The poetical works

This book belongs to

THE LIBRARY

THE POETICAL WORKS OF

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

DOVE COTTAGE, GRASMERE.

THE

POETICAL WORKS

OF

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

EDITED BY

WILLIAM KNIGHT, LL.D.,

PROFESSOR OF MORAL PHILOSOPHY, ST ANDREWS.

VOLUME FOURTH

EDINBURGH :
WILLIAM PATERSON

MDCCCLXXXIIl.

A-

ZI-1-3C,

CONTENTS.

I'AGK

CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY WARRIOR. .... 2

THE HORN OF EGREMONT CASTLE. .... 6

A COMPLAINT. . . . . . . .11

STRAY PLEASURES. . . . . . . 12

POWER OF Music. ...... 14

STAR-GAZERS. ..... .16

YES, IT WAS THE MOUNTAIN ECHO. . . . . 18

PREFATORY SONNET. ...... 20

PERSONAL TALK. . . . . » . .23

ADMONITION. .... 27

" BELOVED VALE ! " I SAID " WHEN I SHALL CON . .28

HOW SWEET IT IS, WHEN MOTHER FANCY ROCKS. ... 29

THOSE WORDS WERE UTTERED AS IN PENSIVE MOOD. . . 30

COMPOSED BY THE SIDE OF GRASMERE LAKE. ... 30

WITH HOW SAD STEPS, O MOON, THOU CLIMB'ST THE SKY. . 31

THE WORLD is TOO MUCH WITH us. .... 32

WITH SHIPS THE SEA WAS SPRINKLED FAR AND NIGH. . . 33

WHERE LIES THE LAND TO WHICH YON SHIP MUST GO ? . 34

To SLEEP. ... . 34

To SLEEP. . . . . . 35

To SLEEP. ....... 30

MICHAEL ANGELO IN REPLY TO THE PASSAGE UPON HIS STATUE

OF NIGHT SLEEPING. ..... 36

FROM THE ITALIAN OF MICHAEL ANGELO. ... 37

FROM THE SAME. ....... 33

FROM THE SAME. To THE SUPREME BEING. ... 39

To THE MEMORY OF RAISLEY CALVERT. . 40

vi CONTENTS.

PAGE

METHOUGHT I SAW THE FOOTSTEPS OF A THRONE.

LINES 42

NOVEMBER, 1806. . •

ADDRESS TO A CHILD. . . • • • •

ODE. INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY FROM RECOLLECTIONS OF

EARLY CHILDHOOD. ....•• 47

A PROPHECY. FEBRUARY, 1807. • • 63

THOUGHT OF A BRITON ON THE SUBJUGATION OF SWITZERLAND. 64

To THOMAS CLARKSON, ON THE FINAL PASSING OF THE BILL

FOR THE ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE. ... 65

THE MOTHER'S RETURN. ... 66

GIPSIES. ...... 68

0 NIGHTINGALE ! THOU SURELY ART. . 70

To LADY BEAUMONT. .... 71

THOUGH NARROW BE THAT OLD MAN'S CARES, AND NEAR. . 73

IN THE GROUNDS OF COLEORTON, THE SEAT OF SIR GEORGE

BEAUMONT, BART., LEICESTERSHIRE. ... 76

IN A GARDEN OF THE SAME. . . . .78

WRITTEN AT THE REQUEST OF SIR GEORGE BEAUMONT, BART.,
AND IN HIS NAME, FOR AN URN, PLACED BY HIM AT THE
TERMINATION OF A NEWLY PLANTED AVENUE IN THE SAME
GROUNDS. , . . . . . 80

FOR A SEAT IN THE GROVES OF COLEORTON. ... 82

SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE, UPON THE RESTORA-
TION OF LORD CLIFFORD. , . ' . . . .83

THE WHITE DOE OF RYLSTONE; OR, THE FATE OF THE

NORTONS. ....... 98

THE FORCE OF PRAYER ; OR, THE FOUNDING OF BOLTON PRIORY.

A TRADITION. . . . , . . . 201

COMPOSED WHILE THE AUTHOR WAS ENGAGED IN WRITING A

TRACT, OCCASIONED BY THE CONVENTION OF CINTRA. . 207

COMPOSED AT THE SAME TIME AND ON THE SAME OCCASION. . 208
GEORGE AND SARAH GREEN. ^ „ .. 209

CONTENTS. vil

PAGE

TTROLESE SONNETS —

HOFFER. ...... 212

ADVANCE — COME FORTH FROM THY TYROLEAN GROUND. . 213

FEELINGS OF THE TYROLESE. . . . .214

ALAS ! WHAT BOOTS THE LONG LABORIOUS QUEST. . . 214

ON THE FINAL SUBMISSION OF THE TYROLESE. . . 215

THE MARTIAL COURAGE OF A DAY IS VAIN. . . . 216

AND IS IT AMONG RUDE UNTUTORED DALES. . . . 220

O'ER THE WIDE EARTH, ON MOUNTAIN AND ON PLAIN. . . 221

HAIL, ZARAGOZA ! IF WITH UNWET EYE. . . . 222

SAY, WHAT is HONOUR ? — 'Tis THE FINEST SENSE. . .223

BRAVE SCHILL ! BY DEATH DELIVERED, TAKE THY FLIGHT. . 223

CALL NOT THE ROYAL SWEDE UNFORTUNATE. . . . 224

LOOK NOW ON THAT ADVENTURER WHO HATH PAID. . . 225

Is THERE A POWER THAT CAN SUSTAIN AND CHEER. . 225

AH ! .WHERE is PALAFOX ? NOR TONGUE NOR PEN. . . 226

IN DUE OBSERVANCE OF AN ANCIENT RITE. . . . 227

FEELINGS OF A NOBLE BISCAYAN AT ONE OF THOSE FUNERALS . 228

ON A CELEBRATED EVENT IN ANCIENT HISTORY. . . . 228

UPON THE SAME EVENT. . . ........ . . 229

THE OAK OF GUERNICA. ...... 230

INDIGNATION OF A HIGH-MINDED SPANIARD. . . . 231

AVAUNT ALL SPECIOUS PLIANCY OF MIND. . . . 232

O'ERWEENING STATESMEN HAVE FULL LONG RELIED. . . 232

THE FRENCH AND THE SPANISH GUERILLAS. . . . 233

EPITAPHS TRANSLATED FROM CHIABRERA —

WEEP NOT, BELOVED FRIENDS ! NOR LET THE AIR. . 234

PERHAPS SOME NEEDFUL SERVICE OF THE STATE. . . 234

O THOU WHO MOVEST ONWARD WITH A MIND. . . 235

THERE NEVER BREATHED A MAN WHO, WHEN HIS LIFE. . 236

TRUE is IT THAT AMBROSIO SALINERO. . . . 237

DESTINED TO WAR FROM VERY INFANCY. 238

viii CONTENTS.

PAGE

EPITAPHS TRANSLATED FROM CHIABRERA — continued.

0 FLOWER OF ALL THAT SPRINGS FROM GENTLE BLOOD. . 239

NOT WITHOUT HEAVY GRIEF OF HEART DID HE. . . 239

PAUSE, COURTEOUS SPIRIT ! — BALBI SUPPLICATES. . . 240

MATERNAL GRIEF. ...... 242

CHARACTERISTICS OF A CHILD THREE YEARS OLD. . . 245

SPANISH GUERILLAS. ...... 246

THE POWER of ARMIES is A VISIBLE THING. . . . 247

HERE PAUSE : THE POET CLAIMS AT LEAST THIS PRAISE. . 248

EPISTLE TO SIR GEORGE HOWLAND BEAUMONT, BART. . . 248

UPON PERUSING THE FOREGOING EPISTLE THIRTY YEARS AFTER

ITS COMPOSITION. .... . 260

UPON THE SIGHT OF A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE, PAINTED BY SlR

G. H. BEAUMONT, BART% ..... 263

SONG FOR THE SPINNING WHEEL. .... 265

COMPOSED ON THE EVE OF THE MARRIAGE OF A FRIEND IN THE

VALE OF GRASMERE, 1812. . . . . . 266

WATER-FOWL. ....... 267

VIEW FROM THE TOP OF BLACK COMB. .... 268

WRITTEN WITH A SLATE PENCIL ON A STONE ON THE SIDE OF

THE MOUNTAIN OF BLACK COMB. .... 269

NOVEMBER, 1813. . . . 271

APPENDIX.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION OF THE LYRICAL BALLADS

(1800). . .... 275

ON POETIC DICTION. . . . . . . 305

DEDICATION TO THE EDITION OF 1815. .... 310

PREFACE TO THE EDITION OF 1815. . .311

ESSAY SUPPLEMENTARY TO THE PREFACE. . . 339

POSTCRIPT, 1835. . sg!

WORDSWORTH'S POETICAL WORKS.
1806.

From evidence gathered since the Chronological Table in the first
volume of this edition was issued, I have been led to assign many of the
Sonnets first published in 1807 to the year 1806. Wordsworth left
Grasmere with his household for Coleorton in November 1806, and we
have no proof that he returned to Westmoreland till April 1808 ;
although his sister spent part of the winter of 1807-8 at Dove Cottage,
while he and Mrs Wordsworth wintered at Stockton with the Hutchin-
sons. Several of the sonnets which are published in the volumes of
1807 refer, however, to Grasmere, and were evidently composed there ;
and I have conjecturally assigned a good many of them — about twenty
in all — to the year 1806, including even the one " composed by the side
of Grasmere Lake," beginning —

Clouds, lingering yet, extend in solid bars,

to which he himself gave the date 1807. (See the note, p. 31.) Some
of these sonnets may have been composed earlier than 1806, but it is not
likely that any of them belong to a later year.

In addition to these sonnets, the poems of 1806 include the Character
of the Happy Warrior (unless that should be assigned to the close
of the previous year — see the note to the poem), The Horn of
Egremont Castle, the three poems composed in London in the spring of
the year (April or May) — viz., Stray Pleasures, Star-gazers, and The Power
of Music — the lines on the Mountain Echo, those composed in expecta-
tion of the death of Mr Fox, and the Ode on Immortality. Sir Walter
Scott, in writing to Southey on the 4th of February 1806, said, "Words-
worth has of late been more employed in correcting his poems than in
writing others."

Since this edition was begun, so many new facts and dates have been
discovered — from sources as yet only partially accessible — that a second
and revised Chronological Table of the Poems will be given in the last
volume, along with the Life of the Poet. — ED.

IV. A

2 CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY WARRIOR.

CHAEACTEE OF THE HAPPY WAEEIOE.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[The course of the great war with the French naturally fixed one's
attention upon the military character, and, to the honour of our country,
there were many illustrious instances of the qualities that constitute its
highest excellence. Lord Nelson carried most of the virtues that the
trials he was exposed to in his department of the service necessarily call
forth and sustain, if they do not produce the contrary vices. But his
public life was stained with one great crime, so that though many
passages of these lines were suggested by what was generally known as
excellent in his conduct, I have not been able to connect his name with
the poem as I could wish, or even to think of him with satisfaction in
reference to the idea of. what a warrior ought to be. For the sake of such
of my friends as may happen to read this note, I will add that many ele-
ments of the character here pourtrayed were found in my brother John,
who perished by shipwreck, as mentioned elsewhere. His messmates used
to call him the Philosopher, from which it must be inferred that the
qualities and dispositions I allude to had not escaped their notice. He
often expressed his regret, after the war had continued some time, that
he had not chosen the Naval, instead of the East India Company's,
service, to which his family connection had led him. He greatly valued
moral and religious instruction for youth, as tending to make good
sailors. The best, he used to say, came from Scotland ; the next to
them, from the North of England, especially from Westmoreland and
Cumberland, where, thanks to the piety and local attachments of our
ancestors, endowed, or, as they are commonly called, free, schools
abound.]

WHO is the happy Warrior ? Who is he
That every man in arms should wish to be ?l
— It is the generous Spirit, who, when brought
Among the tasks of real life, hath wrought
Upon the plan that pleased his boyish thought :2

1 1820.

Whom every man isor.

* 1845.

Upon the plan that pleased his childish thought. 1807.

CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY WARRIOR.

Whose high endeavours are an inward light

That makes the path before him always bright :l

Who, with a natural instinct to discern

What knowledge can perform, is diligent to learn ;

Abides by this resolve, and stops not there,

But makes his moral being his prime care ;

Who, doomed to go in company with Pain,

And Fear, and Bloodshed, miserable train !

Turns his necessity to glorious gain ;

In face of these doth exercise a power

Which is our human nature's highest dower ;

Controls them and subdues, transmutes, bereaves

Of their bad influence, and their good receives :

By objects, which might force the soul to abate

Her feeling, rendered more compassionate ;

Is placable — because occasions rise

So often that demand such sacrifice ;

More skilful in self-knowledge, even more pure,

As tempted more ; more able to endure

As more exposed to suffering and distress ;

Thence, also, more alive to tenderness.

— 'Tis he whose law is reason ; who depends

Upon that law as on the best of friends ;

Whence, in a state where men are tempted still

To evil for a guard against worse ill,

And what in quality or act is best

Doth seldom on a right foundation rest,

He labours good on good to fix, and owes2

To virtue every triumph that he knows :

1 1827.

That make the path .... isor.

2 1836.

He fixes good on good alone, and owes isor.

CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY WARRIOR.

— Who, if he rise to station of command,

Rises by open means ; and there will stand

On honourable terms, or else retire,

And in himself possess his own desire ;

Who comprehends his trust, and to the same

Keeps faithful with a singleness of aim ;

And therefore does not stoop, nor lie in wait

For wealth, or honours, or for worldly state ;

Whom they must follow ; on whose head must fall,

Like showers of manna, if they come at all :

Whose powers shed round him in the common strife,

Or mild concerns of ordinary life,

A constant influence, a peculiar grace ;

But who, if he be called upon to face

Some awful moment to which Heaven has joined

Great issues, good or bad for human kind,

Is happy as a Lover ; and attired

With sudden brightness, like a Man inspired ;

And, through the heat of conflict, keeps the law

In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw ;

Or if an unexpected call succeed,

Come when it will, is equal to the need :

— He who, though thus endued as with a sense

And faculty for storm and turbulence,

Is yet a Soul whose master-bias leans

To homefelt pleasures and to gentle scenes ;

Sweet images ! which, whereso'er he be,

Are at his heart ; and such fidelity

It is his darling passion to approve ;

More brave for this, that he hath much to love : —

'Tis, finally, the Man, who, lifted high,

Conspicuous object in a Nation's eye,

Or left unthought-of in obscurity, —

CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY WARRIOR. 5

Who, with a toward or untoward lot,
Prosperous or adverse, to his wish or not —
Plays, in the many games of life, that one
Where what he most doth value must be won :
Whom neither shape of danger can dismay,
Nor thought of tender happiness betray ;
Who, not content that former worth stand fast,
Looks forward, persevering to the last,
From well to better, daily self-surpast :
Who, whether praise of him must walk the earth
For ever, and to noble deeds give birth,
Or he must fall, to sleep without his fame,1
And leave a dead unprofitable name —
Finds comfort in himself and in his cause ;
And, while the mortal mist is gathering, draws
His breath in confidence of Heaven's applause :
This is the happy Warrior ; this is He
That every Man in arms should wish to be.2

The following note was added, in the edition of 1807. " The above
verses were written soon after tidings had been received of the Death of
Lord Nelson, which event diverted the Author's thoughts to the
subject. His respect for the memory of his great fellow-countryman
induces him to mention this ; though he is well aware that the Verses
must suffer from any connection in the Reader's mind, with a name so
illustrious."

This note would seem to warrant our removing the date of the com-
position of the poem, from 1806 to 1805 ; since Lord Nelson died at the
battle of Trafalgar, on the 21st of October 1805. On the other hand,
Wordsworth himself gave the date, 1806 j and the " soon after " of the
above note may perhaps be stretched to include two months and a half.
In writing to Sir George Beaumont on the llth of February 1806, and en-
closing a copy of these verses, he says, " they were written several weeks

1 C. and 1843.

Or he must go to dust without his fame, 1807.

Or he must fall, and sleep without his fame, 1836.

2 1845.

Whom every Man .... isor.

6 THE HORN OF EGREMONT CASTLE.

ago." Southey, writing to Sir Walter Scott, from Keswick, on the 4th
of February 1806, says, " Wordsworth was with me last week ; he has of
late been more employed in correcting his poems than in writing others ;
but one piece he has written, upon the ideal character of a soldier, than
which I have never seen anything more full of meaning and sound
thought The subject was suggested by Nelson's most glorious death,
though having no reference to it. He had some thoughts of sending it
to the Courier, in which case you will easily recognise it" (The Life and
Correspondence of Robert Southey, VoL IIL p. 19.) As it is impossible
to decide with accuracy, in the absence of more definite data, I have
followed the poet's own statement, and assigned the poem to the year
1806. It was classed by Wordsworth amongst his " Poems of Senti-
ment and Keflection."
In the edition of 1807, the following note was added to the lines —

persevering to the last
From well to better, daily self -surpassed.
" For knighte's ever should be persevering,
To seek honour without feintisse or slouth,
Fro wele to better in all manner thing."

Chaucer — The Floure and the Leafe. — ED.

THE HORN OF EGREMONT CASTLK
Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[A Tradition transferred from the ancient mansion of Hutton John,
the seat of the Hudlestones, to Egremont Castle.]

ERE the Brothers through the gateway
Issued forth with old and young,
To the Horn Sir Eustace pointed
Which for ages there had hung.1

1 c. and 1485.

When the Brothers reached the gateway,

Eustace pointed with his lance

To the Horn which there was hanging ;

Horn of the inheritance. jgo;.

When the Brothers reached the gateway,

With their followers old and young,

To the Horn Sir Eustace pointed

That for ages there had hung. c.

THE HORN OF EGREMONT CASTLE.

Horn it was which none could sound,
No one upon living ground,
Save He who came as rightful Heir
To Egremont's Domains and Castle fair.

Heirs from times of earliest record1

Had the House of Lucie born,

Who of right had held the Lordship

Claimed by proof upon the Horn :2

Each at the appointed hour

Tried the Horn, — it owned his power;

He was acknowledged : and the blast,

Which good Sir Eustace sounded, was the last.

With his lance Sir Eustace pointed,

And to Hubert thus said he,

" What I speak this Horn shall witness

For thy better memory.

Hear, then, and neglect me not !

At this time, and on this spot,

The words are uttered from my heart,

As my last earnest prayer ere we depart.

On good service we are going

Life to risk by sea and land,

In which course if Christ our Saviour

Do my sinful soul demand,

Hither come thou back straightway,

Hubert, if alive that day ;

1 c. and 1845.

Heirs from ages without record 1807.

8 C. and 1845.

Who of right had claimed the Lordship

By the proof upon the Horn : 1807.

THE HORN OF EGREMONT CASTLE.

Eeturn, and sound the Horn, that we

May have a living House still left in thee ! "

" Fear not," quickly answered Hubert ;
"As I am thy Father's son,
What thou askest, noble Brother,
With God's favour shall be done."
So were both right well content :
Forth they from the Castle went,1
And at the head of their Array
To Palestine the Brothers took their way.

Side by side they fought (the Lucies

Were a line for valour famed)

And where'er their strokes alighted,

There the Saracens were tamed.

Whence, then, could it come — the thought —

By what evil spirit brought ?

Oh ! can a brave Man wish to take

His Brother's life, for Lands' and Castle's sake ?

" Sir ! " the Euffians said to Hubert,
" Deep he lies in Jordan flood."
Stricken by this ill-assurance,
Pale and trembling Hubert stood.
" Take your earnings." — Oh ! that I
Could have seen my Brother die !
It was a pang that vexed him then ;
And oft returned, again, and yet again.

Months passed on, and no Sir Eustace !
Nor of him were tidings heard ;

1 C. and 1845.

From the Castle forth they went, isor.

THE HORN OF EGREMONT CASTLE.

Wherefore, bold as day, the Murderer

Back again to England steered.

To his Castle Hubert sped ;

Nothing has he now to dread.1

But silent and by stealth he came,

And at an hour which nobody could name.

None could tell if it were night-time,

Night or day, at even or morn ;

No one's eye had seen him enter,

No one's ear had heard the Horn.2

But bold Hubert lives in glee : ,

Months and years went smilingly ;

With plenty was his table spread ;

And bright the Lady is who shares his bed.

Likewise he had sons and daughters ;

And, as good men do, he sate

At his board by these surrounded,

Flourishing in fair estate.

And while thus in open day

Once he sate, as old books say,

A blast was uttered from the Horn,

Where by the Castle-gate it hung forlorn.

'Tis the breath of good Sir Eustace !
He is come to claim his right :
Ancient castle, woods, and mountains
Hear the challenge with delight.

1 1845.

He has nothing now to dread. 1815.

2 C. and 1845.

For the sound was heard by no one

Of the proclamation-horn isor.

10 THE HORN OF EGREMONT CASTLE.

Hubert ! though the blast be blown

He is helpless and alone :

Thou hast a dungeon, speak the word !

And there he may be lodged, and thou be Lord.

Speak ! — astounded Hubert cannot ;
And, if power to speak he had,
All are daunted, all the household
Smitten to the heart, and sad.
'Tis Sir Eustace ; if it be
Living man, it must be he !
Tims Hubert thought in his dismay,
And by a postern-gate he slunk away.

Long and long was he unheard of :

To his Brother then he came,

Made confession, asked forgiveness,

Asked it by a brother's name,

And by all the saints in heaven ;

And of Eustace was forgiven :

Then in a convent went to hide

His melancholy head, and there he died.

But Sir Eustace, whom good angels

Had preserved from murderers' hands,

And from Pagan chains had rescued,

Lived with honour on his lands.

Sons he had, saw sons of theirs :

And through ages, heirs of heirs,

A long posterity renowned,

Sounded the Horn which they alone could sound.

The following note is appended to the editions, from 1807 to 1845 : —
" This story is a Cumberland tradition ; I have heard it also related of
the Hall of Hutton John, an ancient residence of the Huddlestones, in

A COMPLAINT. 1 1

a sequestered valley upon the river Dacor." Egremont Castle, to which
this Cumberland tradition was transferred, is close to the town of
Egremont, an ancient borough on the river Ehen, not far from St Bees.
The castle was founded about the beginning of the twelfth century, by
William, brother of Ranulph de Meschines, who bestowed on him the
whole of the extensive barony of Copeland. The gateway of the castle
is vaulted with semicircular arches, and defended by a strong tower.
Westward from the castle area is an ascent to three narrow gates,
standing in a line, and close together. These communicated wjth the
outworks, each being defended by a portcullis. Beyond the gates is an
artificial mount, seventy-eight feet above the moat ; and on this stood
an ancient circular tower. (See a description of the castle in Britton
and Brayley's Cumberland.) The river Dacor, or Dacre, referred to in
Wordsworth's note, joins the Eamont, a short way below Ullswater ; and
the hall of Hutton John, which in the reign of Edward III. belonged
to the barony of Graystock, passed in the time of Elizabeth to the
Huddlestonee. The famous Catholic father, John Huddlestone, chaplain
to Charles II. and James II., was of this family.

In the edition of 1815, the footnote runs, " This poem, and the Ballad
which follows it" (it is the ballad of Goody Blake), " as they rather
refer to the imagination than are produced by it would not have been
placed here" (i.e., amongst the Poems of the Imagination), "but to avoid
a needless multiplication of the classes." Accordingly, in all the
editions, from 1815 to 1843, The Horn of Egremont Castle remained
amongst the " Poems of the Imagination ; " in 1845, it was placed along
with its companion " Ballad " — in the class of " Miscellaneous Poems."

The text of the poem underwent no change in the editions from 1807
to 1845. But — as is shown by the notes in Lord Coleridge's copy of
the edition of 1836 — the alterations, subsequently adopted in 1845, were
made in the interval between these years. — ED.

A COMPLAINT.
Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. Suggested by a change in the
manner of a friend.]

THEEE is a change — and I am poor ;
Your love hath been, not long ago,
A fountain at my fond heart's door,
Whose only business was to flow ;
And flow it did ; not taking heed
Of its own bounty, or my need.

12 STRAY PLEASURES.

What happy moments did I count !
Blest was I then all bliss above !
Now, for that consecrated fount1
Of murmuring, sparkling, living love,
What have I ? shall I dare to tell ?
A comfortless and hidden welL

A well of love — it may be deep —
I trust it is, — and never dry :
What matter ? if the waters sleep
In silence and obscurity.
— Such change, and at the very door
Of my fond heart, hath made me poor.

Classed by Wordsworth amongst the " Poems founded on the Affec-
tions."—ED.

STRAY PLEASURES.
Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[Suggested on the Thames by the sight of one of these floating mills
that used to be seen there. This I noticed on the Surrey side between
Somerset House and Blackfriars' Bridge. Charles Lamb was with me
at the time ; and I thought it remarkable that I should have to point
out to him, an idolatrous Londoner, a sight so interesting as the happy
group dancing on the platform. Mills of this kind used to be, and
perhaps still are, not uncommon on the continent. I noticed several
upon the river Saone in the year 1799, particularly near the town of
Chalons, where my friend Jones and I halted a day when we crossed
France; so far on foot; there we embarqued, and floated down to
Lyons.]

" Pleasure is spread through the earth

In stray gifts to be claimed by whoever shall find."

BY their floating mill,
That lies dead and still,2

1 1836.

Now, for this consecrated Fount. 1807.

2 1827.

Which lies dead and still, 1807.

STRAY PLEASURES. 13

Behold yon Prisoners three,

The Miller with two Dames, on the breast of the Thames !
The platform is small, but gives room for them all ; 1
And they're dancing merrily.

From the shore come the notes

To their mill where it floats,
To their house and their mill tethered fast :
To the small wooden isle where, their work to beguile,
They from morning to even take whatever is given ; —
And many a blithe day they have past.

In sight of the spires,

All alive with the fires
Of the sun going down to his rest,
In the broad open eye of the solitary sky,
They dance, — there are three, as jocund as free,
While they dance on the calm river's breast.

Man and Maidens wheel,

They themselves make the reel,
And their music's a prey which they seize ;
It plays not for them, — what matter ? 'tis theirs ;
And if they had care, it has scattered their cares ;
While they dance, crying, " Long as ye please ! "

They dance not for me,

Yet mine is their glee !
Thus pleasure is spread through the earth
In stray gifts to be claimed by whoever shall find ;
Thus a rich loving-kindness, redundantly kind,
Moves all nature to gladness and mirth.

1 1820.

but there's room for them all ; isor.

14 POWER OF MUSIC.

The showers of the spring

Eouse the birds, and they sing ;
If the wind do but stir for his proper delight,
Each leaf, that and this, his neighbour will kiss ;
Each wave, one and t'other, speeds after his brother ;
They are happy, for that is their right !

"Wordsworth went up to London in April 1806, where he stayed two
months. It was, doubtless, on that occasion that these lines were
written. The title Stray Pleasures was first given to them in the
edition of 1820. The verses were classed amongst the "Poems of the
Fancy." The year mentioned in the Fenwick note is incorrect. It was
in 1790 that Wordsworth crossed France with his friend Jones. — ED.

POWEB OF MUSIC.

Comp. 1806. '• Pub. 1807.

[Taken from life.]

AN Orpheus ! an Orpheus ! yes, Faith may grow bold,
And take to herself all the wonders of old ; —
Near the stately Pantheon you'll meet with the same
In the street that from Oxford hath borrowed its name.

His station is there ; and he works on the crowd,
He sways them with harmony merry and loud ;
He fills with his power all their hearts to the brim —
Was aught ever heard like his fiddle and him ?

What an eager assembly ! what an empire is this !
The weary have life, and the hungry have bliss ;
The mourner is cheered, and the anxious have rest ;
And the guilt-burthened soul is no longer opprest.

As the Moon brightens round her the clouds of the night,
So He, where he stands, is a centre of light ;

POWER OF MUSIC. 1 5

It gleams on the face, there, of dusky-browed Jack,1
And the pale-visaged Baker's, with basket on back.

That errand-bound 'Prentice was passing in haste —
What matter ! he's caught — and his time runs to waste ;
The Newsman is stopped, though he stops on the fret ;
And the half -breathless Lamplighter — he's in the net !

The Porter sits down on the weight which he bore ;
The Lass with her barrow wheels hither her store ; —
If a thief could be here he might pilfer at ease ;
She sees the Musician, 'tis all that she sees !

He stands, backed by the wall ; — he abates not his din ;
His hat gives him vigour, with boons dropping in,
From the old and the young, from the poorest : and there !
The one-pennied Boy has his penny to spare.

0 blest are the hearers, and proud be the hand

Of the pleasure it spreads through so thankful a band ;

1 am glad for him, blind as he is ! — all the while

If they speak 'tis to praise, and they praise with a smile.

That tall Man, a giant in bulk and in height,
Not an inch of his body is free from delight ;
Can he keep himself still, if he would ? oh, not he !
The music stirs in him like wind through a tree.

Mark that Cripple who leans on his crutch ; 2 like a tower
That long has leaned forward, leans hour after hour ! —
That Mother, whose spirit in fetters is bound,
While she dandles the Babe in her arms to the sound.

1 1815.

dusky-faced . 1807.

a 1S27.

There's a Cripple 1807.

16 STAK-GAZERS.

Now, coaches and chariots ! roar on like a stream :
Here are twenty souls happy as souls in a dream :
They are deaf to your murmurs — they care not for you,
Nor what ye are flying, nor what ye pursue !

This must be assigned to the same London visit, in the spring of
1806, referred to in the note to the previous poem. It was classed by
Wordsworth amongst the " Poems of the Imagination." — ED.

STAE-GAZEES.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[Observed by me in Leicester-square, as here described.]

WHAT crowd is this ? what have we here ! we must not pass

it by;

A Telescope upon its frame, and pointed to the sky :
Long is it 'as a barber's pole, or mast of little boat,
Some little pleasure-skiff, that doth on Thames's waters float.

The Showman chooses well his place, 'tis Leicester's busy

Square ;
And is as happy in his night, for the heavens are blue and

fair;
Calm, though impatient, is1 the crowd ; each stands ready

with the fee,
And envies him that's looking; — what an insight must it be!2

Yet, Showman, where can lie the cause? Shall thy Imple-
ment have blame,
A boaster, that when he is tried, fails, and is put to shame ?

1 1827.

are the crowd

MS. letter, D. W. to Lady
Beaumont, Nov. 15, 1806.

each is ready . . 1807.

2 1807.

Impatient till his moment comes . . . 1332.
* .... come . . . 1837.

1842 returns to 1807.

STAR-GAZERS. 17

Or is it good as others are, and be their eyes in fault ?
Their eyes, or minds ? or, finally, is yon resplendent vault ?x

Is nothing of that radiant pomp so good as we have here ?
Or gives a thing but small delight that never can be dear ?
The silver moon with all her vales, and hills of mightiest

fame,
Doth she betray us when they're seen ? or2 are they but a

name ?

Or is it rather that Conceit rapacious is and strong,

And bounty never yields so much but it seems to do her

wrong ?

Or is it, that when human Souls a journey long have had
And are returned into themselves, they cannot but be sad ?

Or must we be constrained to think that these Spectators
rude,

Poor in estate, of manners base, men of the multitude,

Have souls which never yet have risen, and therefore pros-
trate lie ?

No, no, this cannot be; — men thirst for power and majesty!3

1 1832.

or finally, is this resplendent vault 1

MS. letter, D. W. to Lady Beaumont,
Nov. 15, 1806, and 1807.

2 1827.

Do they betray us when they're seen? and are they but a name?

MS. letter, D. W. to Lady Beaumont,
Nov. 15, 1806, and 1807.

1 1807.

Or is it but unwelcome thought ! that these Spectators rude,
Poor in estate, of manners base, men of the multitude,
Have souls which never yet have risen, and therefore

prostrate lie,
Not to be lifted up at once to power and majesty ?

MS. letter, D. W. to Lady
Beaumont, Nov. 15, 1806.

IV. B

18 YES, IT WAS THE MOUNTAIN ECHO.

Does, then, a deep and earnest thought the blissful mind

employ1

Of him who gazes, or has gazed ? a grave and steady joy,
That doth reject all show of pride, admits no outward sign,
Because not of this noisy world, but silent and divine !

Whatever be the cause,2 'tis sure that they who pry and

pore

Seem to meet with little gain, seem less happy than before:
One after One they take their turn,3 nor have I one espied
That doth not slackly go away, as if dissatisfied.

Doubtless " observed " during the visit to London in April and May
1806. Classed, like the former, amongst the " Poems of the Imagina
tion."— ED.

THE ECHO.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. The echo came from Nab-scar,
when I was walking on the opposite side of Eydal Mere. I will here
mention, for my dear Sister's sake, that, while she was sitting alone one
day high up on this part of Loughrigg Fell, she was so affected by the
voice of the Cuckoo heard from the crags at some distance that she
could not suppress a wish to have a stone inscribed with her name
among the rocks from which the sound proceeded. On my return from
my walk I recited these verses to Mrs Wordsworth.]

1 1807.

Or does some deep and earnest joy

MS. letter, D. W. to Lady
Beaumont, Nov. 15, 1806.

2 1807.

Whate'er the cause

MS. letter, D. W. to Lady

Beaumont, Nov. 15, 1806.

3 1807.

their turns ....
MS. letter, D. W. to Lady

Beaumont, Nov. 15, 1806.

YES, IT WAS THE MOUNTAIN ECHO.

YES, it was the mountain Echo,1
Solitary, clear, profound,
Answering to the shouting Cuckoo,2
Giving to her sound for sound !3

Unsolicited reply

To a babbling wanderer sent ;4

Like her ordinary cry,

Like — but oh, how different !

Hears not also mortal Life ?
Hear not we, unthinking Creatures !
Slaves of folly, love, or strife — 5
Voices of two different natures ?

Have not we too ? — yes, we have
Answers, and we know not whence ;
Echoes from beyond the grave,
Eecognised intelligence !

1 1827.

