the second poem to Dorothy being yet possibly a "Wife and Friend"; nor to the fact that it was originally addressed "To a beautiful Young Lady." Neither Dorothy nor Mary Wordsworth were physically "beautiful," according to our highest standards; although the poet addressed the latter as "a Phantom of delight," and as "a lovely apparition." It is quite true that it was Mary Wordsworth's old age that was "serene and bright," while Dorothy's was the very reverse; but the poet's anticipation of the future was written when his sister was young, and was by far the stronger of the two.—Ed.


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To a Young Lady, who had been Reproached for taking Long Walks in the CountryA

Composed 1802.—Published 1807

The Poem

[Composed at the same time and on the same view as "I met Louisa in the shade:" indeed they were designed to make one piece.—I. F.]

From 1815 to 1832 this was classed among the "Poems proceeding from Sentiment and Reflection." In 1836 it was transferred to the group of "Poems of the Imagination."—Ed.




The Poem


text variant footnote line number
Dear Child of Nature, let them rail!
—There is a nest in a green dale,
A harbour and a hold;
Where thou, a Wife and Friend, shalt see
Thy own heart-stirring days, and be
A light to young and old.

There, healthy as a shepherd boy,
And treading among flowers of joy
Which at no season fade,
Thou, while thy babes around thee cling,
Shalt show us how divine a thing
A Woman may be made.

Thy thoughts and feelings shall not die,
Nor leave thee, when grey hairs are nigh
A melancholy slave;
But an old age serene and bright,
And lovely as a Lapland night,
Shall lead thee to thy grave.



Note
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1




2







3



5





10





15





Variant 1:  
1836
Thy own delightful days, ...
 1802
return


Variant 2:  
1836
As if thy heritage were joy,
And pleasure were thy trade.
1802
And treading among flowers of joy,
That at no season fade,

1827
return


Variant 3:  
1815
... alive ...
1802
return




Footnote A:   For the original title of this poem,—as published in The Morning Post and Gazetteer,—see the note to the previous poem. When first published it was unsigned.—Ed.
return to footnote mark




Note:   See the editorial note to the preceding poem.—Ed.


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1803


The poems associated with the year 1803 consist mainly of the "Memorials of a Tour in Scotland," which Wordsworth and his sister took—along with Coleridge—in the autumn of that year, although many of these were not written till some time after the Tour was finished. The Green Linnet and Yew-trees were written in 1803, and some sonnets were composed in the month of October; but, on the whole, 1803 was not a fruitful year in Wordsworth's life, as regards his lyrics and smaller poems. Doubtless both The Prelude and The Excursion were revised in 1803.—Ed.


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1801 ← end of Volume II: 1802 → 1803
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