Yes ! full surely 'twas the Echo, isor.

2 1827.

Answering to Thee, shouting Cuckoo !

Giving to thee Sound for Sound. 1807.

3 In ed. 1807, the following verse follows the first —

Whence the Voice 1 from air or earth 1
This the Cuckoo cannot tell ;
But a startling sound had birth,
As the Bird must know full well ;

4 1815.

Like the voice through earth and sky

By the restless Cuckoo sent , 1807.

6 1807.

and strife. 1827.

1832 returns to text of 1S07.

20 PREFATORY SONNET.

Such rebounds our inward ear
Catches sometimes from afar — l
Listen, ponder, hold them dear ;2
For of God, — of God they are.

The place where this echo was heard can easily be identified by any one
walking along the southern, or Loughrigg shore of Rydal. The Fenwick
note refers to a wish of Dorothy Wordsworth to have her name in-
scribed on a stone amongst the rocks of Loughrigg Fell. It is impossible
to know whether it was ever carried out or not. If it was, the place is
undiscoverable, like the spot on the banks of the Rotha, where Joanna's
name was graven "deep in the living rock," or the place where
"Wordsworth carved his wife's initials (as recorded in Mrs Heman's
Memoirs), or where the Daisy was found, which suggested the lines—

" Small service is true service while it lasts ; "

and it is well that they are undiscoverable. It is so easy for pos-
terity to vulgarise, by idle and unappreciative curiosity, spots that
are sacred only to the few who feel them to be shrines. The
very grave where "Wordsworth rests runs the risk of being thus
abused by the unthinking crowds. But, in the hope that no one
will desecrate it as the Rock of Names has been injured, I may
mention that there is a stone with the initial " "W." deeply cut, near
Rydal Mere, on the north-eastern slope of Loughrigg. The exact
locality need not be more minutely indicated. In the edition of 1827,
tli is poem was called The Echo. It was always classed amongst the
" Poems of the Imagination." — ED.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[In the cottage, Town-end, Grasmere, one afternoon in 1801, my
sister read to me the sonnets of Milton. I had long been well acquainted

1 1806.

Such within ourselves we hear

Oft-times, ours though sent from far ; 1807.

Such rebounds our inward ear

Often catches from afar ; 1827.

Often as thy inward ear

Catches such rebounds, beware, — 1832.

Giddy mortals ! hold them dear ; 1327.

Ed. 1832 returns to text of 1807.

PREFATORY SONNET. 21

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 Shakspeare'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 Buonaparte"." One was never
written down ; the third, which was, I believe, preserved, I cannot
particularise.]

NUNS fret not at their convent's narrow room ;

And hermits are contented with their cells ;

And students with their pensive citadels ;

Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom,

Sit blithe, and happy ; bees that soar for bloom,

High as the highest Peak of Furness-fells;

Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells :

In truth the prison, unto which we doom

Ourselves, no prison is : and hence for me,1

In sundry moods, 'twas pastime to be bound

Within the Sonnet's scanty plot of ground ;

Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be)

Who have felt the weight of too much liberty,

Should find brief solace there,2 as I have found.

This sonnet was named " Prefatory Sonnet," and, as such, was pre-
fixed to the series of " Miscellaneous Sonnets " in the editions of 1807,
1815, and 1820. In 1827, it took its place as the first of the series.

In Wordsworth's time " Furness-fells " was a generic phrase for all
the hills east of the Duddon, south of the Brathay, and west of Winder-
mere ; including the Coniston group, Wetherlam, with the Yewdale
and Tilberthwaite fells. The district of Furness, like that of Craven
in Yorkshire, being originally ecclesiastical, had a wide area, of which
the abbey of Furness was the centre.

With the lines

the prison, unto which we doom
Ourselves, no prison is :

1 1849.

to me, 1807.

2 1S27.

Should find short solace . . . isor.

22 PREFATORY SONNET.

compare those in Lovelace's poem, To Altheafrom Prison —
Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage ;
Minds innocent and quiet take
These for a hermitage.

With the phrase —

The weight of too much liberty,

compare the line in the Ode to Duty —

Me this unchartered freedom tires.

In the Fenwick note prefixed to this sonnet, Wordsworth refers to
his earliest attempt at sonnet writing. He says he wrote an irregular
one at school, and the next were three sonnets written one afternoon
in Dove Cottage in the year 1801, after his sister had read the sonnets
of Milton. This note is not, however, to be trusted. It was not in
1801, but on the 21st of May 1802, that his sister read to him these
sonnets of Milton ; and he afterwards wrote not one but two sonnets
on Buonaparte. What the irregular sonnet written at school was it is
impossible to say, unless he refers to the one described in 1807, and sub-
sequent editions, as "written in very early youth •" that, viz., beginning —

Calm is all nature as a resting wheel.

But, as indicated in the note preceding the preface to the first volume
of this edition, Wordsworth wrote on a copy of The Evening Walk
(edition 1793) : — " This is the first of my published poems, with the
exception of a sonnet, written when I was a schoolboy, and published
in the 'European Magazine' in June or July 1786, and signed Axio-
logus." Even as to this date his memory was at fault. It was
published in 1787, when he was seventeen years of age. Its full title
may be given ; although, for reasons already stated, it would be un-
justifiable to republish the sonnet. It was entitled, " Sonnet, on seeing
Miss Maria Williams weep at a Tale of Distress." But, fully ten years
before the date mentioned by Dorothy Wordsworth in her Grasmere
journal — as the day on which she read Milton's sonnets to her brother,
and on which he wrote the two on Buonaparte — he had written others,
the existence of which he had evidently forgotten. On the 6th of
May 1792, his sister wrote thus from Forncett Eectory in Norfolk to
her friend, Miss Jane Pollard : — " I promised to transcribe some of
William's compositions. As I made the promise, I will give you a
little sonnet .... I take the first that offers. It is very valuable
to me, because the cause which gave birth to it was the favourite
evening walk of William and me .... I have not chosen this sonnet
from any particular beauty it has. It was the first I laid my hands upon."
From the clause I have italicised, it would almost seem that other
sonnets belong to that period, viz., before 1793, when The Evening Walk
appeared. She would hardly have spoken of it as she did, if this was

PERSONAL TALK. 23

the only sonnet her brother had then written. Though very inferior
to his later work, this Forncett sonnet — as it may perhaps be called —
may be reproduced as a specimen of Wordsworth's earlier manner —
before he had broken away, by the force of his own imagination, from
the trammels of the conventional style —

Sweet was the walk along the narrow lane
At noon, the bank and hedgerows all the way
Shagged with wild pale-green tufts of fragrant Hay,
Caught by the hawthorns from our loaded Wain,
Which Age with many a slow stoop strove to gain ;
And Childhood seeming still more busy, took
His little rake, with cunning side-long look
Sauntering to pluck the strawberries wild unseen,
Now too on Melancholy's idle Dream,
Musing, the live spot with my soul agrees
Quiet and dark ; for, through the thick- wove trees
Scarce peeps the curious Star till solemn gleams
The clouded Moon, and calls me forth to stray
Through tall green silent woods and ruins gray.

From the above, it will be seen that Wordsworth's memory cannot
be always relied upon, in reference to dates, and similar details, in these
Fenwick memoranda. — ED.

PERSONAL TALK

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. The last line but two stood, at
first, better and more characteristically, thus : —

" By my half -kitchen and half-parlour fire."

My sister and I were in the habit of having the tea-kettle in our little
sitting room ; and we toasted the bread ourselves, which reminds me
of a little circumstance not unworthy to be set down among these
minutiae. Happening both of us to be engaged a few minutes one
morning when we had a young prig of a Scotch lawyer to breakfast
with us, my dear Sister, with her usual simplicity, past the toasting
fork with a slice of bread into the hands of this Edinburgh genius.
Our little book-case stood on one side of the fire. To prevent loss of time,
he took down a book, and fell to reading, to the neglect of the toast,
which was burnt to a cinder. Many a time have we laughed at this
circumstance, and other cottage simplicities of that day. By the bye,
I have a spite at one of this series of Sonnets (I will leave the reader to
discover which) as having been the means of nearly putting off for ever

24 PERSONAL TALK.

our acquaintance with dear Miss Fenwick, who has always stigmatized
one line of it as vulgar, and worthy only of having been composed by a
country squire.]

I AM not One who much or oft delight
To season my fireside with personal talk, —
Of friends, who live within an easy walk,
Or neighbours, daily, weekly in my sight :
And, for my chance-acquaintance, ladies bright,
Sons, mothers, maidens withering on the stalk,
These all wear out of me, like Forms with chalk
Painted on rich men's floors, for one feast night.
Better than such discourse doth silence long,
Long, barren silence, square with my desire ;
To sit without emotion, hope, or aim,
In the loved presence of my cottage-fire,1
And listen to the flapping of the flame,
Or kettle whispering its faint undersong.

II.

" Yet life," you say, " is life ; we have seen and see,

And with a living pleasure we describe ;

And fits of sprightly malice do but bribe

The languid mind into activity.

Sound sense, and love itself, and mirth and glee

Are fostered by the comment and the gibe."

Even be it so : yet still among your tribe,

Our daily world's true Worldlings, rank not me !

Children are blest, and powerful ; their world lies

More justly balanced ; partly at their feet, %

1 1815.

By my half -kitchen my half -parlour fire. 1S07.

PERSONAL TALK. 25

And part far from them : — sweetest melodies
Are those that are by distance made more sweet ;
Whose mind is but the mind of his own eyes,
He is a Slave ; the meanest we can meet !

III.

Wings have we, — and as far as we can go

We may find pleasure : wilderness and wood,

Blank ocean and mere sky, support that mood

Which with the lofty sanctifies the low.

Dreams, books, are each a world ; and books, we know,

Are a substantial world, both pure and good :

Eound these, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood,

Our pastime and our happiness will grow.

There find I personal themes, a plenteous store,

Matter wherein right voluble I am,

To which I listen with a ready ear ;*

Two shall be named, pre-eminently dear, — 2

The gentle Lady married to the Moor ;

And heavenly Una, with her milk-white Lamb.

IV.

Nor can I not believe but that hereby
Great gains are mine ; for thus I live remote
From evil-speaking ; rancour, never sought,
Comes to me not ; malignant truth, or lie.
Hence have I genial seasons, hence have I

Then do I find a never-failing store

Of personal themes, and such as I love best ;

Matter wherein right voluble I am : 1807.

2 1827.

Two will I mention dearer than the rest, 1807

26 PERSONAL TALK.

Smooth passions, smooth discourse, and joyous thought:

And thus from day to day my little boat

Kocks in its harbour, lodging peaceably.

Blessings be with them — and eternal praise,

Who gave us nobler loves, and nobler cares —

The Poets, who on earth have made us heirs

Of truth and pure delight by heavenly lays !

Oh ! might my name be numbered among theirs,

Then gladly would I end my mortal days.

The stanza referred to as disliked by Miss Fenwick is the first.
The text of this poem was little altered, and was fixed in 1829.

The

half -kitchen and half -parlour fire

of 1807, was a reminiscence of Dove Cottage, which we regret to lose
in the later editions.

In the Baptistery of Westminster Abbey, there is a statue of Words-
worth of great merit by Frederick Thrupp, placed there by the late
Dean Stanley, beside busts of Keble, Maurice, and Charles Kingsley.
Underneath the statue of Wordsworth are the four lines from Personal
Talk—

Blessings be with them — and eternal praise,
Who gave us nobler loves, and nobler cares —
The Poets, who on earth have made us heirs
Of truth arid pure delight by heavenly lays !

Dean Stanley found it difficult to select from Wordsworth's poems
the lines most appropriate for inscription, and adopted this at the sug-
gestion of his friend, Principal Shairp.

With the Ines —

Whose mind is but the mind of his own eyes,
He is a Slave, &c.,

compare The Prelude, Book XII. (Vol. III. p. 368)—

I knew a maid,

A young enthusiast who escaped these bonds ;
Her eye was not the mistress of her heart.

—ED.

WELL MAY'ST THOU HALT — 27

ADMONITION.

Intended more particularly for the perusal of those who may have
happened to be enamoured of some beautiful Place of Eetreat, in
the Country of the Lakes.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

WELL may'st thou halt — and gaze with brightening eye I1

The lovely Cottage in the guardian nook

Hath stirred thee deeply ; with its own dear brook,

Its own small pasture, almost its own sky !

But covet not the Abode : — forbear to sigh,2

As many do, repining while they look ;

Intruders — who would tear from Nature's book 3

This precious leaf, with harsh impiety.4

Think what the home must be if it were thine,5

Even thine, though few thy wants ! — Roof, window, door,

The very flowers are sacred to the Poor,

The roses to the porch which they entwine :

Yea, all, that now enchants thee, from the day

On which it should be touched, would melt away.6

1 1836.

Yes, there is holy pleasure in thine eye ! 1807

2 1827.

oh ! do not sigh, 1807.

3 1827.

Sighing a wish to tear from Nature's Book 1807.

4 1827.

This blissful leaf, with worst impiety. isor.

This blissful leaf with harsh impiety. 1815.

6 1827.

Think what the Home would be if it were thine, 1807.

6 1827.

would melt and melt away. 1807.

28 " BELOVED VALE ! " I SAID,

With the lines-
its own dear brook,
Its own small pasture, almost its own sky !

compare those in Peter Bell —

Where deep and low the hamlets lie
Beneath their little patch of sky,
And little lot of stars.

The Cottage at Town-end, Grasmere— where this Sonnet was com-
posed— may have suggested it. Some of the details, however, are
scarcely applicable to Dove Cottage; the "brook" (referred to else-
where) is outside the orchard ground, and there is scarcely anything
in the garden to warrant the phrase, " its own small pasture." It is
unnecessary to localise the allusions.— -Eo.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

"BELOVED Yale !" I said, "When I shall con
Those many records of my childish years,
Remembrance of myself and of my peers
Will press me down : to think of what is gone
Will be an awful thought, if life have one."
But, when into the Vale I came, no fears
Distressed me ; from mine eyes escaped no tears ;x
Deep thought, or dread remembrance, had I none.2
By doubts and thousand petty fancies crost 3
I stood, of simple shame the blushing Thrall ;

1 1827.

Distressed me ; I looked round, I shed no tears ; isov.

2 1836.

Deep thought, or awful vision, I had none. isu7.
had I none. 1827.

3 1827.

By thousand petty fancies I was crossed. 1S07.

HOW SWEET IT IS, WHEN MOTHER FANCY ROCKS 29

So narrow seemed the brooks, the fields so small I1
A Juggler's balls old Time about him tossed ;
I looked, I stared, I smiled, I laughed ; and all
The weight of sadness was in wonder lost.

Doubtless the " Vale " referred to is that of Hawkshead ; the
Brooks, the one that feeds Esthwaite, and Sawrey beck, but above all,
" the famous brook within our garden boxed." (See The Prelude,
passim, and The Fountain.) — ED.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

How sweet it is, when mother Fancy rocks

The wayward brain, to saunter through a wood !

An old place, full of many a lovely brood,

Tall trees, green arbours, and ground-flowers in flocks ;

And wild rose tip-toe upon hawthorn stocks,

Like a bold Girl, who plays her agile pranks2

At Wakes and Fairs with wandering Mountebanks, —

When she stands cresting the Clown's head, and mocks

The crowd beneath her. Verily I think,

Such place to me is sometimes like a dream

Or map of the whole world : thoughts, link by link,

Enter- through ears and eyesight, with such gleam

Of all things, that at last in fear I shrink,

And leap at once from the delicious stream.

1 1827.

To see the Trees, which I had thought so tall,

Mere dwarfs; the Brooks so narrow, Fields so small. 1807.

2 1827.

Like to a bonny Lass, who plays her pranks. 1807.

30 CLOUDS, LINGEKING YET,

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

" they are of the sky,

And from our earthly memory fade away."

THOSE words were uttered as in pensive mood J
We turned, departing from that solemn sight : 2
A contrast and reproach to gross delight,
And life's unspiritual pleasures daily wooed !
But now upon this thought I cannot brood ;
It is unstable as a dream of night ; 3
Nor will I praise a cloud, however bright,
Disparaging Man's gifts, and proper food.
Grove, isle, with every shape of sky-built dome,4
Though clad in colours beautiful and pure,
Find in the heart of man no natural home :
The immortal Mind craves objects that endure :
These cleave to it ; from these it cannot roam,
Nor they from it : their fellowship is secure.

COMPOSED BY THE SIDE OF GEASMEEE LAKE.

1807.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1819.

CLOUDS, lingering yet, extend in solid bars5

Through the grey west ; and lo ! these waters, steeled

1 1845.

These words 1807.

in a pensive mood isis.

2 1827.

Mine eyes, yet lingering on that solemn sight : isis.

3 1827.

It is unstable, and deserts me quite ; 1807.

4 1827.

The Grove, the sky -built Temple, and the Dome, 1807.

6 1832.

Eve's lingering clouds extend in solid bars. 1819.

WITH HOW SAD STEPS, O MOON, 31

By breezeless air to smoothest polish, yield

A vivid repetition of the stars ;

Jove, Venus, and the ruddy crest of Mars

Amid his fellows beauteously revealed

At happy distance from earth's groaning field,

Where ruthless mortals wage incessant wars.

Is it a mirror ? — or the nether Sphere

Opening to view the abyss in which she feeds

Her own calm fires I1 But list ! a voice is near ;

Great Pan himself low-whispering through the reeds,

" Be thankful, thou ; for, if unholy deeds

Eavage the world, tranquillity is here ! "

Notwithstanding the date given by "Wordsworth to this sonnet, it
must be assigned to the previous year, for the reason stated in the
prefatory note to the poems belonging to 1806 (see p. 1). It was first
published along with The Waggoner in 1819. — ED.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

WITH how sad steps, 0 Moon, thou climb'st the sky,
How silently, and with how wan a face !*
Where art thou ? Thou so often seen on high 2
Eirnning among the clouds a Wood-nymph's race !
Unhappy Nuns, whose common breath's a sigh
Which they would stifle, move at such a pace !
The northern Wind, to call thee to the chase,
Must blow to-night his bugle horn. Had I
The power of Merlin, Goddess ! this should be :

1 1836.

Opening its vast abyss, where fancy feeds
On the rich show ! . . . . . 1819.

Opening to view the abyss in which it feeds 1827.

Its own . . .

2 1836.

Thou whom I have seen on high 1307.
* From a sonnet of Sir Philip Sydney. 1807

32 THE WORLD IS TOO MUCH WITH US:

And all the stars, fast as the clouds were riven,1
Should sally forth, to keep thee company,2
Hurrying and sparkling through the clear blue heaven ; 3
But, Cynthia ! should to thee the palm be given,
Queen both for beauty and for majesty.

The sonnet of Sir Philip Sidney's, from which the two first lines of
this one are taken, is No. XXXI. of his Astrophel and Stella. — ED.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

THE world is too much with us : late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers :

Little we see in Nature that is ours ;

*

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon !
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon ;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers ;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune ;

1 1836.

And all the Stars, now shrouded up in heaven, 1807.
And the keen Stars, fast as the clouds were riven, 1827. .

2 isor.

Should sally forth, an emulous company, 1827-1832.

1836 returns to text of 1807.

3 1842.

What strife would then be yours, fair Creatures, driven
Now up, now down, and sparkling in your glee ! 1807.

Sparkling and hurrying through the clear blue heaven. 1827.
All hurrying with thee through the clear blue heaven. 1832.
In that keen sport along the plain of heaven. 1836.

Hurrying and sparkling through the clear blue Heaven. C.

in emulous company,

Sparkling and hurrying through the clear blue Heaven. C.

With emulous brightness through the clear blue Heaven, c.

WITH SHIPS THE SEA WAS SPRINKLED 33

•

It moves us not. — Great God ! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn ;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make, me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea -,1
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

The " pleasant lea " referred to in this sonnet is unknown. It may
have been on the Cumbrian coast, or in the Isle of Man. Before
1805, Wordsworth had lived for four weeks in the Isle of Man, in daily
sight of Peele Castle. — ED.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

WITH Ships the sea was sprinkled far and nigh,

Like stars in heaven, and joyously it showed ;

Some lying fast at anchor in the road,

Some veering up and down, one knew not why.

A goodly Vessel did I then espy

Come like a giant from a haven broad ;

And lustily along the bay she strode,

Her tackling rich, and of apparel high.

This Ship was nought to me, nor I to her,

Yet I pursued her with a Lover's look ;

This Ship to all the rest did I prefer :

When will she turn, and whither ? She will brook

No tarrying : where She comes the winds must stir :

On went She, and due north her journey took.

Probably observed during the visit to the Isle of Man, referred to in
the note to the previous sonnet. — ED.

1 1827.

Have sight of Proteus coming from the sea. 1807.

TV C

34

TO SLEEP.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

WHERE lies the Land to which yon Ship must go ?

Fresh as a lark mounting at break of day,

Festively she puts forth in trim array ; l

Is she for tropic suns, or polar snow ?

What boots the inquiry ? — Neither friend nor foe

She cares for ; let her travel where she may

She finds familiar names, a beaten way

Ever before her, and a wind to blow.

Yet still I ask, what haven is her mark ?

And, almost as it was when ships were rare,

(From time to time, like Pilgrims, here and there

Crossing the waters) doubt, and something dark,

Of the old Sea some reverential fear,

Is with me at thy farewell, joyous Bark !

See note to the previous sonnet. — ED.

TO SLEEP.
Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

0 GENTLE SLEEP ! do they belong to thee,
These twinklings of oblivion ? Thou dost love
To sit in meekness, like the brooding Dove,
A captive never wishing to be free.
This tiresome night, 0 Sleep ! thou art to me
A Fly, that up and down himself doth shove
Upon a fretful rivulet, now above,
Now on the water vexed with mockery.

1836.

Festively she puts forth in trim array ;
Vigorous as a Lark at break of day :

As vigorous as a lark .

1807.

181.1.

TO SLEEP. 35

I have no pain that calls for patience, no ;
Hence am 1 1 cross and peevish as a child :
Am pleased by fits to have thee for my foe,
Yet ever willing to be reconciled :
0 gentle Creature ! do not use me so,
But once and deeply let me be beguiled.

TO SLEEP.
Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

A FLOCK of sheep that leisurely pass by,
One after one ; the sound of rain, and bees
Murmuring ; the fall of rivers, winds and seas,
Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure sky ;
I have thought of all by turns, and yet do lie2
Sleepless ! and soon the small birds' melodies
Must hear, first uttered from my orchard trees ;
And the first cuckoo's melancholy cry.
Even thus last night, and two nights more, I lay,
And could not win thee, Sleep ! by any stealth :
So do not let me wear to-night away :
Without Thee what is all the morning's wealth ?
Come, blessed barrier between day and day,3
Dear mother of fresh thoughts and joyous health !

Compare Ovid, Meta. Book xi., 1. 623 ; Shakespeare's Macbeth,
Act ii., Scene 2 ; King Henry IV., Part ii., Act iii., Scene 1 ; Mid-
summer Night's Dream, Act iii., Scene 2. — ED.

1 1827.

Hence I am 1815.

2 1845.

I've thought of all by turns ; and still I lie 1807.

By turns have all been thought of ; yet I lie 1827.

I thought of all by turns, and yet I lie 1836.

8 1S32.

betwixt 1807.

36 NIGHT SPEAKS.

TO SLEEP.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

FOND words have oft been spoken to thee, Sleep !
And thou hast had thy store of tenderest names ;
The very sweetest, Fancy culls or frames,1
When thankfulness of heart is strong and deep !
Dear Bosom-child we call thee, that dost steep
In rich reward all suffering ; Balm that tames
All anguish ; Saint that evil thoughts and aims
Takest away, and into souls dost creep,
Like to a breeze from heaven. Shall I alone,
I surely not a man ungently made,
Call thee worst Tyrant by which Flesh is crost ?
Perverse, self-willed to own and to disown,
Mere slave of them who never for thee prayed,
Still last to come where thou art wanted most !

MICHAEL ANGELO IN REPLY TO THE PASSAGE UPON
HIS STATUE OF NIGHT SLEEPING—

In the first volume of Lord Coleridge's copy of the edition of 1836,
Wordsworth wrote in MS. two translations of a fragment of Michael
Angelo's on Sleep, and a translation of some Latin verses by Thomas
Warton on the same subject. These fragments were never included
in any edition of his published works, and it is impossible to say to
what year they belong. They may appropriately enough find a place
after the three sonnets To Sleep, belonging to the year 1806, and before
the three translations from Michael Angelo, which follow them. — ED.

Night Speaks.

GRATEFUL is Sleep, my life in stonebound fast ;
More grateful still : while wrong and shame shall last,
On me can Time no happier state bestow
Than to be left unconscious of the woe.
Ah then, lest you awaken me, speak low.

1 1836.

The very sweetest words that fancy frames, ISOT.

FROM THE ITALIAN OF MICHAEL ANGELO. 37

GRATEFUL is Sleep, more grateful still to be
Of marble ; for while shameless wrong and woe
Prevail, 'tis best to neither hear nor see.
Then wake me not, I pray you. Hush, speak low.
Come, gentle Sleep, Death's image tho' thou art,
Come share my couch, nor speedily depart ;
How sweet thus living without life to lie,
Thus without death how sweet it is to die.

The Latin verse by Thomas "Warton, of which the last lines are a
translation, is as follows : —

Somne veni ! quamvis placidissima Mortis imago es,

Consortem cupio te tamen esse tori ;
Hue ades, haud abiture cit6 ! nam sic sine vita

Vivere quam suave est, sic sine morte mori !

Thomas Warton, Fellow of Trinity Coll., Oxford, and Professor of
Poetry in that University, is chiefly known by his History of English
Poetry (1774-1781).— ED.

FKOM THE ITALIAN OF MICHAEL ANGELO.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[Translations from Michael Angelo, done at the request of Mr
Duppa, whose acquaintance I made through Mr Southey. Mr Duppa
was engaged in writing the life of Michael Angelo, and applied to Mr
Southey and myself to furnish some specimens of his poetic genius.]

YES ! hope may with my strong desire keep pace,

And I be undeluded, unbetrayed ;

For if of our affections none finds grace l

In sight of Heaven, then, wherefore hath God made

1840.

none find 1S07

38 TO THE SUPREME BEING.

The world which we inhabit ? Better plea
Love cannot have, than that in loving thee
Glory to that eternal Peace is paid,
Who such divinity to thee imparts
As hallows and makes pure all gentle hearts.
His hope is treacherous only whose love dies
With beauty, which is varying every hour ;
But, in chaste hearts uninfluenced by the power
Of outward change, there blooms a deathless flower,
That breathes on earth the air of paradise.

FKOM THE SAME.

Comp. 1807. Pub. 1807.

II.

No mortal object did these eyes behold

When first they met the placid light of thine,

And my Soul felt her destiny divine,

And hope of endless peace in me grew bold :

Heaven-born, the Soul a heaven-ward course must hold ;

Beyond the visible world she soars to seek

(For what delights the sense is false and weak)

Ideal Form, the universal mould.

The wise man, I affirm, can find no rest

In that which perishes : nor will he lend

His heart to aught which doth on time depend.

'Tis sense, unbridled will, and not true love,

That kills the soul :l love betters what is best,

Even here below, but more in heaven above.

1 1827.

Which kills the soul : isor.

TO THE SUPREME BEING. 39

FEOM THE SAME. TO THE SUPEEME BEING.

Comp. 1807. Pub. 1807.

IIL

THE prayers I make will then be sweet indeed
If Thou the spirit give by which I pray :
My unassisted heart is barren clay,
That of its native self can nothing feed :l
Of good and pious works thou art the seed.
That quickens only where thou say'st it may :2
Unless Thou show to us thine own true way
No man can find it : Father ! Thou must lead.
Do Thou, then, breathe those thoughts into my mind
By which such virtue may in me be bred
That in thy holy footsteps I may tread ;
The fetters of my tongue do Thou unbind,
That I may have the power to sing of thee,
And sound thy praises everlastingly.

The following extract from a letter of Wordsworth's to Sir George
Beaumont, dated October 17, 1805, will cast light on the three last
sonnets. " I mentioned Michael Angelo's poetry some time ago ; it is
the most difficult to construe I ever met with, but just what you would
expect from such a man, shewing abundantly how conversant his soul
was with great things. There is a mistake in the world concerning the
Italian language ; the poetry of Dante and Michael Angelo proves,
that if there be little majesty and strength in Italian verse, the fault is
in the authors, and not in the tongue. I can translate, and have trans-
lated two books of Ariosto, at the rate, nearly, of one hundred lines
a day ; but so much meaning has been put by Michael Angelo into
so little room, and that meaning sometimes so excellent in itself, that
I found the difficulty of translating him insurmountable. I attempted,
at least, fifteen of the sonnets, but could not anywhere succeed. I have
sent you the only one I was able to finish ; it is far from being the
best, or most characteristic, but the others were too much for me." — ED.

1 1827.

Which of its native self .... 1807.

2 182V.

Which quickens only .... 1S07

40 TO THE MEMORY OF RAISLEY CALVERT.

TO THE MEMOEY OF EAISLEY CALVERT.
Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[This young man, Raisley Calvert, to whom I was so much indebted,
died at Penrith, 1795.]

CALVEET ! it must not be unheard by them

Who may respect my name, that I to thee

Owed many years of early liberty.

This care was thine when sickness did condemn

Thy youth to hopeless wasting, root and stem —

That I, if frugal and severe, might stray

Where'er I liked ; and finally array

My temples with the Muse's diadem.

Hence, if in freedom I have loved the truth ;

If there be aught of pure, or good, or great,

In my past verse ; or shall be, in the lays

Of higher mood, which now I meditate ;

It gladdens me, O worthy, short-lived, Youth !

To think how much of this will be thy praise.

Eaisley Calvert was the son of R. Calvert, steward to the Duke of
Norfolk. Writing to Sir George Beaumont, on the 20th February 1805,
Wordsworth said, "I should have been forced into one of the pro-
fessions" (the church or law) " by necessity, had not a friend left me
£900. This bequest was from a young man with whom, though I call
him friend, I had but little connection ; and the act was done entirely
from a confidence on his part that I had powers and attainments which
might be of use to mankind . . . Upon the interest of the £900, and
£100 legacy to my sister, and £100 more which the ' Lyrical Ballads'
have brought me, my sister and I contrived to live seven years, nearly
eight." To his friend Matthews he wrote, November 7th, 1796, "My
friend" (Calvert) "has every symptom of a confirmed consumption, and
I cannot think of quitting him in his present debilitated state." And
in January 1795 he wrote to Matthews from Penrith (where Calvert
was staying), " I have been here for some time. I am still much
engaged with my sick friend ; and am sorry to add that he worsens
daily ... he is barely alive." In a letter to Dr Joshua Stanger of
Keswick, written in the year 1842, Wordsworth referred thus to

METHOUGHT I SAW THE FOOTSTEPS OF A THRONE 41

Raisley Calvert. Dr Calvert — a nephew of Eaisley, and son of the
W. Calvert whom the poet accompanied to the Isle of Wight and
Salisbury Plain in 1793 — had just died. "His removal (Dr Calvert's)
has naturally thrown my mind back as far as Dr Calvert's grandfather,
his father, and sister (the former of whom was, as you know, among my
intimate friends), and his uncle Eaisley, whom I have so much cause
to remember with gratitude for his testamentary remembrance of me,
when the greatest part of my patrimony was kept back from us by
injustice. It may be satisfactory to your wife for me to declare" [Mrs
Stanger — who still lives — is a daughter of William Calvert] " that my
friend's bequest enabled me to devote myself to literary pursuits,
independent of any necessity to look at pecuniary emolument, so that
my talents, such as they might be, were free to take their natural
course. Your brothers Raisley and William were both so well known
to me, and I have so many reasons to respect them, that I cannot
forbear saying, that my sympathy with this last bereavement is
deepened by the remembrance that they both have been taken from
you . . ." On October 1, 1794, Wordsworth wrote from Keswick to
Ensign William Calvert about his brother Eaisley. (The year is not
given in the letter, but it must have been 1794.) He tells him that
Eaisley was determined to set out for Lisbon ; but that he (Wordsworth)
could not brook the idea of his going alone ; and that he wished to
accompany his friend and stay with him, till his health was re-established.
He adds, " Reflecting that his return is uncertain, your brother requests
me to inform you that he has drawn out his will, which he means to
get executed in London. The purport of his will is to leave you all his
property, real and personal, chargeable with a legacy of £600 to me, in
case that, on inquiry into the state of our affairs in London, he should
think it advisable to do so. It is at my request that this information
is communicated to you." Calvert did not live to go south ; and he
changed the sum left to Wordsworth from £600 to £900. The relation-
ship of the two men suggests the somewhat parallel one between Spinoza
and Simon de Vries. For further details, see the Life of the Poet in
the last volume. — ED.

Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

[The latter part of this sonnet was a great favourite with my sister
S. H. When I saw her lying in death, I could not resist the impulse
to compose the Sonnet that follows it.]

METHOUGHT I saw the footsteps of a throne

Which mists and vapours from mine eyes did shroud —

42 LINES.

Nor view of who might sit thereon allowed ;l
But all the steps and ground about were strown
With sights the ruefullest that flesh and bone
Ever put on ; a miserable crowd,
Sick, hale, old, young, who cried before that cloud,
" Thou art our king, 0 Death ! to thee we groan."
Those steps I clomb ; the mists before me gave 2
Smooth way : and I beheld the face of one
Sleeping alone within a mossy cave,
With her face up to heaven ; that seemed to have
Pleasing remembrance of a thought foregone ;
A lovely Beauty in a summer grave !

"The sonnet that follows," referred to in the Fen wick note, is one
belonging to the year 1836, beginning —

" Even so for me a Vision sanctified."
See the note to that sonnet — ED.

LINES

Composed at Grasmere, during a walk one Evening, after a stormy day,
the Author having just read in a Newspaper that the dissolution
of Mr Fox was hourly expected.

Comp. Sept. 1806. Pub. 1807.

LOUD is the Vale ! the Voice is up

With which she speaks when storms are gone,

A mighty unison of streams !

Of all her Voices, One !

1 1815.

Nor view of him who sate thereon allowed ; 1307.

2 1845.

I seemed to mount those steps ; the vapours gave 1807.
Those steps I mounted, as the vapours gave 1836.

Those steps I mounted, which the vapours gave C.

Those steps I clomb ; the opening vapours gave c. & mx

LINES. 43

Loud is the Vale ; — this inland Depth
In peace is roaring like the Sea ;
Yon star upon the mountain-top
Is listening quietly.

Sad was I, even to pain deprest ;
Importunate and heavy load !*
The Comforter had found me here,
Upon this lonely road ;

And many thousands now are sad —
Wait the fulfilment of their fear ;
For he must die who is their stay,
Their glory disappear.

A Power is passing from the earth
To breathless Nature's dark abyss ;
But when the great and good depart1
What is it more than this —

That Man, who is from God sent forth,
Doth yet again to God return ? —
Such ebb and flow must ever be,
Then wherefore should we mourn ?

Charles James Fox died September 13, 1806. He was Minister
for Foreign Affairs at the time, having assumed office on the 5th
February, shortly after the death of William Pitt. Wordsworth's
sadness on this occasion, his recognition of Fox as great and good, and
as " a power " that was " passing from the earth," may have been due
partly to personal and political sympathy, but also probably to Fox's
appreciation of the better side of the French Revolution, and to his

1 1336.

But when the Mighty pass away isor.

* Note to edd. 1807 and onwards: — " Importuna e grave salma."-
Michael Angelo.

44 NOVEMBER, 1806

welcoming the pacific proposals of Talleyrand, perhaps also to his
efforts for the abolition of slavery.

The " lonely road " referred to in these Lines, was, in all likelihood, the
path from Town-end towards the Swan Inn past the Hollins, Grasmere,
A " mighty unison of streams " may be heard there any autumn
evening after a stormy day, and especially after long continued rain,
the sound of waters from Easdale, from Greenhead Ghyll, and the
slopes of Silver How, blending with that of the Rothay in the valley
below. The poem was always classed amongst the "Epitaphs and
Elegiac Pieces." — ED.

NOVEMBEK, 1806.
Comp. 1806. Pub. 1807.

ANOTHER year ! — another deadly blow !
Another mighty Empire overthrown !
And We are left, or shall be left, alone ;
The last that dare to struggle with the Foe.1
'Tis well ! from this day forward we shall know
That in ourselves our safety must be sought ;
That by our own right hands it must be wrought ;
That we must stand unpropped, or be laid low.
0 dastard whom such foretaste doth not cheer !
We shall exult, if they who rule the land
Be men who hold its many blessings dear,
Wise, upright, valiant ; not a servile band,2
Who are to judge of danger which they fear,
And honour which they do not understand.

Napoleon won the battle of Jena on the 14th October 1806, entered
Potsdam on the 25th, and Berlin on the 28th ; Prince Hohenlohe laid
down his arms on the 6th November ; Bliicher surrendered at Liibeck
on the 7th ; Magdeburg was taken on the 8th ; on the 14th the French
occupied Hanover ; and on the 21st Napoleon issued his Berlin decree
for the Blockade of England. — ED.

1 1827.

The last that dares ... . 1807.

2 1820.

not a venal Band, 1807.

ADDRESS TO A CHILD. 45

ADDKESS TO A CHILD,

DURING A BOISTEROUS WINTER EVENING.
BY MY SISTER.

Comp. 1806. — Pub. 1815.
[Written at Town-end, Grasmere.]

"JVHAT way does the Wind come ? What way does he go ?

He rides over the water, and over the snow,

Through wood, and through vale ; and, o'er rocky height

Which the goat cannot climb, takes his sounding flight ;

He tosses about in every bare tree,

As, if you look up, you plainly may see ;

But how he will come, and whither he goes,

There's never a scholar in England knows.

He will suddenly stop in a cunning nook,

And ring a sharp 'larum ; — but, if you should look,

There's nothing to see but a cushion of snow

Eound as a pillow, and whiter than milk,

And softer than if it were covered with silk.

Sometimes he'll hide in the cave of a rock,

Then whistle as shrill as the buzzard cock ;

— Yet seek him, — and what shall you find in the place ?

Nothing but silence and empty space ;

Save, in a corner, a heap of dry leaves,

That he's left, for a bed, to beggars or thieves !

As soon as 'tis daylight to-morrow, with me
You shall go to the orchard, and then you will see
That he has been there, and made a great rout,
And cracked the branches, and strewn them about ;

46 ADDRESS TO A CHILD.

Heaven grant that he spare but that one upright twig
That looked up at the sky so proud and big
All last summer, as well you know,
Studded with apples, a beautiful show !

Hark ! over the roof he makes a pause,

And growls as if he would fix his claws

Eight in the slates, and with a huge rattle

Drive them down, like men in a battle :

— But let him range round ; he does us no harm,

We build up the fire, we're snug and warm ;

Untouched by his breath, see the candle shines bright,

And burns with a clear and steady light ;

Books have we to read, — but that half-stifled knell,

Alas ! 'tis the sound of the eight o'clock bell.1

— Come now we'll to bed ! and when we are there

He may work his own will, and what shall we care ?

He may knock at the door, — we'll not let him in ;

May drive at the windows, — we'll laugh at his din ;

Let him seek his own home wherever it be ;

Here's a cozie warm house for Edward and me.

"Wordsworth dated this poem 1806, and said to Miss Fenwick that it
was written at Grasmere. If it was written " during a boisterous
winter evening" in 1806, it could not have been written at Grasmere,
because the Wordsworths spent that winter at Coleorton. I suspect
this date is wrong, and that the poem really belongs to the year 1805 ;
but as it is just possible that, although referring to winter, it may have
been written at Town-end in the summer of 1806, and is therefore
placed aniongst the poems belonging to the latter year.

In all the editions, from 1815 to 1849, this Address was placed
amongst the " Poems referring to the period of Childhood." From
1815 to 1842 the authorship was veiled, under the title, " by a female
friend of the author." In 1845 it was disclosed, " by my Sister." — ED.

1 1827.

to read — hush ! that half -stifled knell.
Methinks 'tis the sound 1815.

ODE ON IMMORTALITY. 47

ODE.

INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY FROM RECOLLECTIONS OF
EARLY CHILDHOOD.

Comp. 1803-6 Pub. 1807.

[This was composed during my residence at Town-end, Grasmere.
Two years at least passed between the writing of the four first stanzas
and the remaining part. To the attentive and competent reader the
whole sufficiently explains itself ; but there may be no harm in ad-
verting here to particular feelings or experiences of my own mind on
which the structure of the poem partly rests. Nothing was more
difficult for me in childhood than to admit the notion of death as a
state applicable to my own being. I have said elsewhere —

" A simple child,
That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death ! " —

But it was not so much from feelings of animal vivacity that my diffi-
culty came as from a sense of the indomitableness of the Spirit within
me. I used to brood over the stories of Enoch and Elijah, and almost
to persuade myself that, whatever might become of others, I should be
translated, in something of the same way, to heaven. With a feeling
congenial to this, I was often unable to think of external things as
having external existence, and I communed with all that I saw as
something not apart from, but inherent in, my own immaterial nature.
Many times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to
recall myself from this abyss of idealism to the reality. At that time I
was afraid of such processes. In later periods of life I have deplored,
as we have all reason to do, a subjugation of an opposite character, and
have rejoiced over the remembrances, as is expressed in the lines —

" Obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings," &c.

To that dream-like vividness and splendour which invest objects of
sight in childhood, every one, I believe, if he would look back, could
bear testimony, and I need not dwell upon it here ; but having in the
poem regarded it as presumptive evidence of a prior state of existence,
I think it right to protest against a conclusion, which has given pain to
some good and pious persons, that I meant to inculcate such a belief.
It is far too shadowy a notion to be recommended to faith, as more
than an element in our instincts of immortality. But let us bear in
mind that, though the idea is not advanced in revelation, there is
nothing there to contradict it, and the fall of man presents an analogy

48 ODE TO IMMORTALITY.

in its favour. Accordingly, a pre-existent state has entered into the
popular creeds of many nations ; and, among all persons acquainted
with classic literature, is known as an ingredient in Platonic philosophy.
Archimedes said that he could move the world if he had a point where-
on to rest his machine. Who has not felt the same aspirations as
regards the world of his own mind ? Having to wield some of its
elements when I was impelled to write this poem on the " Immortality
of the Soul," I took hold of the notion of pre-existence as having suffi-
cient foundation in humanity for authorizing me to make for my
purpose the best use of it I could as a poet.]

The Child is father of the Man ;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.

(See voL II. p. 260.)

I.

THERE was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,
The earth, and every common sight,

To me did seem
Apparelled in celestial light,
The glory and the freshness of a dream.
It is not now as it hath been of yore ; — l
Turn whereso'er I may,

By night or day,
The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

II.

The Eainbow conies and goes,
And lovely is the Eose,
The Moon doth with delight
Look round her when the heavens are bare,
Waters on a starry night
Are beautiful and fair ;
The sunshine is a glorious birth ;
But yet I know, where'er I go,
That there hath passed away a glory from the earth.

1 1820.

as it has been 1807.

ODE ON IMMORTALITY.

49

in.

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,
And while the young lambs bound

As to the tabor's sound,
To me alone there came a thought of grief :
A timely utterance gave that thought relief,

And I again am strong :

The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep ;
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong ;
I hear the Echoes through the mountains throng,
The Winds come to me from the fields of sleep,
And all the earth is gay ;

Land and sea
Give themselves up to jollity,

And with the heart of May
Doth every Beast keep holiday ; —

Thou Child of Joy,

Shout round me> let me hear thy shouts, thou happy
Shepherd-boy !

IV.

Ye blessed Creatures, I have heard the call

Ye to each other make ; I see
The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee ;
My heart is at your festival,

My head hath its coronal,
The fulness of your bliss, I feel — I feel it all.
Oh evil day ! if I were sullen
While Earth herself is adorning,1

This sweet May-morning,
And the Children are culling: 2

1836.

While the Earth herself
... the Earth itself
the Earth herself

1836.

And the children are pulling
IV. D

1807.
1827.

1807.

50 ODE ON IMMORTALITY.

On every side,

In a thousand valleys far and wide,

Fresh flowers ; while the sun shines warm,
And the Babe leaps up on his Mother's arm : —

I hear, I hear, with joy I hear !

— But there's a Tree, of many, one,
A single Field which I have looked upon,
Both of them speak of something that is gone :

The Pansy at my feet

Doth the same tale repeat:
Whither is fled the visionary gleam ?
Where is it now, the glory and the dream ?

v.

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting :
The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,

Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar :

Not in entire forgetfulness,

And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come

From God, who is our home :
Heaven lies about us in our infancy !
Shades of the prison-house begin to close

Upon the growing Boy,
But He beholds the light, and whence it flows

He sees it in his joy ;
The Youth, who daily farther from the east

Must travel, still is Nature's Priest,

And by the vision splendid

Is on his way attended ;
At length the Man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.

ODE ON IMMORTALITY.

51

VI.

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own ;
Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind,
And, even with something of a Mother's mind,

And no unworthy aim,

The homely Nurse doth all she can
To make her Foster-child, her Inmate Man,

Forget the glories he hath known,
And that imperial palace whence he came.

VII.

Behold the Child among his new-born blisses,
A six years' Darling of a pigmy size !
See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies,
Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses,
With light upon him from his father's eyes !
See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,
Some fragment from his dream of human life,
Shaped by himself with newly-learned art ;
A wedding or a festival,
A mourning or a funeral ,

And this hath now his heart,
And unto this he frames his song :

Then will he fit his tongue
To dialogues of business, love, or strife ;
But it will not be long
Ere this be thrown aside,
And with new joy and pride
The little Actor cons another part ;
Filling from time to time his ' humorous stage '
With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,
That Life brings with her in her equipage ;
As if his whole vocation
Were endless imitation.

52 ODE ON IMMORTALITY.

VIII.

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie

Thy Soul's immensity ;
Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost keep
Thy heritage, thou Eye among the blind,
That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,
Haunted for ever by the eternal mind, —

Mighty Prophet ! Seer blest !

On whom those truths do rest,
Which we are toiling all our lives to find,
In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave ',l
Thou, over whom thy Immortality
Broods like the Day, a Master o'er a Slave,
A Presence which is not to be put by ; 2
Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might
Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's height,3
Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke
The years to bring the inevitable yoke,
Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife ?
Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight,
And custom lie upon thee with a weight,
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life !

1 This line is not in the editions of 180T, 1815.

2 The editions of 1807 and isis have, after " put by : "

To whom the grave
Is but a lowly bed without the sense or sight

Of day or the warm light,
A place of thought where we in waiting lie ;

3 1815.

Of untamed pleasures, on thy Being's height.

ODE ON IMMORTALITY. 53

IX.

0 joy ! that in our embers
Is something that doth live,
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive !

The thought of our past years in me doth breed
Perpetual benediction :l not indeed
For that which is most worthy to be blest ;
Delight and liberty, the simple creed
Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest,
With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast : — 2
Not for these I raise
The song of thanks and praise ;
But for those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings ;
Blank misgivings of a Creature
Moving about in worlds not realised,
High instincts before which our mortal Nature
Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised :
But for those first affections,
Those shadowy recollections,
Which, be they what they may,
Are yet the fountain light of all our day,
Are yet a master light of all our seeing ;

Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make3

1 1827.

Perpetual benedictions : isor.

2 1815.

Of Childhood, whether fluttering or at rest,

With new-born hope for ever in his breast : 1807.

3 1815.

Uphold us, cherish us, and make 1807.

54

ODE ON IMMORTALITY.

Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the eternal Silence : truths that wake,

To perish never ;
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,

Nor Man nor Boy,
Nor all that is at enmity with joy,
Can utterly abolish or destroy !

Hence in a season of calm weather

Though inland far we be,
Our Souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither,

Can in a moment travel thither,
And see the Children sport upon the shore,
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.

x.

Then sing, ye Birds, sing, sing a joyous song !
And let the young Lambs bound
As to the tabor's sound !

We in thought will join your throng,

Ye that pipe and ye that play,
Ye that through your hearts to-day
Feel the gladness of the May !

What though the radiance which was once so bright

Be now for ever taken from my sight,

Though nothing can bring back the hour

Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower ;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind ;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be ;
In the soothing thoughts that spring

ODE ON IMMORTALITY. 55

Out of human suffering ;
In the faith that looks through death
In years that bring the philosophic mind.

XL

And 0, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,

Forebode not any severing of our loves ! x

Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might ;

I only have relinquished one delight

To live beneath your more habitual sway.

I love the Brooks which down their channels fret,

Even more than when I tripped lightly as they ;

The innocent brightness of a new-born Day

Is lovely yet ;

The Clouds that gather round the setting sun
Do take a sober colouring from an eye
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality ;
Another race hath been, and other palms are won.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live,
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.

The edition of 1807 concluded with this poem, which Wordsworth
simply named Ode, prefixing to it the motto, " Paul6 majora canamus."
In 1815, when he revised the poem throughout, he named it, in the
characteristic manner of many of his titles — diffuse and yet precise —
Ode. Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood ;
and he then prefixed to it the lines of his own earlier poem on the
Rainbow (March 1802) :—

The child is Father of the Man ;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.
This longer title and motto it retained in all the subsequent editions.

1 1830.

Think not of any severing .... 1807.

56 ODE ON IMMORTALITY.

In edd. 1807 to 1820, it was placed by itself at the end of the poems,
and formed their natural conclusion and climax. In edd. 1827 and 1832,
it was placed, inappropriately, amongst the "Epitaphs and Elegiac
Poems." The evident mistake of placing it amongst these seems to
have suggested to him in 1836 its having a place by itself, — which
place it retained in the subsequent editions of 1842 and 1849, — when it
closed the series of minor poems in vol. V., and preceded the Excursion
in vol. VI. The same arrangement was adopted in the double-columned
single volume edition of 1845.

The Ode on Immortality was written at intervals, between the years
1803 and 1806 ; and it was subjected to frequent and careful revision.
No poem of "Wordsworth's bears more evident traces in its structure at
once of inspiration and elaboration ; of original flight of thought and
afflatus on the one hand, and on the other of careful sculpture and
fastidious choice of phrase. But it is remarkable that there are very
few changes of text in the successive editions. Most of the alterations
were made before 1815, and the omission of some feeble lines which
originally stood in stanza vni., in the editions of 1807 and 1815, was a
great advantage in disencumbering the poem. The main revision and
elaboration of this Ode, however — an elaboration which suggests the
passage of the glacier ice over the rocks of White Moss Common, where
the poem was murmured out stanza by stanza — was all finished before
it first saw the light in 1807. In form it is irregular and original.
And perhaps the most remarkable thing in its structure, is the frequent
change of the keynote, and the skill and delicacy with which the
transitions are made. "The feet throughout are iambic. The lines
vary in length from the Alexandrine to the line with two accents.
There is a constant ebb and flow in the full tide of song, but scarce two
waves are alike." (Hawes Turner, Selections from Wordsworth.}

In the " notes" to the Selections just referred to, there is an excellent
commentary on this Ode on Immortality, almost every line of which is
worthy of minute analysis and study. Several of the following are
suggested by Mr Turner.

(1.) The winds come to me, from the fields of sleep,

The morning breeze blowing from the fields that were dark during
the hours of sleep.

(2.) But there's a tree, of many, one,

Compare Browning's May and Death —

Only one little sight, one plant
Woods have in May, &c.
(3.) The pansy at my feet

Doth the same tale repeat,

French "PenseV " Pansies, that's for thoughts." Ophelia in
Hamlet.

ODE ON IMMORTALITY. 57

(4.) Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting,

This thought Wordsworth owed, consciously or unconsciously, to
Plato. Though he tells us in the Fen wick note that he did not mean to
inculcate the belief, there is no doubt that he clung to the notion of a
life pre-existing the present, on grounds similar to those on which he
believed in a life to come. But there are some differences in the way
in which the idea commended itself to Plato and to Wordsworth. The
stress was laid by Wordsworth on the effect of terrestrial life in putting
the higher faculties to sleep, and making us " forget the glories we have
known." Plato, on the other hand, looked upon the mingled experi-
ences of mundane life as inducing a gradual but slow remembrance
(d.i>d/j,i>riffis) of the past. Compare Tennyson's Two Voices, and Words-
worth's sonnet —

" Man's life is like a sparrow, mighty king."

(5.) Pilling from time to time his "humorous stage"

With all the persons,
i.e., with the dramatis personce.

(6.) Thou eye among the blind,

That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,

There is an admirable parallel illustration of Wordsworth's use of
this figure (describing one sense in terms of another), in the lines in
Aira Force Valley —

" A soft eye-music of slow waving boughs."

(7.) Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight,
And custom lie upon t/iee with a weight,
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life /

Compare with this, the lines in the fourth book of The Excursion,
beginning —

Alas ! the endowment of immortal Pain
Is matched unequally with custom, time.

(8.) Fallings from us, vanishings,

The outward sensible universe, visible and tangible, seeming to fall
away from us, as unreal, to vanish in unsubstantiality. See the explana-
tion of this youthful experience in the Fenwick note. That confession
of his boyish days at Hawkshead, " many times, while going to school,
have I grasped at a wall or tree, to recall myself from this abyss of
idealism to the reality " (by which he explains those —

fallings from us, vanishings, &c.),

suggests a similar experience and confession of Cardinal Newman's in
his Apologia. (See p. 67.)

The Rev. Robert Perceval Graves, late of Windermere, now of Dublin,

58 ODE ON IMMORTALITY.

wrote thus in 1850. " I remember Mr Wordsworth saying, that at a
particular stage of his mental progress, he used to be frequently so
rapt into an unreal transcendental world of ideas that the external
world seemed no longer to exist in relation to him, and he had to
reconvince himself of its existence by clasping a tree, or something that
happened to be near him. I could not help connecting this fact with
that obscure passage in his great Ode on the ' Intimations of Immor-
tality,' in which he speaks of —

Those obstinate questionings,
Of sense and outward things ;
Fallings from us, vanishings ; &c."

Professor Bonamy Price farther confirms the explanation which
Wordsworth gave of the passage, in an account of a conversation he
had with the poet, as follows. It was an experience, however, not I
think as Mr Price imagines, peculiar to Wordsworth — and its value
would be much lessened if it were so — but one to which (as the poet
said to Miss Fenwick) " everyone, if he would look back, could bear
testimony."

"OXFORD, April 21, 1881.

"Mr DEAR SIR, — You will be glad, I am sure, to receive an inter-
pretation, which chance enabled me to obtain from Wordsworth himself
of a passage in the immortal Ode to Immortality. . . .

"It happened one day that the poet, my wife, and I were taking
a walk together by the side of Eydal Water. We were then by the
sycamores under Nab Scar. The aged poet was in a most genial mood,
and it suddenly occurred to me that I might, without unwarrantable
presumption, seize the golden opportunity thus offered, and ask him to
explain these mysterious words. So I addressed him with an apology,
and begged him to explain, what my own feeble mother-wit was unable
to unravel, and for which I had in vain sought the assistance of others,
what were those " fallings from us, vanishings," for which, above all
other things, he gave God thanks. The venerable old man raised his
aged form erect ; he was walking in the middle, and passed across me
to a five-barred gate in the wall which bounded the road on the side of
the lake. He clenched the top bar firmly with his right hand, pushed
strongly against it, and then uttered these ever-memorable words :
' There was a time in my life when I had to push against something
that resisted, to be sure that there was anything outside of me. I was
sure of my own mind ; everything else fell away, and vanished into
thought.' Thought, he was sure of ; matter for him, at the moment,
was an unreality — nothing but a thought. Such natural spontaneous
idealism has probably never been felt by any other man.

BONAMY PRICE."
Professor Knight.

ODE ON IMMORTALITY. 59

The following is from S. T. Coleridge's Biographia Literaria (ch.
xxii., p. 229, edd. 1817.)

"To the 'Ode on the Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of
Early Childhood,' the poet might have prefixed the lines which Dante
addresses to one of his own Canzoni —

' Canzone, i' credo, che saranno radi
Color che tua ragione intendan bene :
Tanto lor sei faticoso ed alto."

' O lyric song, there will be few, think I,
Who may thy import understand aright :
Thou art for them so arduous and so high ! '

But the Ode was intended for such readers only as had been accustomed
to watch the flux and reflux of their inmost nature, to venture at times
into the twilight realms of consciousness, and to feel a deep interest in
modes of inmost being, to which they know that the attributes of time
and space are inapplicable and alien, but which yet cannot be con-
veyed, save in symbols of time and space. For such readers the
sense is sufficiently plain, and they will be as little disposed to charge
Mr Wordsworth with believing the Platonic pre-existence in the ordinary
interpretation of the words, as I am to believe, that Plato himself
ever meant or taught it.

— 1*05 ux.sa, tXri
"Evdov SVTI <paptrpa$
Quvavra ffvveroiaiv eg
As rb vav ep/mivittv

6 ToX

<pv&
os

Axpavra

— PINDAR, OLTMP. II. '

The following parallel passages from The Prelude and The Excursion,
Ruskin's Modern Painters, Keble's Prcelectiones, and Henry Vaughan,
are quoted in an interesting note to the Ode on Immortality, in Pro-
fessor Henry Reed's American edition of the Poems.

Ah ! why in age

Do we revert so fondly to the walks
Of childhood— but that there the soul discerns
The dear memorial footsteps unimpaired
Of her own native vigour — thence can hear

60 ODE ON IMMORTALITY.

Reverberations ; and a choral song,
Commingling with the incense that ascends
Undaunted toward the imperishable heavens
From her own lonely altar ?

The Excursion, Book IX.

Our childhood sits,

Our simple childhood, sits upon a throne
That hath more power than all the elements.
I guess not what this tells of Being past,
Nor what it augurs of the life to come ; &c.

The Prelude, Book V.

"... There was never yet the child of any promise (so far as the
theoretic faculties are concerned) but awaked to the sense of beauty with
the first gleam of reason ; and I suppose there are few, among those
who love Nature otherwise than by profession and at second-hand, who
look not back to their youngest and least learned days as those of the
most intense, superstitious, insatiable, and beatific perception of her
splendours. And the bitter decline of this glorious feeling, though
many note it not, partly owing to the cares and weight of manhood,
which leave them not the time nor the liberty to look for their lost
treasure, and partly to the human and divine affections which are
appointed to take its place, yet have formed the subject, not indeed of
lamentation, but of holy thankfulness for the witness it bears to the
immortal origin and end of our nature, to one whose authority is almost
without appeal in all questions relating to the influence of external
things upon the pure human soul.

Not for these I raise

The song of thanks and praise

But for those obstinate questionings, &c., &c.

And if it were possible for us to recollect all the unaccountable and
happy instincts of the careless time, and to reason upon them with the
maturer judgment, we might arrive at more right results than either
the philosophy or the sophisticated practice of art has yet attained.
But we love the perceptions before we are capable of methodizing or
comparing them." — (Ruskin's Modern Painters, Vol. II., p. 36, Part iii.,
ch. v., sec. i.)

"... Etenim qui velit acutius indagare causas propensae in antiqua
saecula voluntatis, mirum ni conjectura incidat aliquando in commentum
illud Pythagorse, docentis, animarum nostrarum non turn fieri initium,
cum in hoc mundo nascirmir ; immo ex ignota quadam regione venire
eas, in sua quamque corpora ; neque tarn penitus Lethseo potu imbui,
quin permanet quasi quidam anteactae setatis sapor ; hunc autem
excitari identidem, et nescio, quo sensu percipi, tacito quidem illo et
obscuro, sed percipi tamen. Atque hac ferme sententia extat summi

ODE ON IMMORTALITY. 61

hac memoria Poetae nobilissimum carmen ; nempe non aliam ob causam
tangi pueritiae recordationem exquisita ilia ac pervagata dulcedine,
quam propter debilem quendam prioris eevi Deique proprioris sensum.

Quamvis autem hanc opinionem vix ferat divinae philosophies ratio,
fatemur tamen earn eatenus ad verum accedere, quo sanctum aliquod et
grave tribuit memoriae et caritati puerilium annorum. Nosmet certe
infantes novimus quam prope tetigerit Divina benignitas ; quis porro
scit, an omni ilia temporis anteacti dulcedo habeat quandam significa-
tionem Illius Praesentiae 1 " — Keble, Prcelectiones de Poeticce vi Medica,
p. 728, Prael xxxix.

" CORRUPTION

Sure, it was so. Man in those early days

"Was not all stone and earth ;
He shined a little, and by those weak rays,

Had some glimpse of his birth.
He saw Heaven o'er his head, and knew from whence

He came condemned hither,
And, as first Love draws strongest, so from heuce

His mind sure progressed thither."

Henry Vaughan, Silex ScintUkms.

Mr Reed also quotes from the poem Childe-hood, in the same volume
of Vaughan's. But even a more apposite quotation may be made from
The Retreate, in the Silex Scintillans.

Happy those early dayes, when I
Shined in my Angell-infancy !
Before I understood this place
Appointed for my second race,
Or taught my soul to fancy ought
But a white celestiall thought ;
When yet I had not walkt above
A mile or two from my first Love,
And looking back, at that short space,
Could see a glimpse of his bright face ;
When on some gilded Cloud or Flowre
My gazing soul would dwell an houre,
And in those weaker glories spy
Some shadows of eternity ;

But felt through all this fleshly dresse
Bright shootes of everlastingnesse.

—Ea

62 1807.

1807.

In few instances is it more evident that the dates which Wordsworth
affixed to his poems in 1815, 1820, 1836, and 1845 — and those assigned
in the Fenwick notes — cannot be relied upon, than in the case of the
poems referring to Coleorton. Trusting to these dates, when construct-
ing the Chronological Table, in the absence of contrary evidence, I
assigned the majority of the Coleorton poems to the year 1808. But I
now find that while the sonnet to Lady Beaumont was written in 1806,
the Inscription for the Seat, beginning —

Beneath yon eastern ridge, the craggy bound,

was written, not in 1808 (as stated by Wordsworth himself), but in
1811 ; and that designed for the Niche in the Winter-garden at Coleor-
ton, probably in the same year ; in which year he also wrote the
sonnet on Sir George Beaumont's picture of Bredon Hill and Cloud
Hill, beginning —

Praised be the art whose subtle power could stay.

There is a natural fitness in bringing all the poems referring to
Coleorton together, so far as this can be done without seriously inter-
fering with chronological order. The two " inscriptions " intended for
these Coleorton grounds, which were written at Grasmere in 1811, are
therefore printed along with the poems of 1807 ; the precise date of each
being given — so far as it can be ascertained — along with the title.

Several political sonnets, and others, were written in 1807 ; also the
Song at the Feast of Brougham Castle, and the first and larger parts of
The White Doe of Rylstone, with a few minor fragments. But, for
reasons stated in the notes to The White Doe (see p. 191), I have
assigned that poem to the year 1808. The Song at the Feast of
Brougham Castle forms as natural a preface to The White Doe, as The
Force of Prayer a Tradition of Bolton Abbey, is its natural appendix.
The latter was written, however, before The White Doe was finished.

It would be easier to fix the previous date of some of the poems
written between the years 1806 and 1808, if we knew the exact month
in which the two volumes of 1807 were published.

On November 10, 1806, Wordsworth wrote to Sir George Beau-
mont from Coleorton, " In a day or two I mean to send a sheet or two
of my intended volume to the press" (evidently referring to the poems
of 1807). On the following day— llth November 1806— Dorothy Words-
worth wrote to Lady Beaumont, " William has written two other
poems, which you will see when they are printed. He composes fre-
quently in the grove. . . . We have not yet received a sheet from the
printer." On the 15th November 1806 she again wrote to Lady

A PROPHECY. FEBRUARY, 1807.

63

Beaumont (from Coleorton), " My brother works very hard at his
poems, preparing them for the press. Miss Hutchinson is the sub-
scriber." In a subsequent letter from Coleorton, undated, but bearing
the post mark February 18, 1807, she is speaking of her brother's
poetical labour, and says, " He must go on, when he begins : and any
interruptions (such as attending to the progress of the workmen and
planning the garden) is of the greatest use to him ; for, after a certain
time, the progress is by no means proportioned to the labour in com-
position ; and if he is called from it by other thoughts, he returns to it
with ten times the pleasure, and the work goes on proportionately the
more rapidly." From this we must infer that the years 1806-7 were
productive ones. — ED.

A PROPHECY. FEBRUARY, 1807.

Comp. 1807. — Pub. 1807.
HIGH deeds, 0 Germans, are to come from you !
Thus in your books the record shall be found,
<c A watchword was pronouced, a potent sound —
ARMINIUS !* — all the people quaked like dew
Stirred by the breeze ; they rose, a Nation, true,
True to herself l — the mighty Germany,
She of the Danube and the Northern Sea,
She rose, and off at once the yoke she threw.
All power was given her in the dreadful trance :
Those new-born Kings she withered like a flame." t

True to itself

1807.

* Arminius, or Hermann, the liberator of Germany from the Romau
power, A.D. 9-17. Tacitus says of him, " He was without doubt the
deliverer of Germany ; and, unlike other kings and generals, he attacked
the Roman people, not at the commencement, but in the fulness of their
power : hi battles he was not always successful, but he was invincible in
war. He still lives in the songs of the barbarians." — ED.

t The "new-born Kings " were the lesser German potentates, united in
the Confederation of the Rhine. By a treaty signed at Paris (July 12th,
1806), by Talleyrand, and the ministers of twelve sovereign houses of the
Empire, these princes declared themselves perpetually severed from
Germany, and united together as the Confederate States of the Rhine, of
which the Emperor of the French was declared Protector. — Eu.

TWO VOICES ARE THEHE ;

— Woe to them all ! but heaviest woe and shame
To that Bavarian who could first advance1
His banner in accursed league with France,*
First open traitor to the German name !2

THOUGHT OF A BEITON ON THE SUBJUGATION
OF SWITZEKLAND.

Comp. 1807. Pub. 1807.

[This was composed while pacing to and fro between the Hall of
Coleorton, then rebuilding, and the principal Farm-house of the Estate,
in which we lived for nine or ten months. I will here mention that
the Song on the Restoration of Lord Clifford, as well as that on the
Feast of Brougham Castle, were produced on the same ground.]

Two Voices are there ; one is of the sea,

One of the mountains ; each a mighty Voice :

In both from age to age thou didst rejoice,

They were thy chosen music, Liberty !

There came a Tyrant, and with holy glee

Thou fought'st against him ; but hast vainly striven :

Thou from thy Alpine holds at length art driven,

Where not a torrent murmurs heard by thee.

Of one deep bliss thine ear hath been bereft :

Then cleave, 0 cleave to that which still is left ;

1 1836.

who did first advance 1807.

2 1836.

First open Traitor to her sacred name,
to a

* Ou December 11, 1806, Napoleon concluded a treaty with Frederick
Aiigustus, the Elector of Saxony — who had been secretly on the side of
France all along — to whom he gave additional territories, and the title of
King, admitting him into "the Confederation of the Ehine." He had
fallen, as one of the Prussian statesmen put it, into " that lowest of degra-
dations, to steal at another man's bidding." — ED.

TO THOMAS CLARKSON. 65

For, high-souled Maid, what sorrow would it be
That Mountain floods should thunder as before,
And Ocean bellow from his rocky shore,
And neither awful Voice be heard by thee !

In 1807, the whole of the Continent of Europe was prostrate under
Napoleon. It is impossible to say to what special incident (if to any in
particular) Wordsworth refers in the phrase, " with holy glee thou
fought'st against him : " but, as the sonnet was composed at Col-
eorton in 1807 — after Austeiiitz and Jena, and Napoleon's practical
mastery of Europe — our knowledge of the particular event or events in
Swiss history to which he refers, would not add much to our under-
standing of the poem. In the Fenwick note Wordsworth incorrectly
separates his song on the Restoration of Lord Clifford from that at the
Feast of Brougham Castle. They are the same song. — ED.

TO THOMAS CLAEKSON, ON THE FINAL PASSING OF
THE BILL FOE THE ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE
TEADE.

March, 1807.

Comp. 1807. Pub. 1807.

CLAEKSON ! it was an obstinate hill to climb :
How toilsome — nay, how dire — it was, by thee
Is known ; by none, perhaps, so feelingly :
But thou, who, starting in thy fervent prime,
Didst first lead forth that enterprise sublime,1
Hast heard the constant Voice its charge repeat,
Which, out of thy young heart's oracular seat,
First roused thee.— 0 true yoke-fellow of Time,
Duty's intrepid liegeman, see, the palm 2
Is won, and by all Nations shall be worn !

1836.

Didst first lead forth this pilgrimage sublime, 1807.

1 1836.

With unabating effort, see, the palm
IV. E

1807.

66 THE MOTHER'S RETURN.

The blood-stained Writing is for ever torn ;
And thou henceforth wilt have a good man's calm,1
A great man's happiness ; thy zeal shall find
Eepose at length, firm friend of human kind !

On the 25th of March 1807, the Boyal assent was given to the Bill
for the Abolition of the Slave Trade. The movement for its abolition
was begun by Wilberforce, and carried on by Clarkson. Its abolition
was voted by the House of Lords on the motion of Lord Grenville, and
in the Commons on the motion of Charles James Fox on the 10th of
June 1806. The bill was read a second time in the Lords on the 5th
ef February, and became law on the 25th of March 1807. — ED.

THE MOTHEE'S EETUEN.

BY MY SISTER.

Comp. 1807. Pub. 1815.

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere.]

A MONTH, sweet little-ones, is past
Since your dear Mother went away, —
And she to-morrow will return ;
To-morrow is the happy day.

0 blessed tidings ! thought of joy !
The eldest heard with steady glee ;
Silent he stood ; then laughed amain, —
And shouted, " Mother, come to me ! "

Louder and louder did he shout,
With witless hope to bring her near ;
" Nay, patience ! patience, little boy !
Your tender mother cannot hear."

1 1836.

The bloody Writing is for ever torn ;

And thou henceforth shalt have . . . 1307.

THE MOTHER'S RETURN.

I told of hills, and far-off towns,
And long, long vales to travel through ;-
He listens, puzzled, sore perplexed,
But he submits ; what can he do ?

No strife disturbs his sister's breast ;
She wars not with the mystery
Of time and distance, night and day ;
The bonds of our humanity.

Her joy is like an instinct, joy
Of kitten, bird, or summer fly ;
She dances, runs without an aim,
She chatters in her ecstasy.

Her brother now takes up the note,
And echoes back his sister's glee :
They hug the infant in my arms,
As if to force his sympathy.

Then, settling into fond discourse,
"We rested in the garden tower ;
While sweetly shone the evening sun
In his departing hour.

We told o'er all that we had done, —
Our rambles by the swift brook's side
Far as the willow-skirted pool,
Where two fair swans together glide.

We talked of change, of winter gone,
Of green leaves on the hawthorn spray,
Of birds that build their nests and sing,
And all " since mother went away ! "

68 GIPSIES.

To her these tales they will repeat,
To her our new-born tribes will show,
The goslings green, the ass's colt,
The lambs that in the meadow go.

— But, see, the evening star comes forth !
To bed the children must depart ;
A moment's heaviness they feel,
A sadness at the heart :

'Tis gone — and in a merry fit

They run up stairs in gamesome race ;

I, too, infected by their mood,

I could have joined the wanton chase.

Five minutes past — and, 0 the change !
Asleep upon their beds they lie ;
Their busy limbs in perfect rest,
And closed the sparkling eye.

The Fenwick note is inaccurate. These lines were written by Miss
Wordsworth at Coleorton, on the eve of her brother and sister's return
in the spring of 1807 from London, whither they had gone for a month
— Dorothy remaining at Coleorton, in charge of the children. The poem
was placed by Wordsworth amongst those " referring to the period of
childhood."— ED.

GIPSIES.

Comp. 1807. Pub. 1807.

[Composed at Coleorton. I had observed them, as here described,
near Castle Donnington, on my way to and from Derby.]

YET are they here the same unbroken knot l
Of human Beings, in the self-same spot !

Men, women, children, yea the frame

Of the whole spectacle the same !

1 1827.

Yet are they here ? — the same unbroken knot isor.

GIPSIES. 69

Only their fire seems bolder, yielding light,
Now deep and red, the colouring of night,

That on their Gipsy-faces falls,

Their bed of straw and blanket-walls.
— Twelve hours, twelve bounteous hours are gone, while I
Have been a traveller under open sky,

Much witnessing of change and cheer,

Yet as I left I find them here 1
The weary Sun betook himself to rest ; —
Then issued Vesper from the fulgent west,

Outshining like a visible God

The glorious path in which he trod.
And now, ascending, after one dark hour
And one night's diminution of her power,

Behold the mighty Moon ! this way

She looks as if at them — but they
Eegard not her :— oh better wrong and strife l

1 183*5.

Regard not her : — oh better wrong and strife,
Better vain deeds or evil than such life !

The sileut Heavens have goings-on ;

The stars have tasks — but these have none. 1807.

Regard not her : — oh better wrong and strife,
(By nature transient) than such torpid life !

The silent Heavens have goings-on :

The stars have tasks — but these have none !
Yet, witness all that stirs in heaven and earth !
In scorn I speak not ; — they are what their birth

And breeding suffers them to be ;

Wild outcasts of society ! 1820.

Regard her not ; oh better wrong and strife
(By nature transient) than such torpid life ;

Life which the very stars reprove

As on their silent tasks they move !
Yet witness all that stirs in heaven or earth !
In scorn I speak not : they are what their birth

And breeding suffers them to be ;

Wild outcasts of society ! 1827.

70 THE NIGHTINGALE.

(By nature transient) than this torpid life ;

Life which the very stars reprove

As on their silent tasks they move !
Yet, witness all that stirs in heaven or earth !
In scorn I speak not ; — they are what their birth

And breeding suffer them to be ;

Wild outcasts of society !

In all the editions this poem was placed by Wordsworth amongst
those of the Imagination. — ED.

Comp. 1807 (probably). Pub. 1807.

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. (Mrs "W. says in a note — "At
Coleorton.")]

0 NIGHTINGALE ! thou surely art
A creature of a ' fiery heart : ' — l

These notes of thine — they pierce and pierce ;

Tumultuous harmony and fierce !

Thou sing'st as if the God of wine

Had helped thee to a Valentine ;

A song in mockery and despite

Of shades, and dews, and silent night ;

And steady bliss, and all the loves

Now sleeping in these peaceful groves.

1 heard a Stock-dove sing or say
His homely tale, this very day ;
His voice was buried among trees,
Yet to be come-at by the breeze :

He did not cease ; but cooed — and cooed
And somewhat pensively he wooed :

1 1807, and returned to in 1820.

A creature of ebullient heart, isis.

TO LADY BEAUMONT. 71

He sang of love, with quiet blending,
Slow to begin, and never ending ;
Of serious faith, and inward glee :
That was the song — the song for me !

Mrs Wordsworth corrected her husband's note to Miss Fenwick, by
adding in the MS. " at Coleorton ; " and at Coleorton the Words-
worths certainly spent the winter of 1806, the Town-end Cottage at
Grasmere being too small for their increasing household. It is cer-
tainly much more likely that Wordsworth wrote this poem at Coleorton
than at Grasmere. It bears all the signs of being an evening im-
promptu, after hearing both the nightingale and the stock-dove ; and
there are no nightingales at Grasmere, while they abound in the
" peaceful groves " of Coleorton. If the locality was — as Mrs Words-
worth states it — Coleorton, the year must be 1807, and not 1806 (the
poet's own date). The nightingale is a summer visitant in this country,
and could not have been heard by Wordsworth at Coleorton in 1806, as
he did not go south to Leicestershire till November of that year.

The poem was placed by him amongst those of the Imagination. — ED.

TO LADY BEAUMONT.

Comp. 1807. Pub. 1807.

[The winter garden of Coleorton, fashioned out of an old quarry,
under the superintendence and direction of Mrs Wordsworth and my
sister Dorothy, during the winter and spring we resided there.]

LADY ! the songs of Spring were in the grove
While I was shaping beds for winter flowers ; l
While I was planting green unfading bowers,
And shrubs — to hang upon the warm alcove,
And sheltering wall ; and still, as Fancy wove
The dream, to time and nature's blended powers
I gave this paradise for winter hours,
A labyrinth, Lady ! which your feet shall rove.

1 1827.

While I was framing beds of winter flowers,, ISOT.

72 TO LADY BEAUMONT.

Yes ! when the sun of life more feebly shines,
Becoming thoughts, I trust, of solemn gloom
Or of high gladness you shall hither bring ;
And these perennial bowers and murmuring pines
Be gracious as the music and the bloom
And all the mighty ravishment of spring.

This winter garden, fashioned by the Wordsworths out of the
old quarry at Coleorton, during Sir George and Lady Beaumont's
absence in 1807, exists very much as it was at the beginning of the
century. The " perennial bowers and murmuring pines " may still be
seen, little altered since 1807. The late Sir George Beaumont (whose
grandfather was first-cousin to the artist Sir George, Wordsworth's
friend), with strong reverence for the past, and for the traditions of
literary men which have made the district famous since the days of his
ancestor Beaumont the dramatist, and especially for the memorials of
Wordsworth's ten months' residence at Coleorton, — took a pleasure in
preserving these memorials, very much as they were when he entered
in possession of the estates of his ancestors. Such a reverence for the
past is not only consistent with the " improvement " of an estate, and
its belongings ; it is a part of it. Wordsworth, and his wife and sister,
were adepts in the laying out of grounds. (See the reference to the
poet's joint labour with Wilkinson at Emont, Vol. III. p. 26.) It was
the Wordsworths also, I believe, who designed the grounds of Fox How —
Dr Arnold's residence, near Ambleside. Similar memorials of the poet
survive at Hallsteads, Ullswater. The following is an extract from a
letter of Dorothy Wordsworth to Lady Beaumont, written at Coleorton,
and which has the postmark of February 18, 1807. " For more than a
week we have had the most delightful weather. If William had but
waited a few days, it would have been no anticipation when he said to
you, ' the songs of Spring were in the grove ; ' for all this week the
birds have chanted from morn till evening, larks, blackbirds, thrushes,
and far more than I can name, and the busy rooks have joined their
happy voices."

Wordsworth, writing to Sir George Beaumont, November 16, 1811,
says, '* I remember, Mr Bowles, the poet, objected to the word 'ravish-
ment' at the end of the sonnet to the winter-garden; yet it has the
authority of all the first-rate poets, for instance, Milton :

' In whose sight all things joy, ivith ravishment,
Attracted by thy beauty still to gaze . . "

—ED.

THOUGH NARROW BE THAT OLD MAN'S CARES, 7 ',

Comp. 1807. Pub. 1807.

" Gives to airy nothing

A local habitation and a name."

[Written at Coleorton. This old man's name was Mitchell. He was,
in all his ways and conversation, a great curiosity, both individually and
as a representative of past times. His chief employment was keeping
watch at night by pacing round the house,' at that time building, to
keep off depredators. He has often told me gravely of having seen the
Seven Whistlers, and the Hounds as here described. Among the groves
of Coleorton, where I became familiar with the habits and notions of
old Mitchell, there was also a labourer of whom, I regret, I had no
personal knowledge ; for, more than forty years after, when he
was become an old man, I learned that while I was composing verses,
which I usually did aloud, he took much pleasure, unknown to me, in
following my steps that he might catch the words I uttered ; and,
what is not a little remarkable, several lines caught in this way kept
their place in his memory. My volumes have lately been given to him
by my informant, and surely he must have been gratified to meet in
print his old acquaintances.]

THOUGH narrow be that old Man's cares, and near,

The poor old Man is greater than he seems :

For he hath waking empire, wide as dreams ;

An ample sovereignty of eye and ear.

Eich are his walks with supernatural cheer ;

The region of his inner spirit teems

With vital sounds and monitory gleams

Of high astonishment and pleasing fear.

He the seven birds hath seen, that never part,

Seen the SEVEN WHISTLERS in their nightly rounds,*

And counted them : and oftentimes will start —

For overhead are sweeping GABRIEL'S HOUNDS

Doomed, with their impious Lord, the flying Hart

To chase for ever, on aerial grounds !

* Seen the Seven Whistlers, &c. Both these superstitions are prevalent in
the Midland Counties of England : that of Gabriel's Hounds appears to be
very general over Europe ; being the same as the one upon which the
German poet, Burger, has founded his ballad of the Wild Huntsman. 1807.

74 THE SEVEN WHISTLERS.

To bring all the poems referring to Coleorton together, so far as
possible, this and the next sonnet are transferred from their places in
the chronological list, and placed beside the Coleorton Inscriptions.

I am indebted to Mr William Kelly of Leicester for the following
note on the Leicestershire Superstition of the Seven Whistlers.

" There is an old superstition, which it is not easy to get to the
bottom of, concerning a certain cry or sound heard in the night,
supposed to be produced by the Seven Whistlers. What or who those
whistlers are is an unsolved problem. In some districts they are
popularly believed to be -witches, in others ghosts, in others devils,
while in the Midland Counties they are supposed to be birds, either
plovers or martins — some say swifts. In Leicestershire it is deemed
a bad omen to hear the Seven Whistlers, and our old writers supply
many passages illustrative of the popular credulity. Spenser, in his
Faerie Queene, II. 12, § 36, speaks of

* The whistlers shrill, that who hears doth die.'

Sir Walter Scott, in The Lady of the Lake, names the bird with which
his character associated the cry —

' And in the plover's shrilly strain
The signal whistlers heard again.'

" When the colliers of Leicestershire are flush of money, we are told,
and indulge in a drinking bout, they sometimes hear the warning voice
of the Seven Whistlers, get sobered and frightened, and will not
descend the pit again till next day. Wordsworth speaks of a country-
man who

' The seven birds hath seen, that never part,
Seen the Seven Whistlers in their nightly rounds,
And counted them.'

"A few years ago, during a thunderstorm which passed over
Leicestershire, and while vivid lightning was darting through the sky,
immense flocks of birds were seen flying about, uttering doleful,
affrighted cries as they passed, and keeping up for a long time a
continual whistling like that made by some kinds of sea-birds. The
number must have been immense, for the local newspapers mentioned
the same phenomenon in different parts of the neighbouring counties
of Northampton, Leicester, and Lincoln. A gentleman, conversing
with a countryman on the following day, asked him what kind of birds
he supposed them to have been. The man answered, 'They are what we
call the Seven Whistlers,' and added that ' whenever they are heard it
is considered a sign of some great calamity, and that the last time he
had heard them was on the night before the deplorable explosion of
fire damp at the Hartley Colliery.' "

In Notes and Queries there are several allusions to this local super-

THE SEVEN WHISTLERS. 75

stition. In the Fifth Series (Vol. II., p. 264), Oct. 3, 1874, the Editor
gives a summary of several notes on the subject in Vol. VIII. of the
Fourth Series (pp. 68, 134, 196, and 268), with additional information.
He says "record was made of their having been heard in Leicestershire;
and that the develin or martin, the swift, and the plover were probably
of the whistling fraternity that frightened men. At p. 134 it was
shewn that "Wordsworth had spoken of one who

' . . the seven birds hath seen, that never part,
Seen the Seven Whistlers in their nightly rounds,
And counted them.'

On the same page, the swift is said to be the true whistler (but, as
noted at page 196, the swifts never make nightly rounds), and the
superstition is said to be common in our Midland Counties. At page
268, Mr Pearson put on record that in Lancashire the plovers, whistling
as they fly, are accounted heralds of ill, though sometimes of trivial
accident, and that they are there called ' Wandering Jews,' and are
said to be, or to carry with them, the ever-restless souls of those Jews
who assisted at the Crucifixion. At page 336, the whistlers are
chronicled as having been the harbingers of the great Hartley Colliery
explosion. A correspondent, VIATOR, added, that on the Bosphorous
there are flocks of birds, the size of a thrush, which fly up and down
the channel, and are never seen to rest on land or water. The men
who rowed Viator's caique told him that they were the souls of the
damned, condemned to perpetual motion. The Seven Whistlers have
not furnished chroniclers with later circumstances of their tuneful and

awful progresses till a week or two ago The whistlers

are also heard and feared in Portugal. See The New Quarterly for July
1874, for a record of some travelling experience in that country."

Another extract is to the following effect : —

" ' Your Excellency laughs at ghosts. But there is no lie about the
Seven Whistlers. Many a man besides me has heard them.'

" ' Who are the Seven Whistlers ? and have you seen them your-
self?'

" ' Not seen, thank Heaven ; but I have heard them plenty of times.
Some say they are the ghosts of children unbaptized, who are to know
no rest till the judgment day. Once last winter I was going with
donkeys and a mule to Caia. Just at the moment I stopped by the
river bank to tighten the mule's girth, I heard the accursed whistlers
coming down the wind along the river. I buried my head under the
mule, and never moved till the danger was over ; but they passed very
near, for I heard the flap and rustle of their wings.'

" ' What was the danger 1 '

" ' If a man once sees them, heaven only knows what will not happen
to him — death and damnation at the very least.'

" ' I have seen them many times. I shot, or tried to shoot them ! '

T6 GABRIEL'S HOUNDS.

" ' Holy Mother of God ! you English are an awful people ! You
shot the Seven Whistlers ? '

" ' Yes ; we call them marecos (teal or widgeon) in our country, and
shoot them whenever we can. They are better to eat than wild
ducks.'"

GabrieTs Hounds. — "AtWednesbury in Staffordshire, the colliers going
to their pits early in the morning hear the noise of a pack of hounds
in the air, to which they give the name of Gabriel's Hounds, though
the more sober and judicious take them only to be wild geese making
this noise in their flight." Rennet MS., Lansd. 1033. (See HalliwelPs
Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words, Vol. I. p. 388). The
peculiar cry or cackle, both of the Brent Goose and of the Bean or
Harvest Goose (Anser Segetum), has often been likened to that of a
pack of hounds in full cry — especially when the birds are on the wing
during night. For some account of the superstition of "Gabriel's
Hounds," see Notes and Queries, First Series, Vol. V. pp. 534 and 596 ;
and Vol. XII. p. 470 ; Second Series, Vol. I. p. 80 ; and Fourth Series,
Vol. VII. p. 299. In the last note these hounds are said to be popularly
believed to be "the souls of unbaptised children wandering in the
air till the day of judgment." They are also explained as " a thing
in the air, that is said in these parts (Sheffield) to foretell calamity,
sounding like a great pack of beagles in full cry." This quotation is
from Charles Reade's Put yourself in his place, which contains many
scraps of local folk-lore. The following is from the Statistical History
of Kirkmichad, by the Rev. John Grant. " In the autumnal season,
when the moon shines from a serene sky, often is the wayfaring traveller
arrested by the music of the hills. Often struck with a more sober
scene, he beholds the visionary hunters engaged in the chase, and pur-
suing the deer of the clouds, while the hollow rocks in long sounding
echoes reverberate their cries." "There are several now living who
assert that they have seen and heard this aerial hunting." See the
Statistical History of Scotland, edited by Sir J. Sinclair, Vol. XII. p.
461-2.— ED.

IN THE GROUNDS OF COLEORTON, THE SEAT OF SIR

GEORGE BEAUMONT, BART., LEICESTERSHIRE.

Comp. 1808. Pub. 1815.

[In the grounds of Coleorton these verses are engraved on a stone
placed near the Tree, which was thriving and spreading when I saw it
in the summer of 1841.]

THE embowering rose, the acacia, and the pine
Will not unwillingly their place resign ;

IN THE GROUNDS OF COLEORTON. 77

If but the Cedar thrive that near them stands,

Planted by Beaumont's and by Wordsworth's hands.

One wooed the silent Art with studious pains :

These groves have heard the Other's pensive strains ;

Devoted thus, their spirits did unite

By interchange of knowledge and delight.

May Nature's kindliest powers sustain the Tree,

And Love protect it from all injury !

And when its potent branches, wide out-thrown,

Darken the brow of this memorial Stone,1

Here may some Painter sit in future days,

Some future Poet meditate his lays ;

Not mindless of that distant age renowned

When Inspiration hovered o'er this ground,

The haunt of him who sang how spear and shield

In civil conflict met on Bosworth-field ;

And of that famous Youth, full soon removed

From earth, perhaps by Shakspeare's self approved,

Fletcher's Associate, Jonson's Friend beloved.

About twelve years after the last visit of Wordsworth to Coloerton,
referred to in the Fenwick note — of which the date should, I think, be
1842, not 1841 — this cedar tree fell, uprooted during a storm. It was,
however, as the Coleorton gardener then on the estate tells me, replanted
with much labour, and protected with care ; although the top branches
being injured, it was never quite the same as it had been. During the
night of the great storm on the 1 3th October 1880, however, it fell a
second time, and perished irretrievably. The memorial stone remains,
injured a good deal by the wear and tear of time ; and the inscription
is more than half obliterated. It is in a situation much more exposed
to the elements than the other two inscriptions at Coleorton. He

" who sang how spear and shield
In civil conflict met on Bosworth-field,"

was Sir John Beaumont, the brother of the dramatist, who wrote a

1 In edd. isis and mo the following lines follow " memorial Stone,"
And to a favourite resting-place invite,
For coolness grateful and a sober light ;

78 IN A GARDEN OF THE SAME.

poem on the battle of Bosworth. (See one of Wordsworth's notes to
the Song at the Feast of Brougham Castle.) The

famous Youth, full soon removed
From earth,

was George Beaumont, the dramatist, who wrote in conjunction with
Fletcher. He died at the age of twenty-nine.

In an undated letter addressed to Sir George Beaumont, Wordsworth
wrote, " I like your ancestor's verses the more, the more I see of them.
They are manly, dignified, and extremely harmonious. I do not
remember in any author of that age such a series of well-tuned
couplets."

In another letter written from Grasmere (probably in 1811) to Sir
George, he says in reference to his own poems, " These inscriptions
have all one fault, they are too long ; but I was unable to do justice
to the thoughts in less room. The second has brought Sir John
Beaumont and his brother Francis so lively to my mind that I recur
to the plan of republishing the former's poems, perhaps in connection
with those of Francis."

On November 16, 1811, he wrote to him again, "I am glad that the
inscriptions please you. It did always appear to me, that inscriptions,
particularly those in verse, or in a dead language, were never supposed
necessarily to be the composition of those in whose name they appeared.
If a more striking or more dramatic effect could be produced, I have
always thought, that in an epitaph or memorial of any kind, a father
or husband, &c., might be introduced, speaking without any absolute
deception being intended ; that is, the reader is understood to be at
liberty to say to himself, — these verses, or this Latin, may be the com-
position of some unknown person, and not that of the father, widow,
or friend, from whose hand or voice they profess to proceed. ... I
have altered the verses, and I have only to regret that the alteration
is not more happily done. But I never found anything more difficult.
I wished to preserve this expression patrimonial grounds, but I found
this impossible, on account of the awkwardness of the pronouns, he
and his, as applied to Reynolds, and to yourself. This, even when it
does not produce confusion, is always inelegant. I was, therefore,
obliged to drop it ; so that we must be content, I fear, with the
inscription as it stands below. I hope it will do. I tried a hundred
different ways, but cannot hit upon anything better. . . ." — ED.

IN A GAEDEN OF THE SAME.
Comp. 1811. Pub. 1815.

[This Niche is in the sandstone-rock in the winter-garden at Coleorton,
which garden, as has been elsewhere said, was made under our direc-

IN A GARDEN OF THE SAME. 79

tion out of an old unsightly quarry. While the labourers were at
work, Mrs Wordsworth, my sister and I used to amuse ourselves
occasionally in scooping this seat out of the soft stone. It is of the size,
with something of the appearance, of a stall in a Cathedral. This
inscription is not engraven, as th'e former, and the two following are,
in the grounds.]

OFT is the medal faithful to its trust

When temples, columns, towers, are laid in dust;

And 'tis a common ordinance of fate

That things obscure and small outlive the great :

Hence, when yon mansion and the flowery trim

Of this fair garden, and its alleys dim,

And all its stately trees, are passed away,

This little Niche, unconscious of decay,

Perchance may still survive. And be it known

That it was scooped within the living stone, —

Not by the sluggish and ungrateful pains

Of labourer plodding for his daily gains,

But by an industry that wrought in love ;

With help from female hands, that proudly strove

To aid the work,1 what time these walks and bowers

Were shaped to cheer dark winter's lonely hours.

This niche is still to be seen although not quite " unconscious of
decay." The growth of yew-trees, over and around it, has darkened
the seat ; and constant damp has decayed the soft stone. The niche
having been scooped out by Mrs Wordsworth and Dorothy, as well as
by Wordsworth, suggests the cutting of the inscriptions on the Rock of
Names in 1800, in which they all took part. (See Vol. III. pp. 115, 116.)
On his return to Grasinere from Coleorton, Wordsworth wrote thus to
Sir George Beaumont about this inscription. The extract in a con-
tinuation of the letter quoted in the note to the previous poem. " What
follows I composed yesterday morning, thinking there might be no
impropriety in placing it so as to be visible only to a person sitting
within the niche, which is hollowed out of the sandstone in the winter-
garden. I am told that this is, in the present form of the niche,
impossible ; but I shall be most ready, when I come to Coleorton, to
scoop out a place for it, if Lady Beaumont think it worth while."

1 1827.

To shape the work, what time

Were framed to cheer 1815.

80 THE COLEORTON URN.

Then follows the —

INSCRIPTION.

" Oft is the medal faithful to its trust."

On Nov. 16, 1811, writing again to Sir George on this subject of the
Inscriptions, and evidently referring to this one on the " niche," he says,
" As to the ' Female,' and ' Male,' I know not how to get rid of it ;

for that circumstance gives the recess an appropriate interest

On this account, the lines had better be suppressed, for it is not im-
probable that the altering of them might cost me more trouble than
writing a hundred fresh ones." — ED.

WRITTEN AT THE BEQUEST OF SIR GEORGE BEAUMONT,
BART., AND IN HIS NAME, FOR AN URN, PLACED BY
HIM AT THE TERMINATION OF A NEWLY-PLANTED
AVENUE, IN THE SAME GROUNDS.

Comp. 1808. Pub. 1815.

YE Lime-trees, ranged before this hallowed Urn,

Shoot forth with lively power at Spring's return ;

And be not slow a stately growth to rear

Of pillars, branching off from year to year,

Till they have learned to frame a darksome aisle ;

That may recal to mind that awful Pile x

Where Eeynolds, 'mid our country's noblest dead,

In the last sanctity of fame is laid.

— There, though by right the excelling Painter sleep

Where Death and Glory a joint sabbath keep,

Yet not the less his Spirit would hold dear

Self -hidden praise, and Friendship's private tear :

Hence, on my patrimonial grounds, have I

Eaised this frail tribute to his memory :

1 1820.

Till ye have framed, at length, a darksome aisle,
Like a recess within that sacred pile.

MS. letter to Sir George Beaumont, isn.

Till they at length have framed a darksome Aisle
Like a recess within that awful Pile. isis.

THE COLEORTON URN. 81

From youth a zealous follower of the Art
That he professed ; attached to him in heart ;
Admiring, loving, and with grief and pride
Feeling what England lost when Eeynolds died.

These Lime-trees now form " a stately growth of pillars," " a darksome
aisle;" and the urn remains, as set up in 1807, at the end of the avenue.
The awful Pile where Reynolds lies, and where —

Death and Glory a joint Sabbath keep,

is, of course, Westminster Abbey.

After Wordsworth's return from Coleorton and Stockton to Gras-
mere, he wrote thus to Sir George Beaumont : —

" Mr DEAR SIR GEORGE,

" Had there been room at the end of the small avenue of lime-
trees for planting a spacious circle of the same trees, the urn might have
been placed in the centre, with the inscription thus altered,

" Ye lime-trees ranged around this hallowed urn,
Shoot forth with lively power at spring's return !

Here may some Painter sit in future days,

Some future poet meditate his lays !

Not mindless of that distant age, renowned,

When inspiration hovered o'er this ground,

The haunt of him who sang, how spear and shield

In civic conflict met on Bosworth field,

And if that famous youth (full soon removed

From earth !) by mighty Shakespear's self approved,

Fletcher's associate, Jonson's friend below.

" The first couplet of the above, as it before stood, would have ap-
peared ludicrous, if the stone had remained after the trees might have
been gone. The couplet relating to the household virtues did not accord
with the painter and the poet ; the former being allegorical figures ;
the latter, living men."

This letter — which is not now in the Beaumont Collection at Coleorton
Hall — seems to imply that Wordsworth thought of combining the first
couplet on the Urn with the last nine lines of the inscription for the
stone behind the Cedar tree. But this was never carried out. The in-
scriptions we,re carved at Coleorton, as they are printed in the text. — ED.
IV. F

82 FOR A SEAT IN THE GROVES OF COLEORTON.

FOE A SEAT IN THE GEOVES OF COLEOETON.
Comp. 1811. Pub. 1815.

BENEATH yon eastern ridge, the craggy bound,
Eugged and high, of Charnwood's forest ground
Stand yet, but, Stranger ! hidden from thy view,
The ivied Euins of forlorn GRACE DIEU ;
Erst a religious House, which day and night
With hymns resounded, and the chanted rite :
And when those rites had ceased, the Spot gave birth
To honourable Men of various worth :
There, on the margin of a streamlet wild,
Did Francis Beaumont sport, an eager child ;
There, under shadow of the neighbouring rocks,
Sang youthful tales of shepherds and their flocks ;
Unconscious prelude to heroic themes,
Heart-breaking tears, and melancholy dreams
Of slighted love, and scorn, and jealous rage,
With which his genius shook the buskined stage.
Communities are lost, and Empires die,
And things of holy use unhallowed lie ;
They perish ; — but the Intellect can raise,
From airy words alone, a Pile that ne'er decays.

In editions 1815 and 1820, Wordsworth appended the following line
from Daniel, as a note to the third last line of this " inscription " —

Strait all that holy was unhallowed lies.

Daniel.

Charnwood forest, in Leicestershire, is an almost treeless wold of
between fifteen and sixteen thousand acres. The

Eastern ridge, the craggy bound,
Rugged and high,

refers probably to High Cadmon. The nunnery of Gracedieu was a
religious house, in a retired spot near the centre of the forest ; and was
built between 1236 and 1242. The English monasteries were sup-

SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE. 83

pressed in 1536 ; but Grace Dieu, with thirty others of the smaller
monasteries, was allowed to continue some time longer. It was finally
suppressed in 1539, when the site of the priory, with the demesne lands,
were granted to Sir Humphrey Foster, who conveyed the whole to John
Beaumont. Francis Beaumont, the dramatic poet, was born at Gracedieu
in 1586. He died in 1615, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.

"William and I went to Grace Dieu last week. We were en-
chanted with the little valley and its nooks, and the Rocks of Charn-
wood upon the hill."— Dorothy Wordsworth to Lady Beaumont, No-
vember 17, 1806.

This inscription was composed at Grasmere, November 19, 1811,
as the following extract from a letter of Wordsworth's to Lady Beau-
mont indicates: — " Grasmere, Wednesday, November 20, 1811. — My
Dear Lady Beaumont- When you see this you will think I mean to
overrun you with inscriptions. I do not mean to tax you with putting
them up, only with reading them. The following I composed yesterday
morning in a walk from Brathway, whither I had been to accompany
my sister : —

FOR A SEAT IN THE GROVES OF COLEORTON.

Beneath yon eastern ridge, the craggy bound,
&c., &c.

The thought of writing this inscription occurred to me many years
ago."— ED.

SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE,

UPON THE RESTORATION OF LORD CLIFFORD, THE SHEPHERD, TO THE
ESTATES AND HONOURS OF HIS ANCESTORS.

Comp. 1807. Pub. 1807.

[See the note. This poem was composed of Coleorton while I was
walking to and fro along the path that led from Sir George Beaumont's
Farmhouse, where we resided, to the Hall, which was building at that
time.]

HIGH in the breathless Hall the Minstrel sate,
And Emont's murmur mingled with the Song. —
The words of ancient time I thus translate,
A festal strain that hath been silent long : —

84 SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE.

" From town to town, from tower to tower,

The red rose is a gladsome flower.

Her thirty years of winter past,

The red rose is revived at last ;

She lifts her head for endless spring,

For everlasting blossoming :

Both roses flourish, red and white :

In love and sisterly delight

The two that were at strife are blended,

And all old troubles now are ended. —

J°y • j°y to both ! but most to her

Who is the flower of Lancaster !

Behold her how She smiles to-day

On this great throng, this bright array !

Fair greeting doth she send to all

From every corner of the hall ;

But chiefly from above the board

Where sits in state our rightful Lord,

A Clifford to his own restored !

They came with banner, spear, and shield ;
And it was proved in Bosworth-field.
Not long the Avenger was withstood —
Earth helped him with the cry of blood : *
St George was for us, and the might
Of blessed Angels crowned the right.
Loud voice the Land has uttered forth,
We loudest in the faithful north :
Our fields rejoice, our mountains ring,
Our streams proclaim a welcoming ;

* This line is from the Battle of Bosworth Field, by Sir John Beaumont
(brother to the dramatist), whose poems are written with much spirit,
elegance, and harmony, and have deservedly been reprinted lately in
Chalmers' Collection of English Poets. 1807.

SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE. 85

Our strong abodes and castles see
The glory of their loyalty.1

How glad is Skipton at this hour —
Though lonely, a deserted Tower ;2
Knight, squire, and yeoman, page, and groom :3
We have them at the feast of Brough'm.
How glad Pendragon — though the sleep
Of years be on her ! — She shall reap
A taste of this great pleasure, viewing
As in a dream her own renewing.
Eejoiced is Brough, right glad I deem
Beside her little humble stream ;
And she that keepeth watch and ward
Her statelier Eden's course to guard ;
They both are happy at this hour,
Though each is but a lonely Tower : —
But here is perfect joy and pride
For one fair House by Emont's side,
This day, distinguished without peer
To see her Master and to cheer —
Him, and his Lady-mother dear !

Oh ! it was a time forlorn
When the fatherless was born —
Give her wings that she may fly,
Or she sees her infant die !

1 1807.

their royalty. 1815.

1820 returns to text of 1807.

2 1845.

Though she is but a lonely tower.

Silent, deserted of her best

Without an Inmate or a Guest. 1807.

To vacancy and silence left
Of all her guardian sons bereft.

1836.

Knight, Squire, Yeoman, Page or Groom.

86 SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE.

Swords that are with slaughter wild
Hunt the Mother and the Child.
Who will take them from the light ?
— Yonder is a man in sight —
Yonder is a house — but where ?
No, they must not enter there.
To the eaves, and to the brooks,
To the clouds of heaven she looks :
She is speechless, but her eyes
Pray in ghostly agonies.
Blissful Mary, Mother mild,
Maid and Mother undefiled,
Save a Mother and her Child !

Now Who is he that bounds with joy
On Carrock's side, a Shepherd-boy ?
No thoughts hath he but thoughts that pass
Light as the wind along the grass.
Can this be He who hither came
In secret, like a smothered flame ?
O'er whom such thankful tears were shed
For shelter, and a poor man's bread !
God loves the Child ; and God hath willed
That those dear words should be fulfilled,
The Lady's words, when forced away,
The last she to her Babe did say :
' My own, my own, thy Fellow-guest
I may not be ; but rest thee, rest,
For lowly shepherd's life is best ! '

Alas ! when evil men are strong
No life is good, no pleasure long.
The Boy must part from Mosedale's groves,
And leave Blencathara's' rugged coves,

SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE. 87

And quit the flowers that summer brings
To Glenderamakin's lofty springs ;
Must vanish, and his careless eheer
Be turned to heaviness and fear.
— Give Sir Lancelot Threlkeld praise I
Hear it, good man, old in "days !
Thou tree of covert and of rest
For this young Bird that is distrest ;
Among thy branches safe he lay,
And he was free to sport and play,
When falcons were abroad for prey.

A recreant harp, that sings of fear
And heaviness in Clifford's ear !
I said, when evil men are strong,
No life is good, no pleasure long,
A weak and cowardly untruth !
Our Clifford was a happy Youth,
And thankful through a weary time,
That brought him up to manhood's prime.
— Again he wanders forth at will,
And tends a flock from hill to hill :
His garb is humble ; ne'er was seen
Such garb with such a noble mien;
Among the shepherd grooms no mate
Hath he, a Child of strength and state 3
Yet lacks not friends for simple glee,1
Nor yet for higher sympathy.2

1845.

for solemn glee. isor.

1845.

And a cheerful company,

That learned of him submissive ways ;

And comforted his private days. 1807.

A spirit soothing company

That learned, &c. 1836.

88 SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE.

To his side the fallow-deer

Came and rested without fear ;

The eagle, lord of land and sea,

Stooped down to pay him fealty ;

And both the undying fish that swim

Through Bowscale-tarn did wait on him ; *

The pair were servants of his eye

In their immortality ;

And glancing, gleaming, dark or bright,

Moved to and fro, for his delight. *

He knew the rocks which Angels haunt

Upon the mountains visitant ; 2

He hath kenned them taking wing :

And into caves where Faeries sing 8

He hath entered ; and been told

By Voices how men lived of old.

Among the heavens his eye can see

The face of thing that is to be ; 4

And, if that men report him right,

His tongue could whisper words of might.5

1 1836.

They moved about in open sight,

To and fro, for his delight. 1807.

* 1836.

On the mountains . . . 1807.

3 1836.

And the Caves where Fairies sing 1807.

* 1836.

Face of thing .... 1807.

6 C. & 1842.

And, if men report him right,

He can whisper words of might, 1807.

He could whisper . . . 1827.

And if that men report him right,

He could whisper . .. . 1836.

* It is imagined by the people of the country that there are two im-
mortal Fish, inhabitants of this Tarn, which lies in the mountains not
far from Threlkeld. — Blencathara, mentioned before, is the old and proper
name of the mountain vulgarly called Saddle-back. W. W., 1807.

SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE. 89

— Now another day is come,

Fitter hope, and nobler doom ;

He hath thrown aside his crook,

And hath buried deep his book ;

Armour rusting in his halls

On the blood of Clifford caUs ; — *

' Quell the Scot,' exclaims the Lance —

Bear me to the heart of France,

Is the longing of the Shield —

Tell thy name, thou trembling Field ;

Field of death, where'er thou be,

Groan thou with our victory !

Happy day, and mighty hour,

When our Shepherd, in his power,

Mailed and horsed, with lance and sword,

To his ancestors restored

Like a re-appearing Star,

Like a glory from afar,

First shall head the flock of war ! "
Alas ! the impassioned minstrel did not know
How, by Heaven's grace this Clifford's heart was framed:
How he, long forced in humble walks to go,
Was softened into feeling, soothed and tamed.1

1 1845.

Alas ! the fervent Harper did not know

That for a tranquil Soul the Lay was framed,

Who long compelled in humble walks to go,

Was softened into feeling, soothed, and tamed. 1807.

* The martial character of the Cliffords is well known to the readers of
English History ; but it may not be improper here to say, by way of com-
ment on these lines and what follows, that, besides several others who
perished in the same manner, the four immediate Progenitors of the Person
in whose hearing this is supposed to be spoken, all died in the Field. W. W. ,
1807.

Compare Tlw Borderers, Vol. I. p. 155 —

" They say Lord Clifford is a savage man."

—ED,

90 SOXG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE.

Love had he found in huts where poor men lie ;
His daily teachers had been woods and rills,
The silence that is in the starry sky,
The sleep that is among the lonely hills.

In him the savage virtue of the Eace,
Revenge, and all ferocious thoughts were dead :
Nor did he change ; but kept in lofty place
The wisdom which adversity had bred.

Glad were the vales, and every cottage-hearth ;
The Shepherd-lord was honoured more and more ;
And, ages after he was laid in earth,
" The good Lord Clifford " was the name he bore.

The original text of this Song was altered but little in succeeding
editions, and was not changed at all till 1836 and 1845. It was always
ranked amongst the " Poems of the Imagination." The following is
"Wordsworth's Explanatory Note, appended to the poem in all the
editions : —

" Henry Lord Clifford, &c., &c., who is the subject of this Poem, was
the son of John Lord Clifford, who was slain at Towton Field,* which
John Lord Clifford, as is known to the Reader of English History, was
the person who after the battle of Wakefield slew, in the pursuit, the
young Earl of Rutland, son of the Duke of York who had fallen in the
battle, ' in part of revenge ' (say the Authors of the History of Cum-
berland and Westmoreland) ; ' for the Earl's Father had slain his.' A
deed which worthily blemished the author (says Speed) ; But who, as
he adds, ' dare promise any thing temperate of himself in the heat of
martial fury I chiefly, when it was resolved not to leave any branch of
the York line standing ; for so one muketh this Lord to speak.' This,
no doubt, I would observe by the by, was an action sufficiently in the
vindictive spirit of the times, and yet not altogether so bad as
represented ; ' for the Earl was no Child, as some writers would have
him, but able to bear arms, being sixteen or seventeen years of age, as
is evident from this (say the Memoirs of the Countess of Pembroke,
who was laudably anxious to wipe away, as far as could be, this stigma
from the illustrious name to which she was born) ; that he was the

* He was killed at Ferrybridge the day before the battle of Towton.
—ED.

SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE. 91

next Child to King Edward the Fourth, which his mother had by
Richard Duke of York, and that King was then eighteen years of age :
and for the small distance betwixt her Children, see Austin Vincent in
his book of Nobility, page 622, where he writes of them all. It may
further be observed, that Lord Clifford, who was then himself only
twenty-five years of age, had been a leading Man and Commander, two
or three years together in the army of Lancaster, before this time ; and,
therefore, would be less likely to think that the Earl of Rutland might
be entitled to mercy from his youth. — But, independent of this act, at
best a cruel and savage one, the Family of Clifford had done enough to
draw upon them the vehement hatred of the House of York : so that
after the Battle of Towton there was no hope for them but in flight and
concealment. Henry, the subject of the Poem, was deprived of his
estate and honours during the space of twenty-four years ; all which
time he lived as a shepherd in Yorkshire, or in Cumberland, where the
estate of his Father-in-law (Sir Lancelot Threlkeld) lay. He was re-
stored to his estate and honours in the first year of Henry the Seventh.
It is recorded that, ' when called to parliament, he behaved nobly and
wisely ; but otherwise came seldom to London or the Court ; and rather
delighted to live in the country, where he repaired several of his
Castles, which had gone to decay during the late troubles.' Thus far
is chiefly collected from Nicholson and Burn ; and I can add, from my
own knowledge, that there is a tradition current in the village of Threl-
keld and its neighbourhood, his principal retreat, that, in the course of
his shepherd life, he had acquired great astronomical knowledge. I
cannot conclude this note without adding a word upon the subject of
those numerous and noble feudal Edifices, spoken of in the Poem, the
ruins of some of which are, at this day, so great an ornament to that
interesting country. The Cliffords had always been distinguished for
an honourable pride in these Castles ; and we have seen that after the
wars of York and Lancaster they were rebuilt ; in the civil Wars of
Charles the First, they were again laid waste, and again restored almost
to their former magnificence by the celebrated Lady Ann Clifford,
Countess of Pembroke, &c., &c. Not more than twenty-five years after
this was done, when the Estates of Clifford had passed into the Family
of Tufton, three of these Castles, namely Brough, Brougham, and
Pendragon, were demolished, and the timber and other materials sold
by Thomas E,arl of Thanet. We will hope that, when this order was
issued, the Earl had not consulted the text of Isaiah, 58th Chap. 12th
Verse, to which the inscription placed over the gate of Pendragon Castle,
by the Countess of Pembroke (I believe his Grandmother) at the time she
repaired that structure, refers the reader. ' And they that shall be of
ih.ee shall build the old waste places ; thou shalt raise up the foundations of
many yenerations, and thou shalt be called the repairer of the breach, the
restorer of paths to dwell in.' The Earl of Thanet, the present possessor
of the Estates, with a due respect for the memory of his ancestors, and

92 SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE.

a proper sense of the value and beauty of these remains of antiquity,
has (I am told) given orders that they shall be preserved from all de-
predations."

Compare the reference to the " Shepherd Lord," in the first canto of
The White Doe of Rylstone, and the topographical allusions there, with
this Song.

High in the breathless Hall the Minstrel sate,
And Emonfs murmur mingled with the song.

Brougham Castle, past which the river Emont flows, is about two
miles out of Penrith, on the Appleby Road. It is now a ruin, but was
once a place of importance. The larger part of it was built by Roger,
Lord Clifford, son of Isabella de Veteripont, who placed over the inner
door the inscription, "This made Roger." His grandson added the
eastern part. The castle was frequently laid waste by the Scottish
Bands, and during the Wars of the Roses. The Earl of Cumberland
entertained James I. within it, in 1617, on the occasion of the king's
last return from Scotland ; but it seems to have " layen ruinous " from
that date, and to have suffered much during the civil wars in the reign
of Charles I. In 1651-52 it was repaired by Lady Anne Clifford,
Countess Dowager of Pembroke, who wrote thus — " After I had been
there myself to direct the building of it, did I cause my old decayed
castle of Brougham to be repaired, and also the tower called the Roman
Tower, in the same old castle, and the court-house, for keeping my
courts in, with some dozen or fourteen rooms to be built in it upon the
old foundation." (Pembroke Memoirs, I. p. 216.) After the time of the
Countess Anne, the castle was neglected, and much of the stone, timber,
and lead disposed of at public sales : the wainscotting being purchased
by the neighbouring villagers.

Her thirty years of winter past,

The red rose is revived at last.

This refers to the thirty years interval between 1455 (the first battle
of St Albans in the wars of the Roses) and 1485 (the battle of Bosworth
and the accession of Henry VII.)

Both roses flourish, red and white,

Alluding to the marriage of Henry VII. with Elizabeth, which
united the two warring lines of York and Lancaster.

And it was found at Bosworth-field.
The Battle of Bosworth Field, in Leicestershire, was fought in 1485.

Not long the Avenger was withstood —
Earth helped him with the cry of blood.
Henry VII. — who, as Henry, Earl of Richmond, last scion of the line

SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE. 93

l

of Lancaster, had fled to Brittany— returned with Morton, the exiled
Bishop of Ely, landed at Milford, advanced through Wales, and met
the royal army at Bosworth, where Eichard was slain, and Henry
crowned king on the battlefield. The " cry of blood " refers, doubtless,
to the murder of the young princes in the Tower.

How glad is Skipton at this hour,
Though lonely, a deserted Tower.

Skipton is the " capital " of the Craven district of Yorkshire, as Bar-
row is the capital of the Furness district of Lancashire and Westmore-
land. The castle of Skipton was the chief residence of the Cliffords.
Architecturally it is of two periods : the round tower dating from the
reign of Edward II., and the rest from that of Henry VIII. From the
time of Robert de Clifford, who fell at Bannockburn (1314), until the
seventeenth century, the estates of the Cliffords extended from Skipton
to Brougham Castle — seventy miles — with only a short interruption of
ten miles. The "Shepherd Lord" Clifford of this poem was attainted
— as explained in Wordsworth's note — by the triumphant House of
York. He was " committed by his mother to the care of certain
shepherds, whose wives had served her," and who kept him concealed
both in Cumberland, and at Londesborough, in Yorkshire, where
his mother's (Lady Margaret Vesci) own estates lay. The old " Tower "
of Skipton Castle was " deserted " during these years when the " Shep-
herd Lord " was concealed in Cumberland.

How glad Pendragon — though the sleep
Of years be on her /

Pendragon Castle, in a narrow dell in the forest of Mallerstang, near
the source of the Eden, south of Kirkby-Stephen, was another of the
castles of the Cliffords. Its building was traditionally ascribed to Uter
Pendragon, of Stonehenge celebrity, who was fabled to have tried to
make the Eden flow round the castle of Pendragon : hence the
distich —

Let Uter Pendragon do what he can,
Eden will run where Eden ran.

In the Countess of Pembroke's Memoirs (Vol. I. pp. 22, 228), we are
told that Idouea de Veteripont " made a great part of her residence in
Westmoreland at Brough Castle, near Stanemore, and at Pendragon
Castle, in Mallerstang." The castle was burned and destroyed by
Scottish raiders in 1341, and for 140 years it was in a ruinous state.
It is probably to this that reference is made in the phrase, " Though
the sleep of years be on her." During the attainder of Henry Lord
Clifford, in the reign of Edward IV., part of this estate of Mallerstang
was granted to Sir William Parr of Kendal Castle. It was again
destroyed during the civil wars of the Stewarts, and was restored,

94 SONG OF THE FEAST AT BROUGHAM CASTLE.

along with Skipton and Brougham, by Lady Anne Clifford, in 1660,
who put up an inscription "... Eepaired in 1660, so as she came to lye
in it herself for a little while in October 1661, after it had lain ruin-
ous without timber or any other covering since 1541. Isaiah, cap.
Iviii. ver. 12." It was again demolished in 1685.

Rejoiced is Brough, right glad I deem

Beside her little humble stream.

Brough — the Verterae of the Romans — is called, for distinction sake,
Brough-under-Stainmore (or Stanemore). The " little humble stream "
is Hillbeck, formerly Hellebeck — (it was said to derive its name from the
waters rushing or helleing down the channel) — which descends from
"Warcop Fell, runs through Market Brough, and joins the Eden below
it. The date of the building of the castle of Brough is uncertain, but
it is probably older than the Conquest. It was sacked by the Scottish
King William in 1174. It was " one of the chief residences " of Idonea
de Veteripont (referred to in the previous note) ; for " then it was in its
prime" (Pemb. Mem., Vol. I. p. 22). Probably she rebuilt it, and changed
it from a tower — like Pendragon — into a castle. In the Pembroke Memoirs
(I. p. 108), we read of its subsequent destruction by fire. "A great mis-
fortune befell Henry Lord Clifford, some two years before his death,
which happened in 1521 ; his ancient and great castle of Brough-under-
Stanemore was set on fire by a casual mischance, a little after he had
kept a great Christmas there, so as all the timber and lead were utterly
consumed, and nothing left but the bare walls, which since are more
and more consumed, and quite ruinated." This same Countess Anne
Pembroke began to repair it in April 1660, "at her exceeding great
charge and cost." She put up an inscription over the gate similar to
the one which she inscribed at Pendragon.

And she that keepeth watch and ward

Her statelier Eden's course to guard.

Doubtless Appleby Castle. Its origin is equally uncertain. Before
1422, John, Lord Clifford, " builded that strong and fine artificial gate-
liouse, all arched with stone, and decorated with the arms of the
Veteriponts, Cliffords, and Percys, which with several parts of the
castle walls was defaced and broken down in the civil war of 1648."
His successor, Thomas, Lord Clifford, " built the chiefest part of the
castle towards the east, as the hall, the chapel, and the great chamber."
This was in 1454. The Countess Anne Pembroke wrote of Appleby
Castle thus (Pemb. MSS., Vol. I , p. 187) : " In 1651 I continued to
live in Appleby Castle a whole year, and spent much time in repairing
it and Brougham Castle, to make them as habitable as I could, though
Brougham was very ruinous, and much out of repair. And in this
year, the 21st of April, I helped to lay the foundation stone of the
middle wall of the great tower of Appleby Castle, called C&sar's Tower,

SONG- AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE. 95

to the end it might be repaired again, and made habitable, if it pleased
God (Is. Ivi. 12), after it had stood without a roof or covering, or one
chamber habitable in it, since about 1567," &c., &c,

One fair House by Emont's side,
Brougham Castle.

Him, and his Lady-mother dear,

Lady Margaret, 'daughter and heiress of Lord Vesci, who manned
John, Lord Clifford — the Clifford of Shakespeare's Henry VI. He
was killed at Ferrybridge near Knottingley in 1461. Their son was
Henry, " the Shepherd Lord." His mother is buried in Londesborough
Church, near Market Weighton.

Now who is he that bounds with joy
On Carroctfs side, a Shepherd-boy ?

Carrock-fell, is three miles south-west from Castle Sowerby, in Cum-
berland.

The boy must part from Mosedale's groves,
And leave Blencathara^ rugged coves.

There are many Mosedales in the English Lake District. The one
referred to here is to the north of Blencathara or Saddleback.

And quit the flowers that summer brings
To Glenderamakiris lofty springs.

The river Glenderamakin rises in the lofty ground to the north of
Blencathara.

Give Sir Lancelot Threlkeld praise !

Thou tree of covert and of rest
For this young Bird that is distressed.

It was on Sir Lancelot Thelkeld's estates in Cumberland that the
young Lord was concealed, disguised as a Shepherd-boy. He was the
" tree of covert " for the young " Bird " Henry Clifford. Compare The
Waggoner (Vol. III. p. 100).

And see, beyond that hamlet small,

The ruined towers of Thelkeld Hall,

Lurking in a double shade,

By trees and lingering twilight made !

There, at Blencathara's rugged feet,

Sir Lancelot gave a safe retreat

To noble Clifford ; from annoy

Concealed the persecuted boy,

Well pleased in rustic garb to feed

His flock, and pipe on shepherd's reed

Among this multitude of hills,

Crags, woodlands, waterfalls, and rills.

96 SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE.

The old hall of Thelkeld has long been a ruin. Its only habitable part
has been a farmhouse for many years.

And both the undying fish that sirim
Through Bowsccde-Tarn did wait on him.

Bowscale-Tarn is to the north of Blencathara. Its stream joins the
Caldew river.

And into caves where fairies sing
He hath entered.

Compare the previous reference to Blencathara's "rugged coves."
There are many such on this mountain.

Alas I the impassioned minstrel did not know
How, by Heaven's grace this Cliffords heart was framed:
How he, long forced in humble walks to go,
Was softened into feeling, soothed, and tamed.

After restoration to his ancestral estates, the Shepherd Lord preferred
to live in comparative retirement. He spent most of his time at Barden
Tower (see notes to The White Doe of Rylstone), which he enlarged, and
where he lived with a small retinue. He was much at Bolton (which
was close at hand), and there he studied astronomy and alchemy, aided
by the monks. It is to the time when he lived at Threlkeld, however —
wandering as a shepherd-boy, over the ridges and around the coves
of Blencathara, amongst the groves of Mosedale, and by the lofty
springs of Glenderamakin — that Wordsworth refers in the lines,

Love had he found in huts where poor men lie ;
His daily teachers had been woods and rills,
The silence that is in the starry sky,
The sleep that is among the lonely hills.

He was at Flodden in 1513, when nearly sixty years of age, leading
there the " flower of Craven."

From Penigent to Pendle Hill,
From Linton to long Addingham,

And all that Craven's coasts did till,
They with the lusty Clifford came.

Compare the first canto of The White Doe of Rylstone —

When he, with spear and shield,
Bode, full of years, to Flodden field.

He died in 1523, and was buried in the choir of Bolton Priory.

The following is Sarah Coleridge's criticism of the Song at the Feast
of Brougham Castle, in the editorial note to her father's Biographia
Literaria (Vol. II., ch. ix., p. 152, ed. 1847) :—

" The transitions and vicissitudes in this noble lyric 1 have always
thought rendered it one of the finest specimens of modern subjective
poetry which our age has seen. The ode commences in a tone of high

SONG AT THE FEAST OF BROUGHAM CASTLE. 97

gratulation and festivity — a tone not only glad, but comparatively even
jocund and light-hearted. The Clifford is restored to the home, the
honours and estates of his ancestors. Then it sinks and falls away to
the remembrance of tribulation — times of war and bloodshed, flight and
terror, and hiding away from the enemy — times of poverty and distress,
when the Clifford was brought, a little child, to the shelter of a northern
valley. After a while it emerges from those depths of sorrow — gradu-
ally rises into a strain of elevated tranquillity and contemplative rap-
ture ; through the power of imagination, the beautiful and impres-
sive aspects of nature are brought into relationship with the spirit of
him, whose fortunes and character form the subject of the piece, and
are represented as gladdening and exalting it, whilst they keep it pure
and unspotted from the world. Suddenly the Poet is carried on with
greater animation and passion : he has returned to the point whence
he started — flung himself back into the tide of stirring life and moving
events. All is to come over again, struggle and conflict, chances and
changes of war, victory and triumph, overthrow and desolation. I
know nothing, in lyric poetry, more beautiful or affecting than the
final transition from this part of the ode, with its rapid metre, to the
slow elegiac stanzas at the end, when, from the warlike fervour and
eagerness, the jubilant strain which has just been described, the Poet
passes back into the sublime silence of Nature, gathering amid her
deep and quiet bosom a more subdued and solemn tenderness than he
had manifested before ; it is as if from the heights of the imaginative
intellect, his spirit had retreated into the recesses of a profoundly
thoughtful Christian heart."

The Song at the Feast of Brougham Castle was placed by Wordsworth
amongst the " Poems of the Imagination." — ED.

1808.

As the Coleorton poems are all transferred to the year 1807, and The
Force of Prayer was also written in that year, those actually com-
posed in 1808 were few in number. With the exception of The White
Doe, which was added to, they include only the two sonnets " composed
while the author was engaged in writing a tract, occasioned by the
Convention of Ciritra," and the fragment on George and Sarah Green.
The latter poem Wordsworth gave to De Quiucey, who published it in
his " Recollections of Grasmere," which appeared in Tail's Edinburgh
Magazine, September 1839 ; but it never found a place in any edition
of the poems.

The reasons which have led me to assign The White Doe to the year
1808, are stated in a note to the poem (see p. 191). I infer that it was

IV. G

98 THE WHITE DOE OF RYLSTONE.

practically finished in April 1808, because Dorothy Wordsworth, in a
letter to Lady Beaumont, dated April 20, 1808, says, " The poem is to be
published. Longman has consented — in spite of the odium under which
my brother labours as a poet — to give him 100 guineas for 1000 copies,
according to his demand." She gives no indication of the name of the
poem referred to. As it must, however, have been one which was to be
published separately, she can only refer to The White Doe or to The
Excursion ; but the latter poem was not finished in 1808.

It is probable, from the remark made in a subsequent letter to Lady
Beaumont, February 1810 (see p. 190), that Wordsworth intended either
to add to what he had written in 1808, or to alter some passages before
publication ; or by " completing " the poem, he may mean simply add-
ing the Dedication, which was not written till 1815.

All things considered, it seems the best arrangement that the poems
of 1808 should begin with The White Doe, and end with the lines OH
George and Sarah Green. — ED.

THE WHITE DOE OF RYLSTONE;

OR, THE FATE OF THE NORTONS.
Comp. 1807-10. Pub. 1815.

[The earlier half of this poem was composed at Stockton-upon-Tees,
when Mrs Wordsworth and I were on a visit to her eldest brother,
Mr Hutchinson, at the close of the year 1807. The country is flat,
and the weather was rough. I was accustomed every day to walk to
and fro under the shelter of a row of stacks, in a field at a small
distance from the town, and there poured forth my verses aloud as
freely as they would come. Mrs Wordsworth reminds me that her
brother stood upon the punctilio of not sitting down to dinner till I
joined the party ; and it frequently happened that I did not make my
appearance till too late, so that she was made uncomfortable. I here
beg her pardon for this and similar transgressions during the whole
course of our wedded life. To my beloved sister the same apology
is due.

When, from the visit just mentioned, we returned to Town-end,
Grasmere, I proceeded with the poem ; and it may be worth while to
note, as a caution to others who may cast their eye on these memoranda,
that the skin having been rubbed off my heel by my wearing too tight
a shoe, though I desisted from walking, I found that the irritation of
the wounded part was kept up, by the act of composition, to a degree
that made it necessary to give my constitution a holiday. A rapid
cure was the consequence. Poetic excitement, when accompanied by
protracted labour in composition, has throughout my life brought on

THE WHITE DOE OF RYLSTONE.

99

more or less bodily derangement. Nevertheless, I am at the close of
my seventy-third year, in what may be called excellent health ; so that
intellectual labour is not necessarily unfavourable to longevity. But
perhaps I ought here to add that mine has been generally carried on
out of doors.

Let me here say a few words of this poem in the way of criticism.
The subject being taken from feudal times has led to its being com-
pared to some of Walter Scott's poems that belong to the same age and
state of society. The comparison is inconsiderate. Sir Walter pursued
the customary and very natural course of conducting an action, pre-
senting various turns of fortune, to some outstanding point on which
the mind might rest as a termination or catastrophe. The course I
have attempted to pursue is entirely different. Everything that is
attempted by the principal personages in " The White Doe " fails, so
far as its object is external and substantial. So far as it is moral and
spiritual it succeeds. The heroine of the poem knows that her duty is
not to interfere with the current of events, either to forward or delay
them, but

To abide

The shock, and finally secure
O'er pain and grief a triumph pure.

This she does in obedience to her brother's injunction, as most suit-
able to a mind and character that, under previous trials, has been
proved to accord with his. She achieves this not without aid from the
communication with the inferior Creature, which often leads her
thoughts to revolve upon the past with a tender and humanising
influence that exalts rather than depresses her. The anticipated heati-
fication, if I may so say, of her mind, and the apotheosis of the com-
panion of her solitude, are the points at which the Poem aims, and
constitute its legitimate catastrophe, far too spiritual a one for instant
or widely-spread sympathy, but not, therefore, the less fitted to make
a deep and permanent impression upon that class of minds who think
and feel more independently, than the many do, of the surfacas of
things and interests transitory, because belonging more to the outward
and social forms of life than to its internal spirit. How insignificant
a thing, for example, does personal prowess appear compared with the
fortitude of patience and heroic martyrdom ; in other words, with
struggles for the sake of principle, in preference to victory gloried in
for its own sake.]

ADVERTISEMENT.

DURING the Summer of 1807, 1 visited, for the first time, the beautiful
country that surrounds Bolton Priory, in Yorkshire ; and the Poem of
the WHITE DOE, founded upon a Tradition connected with that place,
was composed at the close of the same year.

100 THE WHITE DOE OF RYLSTONE.

DEDICATION.

IN trellised shed with clustering roses gay,*

And, MARY ! oft beside our blazing fire,

When years of wedded life were as a day

Whose current answers to the heart's desire,

Did we together read in Spenser's Lay

How Una, sad of soul — in sad attire,

The gentle Una, of celestial birth,1

To seek her Knight went wandering o'er the earth.

Ah, then, Beloved ! pleasing was the smart,

And the tear precious in compassion shed

For Her, who, pierced by sorrow's thrilling dart,

Did meekly bear the pang unmerited ;

Meek as that emblem of her lowly heart

The milk-white Lamb which in a line she led, —

And faithful, loyal in her innocence,

Like the brave Lion slain in her defence.

Notes could we hear as of a faery shell
Attuned to words with sacred wisdom fraught ;
Free Fancy prized each specious miracle,
And all its finer inspiration caught ;
Till in the bosom of our rustic Cell,
We by a lamentable change were taught
That " bliss with mortal Man may not abide :"
How nearly joy and sorrow are allied !

1 1336.

The gentle Una, born of heavenly birth, isi5.

* In the orchard at Town-end Cottage, Grasmere. — ED.

DEDICATION. 101

For us the stream of fiction ceased to flow,
For us the voice of melody was mute.
— But, as soft gales dissolve the dreary snow,
And give the timid herbage leave to shoot,
Heaven's breathing influence failed not to bestow
A timely promise of unlooked-for fruit,
Fair fruit of pleasure and serene content
From blossoms wild of fancies innocent.

It soothed us — it beguiled us — then, to hear
Once more of troubles wrought by magic spell
And griefs whose aery motion comes not near
The pangs that tempt the Spirit to rebel :
Then, with mild Una in her sober cheer,
High over hill and low adown the dell
Again we wandered, willing to partake
All that she suffered for her dear Lord's sake.

Then, too, this Song of mine once more could please,

Where anguish, strange as dreams of restless sleep,

Is tempered and allayed by sympathies

Aloft ascending, and descending deep,

Even to the inferior Kinds ; whom forest-trees

Protect from beating sunbeams, and the sweep

Of the sharp winds; — fair Creatures! — to whom Heaven

A calm and sinless life, with love, hath given.

This tragic Story cheered us ; for it speaks
Of female patience winning firm repose ;
And, of the recompense that conscience seeks,1
A bright, encouraging, example shows ;

1 1836.

, . which conscience seeks, 1815.

102 THE WHITE DOE OF RYLSTONE.

Needful when o'er wide realms the tempest breaks,
Needful amid life's ordinary woes ; —
Hence, not for them unfitted who would bless
A happy hour with holier happiness.

He serves the Muses erringly and ill,

Whose aim is pleasure light and fugitive :

0, that my mind were equal to fulfil

The comprehensive mandate which they give —

Vain aspiration of an earnest will !

Yet in this moral Strain a power may live,

Beloved Wife ! such solace to impart

As it hath yielded to thy tender heart.

ETDAL MOUNT, WESTMORELAND,
April 20, 1815.

" Action is transitory — a step, a blow,

The motion of a muscle — this way or that —

'Tis done ; and in the after-vacancy

We wonder at ourselves like men betrayed :

Suffering is permanent, obscure and dark,

And has the nature of infinity.

Yet through that darkness (infinite though it seem

And irremovable) gracious openings lie,

By which the soul — with patient steps of thought

Now toiling, wafted now on wings of prayer —

May pass in hope, and though from mortal bonds

Yet undelivered, rise with sure ascent

Even to the fountain-head of peace divine." *

* The above extract, which follows the Dedication of the Poem to Mrs
Wordsworth, is taken from his youthful tragedy of The Borderers. (See
Vol. I. p. 167.) In the prefatory note to The Borderers — first published in
1842 — Wordsworth says he would not have made use of these lines in The
White Doe, if he could have foreseen the time when he would be induced
to publish the tragedy.

In a note to the edition of 1836, he says, "' Action is transitory.'

CANTO FIRST. 103

" They that deny a God destroy Man's nobility : for certainly Man is
of kinn to the Beast by his Body ; and if he be not of kinu to God by
his spirit, he is a base ignoble Creature. It destroys likewise Magna-
nimity, and the raising of humane Nature ; for take an example of a
Dogg, and mark what a generosity and courage he will put on, when
he finds himself maintained by a Man, who to him is instead of a God,
or Melior Natura. Which courage is manifestly such, as that Creature
without that confidence of a better Nature than his own could never
attain. So Man, when he resteth and assureth himself upon Divine
protection and favour, gathereth a force and faith which human Nature
in itself could not obtain." LOED BACON.

Cants J[tr0t

FROM Bolton's old monastic tower*

The bells ring loud with gladsome power ;

This and the five lines that follow were either read or recited by me,
more than thirty years since, to the late Mr Hazlitt, who quoted some
expressions in them (imperfectly remembered) in a work of his, published
several years ago."

In the quarto edition of 1815 the following lines precede the extract
from Lord Bacon ; and in the edition of 1820, they succeed it.

" Weak is the will of Man, his judgment blind ;
Remembrance persecute,*, and Hope betrays ;
Heavy is woe ; — and joy, for human kind,
A mournful tiling, so transient is the blaze ! " —
Thus 'might he paint our lot of mortal days,
Who wants the glorious fatuity, assigned
To elevate the more-than-reasoning Mind,
And colour life's dark cloud with orient rays.
Imagination, is that sacred power,
Imagination lofty and refined:
'Tis hers to pluck the amaranthine Flower
Of faith, and round the Sufferer's temples bind
Wreaths that endure affliction's heaviest shower,
And do not shrink from sorrow'* keenest wind. — ED.

* " It is to be regretted that at the present day Bolton Abbey wants this
ornament : but the Poem, according to the imagination of the Poet, is
composed in Queen Elizabeth's time. 'Formerly,' says Dr Whitaker,
' over the Transept was a tower. This is proved not only from ths men-
tion of bells at the Dissolution, when they could have had no other place,
but from the pointed roof of the Choir, which must have terminated west-
ward, in some building of superior height to the ridge.'" W.W., 1815.

104 THE WHITE DOE.

The sun shines bright ; l the fields are gay
With people in their best array
Of stole and doublet, hood and scarf,
Along the banks of crystal Wharf,2
Through the vale retired and lowly,
Trooping to that summons holy.
And, up among the moorlands, see
What sprinklings of blithe company !
Of lasses and of shepherd grooms,
That down the steep hills force their way,
Like cattle through the budded brooms ;
Path, or no path, what care they ?
And thus in joyous mood they hie
To Bolton's mouldering Priory.

What would they there ? — Full fifty years
That sumptuous Pile, with all its peers,
Too harshly hath been doomed to taste
The bitterness of wrong and waste :
Its courts are ravaged ; but the tower
Is standing with a voice of power,
That ancient voice which wont to call
To mass or some high festival ;
And in the shattered fabric's heart
Remaineth one protected part ;
A Chapel, like a wild-bird's nest, *

1 1836.

The sun is bright ; 1815.

2 1820.

Along the banks of the crystal Wharf, 1815.

* "The Nave of the Church having been reserved at the Dissolution, for
the use of the Saxon Cure, is still a parochial Chapel ; and, at this day, is
as well kept as the neatest English Cathedral." W. W., 1815.

CANTO FIRST. 105

Closely embowered and trimly drest ; x
And thither young and old repair,
This Sabbath-day, for praise and prayer.

Fast the church-yard fills ; — anon
Look again, and they are all gone ;2
The cluster round the porch, and the folk
Who sate in the shade of the Prior's Oak ! *
And scarcely have they disappeared
Ere the prelusive hymn is heard : —
With one consent the people rejoice,
Filling the church with a lofty voice !
They sing a service which they feel ;
For 'tis the sunrise now of zeal ;
Of a pure faith the vernal prime — 3
In great Eliza's golden time.

A moment ends the fervent din,
And all is hushed, without and within ;
For though the priest, more tranquilly,
Eecites the holy liturgy,
The only voice which you can hear
Is the river murrriUring near.
— When soft ! — the dusky trees between,
And down the path through the open green,
Where is no living thing to be seen ;

1 1836.

A rural Chapel, neatly dressed,

In covert like a little nest ; 1815.

2 1820.

all are gone ; 1815.

3 1836.

And faith and hope are in their prime. 1815.

* " At a small distance from the great gateway stood the Prior's Oak,
which was felled about the year 1720, and sold for £70. According to the
price of wood at that time, it could scarcely have contained less than 1400
feet of timber." W. W., 1815.

106 THE WHITE DOE.

And through yon gateway, where is found,

Beneath the arch with ivy bound,

Free entrance to the church-yard ground — l

Comes gliding in with lovely gleam,

Comes gliding in serene and slow,

Soft and silent as a dream,

A solitary Doe !

White she is as lily of June,

And beauteous as the silver moon

When out of sight the clouds are driven

And she is left alone in heaven ;

Or like a ship some gentle day

In sunshine sailing far away,

A glittering ship, that hath the plain

Of ocean for her own domain.

Lie silent in your graves, ye dead !
Lie quiet in your church-yard bed !
Ye living, tend your holy cares ;
Ye multitude, pursue your prayers ;
And blame not me if my heart and sight
Are occupied with one delight !
'Tis a work for sabbath hours
If I with this bright Creature go :
Whether she be of forest bowers,
From the bowers of earth below ;
Or a Spirit for one day given,
A pledge of grace from purest heaven.2

1 After " ground " then follows, in edd. 1815 to 1832,
And right across the verdant sod
Towards the very house of God ;

183C.

A gift of grace from purest heaven. 1815.

CANTO FIRST. 107

What harmonious pensive changes
Wait upon her as she ranges
Eound and through this Pile of state
Overthrown and desolate !
Now a step or two her way
Leads through space of open day,1
Where the enamoured sunny light
Brightens her that was so bright ;
Now doth a delicate shadow fall,
Palls upon her like a breath,
From some lofty arch or wall,
As she passes underneath :
Now some gloomy nook partakes
Of the glory that she makes, —
High-ribbed vault of stone, or cell,
With perfect cunning framed as well
Of stone, and ivy, and the spread
Of the elder's bushy head ;
Some jealous and forbidding cell,
That doth the living stars repel,
And where no flower hath leave to dwell.

The presence of this wandering Doe
Fills many a damp obscure recess
With lustre of a saintly show ;
And, reappearing, she no less
Sheds on the flowers that round her blow
A more than sunny liveliness.2

1 183C.

Is through space of open day, 1815.

2 1836.

And reappearing, she no less

To the open day gives blessedness. 1815.

108 THE WHITE DOE.

But say, among these holy places,

Which thus assiduously she paces,

Comes she with a votary's task,

Eite to perform, or boon to ask ?

Fair Pilgrim ! harbours she a sense

Of sorrow, or of reverence ?

Can she be grieved for quire or shrine,

Crushed as if by wrath divine ?

For what survives of house where God

Was worshipped, or where Man abode ;

For old magnificence undone ;

Or for the gentler work begun

By Nature, softening and concealing,

And busy with a hand of healing ?

Mourns she for lordly chamber's hearth

That to the sapling ash gives birth ;

For dormitory's length laid bare

Where the wild rose blossoms fair ;

Or altar, whence the cross was rent,

Now rich with mossy ornament ? x

— She sees a warrior carved in stone,

Among the thick weeds, stretched alone ;

A warrior, with his shield of pride

Cleaving humbly to his side,

And hands in resignation prest,

Palm to palm, on his tranquil breast ;

1 18S6.

And busy with a hand of healing, —

The altar, whence the cross was rent,

Now rich with mossy ornament, —

The dormitory's length laid bare,

Where the wild rose blossoms fair ;

And sapling ash, whose place of birth

Is that lordly chamber's hearth ? 1815.

For altar ....

Or dormitory's length . . . 1827.

CANTO FIRST. 109

As little she regards the sight 1
As a common creature might :
If she be doomed to inward care,
Or service, it must lie elsewhere.
— But hers are eyes serenely bright,
And on she moves — with pace how light !
Nor spares to stoop her head, and taste
The dewy turf with flowers bestrewn ;
And thus she fares, until at last 2
Beside the ridge of a grassy grave
In quietness she lays her down ;
Gentle as a weary wave3
Sinks, when the summer breeze hath died,
Against an anchored vessel's side ;
Even so, without distress, doth she
Lie down in peace, and lovingly.

The day is placid in its going,
To a lingering motion bound,
Like the crystal stream now flowing
With its softest summer sound :4
So the balmy minutes pass,
While this radiant Creatures lies
Couched upon the dewy grass,
Pensively with downcast eyes.

1 1836.

Methinks she passeth by the sight, 1315

2 1827.

And in this way she fares, till at last 1815.

3 1845.

Gently as a weary wave 1815.

4 1S36.

Like the river in its flowing ;

Can there be a softer sound ? 1815.

11 0 THE WHITE DOE.

— But now again the people raise

With awful cheer a voice of praise ; 1

It is the last, the parting song ;

And from the temple forth they throng,

And quickly spread themselves abroad,

While each pursues his several road.

But some — a variegated band

Of middle-aged, and old, and young,

And little children by the hand

Upon their leading mothers hung —

With mute obeisance gladly paid

Turn towards the spot, where full in view,2

The white Doe, to her service true,3

Her sabbath couch has made.

It was a solitary mound ;
Which two spears' length of level ground
Did from all other graves divide :
As if in some respect of pride ;
Or melancholy's sickly mood,
Still shy of human neighbourhood ;
Or guilt, that humbly would express
A penitential loneliness.

" Look, there she is, my Child ! draw near
She fears riot, wherefore should we fear ?
She means no harm ;" — but still the Boy,
To whom the words were softly said,
Hung back, and smiled, and blushed for joy,

1 1836.

— When now again the people rear

A voice of praise, with awful chear. 1815.

2 1836.

Turn with obeisance gladly paid

Towards the spot, where, full in view, isis.

3 1836.

The lovely Doe, of whitest hue, isis.

CANTO FIRST. Ill

A shamed-faced blush of glowing red !
Again the Mother whispered low,
" Now you have seen the famous Doe ;
From Kylstone she hath found her way
Over the hills this sabbath day ;
Her work, whate'er it be, is done,
And she will depart when we are gone ;
Thus doth she keep, from year to year,
Her sabbath morning, foul or fair." l

Bright was the Creature,2 as in dreams
The Boy had seen her, yea, more bright ;
But is she truly what she seems ?
He asks with insecure delight,
Asks of himself, and doubts, — and still
The doubt returns against his will :
Though he, and all the standers-by,
Could tell a tragic history
Of facts divulged, wherein appear
Substantial motive, reason clear,
Why thus the milk-white Doe is found
Couchant beside that lonely mound ;
And why she duly loves to pace
The circuit of this hallowed place.
Nor to the Child's inquiring mind
Is such perplexity confined :
For, spite of sober Truth that sees
A world of fixed remembrances
Which to this mystery belong,

1 Inserted in edd. isis to 1332, before " Bright was the Creature,"
This whisper soft repeats what he
Had known from early infancy.

1836.

Bright is the Creature,

1815.

112 THE WHITE DOE.

If, undeceived, my skill can trace
The characters of every face,
There lack not strange delusion here,
Conjecture vague, and idle fear,
And superstitious fancies strong,
Which do the gentle Creature wrong.

That bearded, staff-supported Sire —
Who in his boyhood often fed x
Full cheerily on convent-bread
And heard old tales by the convent-fire,
And to his grave will go with scars,
Eelics of long and distant wars — 2
That Old Man, studious to expound
The spectacle, is mounting high3
To days of dim antiquity ;
When Lady Aaliza mourned *
Her Son, and felt in her despair
The pang of unavailing prayer ;
Her Son in Wharf's abysses drowned,
The noble Boy of Egremound.
From which affliction — when the grace

1 1836.

Who in his youth had often fed 1815.

. . . hath often fed. 1827.

2 1836.

And lately hath brought home the scars

Gathered in long and distant wars. 1815.

8 1836.

hath mounted high 1815.

* "The detail of this tradition may be found in Dr Whitaker's book, and
in the poem, ' The Force of Prayer,' &c." (See pp. 90, &c., of this Volume).
W. W., 1815.

CANTO FIRST. 113

Of God had in her heart found place — l

A pious structure, fair to see,

Eose up, this stately Priory !

The Lady's work ; — but now laid low ;

To the grief of her soul that doth come and go

In the beautiful form of this innocent Doe :

Which, though seemingly doomed in its breast to sustain

A softened remembrance of sorrow and pain,

Is spotless, and holy, and gentle, and bright ;

And glides o'er the earth like an angel of light.

Pass, pass who will, yon chantry door ; *
And, through the chink in the fractured floor
Look down, and see a griesly sight ;
' A vault where the bodies are buried upright !
There, face by face, and hand by hand,
The Claphams and Mauleverers stand ;
And, in his place, among son and sire,
Is John de Clapham, that fierce Esquire,
A valiant man, and a name of dread
In the ruthless wars of the White and Bed ;
Who dragged Earl Pembroke from Banbury church
And smote off his head on the stones of the porch !
Look down among them, if you dare ;
Oft does the White Doe loiter there,

1 1886.

From which affliction, when God's grace

At length had in her heart found place, 1815.

* " ' At the East end of the North aisle 'of Bolton Priory Church is a
chantry belonging to Bethmesly Hall, and a vault, where, according to
tradition, the Claphams ' (who inherited this estate, by the female line
from the Mauliverers) ' were interred upright. ' John de Clapham, of
whom this ferocious act is recorded, was a name of great note in his time ;
1 he was a vehement partisan of the House of Lancaster, in whom the
spirit of his chieftains, the Cliffords, seemed to survive.' " — W. W., 1815.

IV. H

114 THE WHITE DOE.

Prying into the darksome rent ;
Nor can it be with good intent :
So thinks that Dame of haughty air,
Who hath a Page her book to hold,
And wears a frontlet edged with gold.
Harsh thoughts with her high mood agree —
Who counts among her ancestry1
Earl Pembroke, slain so impiously !

That slender Youth, a scholar pale,
From Oxford come to his native vale,
He also hath his own conceit :
It is, thinks he, the gracious Fairy,
Who loved the Shepherd-lord to meeib*

1 1836.

"Well may her thoughts be harsh ; for she

Numbers among her ancestry 1815.

* " In the second volume of Poems published by the author, will be found
one, entitled, ' Song at the Feast of Brougham Castle, upon the Restora-
tion of Lord Clifford the Shepherd to the Estates and Honours of his
Ancestors.' To that Poem is annexed an account of this personage, chiefly
extracted from Burn's and Nicholson's History of Cumberland and West-
moreland. It gives me pleasure to add these further particulars concerning
him from Dr Whitaker, who says, ' he retired to the solitude of Barden,
where he seems to have enlarged the tower out of a common keeper's lodge,
and where he found a retreat equally favourable to taste, to instruction,
and to devotion. The narrow limits of his residence shew that he had
learned to despise the pomp of greatness, and that a small train of servants
could suffice him, who had lived to the age of thirty a servant himself.
I think this nobleman resided here almost entirely when in Yorkshire, for
all his charters which I have seen are dated at Barden.

" ' His early habits, and the want of those artificial measures of time
which even shepherds now possess, had given him a turn for observing the
motions of the heavenly bodies, and, having purchased such an apparatus
as could then be procured, he amused and informed himself by those pur-
suits, with the aid of the Canons of Bolton, some of whom are said to have
been well versed hi what was then known of the science.

" ' I suspect this nobleman to have been sometimes occupied in a more
visionary pursuit, and probably in the same company.

" ' For, from the family evidences, I have met with two MSS. on the

CANTO FIRST. 115

In his wanderings solitary :

Wild notes she in his hearing sang,

A song of Nature's hidden powers ;

That whistled like the wind, and rang

Among the rocks and holly bowers.

Twas said that She all shapes could wear ;

And oftentimes before him stood,

Amid the trees of some thick wood,

In semblance of a lady fair ;

And taught him signs, and showed him sights,

In Craven's dens, on Cumbrian heights ; l

When under cloud of fear he lay,

A shepherd clad in homely grey ;

Nor left him at his later day.

And hence, when he, with spear and shield,

Eode full of years to Flodden-field,

1 1827.

on Cambria's heights ; 1815.

subject of Alchemy, which, from the character, spelling, &c. , may almost
certainly be referred to the reign of Henry the Seventh. If these were
originally deposited with the MSS. of the Cliffords, it might have been for
the use of this nobleman. If they were brought from Bolton at the Dis-
solution, they must have been the work of those Canons whom he almost
exclusively conversed with.

" ' In these peaceful employments Lord Clifford spent the whole reign of
Henry the Seventh, and the first years of his son. But in the year 1513,
when almost sixty years old, he was appointed to a principal command
over the army which fought at Flodden, and shewed that the military
genius of the family had neither been chilled in him by age, nor extin-
guished by habits of peace.

' ' ' He survived the battle of Flodden ten years, and died April 23rd,
1523, aged about 70. I shall endeavour to appropriate to him a tomb,
vault, and chantry, in the choir of the church of Bolton, as I should be
sorry to believe that he was deposited when dead at a distance from the
place which in his life-time he loved so well.

" ' By his last will he appointed his body to be interred at Shap if he died
in Westmoreland ; or at Bolton if he died in Yorkshire.'

" With respect to the Canons of Bolton, Dr Whitaker shews from MSS.
that not only alchemy but astronomy was a favourite pursuit with them. " —
W. W., 1815.

116 THE WHITE DOE.

His eye could see the hidden spring,

And how the current was to flow ;

The fatal end of Scotland's King,

And all that hopeless overthrow.

But not in wars did he delight,

This Clifford wished for worthier might ;

Nor in broad pomp, or courtly state ;

Him his own thoughts did elevate, —

Most happy in the shy recess

Of Barden's lowly quietness.1

And choice of studious friends had he

Of Bolton's dear fraternity ;

Who, standing on this old church tower,

In many a calm propitious hour,

Perused, with him, the starry sky ;

Or, in their cells, with him did pry

For other lore, — by keen desire

Urged to close toil with chemic fire ; 2

In quest belike of transmutations

Eich as the mine's most bright creations.3

But they and their good works are fled,

And all is now disquieted —

And peace is none, for living or dead !

Ah, pensive Scholar, think not so,
But look again at the radiant Doe !
What quiet watch she seems to keep,
Alone, beside that grassy heap !

1 1836.

Of Barden's humble quietness. 1815.

2 1836.

• ... through strong desire

Searching the earth with chemic fire. 1815.

3 These two lines added in isse.

CANTO FIRST. 11*7

Why mention other thoughts unmeet
For vision so composed and sweet ?
While stand the people in a ring,
Gazing, doubting, questioning ;
Yea, many overcome in spite
Of recollections clear and bright ;
Which yet do unto some impart
An undisturbed repose of heart
And all the assembly own a law
Of orderly respect and awe ;
But see — they vanish one by one,
And last, the Doe herself is gone.

Harp ! we have been full long beguiled
By vague thoughts, lured by fancies wild ; l
To which, with no reluctant strings,
Thou hast attuned thy murmurings ;
And now before this Pile we stand
In solitude, and utter peace :
But, Harp ! thy murmurs may not cease —
A Spirit, with his angelic wings,
In soft and breeze-like visitings,2
Has touched thee — and a Spirit's hand :
A voice is with us — a command
To chant, in strains of heavenly glory,
A tale of tears, a mortal story !

1 1836.

By busy dreams, and fancies wild, »15.

2 1842.

Thou hast breeze-ljke visitings ;

For a Spirit with angel wings

Hath touched thee, . . . 1816.

A Spirit, with angelic wings ^

In soft and breeze-like visitings

Has touched thee, 1836.

A Spirit, with his angelic wings, C.

118 THE WHITE DOE.

THE Harp in lowliness obeyed ;

And first we sang of the green-wood shade

And a solitary Maid ;

Beginning, where the song must end,

With her, and with her sylvan Friend ;

The Friend who stood before her sight,

Her only unextinguished light;

Her last companion in a dearth

Of love, upon a hopeless earth.

For She it was — this Maid, who wrought1
Meekly, with foreboding thought,
In vermeil colours and in gold
An unblest work ; which, standing by,
Her Father did with joy behold, —
Exulting in its imagery ; 2
A Banner, fashioned to fulfil*
Too perfectly his headstrong will :
For on this Banner had her hand
Embroidered (such her Sire's command) 4
The sacred Cross; and figured there
The five dear wounds our Lord did bear ;
Full soon to be uplifted high,
And float in rueful company 1

1 1827.

For She it was — 'twas She who wrought, isis.

2 183(3.

Exulting in the imagery ; 1815.

3 1836.

- A Banner, one that did fulfil, isis.

4 1836.

. . (such was the command) ms.

CANTO SECOND.

It was the time when England's Queen
Twelve years had reigned, a Sovereign dread ;
Nor yet the restless crown had been
Disturbed upon her virgin head ;
But now the inly-working North
Was ripe to send its thousands forth,
A potent vassalage, to fight
In Percy's and in Neville's right,
Two Earls fast leagued in discontent,
Who gave their wishes open vent ;
And boldly urged a general plea,
The rites of ancient piety
To be triumphantly restored,
By the stern justice of the sword I1
And that same Banner, on whose breast
The blameless Lady had exprest
Memorials chosen to give life
And sunshine to a dangerous strife ;
That Banner, waiting for the Call,
Stood quietly in Rylstone-hall.

It came ; and Francis Norton said,
" 0 Father ! rise not in this fray —
The hairs are white upon your head ;
Dear Father, hear me when I say
It is for you too late a day !
Bethink you of your own good name :
A just and gracious Queen have we,
A pure religion, and the claim

1 1845.

To be by force of anna renewed ;

Glad prospect for the multitude. isi5.

To be triumphantly restored,

By the dread justice of the sword. 1S20.

120 THE WHITE DOE.

Of peace on our humanity. —
Tis meet that I endure your scorn ;
I am your son, your eldest born ;
But not for lordship or for land,
My Father, do I clasp your knees ;
The Banner touch not, stay your hand,
This multitude of men disband,
And live at home m blameless ease ; l
For these my brethren's sake, for me ;
And, most of all, for Emily ! "

Tumultuous noises filled the hall ;2
And scarcely could the Father hear
That name — pronounced with a dying fall —
The name of his only Daughter dear,
As on 4 the banner which stood near
He glanced a look of holy pride,
And his moist eyes were glorified ; 5
Then did he seize the staff, and say : 6
" Thou, Eichard, bear'st thy father's name :
Keep thou this ensign till the day

1 1827.

And live at home in blissful ease, 1815

• 1836.

Loud noise was in the crowded hall ; isis.

3 1836.

That name — which had a dying fall — 1815.

4 1836.

And on 1815.

6 1820.

And his wet eyes were glorified, isis.

1836.

Then seized the staff, and thus did say :

* " That strain again ; it had a dying fall. " — Shakespeare (Twelfth N
Act i., Scene i.)— ED.

CANTO SECOND. 121

When I of thee require the same :

Thy place be on my better hand ; —

And seven as true as thou, I see,

Will cleave to this good cause and me."

He spake, and eight brave sons straightway

All followed him, a gallant band !

Thus, with his. sons, when forth fie came,
The sight was hailed with loud acclaim l
And din of arms and minstrelsy,
From all his warlike tenantry,
All horsed and harnessed with him to ride, —
A voice to which the hills replied !2

But Francis, in the vacant hall,
Stood silent under dreary weight, —
A phantasm, in which roof and wall
Shook, tottered, swam before his sight ;
A phantasm like a dream of night !
Thus overwhelmed, and desolate,
He found his way to a postern-gate ;
And, when he waked, his languid eye3
Was on the calm and silent sky ;
With air about him breathing sweet,
And earth's green grass beneath his feet ;

1 1836.

Forth when Sire and Sons appeared

A gratulating shout was reared,

With din . . . . 1815.

2 1836.

A shout to which the hills replied. 1815.

3 1S36.

And when he waked at length, his eye isis.

122 THE WHITE DOE.

Nor did he fail ere long to hear

A sound of military cheer,

Faint — but it reached that sheltered spot ;

He heard, and it disturbed him not.

There stood he, leaning on a lance
Which he had grasped unknowingly,
Had blindly grasped in that strong trance
That dimness of heart-agony ;
There stood he, cleansed from the despair
And sorrow of his fruitless prayer.
The past he calmly hath reviewed :
But where will be the fortitude
Of this brave man, when he shall see
That Form beneath the spreading tree,
And know that it is Emily ? l

He saw her where in open view
She sate beneath the spreading yew —
Her head upon her lap, concealing
In solitude her bitter feeling :2
" Might ever son command a sire,
The act were justified to-day."
This to himself — and to the Maid,
Whom now he had approached, he said —
" Gone are they, — they have their desire ;
And I with thee one hour will stay,
To give thee comfort if I may."

1 Added in edd. 1815 to 1832.

Oh ! hide them from each other, hide,
Kind Heaven, this pair severely tried !

2 Added in edd. isis to 1832.

How could he choose but shrink or sigh ?
He shrunk, and muttered inwardly,

CANTO SECOND. 123

She heard, but looked not up, nor spake ;
And sorrow moved him to partake
Her silence ; then his thoughts turned round,
And fervent words a passage found.1

" Gone are they, bravely, though misled ;
With a dear Father at their head !
The Sons obey a natural lord ;
The Father had given solemn word
To noble Percy ; and a force
Still stronger bends him to his course.
This said, our tears to-day may fall
As at an innocent funeral.
In deep and awful channel runs
This sympathy of Sire and Sons ;
Untried our Brothers have been loved 2
With heart by simple nature moved ; 3
And now their faithfulness is proved :
For faithful we must call them, bearing
That soul of conscientious daring.
— There were they all in circle — there
Stood Kichard, Ambrose, Christopher,
John with a sword that will not fail,
And Marmaduke in fearless mail,
And those bright Twins were side by side,
And there, by fresh hopes beautified,

1 1836.

He paused, her silence to partake,

And long it was before he spake :

Then, all at once, his thoughts turned round.

And fervent words a passage found. 1815.

2 1836.

Untried our Brothers were beloved isis.

3 This line not in edd. isis to 1532.

124 THE WHITE DOE.

Stood He,1 whose arm yet lacks the power
Of man, our youngest, fairest flower !
I, by the right 2 of eldest born,
And in a second father's place,
Presumed to grapple with their scorn,3
And meet their pity face to face ;
Yea, trusting in God's holy aid,
I to my Father knelt and prayed ;
And one, the pensive Marmaduke,
Methought, was yielding inwardly,
And would have laid his purpose by,
But for a glance of his Father's eye,
"Which I myself could scarcely brook.

" Then be we, each and all, forgiven !
Thou, chiefly thou, my Sister dear,4
Whose pangs are registered in heaven —
The stifled sigh, the hidden tear,
And smiles, that dared to take their place,
Meek filial smiles, upon thy face,
As that unhallowed Banner grew
Beneath a loving old Man's view.
Thy part is done — thy painful part ;
Be thou then satisfied in heart !
A further, though far easier, task
Than thine hath been, my duties ask ;
With theirs my efforts cannot blend,
I cannot for such cause contend ;

1 1827.

Was He, isis.

2 1827.

I, in the right .... 1815.

3 1827.

Presumed to stand against their scorn, isis.

4 1836.

Thee, chiefly thee, my Sister dear isis.

CANTO SECOND.

Their aims I utterly forswear ;

But I in body will be there.

Unarmed and naked will I go,

Be at their side, come weal or woe :

On kind occasions I may wait,

See, hear, obstruct, or mitigate.

Bare breast I take and an empty hand." * —

Therewith he threw away the lance,

Which he had grasped in that strong trance ;

Spurned it, like something that would stand

Between him and the pure intent

Of love on which his soul was bent.

125

" For thee, for thee, is left the sense
Of trial past without offence
To God or man ; such innocence,
Such consolation, and the excess
Of an unmerited distress ;
In that thy very strength must lie.
— 0 Sister, I could prophesy !
The time is come that rings the knell
Of all we loved, and loved so well :
Hope nothing, if I thus may speak
To thee, a woman, and thence weak :
Hope nothing, I repeat ; for we
Are doomed to perish utterly :
'Tis meet that thou with me divide
The thought while I am by thy side,
Acknowledging a grace in this,
A comfort in the dark abyss.
But look not for me when I am gone,
And be no farther wrought upon :

* See the Old Ballad,— <( The Rising of the North."— W. W. 1827.

126 THE WHITE DOE.

Farewell all wishes, all debate,

All prayers for this cause, or for that !

Weep, if that aid thee ; but depend

Upon no help of outward friend ;

Espouse thy doom at once, and cleave

To fortitude without reprieve.

For we must fall, both we and ours —

This Mansion and these pleasant bowers,

Walks, pools, and arbours, homestead, hall —

Our fate is theirs, will reach them all;

The young horse must forsake his manger,

And learn to glory in a Stranger ;

The hawk forget his perch ; the hound

Be parted from his ancient ground :

The blast will sweep us all away —

One desolation, one decay !

And even this Creature !" which words saying,

He pointed to a lovely Doe,

A few steps distant, feeding, straying ;

Fair creature, and more white than snow !

" Even she will to her peaceful woods

Eeturn, and to her murmuring floods,

And be in heart and soul the same

She was before she hither came ;

Ere she had learned to love us all,

Herself beloved in Rylstone-hall.

— But thou, my Sister, doomed to be

The last leaf on a blasted tree;1

If not in vain we breathed the breath 2

Together of a purer faith ;

1 1836.

— But thou, my Sister, doomed to be

The last leaf which by heaven's decree

Must hang upon a blasted tree ; isis.

2 1827.

If not in vain we have breathed the breath. ms.

CANTO SECOND.

If hand in hand we have been led,
And thou, (0 happy thought this day !)
Not seldom foremost in the way ;
If on one thought our minds have fed,
And we have in one meaning read ;
If, when at home our private weal
Hath suffered from the shock of zeal,
Together we have learned to prize
Forbearance and self-sacrifice ;
If we like combatants have fared,
And for this issue been prepared ;
If thou art beautiful, and youth
And thought endue thee with all truth-
Be strong; — be worthy of the grace
Of God, and fill thy destined place :
A Soul, by force of sorrows high,
Uplifted to the purest sky
Of undisturbed humanity !"

He ended, — or she heard no more ;
He led her from the yew-tree shade,
And at the mansion's silent door,
He kissed the consecrated Maid,
And down the valley then pursued,1
Alone, the armed Multitude.

127

Canto Ihirb.

Now joy for you who from the towers
Of Brancepeth look in doubt and fear,*

1 is::r>.

he pursued,

1815.

* " Brancepeth Castle stands near the river Were, a few miles from the
city of Durham. It formerly belonged to the Nevilles, Earls of West-
moreland. See Dr Percy's account." — W. W., 1815.

128 THE WHITE DOE.

Telling melancholy hours ! l
Proclaim it, let your Masters hear
That Norton with his band is near !
The watchmen from their station high
Pronounced the word, — and the Earls descry,
Well-pleased, the armed Company 2
Marching down the banks of Were.

Said fearless Norton to the pair
Gone forth to greet him on the plain — 3
" This meeting, noble Lords ! looks fair,
I bring with me a goodly train ;
Their hearts are with you : hill and dale
Have helped us : Ure we crossed, and Swale,
And horse and harness followed — see
The best part of their Yeomanry !
— Stand forth, my Sons ! — these eight are mine,
Whom to this service I commend ;
Which way soe'er our fate incline,
These will be faithful to the end ;
They are my all " — voice failed him here —
" My all save one, a Daughter dear !
Whom I have left, Love's mildest birth,4
The meekest Child on this blessed earth.
I had — but these are by my side,
These Eight, and this is a day of pride !

1 1836.

Now joy for you and sudden cheer,

Ye watchmen upon Brancepeth Towers j

Looking forth in doubt and fear,

Telling melancholy hours ! 1815.

2 1836.

Forthwith the armed Company isis.

3 1836.

Gone forth to hail him on the plain — 1815.

4 1836.

the mildest birth, isis.

CANTO THIRD. 129

The time is ripe. With festive din
Lo ! how the people are flocking in, —
like hungry fowl to the feeder's hand
When snow lies heavy upon the land."

He spake bare truth ; for far and near
From every side came jloisy swarms
Of Peasants in their homely gear ;
And, mixed with these, to Brancepeth came
Grave Gentry of estate and name,
And Captains known for worth in arms ;
And prayed the Earls in self-defence
To rise, and prove their innocence. —
" Rise, noble Earls, put forth your might
For holy Church, and the People's right !"

The Norton fixed, at this demand,
His eye upon Northumberland,
And said ; " The Minds of Men will own
No loyal rest while England's Crown
Eemains without an Heir, the bait
Of strife and factions desperate ;
Who, paying deadly hate in kind
Through all things else, in this can find
A mutual hope, a common mind ;
And plot, and pant to overwhelm
All ancient honour in the realm.
— Brave Earls ! to whose heroic veins
Our noblest blood is given in trust,
To you a suffering State complains,
And ye must raise her from the dust.
With wishes of still bolder scope
On you we look, with dearest hope ;
Even for our Altars — for the prize

iv. I

130 THE WHITE DOE.

In Heaven, of life that never dies ;

For the old and holy Church we mourn,

And must in joy to her return.

Behold ! " — and from Ms Son whose stand

Was on his right, from that guardian hand

He took the Banner, and unfurled

The precious folds — " behold," said he,

" The ransom of a sinful world ;

Let this your preservation be';

The wounds of hands and feet and side,

And the sacred Cross on which Jesus died !

— This bring I from an ancient hearth,

These Records wrought in pledge of love

By hands of no ignoble birth,

A Maid o'er whom the blessed Dove

Vouchsafed in gentleness to brood

While she the holy work pursued."

" Uplift the standard ! " was the cry

From all the listeners that stood round,

" Plant it, — by this we live or die."

The Norton ceased not for that sound,

But said ; " The prayer which ye have heard,

Much injured Earls ! by these preferred,

Is offered to the Saints, the sigh

Of tens of thousands, secretly."

" Uplift it ! " cried once more the Band,

And then a thoughtful pause ensued :

" Uplift it ! " said Northumberland —

Whereat from all the multitude

Who saw the Banner reared on high

In all its dread emblazonry,1

1 In edd. 1815 to 1832 is added after " emblazonry "-
With tumult and iudiguant rout,

CANTO THIRD. 131

A voice of uttermost joy brake out :
The transport was rolled down the river of Were,
And Durham, the time-honoured Durham, did hear,
And the towers of Saint Cuthbert were stirred by the
shout ! *

Now was the North in arms: — they shine
In warlike trim from Tweed to Tyne,
At Percy's voice : and Neville sees
His followers gathering in from Tees,
From Were, and all the little rills
Concealed among the forked hills —
Seven hundred Knights, Ketainers all
Of Neville, at their Master's call
Had sate together in Kaby Hall !
Such strength that Earldom held of yore ;
Nor wanted at this time rich store
Of well-appointed chivalry.
— Not loth the sleepy lance to wield,
And greet the old paternal shield,
They heard the summons ; — and, furthermore,
Horsemen and Foot of each degree,1
Unbound by pledge of fealty,
Appeared, with free and open hate
Of novelties in Church and State ;
Knight, burgher, yeoman, and esquire ;
And Romish priest, in priest's attire.
And thus, in arms, a zealous Band
Proceeding under joint command,

1 1S2T.

Came Foot and Horse-meu of each degree, 1815.

* The tower of the Cathedral of Durham, of which St Cuthbert is the
patron saint. — ED.

132 THE WHITE DOE.

To Durham first their course they bear ;
And in Saint Cuthbert's ancient seat
Sang mass, — and tore the book of prayer, —
And trod the bible beneath their feet.

Thence marching southward smooth and free
' They mustered their host at Wetherby,
Full sixteen thousand fair to see ; ' *
The Choicest Warriors of the North !
But none for beauty and for worth1
Like those eight sons — who, in a ring,
(Eipe men, or blooming in life's spring)2
Each with a lance, erect and tall,
A falchion, and a buckler small,
Stood by their Sire, on Clifford-moor,3
To guard the Standard which he bore.
On foot they girt their Father round ;
And so will keep the appointed ground
Where'er their march : no steed will he4
Henceforth bestride ; — triumphantly,

1 1827.

But none for undisputed worth 1815.

2 1836.

Like those eight Sons ; who in a ring,

Each with a lance — . . . 1815.

Like those eight sons — embosoming

Determined thoughts — who in a ritig,

Each with a lance . . . 1827.

3 The ed. of isis, has after " Clifford-moor," the line

In youthful beauty flourishing.

4 1836.

— With feet that firmly pressed the ground

They stood, and girt their Father round

Such was his choice, — no steed will he isi5.

* From the old Ballad.— W. W. 1827.

CANTO THIRD. 133

He stands upon the grassy sod,1

Trusting himself to the earth, and God.

Rare sight to embolden and inspire !

Proud was the field of Sons and Sire ;

Of him the most ; and, sooth to say,

No shape of man in all the array

So graced the sunshine of that day,

The monumental pomp of age

Was with this goodly Personage ;

A stature undepressed in size,

Unbent, which rather seemed to rise,

In open victory o'er the weight

Of seventy years, to loftier height ; 2

Magnific limbs of withered state ;

A face to fear and venerate ;

Eyes dark and strong ; and on his head

Bright locks of silver hair, thick spread,3

Which a brown morion half-concealed,

Light as a hunter's of the field ;

And thus, with girdle round his waist,

Whereon the Banner-staff might rest

At need, he stood, advancing high

The glittering, floating Pageantry.

1 1845.

He stood upon the verdant sod, 1815.

He stood upon the grassy sod, 1820.

2 1836.

to higher height ; 1815.

3 1827.

Rich locks .... 1815.

134 THE WHITE DOE.

Who sees him ? — thousands see, and One l
With unparticipated gaze ;
Who 'mong those thousands, friend hath none,
And treads in solitary ways.
He, following wheresoe'er he might,
Hath watched the Banner from afar,
As shepherds watch a lonely star,
Or mariners the distant light
That guides them through a stormy night.2
And now, upon a chosen plot
Of rising ground, yon heathy spot !
He takes alone his far-off stand,3
With breast unmailed, unweaponed hand.
Bold is his aspect ; but his eye
Is pregnant with anxiety,
While, like a tutelary Power,
He there stands fixed from hour to hour :
Yet sometimes in more humble guise,
Upon the turf-clad height he lies
Stretched, herdsman-like, as if to bask
In sunshine were his only task,4
Or by his mantle's help to find
A shelter from the nipping wind :
And thus, with short oblivion blest,
His weary spirits gather rest.
Again he lifts his eyes ; and lo !

1 1836.

Who sees him 1 — many see, and One 1815.

2 1836.

That guides them on a . . . 1815.

3 1836.

He takes this day his far-off stand, 1815.

4 1836.

Stretched out upon the ground he lies, —

As if it were his only task

Like Herdsman in the sun to bask, isis.

CANTO THIKD.

135

The pageant glancing to and fro ;
And hope is wakened by the sight,
He thence may learn, ere fall of night,1
Which way the tide is doomed to flow.

To London were the Chieftains bent ;
But what avails the bold intent ?
A Eoyal army is gone forth
To quell the EISING OF TPE NORTH ;
They march with Dudley at their head,
And, in seven days' space, will to York be led ! —
Can such a mighty Host be raised
Thus suddenly, and brought so near ?
The Earls upon each other gazed,
And Neville's cheek grew pale with fear ;
For, with a high and valiant name,
He bore a heart of timid frame ; 2
And bold if both had been, yet they
' Against so many may not stay.'*
Back therefore will they hie to seize3
A strong Hold on the banks of Tees ;
There wait a favourable hour,
Until Lord Dacre with his power
From Naworth come ;4 and Howard's aid
Be with them openly displayed.

1827.

1836.

1836.

1836.

That he thence may learn

And Neville was oppressed with fear
For, though he bore a valiant name,
His heart was of a timid frame,

And therefore will retreat to seize
From Naworth comes

1815.

1815.

1815.

1815.

* From the old Ballad.— VV. W. 1827.

136 THE WHITE DOE.

While through the Host, from man to man,
A rumour of this purpose ran,
The Standard trusting to the care1
Of him who heretofore did bear
That charge, impatient Norton sought
The Chieftains to unfold his thought,
And thus abruptly spake ; — " We yield
(And can it be ?) an unfought field ! —
How oft has strength, the strength of heaven,2
To few triumphantly been given !
Still do our very children boast
Of mitred Thurston — what a Host
He conquered!* — Saw we not the Plain
(And flying shall behold again)
Where faith was proved ? — while to battle moved
The Standard, on the Sacred Wain
That bore it, compassed round by a bold
Fraternity of Barons old ;
And with those grey-haired champions stood,
Under the saintly ensigns three,
The infant Heir of Mowbray's blood —
All confident of victory ! — 3

1 183C.

The Standard giving to the care 1815.

2 1836.

How often hath the strength of heaven isis.

3 1836.

The Standard on the sacred wain,

On which the grey-haired Barons stood,

And the infant Heir of Mowbray's blood,

Beneath the saintly Ensigns three,

Their confidence and victory ! 1815.

Stood confident of victory. 1820.

* ' ' See the Historians for the account of this memorable battle, usually
denominated the Battle of the Standard."— W. W., 1815.

CANTO THIRD. 137

Shall Percy blush, then, for his name ?
Must Westmoreland be asked with shame
Whose were the numbers, where the loss,
In that other day of Neville's Cross ? *

* " ' In the night before the battle of Durham was strucken and begun,
the 17th day of October, anno 1346, there did appear to John Fosser, then
Prior of the abbey of Durham, commanding him to take the holy Corporax-
cloth, wherewith St Cuthbert did cover the chalice when he used to say
mass, and to put the same holy relique like to a banner-cloth upon the
point of a spear, and the next morning to go and repair to a place on the
west side of the city of Durham, called the Red Hills, where the Maid's
Bower wont to be, and there to remain and abide till the end of the battle.
To which vision, the Prior obeying, and taking the same for a revelation
of God's grace and mercy by the mediation of holy St Cuthbert, did
accordingly the next morning, with the monks of the said abbey, repair
to the said Red Hills, and there most devoutly humbling and prostrating
themselves in prayer for the victory in the said battle : (a great multitude
of the Scots running and pressing by them, with intention to have spoiled
them, yet had no power to commit any violence under such holy persons,
so occupied in prayer, being protected and defended by the mighty Pro-
vidence of Almighty God, and by the mediation of Holy St Cuthbert, and
the presence of the holy relique). And, after many conflicts and warlike
exploits there had and done between the English men and the King of
Scots and his company, the said battle ended, and the victory was obtained,
to the great overthrow and confusion of the Scots, their enemies : And
then the said Prior and monks, accompanied with Ralph Lord Nevil, and
John Nevil his son, and the Lord Percy, and many other nobles of England,
returned home and went to the abbey church, there joining in hearty
prayer and thanksgiving to God and holy St Cuthbert for the victory
atchieved that day. '

" This battle was afterwards called the Battle of Neville's Cross from the
following circumstance : —

" ' On the west side of the city of Durham, where two roads pass each
other, a most notable, famous, and goodly cross of stone-work was erected,
and set up to the honour of God for the victory there obtained in the field
of battle, and known by the name of Nevil 's Cross, and built at the sole
cost of the Lord Ralph Nevil, one of the most excellent and chief persons
in the said battle.' The Relique of St Cuthbert afterwards became of
great importance in military events. For soon after this battle, says the
same author, ' The Prior caused a goodly and sumptuous banner to be
made, (which is then described at great length,) and in the midst of the
same banner-cloth was the said holy relique and corporax-cloth enclosed,
&c. &c. and so sumptuously finished, and absolutely perfected, this banner
was dedicated to holy St Cuthbert, of intent and purpose, that for the
future it should be carried to any battle, as occasion should serve ; and
was never carried and shewed at any battle but by the especial grace of
God Almighty, and the mediation of holy St Cuthbert, it brought home

138 THE WHITE DOE.

When the Prior of Durham with holy hand

Eaised, as the Vision gave command,

Saint Cuthbert's Eelic — far and near

Kenned on the point of a lofty spear ;

While the Monks prayed in Maiden's Bower

To God descending in his power.1

Less would not at our need be due

To us, who war against the Untrue ; —

The delegates of Heaven we rise,

Convoked the impious to chastise :

We, we, the sanctities of old

Would re-establish and uphold :

Be warned " — His zeal the Chiefs confounded,

But word was given and the trumpet sounded :2

Back through the melancholy Host

Went Norton, and resumed his post.

Alas ! thought he, and have I borne

1 1836.

When, as the Vision gave command,

The Prior of Durham with holy hand

Saint Cuthbert's Relic did uprear

Upon the point of a lofty spear,

And God descended in his power,

While the Monks prayed in Maiden's Bower. 1815

2 1836.

uphold."—

— The Chiefs were by his zeal confounded,

But word was given — and the trumpet sounded ; 1815.

victory ; which banner-cloth, after the dissolution of the abbey, fell into
the possession of Dean WHITTINGHAM, whose wife was called KATHARINE,
being a French woman, (as is most credibly reported by eye- witnesses, )
did most injuriously burn the same in her fire, to the open contempt and
disgrace of all ancient and goodly reliques.'— Extracted from a book
entitled, ' Durham Cathedral, as it stood before the Dissolution of the
Monastery.' It appears, from the old metrical History, that the above-
mentioned banner was carried by the Earl of Surry to Flodden Field. "-
W. W., 1815.

CANTO THIRD. 139

This Banner raised with joyful pride,1

This hope of all posterity,

By those dread symbols sanctified ; 2

Thus to become at once the scorn

Of babbling winds as they go by,

A spot of shame to the sun's bright eye,

To the light clouds a mockery ! 3

— " Even these poor eight of mine would stem "-

Half to himself, and half to them

He spake — " would stem, or quell, a force

Ten times their number, man and horse ;

This by their own unaided might,

Without their father in their sight,

Without the Cause for which they fight ;

A Cause, which on a needful day

Would breed us thousands brave as they."

— So speaking, he his reverend head

Raised towards that Imagery once more : 4

But the familiar prospect shed

Despondency unfelt before :

A shock of intimations vain,

Dismay, and superstitious pain,

Fell on him, with the sudden thought

Of her by whom the work was wrought : —

Oh wherefore was her countenance bright

With love divine and gentle light ?

1 1836.

This Banner raised so joyfully, 1815.

2 This line added in 1836.

3 1836.

To the frail clouds .... 1815.

4 1827.

— So speaking, he upraised his head

Towards that Imagery once more ; isis.

140 THE WHITE DOE.

She would not, could not, disobey,1

But her Faith leaned another way.

Ill tears she wept ; I saw them fall,

I overheard her as she spake

Sad words to that mute Animal,

The White Doe, in the hawthorn brake ;

She steeped, but not for Jesu's sake,

This Cross in tears ; by her, and One

Unworthier far we are undone —

Her recreant Brother — he prevailed

Over that tender Spirit — assailed

Too oft, alas ! by her whose head

In the cold grave hath long been laid : 2

She first in reason's dawn beguiled

Her docile unsuspecting Child:3

Far back — far back my mind must go,

To reach the well-spring of this woe !

While thus he brooded, music sweet
Of border tunes was played to cheer
The footsteps of a quick retreat ;
But Norton lingered in the rear,
Stung with sharp thoughts ; and ere the last
From his distracted brain was cast,

1 1836.

She did in passiveness obey, 1815.

2 1836.

Her Brother was it who assailed

Her tender spirit and prevailed,

Her other Parent, too, whose head

In the cold grave hath long been laid, isis.

3 1836. ,

From reason's earliest dawn beguiled

The docile, unsuspecting Child : isio.

CANTO THIRD.

Before his Father, Francis stood,
And spake in firm and earnest mood.1

" Though here I bend a suppliant knee
In reverence, and unarmed, I bear
In your indignant thoughts my share ;
Am grieved this backward march to see
So careless and disorderly.
I scorn your Chiefs — men who would lead,
And yet want courage at their need :
Then look at them with open eyes !
Deserve they further sacrifice ? —
If — when they shrink, nor dare oppose
In open field their gathering foes,
(And fast, from this decisive day,
Yon multitude must melt away ;)
If now I ask a grace not claimed
While ground was left for hope ; unblamed
Be an endeavour that can do
No injury to them or you.2

141

1836.

1836.

While thus he brooded, music sweet
Was played to cheer them in retreat ;
But Norton lingered in the rear :
Thought followed thought —and ere the last
Of that unhappy train was past,
Before him Francis did appear.

" Now when 'tis not your aim to oppose,"
Said he, " in open field your Foes ;
Now that from this decisive day
Your multitude must melt away,
An unarmed Man may come unblamed ;
To ask a grace, that was not claimed
Long as your hopes were high, he now
May hither bring a fearless brow ;
When his discountenance can do

142 THE WHITE DOE.

My Father ! 1 would help to find
A place of shelter, till the rage
Of cruel men do like the wind
Exhaust itself and sink to rest :
Be Brother now to Brother joined !
Admit me in the equipage
Of your misfortunes, that at least,
Whatever fate remain behind,
I may bear witness in my breast
To your nobility of mind ! "

" Thou enemy, my bane and blight !
Oh ! bold to fight the Coward's fight
Against all good " — but why declare,
At length, the issue of a prayer
Which love had prompted, yielding scope
Too free to one bright moment's hope ? l
Suffice it that the Son, who strove
With fruitless effort to allay
That passion, prudently gave way ; 2

No injury, — may coma to you.

Though in your cause no part I bear,

Your indignation I can share ;

Am grieved this backward march to see,

How careless and disorderly !

I scorn your chieftains, Men who lead,

And yet want courage at their need ;

Then look at them with open eyes !

Deserve they farther sacrifice ?

My Father, &c." isio.

1 1836.

At length, the issue of this prayer?
Or how, from his depression raised,
The Father on his Son had gazed ; 1815.

2 1845.

Suffice it that the Son gave way,

Now strove that passion to allay, isis.

CANTO FOURTH. 143

Nor did he turn aside to prove
His Brothers' wisdom or their love —
But calmly from the spot withdrew ;
His best endeavours to renew,
Should e'er a kindlier time ensue. 1

CCant<r

Tis night : in silence looking down,
The Moon, from cloudless ether, sees 2
A Camp, and a beleaguered Town,
And Castle, like a stately crown
On the steep rocks of winding Tees ; —
And southward far, with moor between,
Hill-top, and flood, and forest green, 3
The bright Moon sees that valley small
Where Bylstone's old sequestered Hall
A venerable image yields
Of quiet to the neighbouring fields ;
While from one pillared chimney breathes
The smoke, and mounts in silver wreaths,4
— The courts are hushed ; — for timely sleep
The greyhounds to their kennel creep ;
The peacock in the broad ash tree

1 1836.

The like endeavours to renew,

Should e'er a kindlier time ensue. 1815.

1836.

From cloudless ether looking down,

The moon, this tranquil evening, sees

A Camp, &c. 1815.

3 1836.

with moors between,
Hill-tops, and floods, and forests green, isis.

4 1827.

The silver smoke, and mounts in wreaths, isis.

144 THE WHITE DOE.

Aloft is roosted for the night,
He who in proud prosperity
Of colours manifold and bright
Walked round, affronting the daylight ;
And higher still, above the bower
Where he is perched, from yon lone Tower
The hall-clock in the clear moonshine
With glittering finger points at nine.

Ah ! who could think that sadness here
Hath any sway ? or pain, or fear ?
A soft and lulling sound is heard
Of streams inaudible by day ;
The garden pool's dark surface, stirred
By the night insects in their play,
Breaks into dimples small and bright ;
A thousand, thousand rings of light
That shape themselves and disappear
Almost as soon as seen : — and lo !
Not distant far, the milk-white Doe —
The same who quietly was feeding l
On the green herb, and nothing heeding,
When Francis, uttering to the Maid 2
His last words in the yew-tree shade,

1815.

The same fair Creature who was nigh 1827.

1836 returns to text of 1815.

2 1836.

The same fair Creature which was nigh

Feeding in tranquillity,

When Francis uttered to the Maid isu

CANTO FOURTH. 145

Involved whate'er by love was brought

Out of his heart, or crossed his thought,

Or chance presented to his eye,

In one sad sweep of destiny — l

The same fair Creature, who hath found

Her way into forbidden ground ;

Where now — within this spacious plot

For pleasure made, a goodly spot,

With lawns and beds of flowers, and shades

Of trellis-work in long arcades,

And cirque and crescent framed by wall

Of close-clipt foliage green and tall,

Converging walks, and fountains gay,

And terraces in trim array —

Beneath yon cypress spiring high,

With pine and cedar spreading wide

Their darksome boughs on either side,

In open moonlight doth she lie ;

Happy as others of her kind,

That, far from human neighbourhood,

Eange unrestricted as the wind,

Through park, or chase, or savage wood.

But see the consecrated Maid
Emerging from a cedar shade
To open moonshine, where the Doe
Beneath the cypress-spire is laid ; 2

1 The last four lines not in edd. isis to 1332.

2 1836.

But where at this still hour is she,
The consecrated Emily ?
Even while I speak, behold the Maid
Emerging from the cedar shade
To open moonshine where the Doe
Beneath the cypress-spire is laid ; 1815.

IV. K

146 THE WHITE DOE.

Like a patch of April snow —

Upon a bed of herbage green,

Lingering in a woody glade

Or behind a rocky screen —

Lonely relic ! which, if seen

By the shepherd, is passed by

With an inattentive eya

Nor more regard doth She bestow

Upon the uncomplaining Doe *

Now couched at ease, thought oft this day

Not unperplexed nor free from pain,

When she had tried, and tried in vain,

Approaching in her gentle way,

To win some look of love, or gain

Encouragement to sport or play;

Attempts which still the heart-sick Maid

Rejected, or with slight repaid.2

Yet Emily is soothed ; — the breeze
Came fraught with kindly sympathies.
As she approached yon rustic Shed 3

1 In edd. 1815 to 1832, a paragraph ends at " Doe ! "

2 1836.

Yet the meek Creature was not free,

Erewhile, from some perplexity :

For thrice hath she approached, this day,

The thought-bewildered Emily ;

Endeavouring, in her gentle way,

Some smile or look of love to gain, —

Encouragement to sport or play ;

Attempts which by the unhappy Maid

Have all been slighted or gainsaid. 1815.

3 1836.

— O welcome to the viewless breeze !
'Tis fraught with acceptable feeling,
And instantaneous sympathies

CANTO FOURTH.

147

Hung with late-flowering woodbine, spread

Along the walls and overhead,

The fragrance of the breathing flowers

Revived l a memory of those hours

When here, in this remote alcove,

(While from the pendent woodbine came

Like odours, sweet as if the same)

A fondly-anxious Mother strove

To teach her salutary fears

And mysteries above her years.

Yes, she is soothed ; an Image faint,

And yet not faint — a presence bright

Returns to her — that blessed Saint 2

Who with mild looks and language mild

Instructed here her darling Child,

While yet a prattler on the knee,

To worship in simplicity

The invisible God, and take for guide

The faith reformed and purified.

'Tis flown — the Vision, and the sense
Of that beguiling influence ;
" But oh ! thou Angel from above,
Mute Spirit of maternal love,3

Into the Sufferer's bosom stealing ; —
Ere she hath reached yon rustic Shed

Yet ia she soothed ; the viewless breeze,
Comes fraught with kindlier sympathies :
Ere she hath reached yon rustic Shed.

Ere she had reached

1836.

1836.

1836.

Revives

— 'tis that bless'd Saint

Thou Spirit of maternal love,

1615.

1827
1832.
1815.
1815.
1815.

148 THE WHITE DOE.

That stood'st before my eyes, more clear

Than ghosts are fabled to appear

Sent upon embassies of fear ;

As thou thy presence hast to me

Vouchsafed, in radiant ministry

Descend on Francis ; nor forbear

To greet him with a voice, and say ; —

' If hope be a rejected stay,

Do thou, my Christian Son, beware

Of that most lamentable snare,

The self-reliance of despair ! '" l

Then from within the embowered retreat
Where she had found a grateful seat
Perturbed she issues. She will go !
Herself will follow to the war,
And clasp her Father's knees ; — ah, no !
She meets the insuperable bar,
The injunction by her Brother laid ;
His parting charge — but ill obeyed —
That interdicted all debate,
All prayer for this cause or for that ;
All efforts that would turn aside
The headstrong current of their fate :
Her duty is to stand and wait ;
In resignation to abide
The shock, AND FINALLY SECURE

O'ER PAIN AND GRIEF A TRIUMPH PURE.2
1 1836.

Descend on Francis : — through the air
Of this sad earth to him repair,
Speak to him with a voice, and say,
" That he must cast despair away ! "

2 Italics and capitals first given in ed. 1820.

CANTO FOURTH.

— She feels it, and her pangs are checked.1

But now, as silently she paced

The turf, and thought by thought was chased,

Came One who, with sedate respect,

Approached, and, greeting her, thus spake ;2

" An old man's privilege I take :

Dark is the time — a woeful day !

Dear daughter of affliction, say

How can I serve you ? point the way."

" Eights have you, and may well be bold :
You with my Father have grown old
In friendship — strive — for his sake go —
Turn from us all the coming woe : 3
This would I beg ; but on my mind
A passive stillness is enjoined
On you, if room for mortal aid
Be left, is no restriction laid ; 4
You not forbidden to recline
With hope upon the Will divine."

149

1836.

1836.

1830.

1830.

— She knows, she feels it, and is cheered ;

At least her present pangs are checked. 1815.

— And now an ancient Man appeared,

Approaching her with grave respect.

Down the smooth walk which then she trod,

He paced along the silent sod,

And greeting her thus gently spake, 1815.

But now an ancient . . . 1827.

In friendship ; — go — from him — from me —

Strive to avert this misery. 1815.

— If prudence offer help or aid,

On you is no restriction laid ; 1815.

150 THE WHITE DOE.

" Hope," said the old Man, " must abide
With all of us, whate'er betide.1
In Craven's Wilds is many a den,
To shelter persecuted men :
Far under ground is many a cave,
Where they might lie as in the grave,
Until this storm hath ceased to rave : 2
Or let them cross the River Tweed,
And be at once from peril freed ! "

" Ah tempt me not ! " she faintly sighed ;
" I will not counsel nor exhort,
With my condition satisfied ;
But you, at least, may make report
Of what befals ; — be this your task —
This may be done ; — 'tis all I ask ! "

She spake — and from the Lady's sight
The Sire, unconscious of his age,
Departed promptly as a Page
Bound on some errand of delight.
— The noble Francis — wise as brave,
Thought he, may want not skill to save.3
With hopes in tenderness concealed,
Unarmed he followed to the field ;
Him will I seek : the insurgent Powers
Are now besieging Barnard's Towers, —
" Grant that the moon which shines this night
May guide them in a prudent flight ! "

1 1836.

" Hope," said the Sufferer's zealous Friend,

" Must not forsake us till the end. — isis.

1820.

had ceased . . . 1815.

J836.

may have the skill to save : 1815.

CANTO FOURTH. 151

But quick the turns of chance and change,
And knowledge has a narrow range ;
Whence idle fears, and needless pain,
And wishes blind, and efforts vain. —
The Moon may shine, but cannot be
Their guide in flight — already she l
Hath witnessed their captivity.
She saw the desperate assault
Upon that hostile castle made ; —
But dark and dismal is the vault
Where Norton and his sons are laid !
Disastrous issue ! — he had said
" This night yon faithless Towers must yield,2
Or we for ever quit the field.
— Neville is utterly dismayed,
For promise fails of Howard's aid ;
And Dacre to our call replies
That he is unprepared to rise.
My heart is sick ; — this weary pause
Must needs be fatal to our cause.3
The breach is open — on the wall,
This night the Banner shall be planted ! "
— 'Twas done : his Sons were with him — all ;
They belt him round with hearts undaunted,
And others follow ; — Sire and Son
Leap down into the court ; — " 'Tis won " —
They shout aloud — but Heaven decreed
That with their joyful shout should close

1 1836.

Their flight the fair Moon may not see ;

For, from mid-heaven, already she 1815.

2 1836.

This night yon haughty Towers . 1815.

3 1836.

to the cause. 1815.

152 THE WHITE DOE.

The triumph of a desperate deed l
Which struck with terror friends and foes
The friend shrinks back — the foe recoils
From Norton and his filial band ;
But they, now caught within the toils,
Against a thousand cannot stand ; —
The foe from numbers courage drew,
And overpowered that gallant few.
" A rescue for the Standard ! " cried
The Father from within the walls ;
But, see, the sacred Standard falls ! —
Confusion through the Camp spread wide : 2
Some fled ; and some their fears detained :
But ere the Moon had sunk to rest
In her pale chambers of the west
Of that rash levy nought remained.

totxx Jifth.

HIGH on a point of rugged ground

Among the wastes of Eylstone Fell

Above the loftiest ridge or mound

Where foresters or shepherds dwell,

An edifice of warlike frame

Stands single — Norton Tower its name — *

1 183fi.

They shout aloud — but Heaven decreed

Another close

To that brave deed
Which struck with terror friends and foes ! 1815.

2 1820.

. . . . . spreads wide : 1815.

* " It is so called to this day, and is thus described by Dr Whitaker.
' Rylstone Fell yet exhibits a monument of the old warfare between the
Nortons and Cliffords. On a point of very high ground, commanding an

CANTO FIFTH. 153

It fronts all quarters and looks round
O'er path and road, and plain and dell,
Dark moor, and gleam of pool and stream
Upon a prospect without bound.

The summit of this bold ascent —
Though bleak and bare, and seldom free l
As Pendle-hill or Pennygent
From wind, or frost, or vapours wet —
Had often heard the sound of glee
When there the youthful Nortons met,
To practice games and archery :
How proud and happy they ! the crowd
Of Lookers-on how pleased and proud !
And from the scorching noon-tide sun,2
From showers, or when the prize was won,
They to the Tower withdrew, and there 3
Would mirth run round, with generous fare ;
And the stern old Lord of Eylstone-hall,
Was happiest, proudest, of them all !4

1 1820.

and as seldom free 1815.

2 1820.

And from the heat of the noon-tide sun, 1815.

3 1836.

They to the "Watch-tower did repair,

Commodious Pleasure-house ! and there 1815.

4 1836.

He was the proudest of them all ! 1815.

immense prospect, and protected by two deep -ravines, are the remains of
a square tower, expressly said by Dodsworth to have been built by
Richard Norton. The walls are of strong grout-work, about four feet
thick. It seems to have been three stories high. Breaches have been
industriously made in all the sides, almost to the ground, to render it
untenable.

' But Norton Tower was probably a sort of pleasure-house in summer,
as there are, adjoining to it, several large mounds (two of them are pretty
entire), of which no other account can be given than that they were butts
for large companies of archers.

' The place is savagely wild, and admirably adapted to the uses of a
watch-tower.'"— W. W. 1815.

154 THE WHITE DOE.

But now, his Child, with anguish pale,
Upon the height walks to and fro ;
'Tis well that she hath heard the tale,
Eeceived the bitterness of woe : l
For she had hoped, had hoped and feared,
Such rights did feeble nature claim ;
And oft her steps had hither steered,
Though not unconscious of self- blame ;
For she her brother's charge revered,
His farewell words ; and by the same,
Yea by her brother's very name,
Had, in her solitude, been cheered.

Beside the lonely watch-tower stood 2
That grey-haired Man of gentle blood,
Who with her Father had grown old
In friendship ; rival hunters they,
And fellow warriors in their day :
To Rylstone he the tidings brought ;
Then on this height the Maid had sought,

1 In the edition of isis these lines follow " the bitterness of
woe" : —

Dead are they, they were doomed to die ;

The Sons and Father all are dead,

All dead save one ; and Emily

No more shall seek this Watch-tower high,

To look far forth with anxious eye, —

She is relieved from hope and dread,

Though suffering in extremity.

* In edd. isis to 1832 the following precedes the line beginning " That
grey-haired man " : —

She turned to him, who with his eye
Was watching her while on the height
She sate, or wandered restlessly,
O'erburdened by her sorrow's weight ;
To him who this dire news had told,
And now beside the Mourner stood ;

CANTO FIFTH. 155

And, gently as he could, had told
The end of that dire Tragedy,
Which it had been his lot to see.1

To him the Lady turned ; " You said
That Francis lives, he is not dead ?"

" Your noble brother hath been spared ;
To take his life they have not dared ;
On him and on his high endeavour
The light of praise shall shine for ever !
Nor did he (such Heaven's will) in vain
His solitary course maintain ;
Not vainly struggled in the might
Of duty, seeing with clear sight ;
He was their comfort to the last,
Their joy till every pang was past.

I witnessed when to York they came —
What, Lady, if their feet were tied ;
They might deserve a good Man's blame ;
But marks of infamy and shame —
These were their triumph, these their pride ;
Nor wanted 'mid the pressing crowd
Deep feeling, that found utterance loud,2
' Lo, Francis comes,' there were who cried,3
' A Prisoner once, but now set free !
'Tis well, for he the worst defied

1 1836.

Then on this place the Maid had sought :

And told, as gently as could be,

The end of that sad Tragedy,

Which it had been his lot to see. 1815.

2 The two last lines not in edd. 1815 to 1320.

1S27.

the people cried, 1815.

156 THE WHITE DOE.

Through force of natural piety ; l

He rose not in this quarrel, he,

For concord's sake and England's good,

Suit to his Brothers often made

With tears, and of his Father prayed —

And when he had in vain withstood

Their purpose — then did he divide,2

He parted from them ; but at their side

Now walks in unanimity.

Then peace to cruelty and scorn,

While to the prison they are borne,

Peace, peace to all indignity !'

And so in Prison were they laid —
Oh hear me, hear me, gentle Maid,
For I am come with power to bless,
By scattering gleams, through your distress,3
.Of a redeeming happiness.
Me did a reverent pity move
And privilege of ancient love ;
And, in your service, making bold,
Entrance I gained to that strong-hold.4

1 1836.

For sake of natural piety ; 1815

2 1836.

He rose not in this quarrel, he

His Father and his Brothers wooed,

Both for their own and Country's good,

To rest in peace — he did divide, 1815.

3 1820. .

To scatter gleams through your distress, ms.

4 1836.

And privilege of ancient love,

But most, compassion for your fate,

Lady ! for your forlorn estate,

Me did these move, and I made bold,

And entrance gained to that strong-hold. 1815.

And privilege of ancient love ;

And, in your service, I made bold —

And entrance gained to that strong-hold. 1S20.

CANTO FIFTH. 157

Your Father gave me cordial greeting ;
But to his purposes, that burned
Within him, instantly returned :
He was commanding and entreating,
And said — ' We need not stop, my Son !
Thoughts press, and time is hurrying on.' l
And so to Francis he renewed
His words, more calmly thus pursued.

' Might this our enterprise have sped,
Change wide and deep the Land had seen,
A renovation from the dead,
A spring-tide of immortal green :
The darksome altars would have blazed
Like stars when clouds are rolled away ;
Salvation to all eyes that gazed,
Once more the Eood had been upraised
To spread its arms, and stand for aye.
Then, then — had I survived to see
New life in Bolton Priory ;
The voice restored, the eye of Truth
Ee-opened that inspired my youth ;
To see her in her pomp arrayed — 2
This Banner (for such vow I made)
Should on the consecrated breast
Of that same Temple have found rest :
I would myself have hung it high,
Fit offering of glad victory !s

1 1836.

And said, " We need not stop, my Son !

But I will end what is begun ;

'Tis matter which I do not fear

To entrust to any living ear." 1815.

2 1820.

Had seen her in her pomp arrayed — 1815.

3 1836.

Glad offering of glad victory ! 1&5.

158 THE WHITE DOE.

A shadow of such thought remains
To cheer this sad and pensive time ;
A solemn fancy yet sustains
One feeble Being — bids me climb
Even to the last — one effort more
To attest my Faith, if not restore.

' Hear then,' said he, ' while I impart,
My Son, the last wish of my heart.
The Banner strive thou to regain ;
And, if the endeavour prove not vain,1
Bear it — to whom if not to thee
Shall I this lonely thought consign ? —
Bear it to Bolton Priory,
And lay it on Saint Mary's shrine ;
To wither in the sun and breeze
'Mid those decaying sanctities.
There let at least the gift be laid,
The testimony there displayed ;
Bold proof that with no selfish aim,
But for lost Faith and Christ's dear name,
I helmeted a brow though white,
And took a place in all men's sight ;
Yea offered up this noble Brood,2
This fair unrivalled Brotherhood,
And turned away from thee, my Son !
And left — but be the rest unsaid,
The name untouched, the tear unshed ; —
My wish is known, and I have done :
Now promise, grant this one request,
This dying prayer, and be thou blest !'

1 1836.

And, if the endeavour be not vain,

2 1836.

Yea, offered up this beauteous brood,

CANTO FIFTH. 159

Then Francis answered — ' Trust thy Son,
For, with God's will, it shall be done !' 1

The pledge obtained, the solemn word 2
Thus scarcely given, a noise was heard,
And Officers appeared in state
To lead the prisoners to their fate.
They rose, oh ! wherefore should I fear
To tell, or, Lady, you to hear ?
They rose — embraces none were given —
They stood like trees when earth and heaven
Are calm ; they knew each other's worth,
And reverently the Band went forth.
They met, when they had reached the door,
One with profane and harsh intent
Placed there — that he might go before
And, with that rueful Banner borne
Aloft in sign of taunting scorn,
Conduct them to their punishment : 3
So cruel Sussex, unrestrained
By human feeling, had ordained.
The unhappy Banner Francis saw,
And, with a look of calm command,
Inspiring universal awe,
He took it from the soldier's hand ;

1 1836.

Then Francis answered fervently,

" If God so will, the same shall be." isis.

2 1836.

Immediately, this solemn word 1815.

3 1836.

They met, when they had reached the door,

The Banner which a Soldier bore,

One marshalled thus with base intent

That he in scorn might go before,

And, holding up this monument,

Conduct them to their punishment ; 1815.

160 THE WHITE DOE.

And all the people that stood round 1
Confirmed the deed, in peace profound.
— High transport did the Father shed
Upon his Son — and they were led,
Led on, and yielded up their breath ;
Together died, a happy death ! —
But Francis, soon as he had braved
That insult, and the Banner saved,
Athwart the unresisting tide 2
Of the spectators occupied
In admiration or dismay,
Bore instantly 3 his Charge away."

These things, which thus had in the sight
And hearing passed of Him who stood
With Emily, on the Watch-tower height,
In Eylstone's woeful neighbourhood,
He told ; and oftentimes with voice
Of power to comfort or rejoice ; 4
For deepest sorrows that aspire
Go high, no transport ever higher.
" Yes — God is rich in mercy," said
The old Man to the silent Maid.
" Yet, Lady ! shines, through this black night,
One star of aspect heavenly bright ; 5

1 1836.

that were round isis.

2 1836.

This insult, and the Banner saved,

That moment from among the tide isis.

3 18S6.

Bore unobserved his charge . , . 1815.

4 1820.

Of power to encourage or rejoice ; 1815.

6 1836.

" Yet, yet in this affliction," said

The old Man to the silent Maid,

" Yet, Lady ! heaven is good — the night

Shows yet a Star which is most bright ; isis.

CANTO SIXTH.

Your Brother lives — he lives — is come
Perhaps already to his home ;
Then let us leave this dreary place."
She yielded, and with gentle pace,
Though without one uplifted look,
To Eylstone-hall her way she took.

161

(Sixth.

WHY comes not Francis ? — From the doleful City

He fled, — and, in his flight, could hear

The death-sounds of the Minster-bell : l

That sullen stroke pronounced farewell

To Marmaduke, cut off" from pity !

To Ambrose that ! and then a knell

For him, the sweet half -opened Flower !

For all — all dying in one hour !

— Why comes not Francis ? Thoughts of love

Should bear him to his Sister dear

With the fleet motion of a dove ; 2

Yea, like a heavenly messenger

Of speediest wing, should he appear.8

1 1836.

"Why comes not Francia ? — Joyful cheer

In that parental gratulation,

And glow of righteous indignation,

Went with him from the doleful City : —

He fled — yet in his flight could hear

The death-sound of the Minster-bell ; 1815.

2 1836.

With motion fleet as winged Dove ; 1815.

as a winged Dove ; 1832.

8 1836.

Messenger,
An Angel-guest should he appear. 1815.

IV. L

162 THE WHITE DOE.

Why comes he not ? — for westward fast
Along the plain of York he past ;
Reckless of what impels or leads,
Unchecked he hurries on ; — nor heeds
The sorrow, through the Villages,
Spread by triumphant cruelties
Of vengeful military force,1
And punishment without remorse.
He marked not, heard not, as he fled ;
All but the suffering heart was dead
For him abandoned to blank awe,
To vacancy, and horror strong :
And the first object which he saw,2
With conscious sight, as he swept along —
It was the Banner in his hand !
He felt — and made a sudden stand.

1 1836.

Why comes he not ? For westward fast

Along the plain of York he -passed ;

The Banner-staff was in his hand,

The Imagery concealed from sight,

And cross the expanse, in open flight,

Reckless of what impels or leads,

Unchecked he hurries on ; — nor heeds

The sorrow of the Villages ;

From the triumphant cruelties

Of vengeful military force, 1815.

Spread by triumphant cruelties 1827.

The sorrow through the villages, 1832.

1827.

And punishment without remorse,

Unchecked he journies — under law

Of inward occupation strong ;

And the first 1815.

CANTO SIXTH.

163

He looked about like one betrayed :
What hath he done ? what promise made ?
O weak, weak moment ! to what end
Can such a vain oblation tend,
And he the Bearer ? — Can he go
Carrying this instrument of woe,
And find, find anywhere, a right
To excuse him in his Country's sight ?
No ; will not all men deem the change
A downward course, perverse and strange ?
Here is it ; — but how ? when ? must she,
The unoffending Emily,
Again this piteous object see ?

Such conflict long did he maintain,
Nor liberty nor rest could gain : l
His own life into danger brought
By this sad burden — even that thought,
Exciting self -suspicion strong,
Swayed the brave man to his wrong.2
And how — unless it were the sense
Of all- disposing Providence,
Its will unquestionably shown —
How has the Banner clung so fast
To a palsied and unconscious hand ;
Clung to the hand to which it passed
Without impediment ? And why
But that Heaven's purpose might be known

1 1836.

Such conflict long did he mainta n
"Within himself, and found no rest ;
Calm liberty he could not gain ;
And yet the service was unblessed.

1320.

Raised self-suspicion which was strong,
Swaying the brave Man to his wrong.

1815.

1S15.

164 THE WHITE DOE.

Doth now no hindrance meet his eye,

No intervention, to withstand

Fulfilment of a Father's prayer

Breathed to a Son forgiven, and blest

When all resentments were at rest,

And life in death laid the heart bare ? —

Then, like a spectre sweeping by,

Bushed through his mind the prophecy

Of utter desolation made

To Emily in the yew-tree shade :

He sighed, submitting will and power

To the stern embrace of that grasping hour.1

" No choice is left, the deed is mine —

Dead are they, dead ! — and I will go,

And, for their sakes, come weal or woe,

Will lay the Eelic on the shrine."

So forward with a steady will
He went, and traversed plain and hill :
And up the vale of Wharf his way
Pursued ; — and, at the dawn of day,

1836.

Providence,

Its will intelligibly shewn,
Finds he the Banner in his hand,
Without a thought to such intent,
Or conscious effort of his own 1
And no obstruction to prevent
His Father's wish and last command !
And, thus beset, he heaved a sigh ;
Remembering his own prophecy
Of utter desolation, made
To Emily in the yew-tree shade :
He sighed, submitting to the power,
The might of that prophetic hour. 1815.

CANTO SIXTH. 165

'Attained a summit whence his eyes *

Could see the Tower of Bolton rise.

There Francis for a moment's space

Made halt — but hark ! a noise behind

Of horsemen at an eager pace !

He heard, and with misgiving mind.

— 'Tis Sir George Bowes who leads the Band :

They come, by cruel Sussex sent ;

Who, when the Nortons from the hand

Of death had drunk their punishment,

Bethought him, angry and ashamed,

How Francis, with the Banner claimed

As his own charge, had disappeared,2

By all the standers-by revered.

His whole bold carriage (which had quelled

Thus far the Opposer, and repelled

All censure, enterprise so bright

That even bad men had vainly striven

Against that overcoming light)

Was then reviewed, and prompt word given,

That to what place soever fled

He should be seized, alive or dead.

The troop of horse have gained the height
Where Francis stood in open sight
They hem him round — " Behold the proof,"
They cried, " the Ensign in his hand ! 8

1 1836.

Pursued ; and, on the second day,

He reached a summit whence his eyes 1815.

2 1836.

How Francis had the Banner claimed,

And with that charge had disappeared ; 1815.

1836.

Behold the Ensign in his hand !" isis.

166 THE WHITE DOE.

He did not arm, he walked aloof !
For why ? — to save his Father's land ; —
Worst Traitor of them all is he,
A Traitor dark and cowardly ! "

" I am no Traitor," Francis said,
" Though this unhappy freight I bear ;
And must not part with. But beware ; —
Err not, by hasty zeal misled,
Nor do a suffering Spirit wrong,1
Whose self-reproaches are too strong ! "
At this he from the beaten road
Retreated towards a brake of thorn,
That like 2 a place of vantage showed ;
And there stood bravely, though forlorn.
In self-defence with warlike brow 3
He stood, — nor weaponless was now ;
He from a Soldier's hand had snatched
A spear, — and, so protected, watched
The Assailants, turning round and round ;
But from behind with treacherous wound
A Spearman brought him to the Ground.
The guardian lance, as Francis fell,
Dropped from him ; but his other hand
The Banner clenched ; till, from out the Band,
One, the most eager for the prize,
Rushed in ; and — while, 0 grief to tell !
A glimering sense still left, with eyes

1 1836.

freight I bear ;

It weakens me, my heart hath bled
Till it is weak — but you beware,
Nor do a suffering Spirit wrong, 1815.

2 1838.

Which like .... 1815.

8 1820

with a Warrior's brow 1815.

CANTO SIXTH.

Unclosed the noble Francis lay —

Seized it, as hunters seize their prey ; l

But not before the warm life-blood

Had tinged more deeply, as it flowed,

The wounds the broidered Banner showed,

Thy fatal work, 0 Maiden, innocent as good ! 2

Proudly the Horsemen bore away
The Standard ; and where Francis lay
There was he left alone, unwept,
And for two days unnoticed slept.
For at that time bewildering fear
Possessed the country, far and near ;
But, on the third day, passing by,
One of the Norton Tenantry
Espied the uncovered Corse ; the Man

167

1836.

1845.

had snatched

A spear, — and with his eyes he watched
Their motions, turning round and round : —
His weaker hand the Banner held ;
And straight by savage zeal impelled
Forth rushed a Pikeman, as if he,
Not without harsh indignity,
"Would seize the same : — instinctively —
To smite the Offender — with his lance
Did Francis from the brake advance ;
But, from behind, a treacherous wound
Unfeeling, brought him to the ground,
A mortal stroke : — oh, grief to tell !
Thus, thus, the noble Francis fell :
There did he lie of breath forsaken ;
The Banner from his grasp was taken,
And borne exultingly away ;
And the body was left on the ground where it lay. 1815.

But not before the warm life-blood

Had tinged with searching overflow,

More deeply tinged the embroidered show

Of His whose side was pierced upon the Rood. isse.

168 THE WHITE DOE.

Shrunk as he recognised the face,
And to the nearest homesteads ran
And called the people to the place.
— How desolate is Kylstone-hall !
This was the instant thought of all ;
And if the lonely Lady there
Should be ; to her they cannot bear
This weight of anguish and despair.
So, when upon sad thoughts had prest
Thoughts sadder still, they deemed it best
That, if the Priest should yield assent
And no one hinder their intent,1
Then, they, for Christian pity's sake,
In holy ground a grave would make ;
And straightway buried he should be
In the Church-yard of the Priory.

1 1836.

Two days, as many nights, he slept

Alone, unnoticed, and unwept ;

For at that time distress and fear

Possessed the Country far and near ;

The third day, One, who chanced to pass,

Beheld him stretched upon the grass. •

A gentle Forester was he,

And of the Norton Tenantry ;

And he had heard that by a train

Of Horsemen Francis had been slain.

Much was he troubled — for the Man

Hath recognised his pallid face ;

And to the nearest Huts he ran,

And called the People to the place.

— How desolate is Rylstone-hall !

Such was the instant thought of all ;

And if the lonely Lady there

Should be, this sight she cannot bear !

Such thought the Forester expressed,

And all were swayed, and deemed it best,

That, if the Priest should yield assent

And join himself to their intent, 1815.

CANTO SIXTH. 169

Apart, some little space, was made
The grave where Francis must be laid.
In no confusion or neglect
This did they, — but in pure respect
That he was born of gentle blood ;
And that there was no neighbourhood
Of kindred for him in that ground :
So to the Church-yard they are bound,
Bearing the body on a bier ;
And psalms they sing — a holy sound
That hill and vale with sadness hear.1

But Emily hath raised her head,
And is again disquieted ;
She must behold ! — so many gone,
Where is the solitary One ?
And forth from Kylstone-hall stepped she, —
To seek her Brother forth she went,
And tremblingly her course she bent
Towards Bolton's ruined Priory.
She comes, and in the vale hath heard
The funeral dirge ; — she sees the knot
Of people, sees them in one spot —
And darting like a wounded bird
She reached the grave, and with her breast
Upon the ground received the rest, —
The consummation, the whole ruth
And sorrow of this final truth !

1843.

Bearing the Body on a bier

In decency and humble cheer ;

And psalms are sung with holy sound. 1815.

And psalms they sung . . 1836.

170 THE WHITE DOE.

(JTantxx (Setenth.

' Powers there are

That touch each other to the quick — in modes
Which the gross world no sense hath to perceive,
No soul to dream of.' *

TtfOU Spirit, whose angelic hand
Was to the harp a strong command,
Called the submissive strings to wake
In glory for this Maiden's sake,
Say, Spirit ! whither hath she fled
To hide her poor afflicted head ?
What mighty forest in its gloom
Enfolds her ? — is a rifted tomb
Within the wilderness her seat ?
Some island which the wild waves beat —
Is that the Sufferer's last retreat ?
Or some aspiring rock, that sh'rouds
Its perilous front in mists and clouds ?
High-climbing rock, low sunless dale,1
Sea, desert, what do these avail ?
Oh take her anguish and her fears
Into a deep recess of years ! 2

'Tis done ; — despoil and desolation
O'er Eylstone's fair domain have blown;t

1 1820.

deep sunless dale, 1815.

2 1820.

Into a calm recess of years ! 1815.

* This extract ("Powers there are," &c.) was first prefixed to canto
seventh, in the edition of 1836. — ED.

t " ' After the attainder of Kichard Norton, his estates were forfeited to
the crown, where they remained* till the 2d or 3d of James ; they were
then granted to Francis Earl of Cumberland.' From an accurate survey
made at that time, several particulars have been extracted by Dr W. It
appears that the mansion-house was then in decay. ' Immediately ad-
joining is a close, called the Vivery, so called undoubtedly from the French
Vivier, or modern Latin Viverium ; for there are near the house large

CANTO SEVENTH. 17 1

Pools, terraces, and walks are sown *
With weeds ; the bowers are overthrown,
Or have given way to slow mutation,
While, in their ancient habitation
The Norton name hath been unknown.
The lordly Mansion of its pride
Is stripped ; the ravage hath spread wide
Through park and field, a perishing
That mocks the gladness of the Spring !
And, with this silent gloom agreeing,
Appears a joyless human Being,2
Of aspect such as if the waste
Were under her dominion placed.
Upon a primrose bank, her throne
Of quietness, she sits alone ; 3
Among the ruins of a wood,
Erewhile a covert bright and green,
And where full many a brave tree stood,
That used to spread its boughs, and ring
With the sweet bird's carolling.
Behold her, like a virgin Queen,
Neglecting in imperial state

1 1836.

The walks and pools neglect hath sown 1815.

2 1836.

There is a joyless human Being, 1815.

3 1836. Edd. 1815-1832, after "wood" have the line

There seated may this maid be seen.

remains of a pleasure-ground, such as were introduced in the earlier part
of Elizabeth's time, with topiary works, fish-ponds, an island, &c. The
whole township was ranged by an hundred and thirty red deer, the pro-
perty of the Lord, which, together with the wood, had, after the attainder
of Mr Norton, been committed to Sir Stephen Tempest. The wood, it
seems, had been abandoned to depredations, before which time it appears
that the neighbourhood must have exhibited a forest-like and sylvan scene.
In this survey, among the old tenants, is mentioned one Richard Kitchen,
butler to Mr Norton, who rose in rebellion with his master, and was ex -
ecuted at Ripon.'"— W.W., 1815.

172 THE WHITE DOE.

These outward images of fate,

And carrying inward a serene

And perfect sway, through many a thought

Of chance and change, that hath been brought

To the subjection of a holy,

Though stern and rigorous, melancholy !

The like authority, with grace

Of awfulness, is in her face, —

There hath she fixed it ; yet it seems

To o'ershadow by no native right

That face, which cannot lose the gleams,

Lose utterly the tender gleams,

Of gentleness and meek delight,

And loving-kindness ever bright :

Such is her sovereign mien : — her dress

(A vest with woollen cincture tied,

A hood of mountain-wool undyed)

Is homely, — fashioned to express

A wandering Pilgrim's humbleness.

And she hath wandered, long and far,
Beneath the light of sun and star ;
Hath roamed in trouble and in grief,
Driven forward like a withered leaf,
Yea like a ship at random blown
To distant places and unknown.
But now she dares to seek a haven
Among her native wilds of Craven ;
Hath seen again her Father's roof,
And put her fortitude to proof ;
The mighty sorrow hath been borne,
And she is thoroughly forlorn :
Her soul doth in itself stand fast,
Sustained by memory of the past

CANTO SEVENTH. 173

And strength of Eeason ; held above
The infirmities of mortal love ;
Undaunted, lofty, calm, and stable,
And awfully impenetrable.

And so — beneath a mouldered tree,
A self-surviving leafless oak
By unregarded age from stroke
Of ravage saved — sate Emily.
There did she rest, with head reclined,
Herself most like a stately flower,
(Such have I seen) whom chance of birth
Hath separated from its kind,
To live and die in a shady bower,
Single on the gladsome earth.

When, with a noise like distant thunder,
A troop of deer came sweeping by ;
And, suddenly, behold a wonder !
For One, among those rushing deer,1
A single One, in mid career
Hath stopped, and fixed her large full eye 2
Upon the Lady Emily ;
A Doe most beautiful, clear-white,
A radiant creature, silver-bright !

Thus checked, a little while it stayed ;
A little thoughtful pause it made ;
And then advanced with stealth-like pace,
Drew softly near her, and more near —
Looked round — but saw no cause for fear ;

1 1836.

For, of that band of rushing deer. isis.

2 1836.

its large full eye isis.

his . . . 1832.

174 . THE WHITE DOE.

So to her feet the Creature came,1
And laid its head upon her knee,
And looked into the Lady's face,
A look of pure benignity,
And fond unclouded memory.
It is, thought Emily, the same,
The very Doe of other years ! —
The pleading look the Lady viewed,
And, by her gushing thoughts subdued,
She melted into tears —
A flood of tears, that flowed apace,
Upon the happy Creature's face.

Oh, moment ever blest ! 0 Pair
Beloved of Heaven, Heaven's chosen care,2
This was for you a precious greeting ;
And may it prove a fruitful meeting !3
Joined are they, and the sylvan Doe
Can she depart ? can she forego
The Lady, once her playful peer,
And now her sainted Mistress dear ?
And will not Emily receive
This lovely chronicler of things
Long past, delights and sorrowings ?
Lone Sufferer ! will not she believe

1 1836.

Drew softly near her — and more near,

Stopped once again ; — but, as no trace

Was found of anything to fear,

Even to her feet the Creature came, isis.

2 1836.

. . . . heaven's choicest care ! 1815.

3 1830.

For both a bounteous, fruitful meeting. isis.

CANTO SEVENTH. 175

The promise in that speaking face ;

And welcome, as a gift of grace,1

The saddest thought the Creature brings ?2

That day, the first of a re-union
Which was to teem with high communion,
That day of balmy April weather,
They tarried in the wood together.
And when, ere fall of evening dew,
She from her sylvan haunt withdrew,3
The White Doe tracked witli faithful pace
The Lady to her dwelling-place ;
That nook where, on paternal ground,
A habitation she had found,
The Master of whose humble board
Once owned her Father for his Lord ;
A hut, by tufted trees defended,
Where Rylstone brook with Wharf is blended.

When Emily by morning light
Went forth, the Doe stood there in sight.4
She shrunk : — with one frail shock of pain
Eeceived and followed by a prayer,
She saw the Creature once again;5
Shun will she not, she feels, will bear ; —
But, wheresoever she looked round,
All now was trouble-haunted ground ;

1 1336.

And take this gift of Heaven with grace ? isis.

2 This line added in 1836.

3 1836.

She from this sylvan haunt . . isis.

* 1836.

. . . the Doe was there in sight. isis.

5 1836.

Did she behold — saw once again ; 1815.

176 THE WHITE DOE.

And therefore now she deems it good

Once more this restless neighbourhood

To leave.1 Unwooed, yet underbidden,

The White Doe followed up the vale,

Up to another cottage, hidden

In the deep fork of Amerdale ;*

And there may Emily restore

Herself, in spots unseen before.

— Why tell of mossy rock, or tree,

By lurking Dernbrook's pathless side,

Haunts of a stregthening amity

That calmed her, cheered, and fortified ?

For she hath ventured now to read

Of time, and place, and thought, and deed —

Endless history that lies

In her silent Follower's eyes ;

Who with a power like human reason

Discerns the favourable season,

Skilled to approach or to retire, —

From looks conceiving her desire ;

From look, deportment, voice, or mien,

That vary to the heart within.

If she too passionately wreathed 2

Her arms, or over-deeply breathed,

1 1836.

So doth the sufferer deem it good

Even once again this neighbourhood

To leave 1S15.

2 1827.

. . . passionately writhed isis.

* " ' At the extremity of the parish of Burnsal, the valley of Wharf forks
off into two great branches, one of which retains the name of Wharfdale to
the source of the river ; the other is usually called Littondale, but more
anciently and properly Amerdale. Dern-brook, which runs along an ob-
scure valley from the N.W. , is derived from a Teutonic word, signifying
concealment.' — Dr WHITAKER." — W. W., 1815.

CANTO SEVENTH. 177

Walked quick or slowly, every mood
In its degree was understood ;
Then well may their accord be true,
And kindliest intercourse ensue.

— Oh ! surely 'twas a gentle rousing
When she by sudden glimpse espied
The White Doe on the mountain browsing,
Or in the meadow wandered wide !
How pleased, when down the Straggler sank
Beside her, on some sunny bank !
How soothed, when in thick bower enclosed,
They, like a nested pair, reposed !
Fair Vision ! when it crossed the Maid
Within some rocky cavern laid,
The dark cave's portal gliding by,
White as whitest cloud on high l
Floating through the azure sky.2
— What now is left for pain or fear ?
That Presence, dearer and more dear,
While they, side by side, were straying,
And the Shepherd's pipe was playing,
Did now a very gladness yield
At morning to the dewy field,3
And with a deeper peace endued
The hour of moonliht solitude.

1 1827.

White as the whitest 1815.

2 1815.

an azure sky. 1827.

1836 returns to text of isis.

3 1836.

Did now a very gladness yield

At morning to the dewy field,

"While they side by side were straying,

And the Shepherd's pipe was playing ; IRIS.

IV. M

178 THE WHITE DOE.

With her Companion, in such frame
Of mind, to Eylstone back she came ;
And, ranging through the wasted groves,1
Eeceived the memory of old loves,
Undisturbed and undistrest,
Into a soul which now was blest
With a soft spring-day of holy,
Mild, and grateful, melancholy : 2
Not sunless gloom or unenlightened,
But by tender fancies brightened.

When the bells of Eylstone played
Their sabbath music — ' d>ob us aj)to ! ' *
That was the sound they seemed to speak ;
Inscriptive legend which I ween
May on those holy bells be seen,
That legend and her Grandsire's name ;
And oftentimes the Lady meek
Had in her childhood read the same ;
Words which she slighted at that day ;
But now, when such sad change was wrought,
And of that lonely name she thought —
The bells of Eylstone seemed to say,
While she sate listening in the shade,
With vocal music, ' (iob us agb* ; '
And all the hills were glad to bear
Their part in this effectual prayer.

Nor lacked she Eeason's firmest power ;
But with the White Doe at her side

1 1836.

And, wandering through . . . 1S15.

2 1S45.

Mild, delicious, melancholy : 1815.

* On one of the bells of Rylstone church, which seems co-eval with the
building of the tower, is this cypher, $. ff,. for John Norton, and the
motto, " (Sob ns agbr." — W.W., 1815.

i

CANTO SEVENTH.

Up would she climb to Norton Tower,

And thence look round her far and wide,

Her fate there measuring ; — all is stilled, —

The weak One hath subdued her heart ; l

Behold the prophecy fulfilled,

Fulfilled, and she sustains her part !

But here her Brother's words have failed :

Here hath a milder doom prevailed ;

That she, of him and all bereft,

Hath yet this faithful Partner left

This one Associate that disproves 2

His words, remains for her, and loves.

If tears are shed, they do not fall

For loss of him — for one, or all ;

Yet, sometimes, sometimes doth she weep

Moved gently in her soul's soft sleep ;

A few tears down her cheek descend

For this her last and living Friend.

Bless, tender Hearts, their mutual lot,
And bless for both this savage spot ;
Which Emily doth sacred hold
For reasons dear and manifold —
Here hath she, here before her sight,
Close to the summit of this height,
The grassy rock-encircled Pound *
In which the Creature first was found.

179

1836.

1836.

Up doth she climb to Norton Tower,
And thence looks round her far and wide.
Her fate there measures, — all is stilled, —
The feeble hath subdued her heart ;

This single Creature that disproves

1815.
1815

* Which is thus described by Dr Whitaker : — "On the plain summit of
the hill are the foundations of a strong wall, stretching from the S. VV. to

180 THE WHITE DOE.

So beautiful the timid Thrall

(A spotless Youngling white as foam)

Her youngest Brother brought it home ;

The youngest, then a lusty boy,

Bore it, or led, to Eylstone-hall

With heart brimful of pride and joy ! 1

But most to Bolton's sacred Pile,
On favouring nights, she loved to go ;
There ranged through cloister, court, and aisle,
Attended by the soft-paced Doe ;

1 1836.

So beautiful the spotless Thrall,

(A lovely Youngling white as foam,)

That it was brought to Rylstone-hall ;

Her youngest Brother led it home,

The youngest, then a lusty Boy,

Brought home the prize — and with what joy ! IBIS.

the N.E. corner of the tower, and to the edge of a very deep glen. From
this glen, a ditch, several hundred yards long, runs south to another deep
and rugged ravine. On the N. and W. where the banks are very steep,
no wall or mound is discoverable, paling being the only fence that would
stand on such ground.

" From the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, it appears that such pounds
for deer, sheep, &c. , were far from being uncommon in the south of Scot-
land. The principle of them was something like that of a wire mouse-trap.
On the declivity of a steep hill, the bottom and sides of which were fenced
so as to be impassable, a wall was constructed nearly level with the surface
on the outside, yet so high within that without wings it was impossible to
escape in the opposite direction. Care was probably taken that these en-
closures should contain better feed than the neighbouring parks or forests;
and whoever is acquainted with the habits of these sequacious animals,
will easily conceive, that if the leader was once tempted to descend into
the snare, an herd would follow."

I cannot conclude without recommending to the notice of all lovers of
beautiful scenery — Bolton Abbey and its neighbourhood. This enchanting
spot belongs to the Duke of Devonshire ; and the superintendence of it
has for some years been entrusted to the Rev. William Carr, who has most
skilfully opened out its features ; and in whatever he has added, has done
justice to the place by working with an invisible hand of art in the very
spirit of nature.- W. W., 1815.

CANTO SEVENTH.

181

Nor feared she in the still moonshine l

To look upon Saint Mary's shrine ;

Nor on the lonely turf that showed

Where Francis slept in his last abode.

For that she came ; there oft she sate

Forlorn, but not disconsolate : 2

And, when she from the abyss returned

Of thought, she neither shrunk nor mourned ;

Was happy that she lived to greet

Her mute Companion as it lay

In love and pity at her feet ;

How happy in its turn to meet 3

The recognition ! the mild glance

Beamed from that gracious countenance ;

Communication, like the ray

Of a new morning, to the nature

And prospects of the inferior Creature !

A mortal Song we sing, by dower *
Encouraged of celestial power ;
Power which the viewless Spirit shed
By whom we were first visited ;
Whose voice we heard, whose hand and wings
Swept like a breeze the conscious strings,
When, left in solitude, erewhile
We stood before this ruined Pile,
And, quitting unsubstantial dreams,
Sang in this Presence kindred themes ;

1S27.

1836.

1820.

1836.

Nor did she fear .

For that she came ; there oft and long
She sate in meditation strong :

in her turn
A mortal Song we frame,

1815.

1815.
1815.
1815.

182 THE WHITE DOE.

Distress and desolation spread

Through human hearts, and pleasure dead, —

Dead — but to live again on earth,

A second and yet nobler birth ;

Dire overthrow, and yet how high

The re-ascent in sanctity !

From fair to fairer ; day by day

A more divine and loftier way !

Even such this blessed Pilgrim trod,

By sorrow lifted towards her God ;

Uplifted to the purest sky

Of undisturbed mortality.

Her own thoughts loved she ; and could bend

A dear look to her lowly Friend ;

There stopped ; her thirst was satisfied

With what this innocent spring supplied :

Her sanction inwardly she bore,

And stood apart from human cares :

But to the world returned no more,

Although with no unwilling mind

Help did she give at need, and joined

The Wharfdale peasants in their prayers.

At length, thus faintly, faintly tied

To earth, she was set free, and died.

Thy soul, exalted Emily,

Maid of the blasted family,

Kose to the God from whom it came !

— In Eylstone Church her mortal frame

Was buried by her Mother's side.

Most glorious sunset ! and a ray
Survives — the twilight of this day —
In that fair Creature whom the fields
Support, and whom the forest shields ;

CANTO SEVENTH. 183

Who, having filled a holy place,

Partakes, in her degree, Heaven's grace ;

And bears a memory and a mind

Eaised far above the law of kind ;

Haunting the spots with lonely cheer

Which her dear Mistress once held dear :

Loves most what Emily loved most —

The enclosure of this church-yard ground ;

Here wanders like a gliding ghost.

And every sabbath here is found ;

Comes with the people when the bells

Are heard among the moorland dells,

Finds entrance through yon arch, where way

Lies open on the sabbath-day ;

Here walks amid the mournful waste

Of prostrate altars, shrines defaced,

And floors encumbered with rich show

Of fret-work imagery laid low ;

Paces softly, or makes halt,

By fractured cell, or tomb, or vault ;

By plate of monumental brass

Dim-gleaming among weeds and grass,

And sculptured Forms of Warriors brave :

But chiefly by that single grave,

That one sequestered hillock green,

The pensive visitant is seen.

There doth the gentle Creature lie

With those adversities unmoved ;

Calm spectacle, by earth and sky

In their benignity approved !

And aye, methinks, this hoary Pile,

Subdued by outrage and decay,

Looks down upon her with a smile,

A gracious smile, that seems to say —

184 THE WHITE DOE.

" Thou, thou art not a Child of Time,
But Daughter of the Eternal Prime ! "

The following is the full text of the first " note " to The White Doe in
the quarto edition of 1815. The other notes to that edition are printed
in this, at the foot of the pages where they occur : —

" The Poem of the ' White Doe of Rylstone ' is founded on a local tra-
dition, and on the Ballad in Percy's Collection, entitled ' The Eising of
the North.' The tradition is as follows : — 'About this time,' not long
after the Dissolution, ' a White Doe, say the aged people of the neigh-
bourhood, long continued to make a weekly pilgrimage from Rylstone
over the fells of Bolton, and was constantly found in the Abbey Church-
yard during divine service ; after the close of which she returned home
as regularly as the rest of the congregation.' — DR WHITAKER'S History
of the Deanery of Craven. Rylstone was the property and residence of
the Nortons, distinguished in that ill-advised and unfortunate Insurrec-
tion, which led me to connect with this tradition the principal circum-
stances of their fate, as recorded in the Ballad which I have thought it
proper to annex.

The Rising in the North.

" The subject of this ballad is the great Northern Insurrection in the
12th year of Elizabeth, 1569, which proved so fatal to Thomas Percy,
the seventh Earl of Northumberland.

" There had not long before been a secret negociation entered into be-
tween some of the Scottish and English nobility, to bring about a marriage
between Mary Q. of Scots, at that time a prisoner in England, and the
Duke of Norfolk, a nobleman of excellent character. This match was
proposed to all the most considerable of the English nobility, and among
the rest to the Earls of Northumberland and Westmoreland, two noble-
men very powerful in the North. As it seemed to promise a speedy
and safe conclusion of the troubles in Scotland, with many advantages
to the crown of England, they all consented to it, provided it should
prove agreeable to Queen Elizabeth. The Earl of Leicester (Elizabeth's
favourite) undertook to break the matter to her, but before he could
find an opportunity, the affair had come to her ears by other hands, and
she was thrown into a violent flame. The Duke of Norfolk, with
several of his friends, was committed to the Tower, and summons were
sent to the Northern Earls instantly to make their appearance at court.
It is said that the Earl of Northumberland, who was a man of a mild
and gentle nature,* was deliberating with himself whether he should

-t-

* Camden expressly says that he was violently attached to the Catholic
Religion.

THE WHITE DOE. 185

not obey the message, and rely upon the Queen's candour and clemency,
•when he was forced into desperate measures by a sudden report at mid-
night, Nov. 14, that a party of his enemies were come to seize his per-
son. The Earl was then in his house at Topcliffe in Yorkshire. When,
rising hastily out of bed, he withdrew to the Earl of Westmoreland at
Brancepeth, where the country came in to them, and pressed them to
take up arms in their own defence. They accordingly set up their
standards, declaring their intent was to restore the ancient Religion, to
get the succession of the crown firmly settled, and to prevent the de-
struction of the ancient nobility, &c. Their common banner (on which
was displayed the cross, together with the five wounds of Christ) was borne
by an ancient gentleman, Richard Norton, Esquire, who, with his sons
(among whom, Christopher, Marmaduke, and Thomas, are expressly
named by Camden), distinguished himself on this occasion. Having
entered Durham, they tore the Bible, &c., and caused mass to be said
there ; they then marched on to Clifford-moor, near Whetherby, where
they mustered their men. . . . The two Earls, who spent
their large estates in hospitality, and were extremely beloved on that
account, were masters of little ready money ; the E. of Northumber-
land bringing with him only 8000 crowns, and the E. of Westmoreland
nothing at all, for the subsistence of their forces, they were not able to
march to London, as they had at first intended. In these circumstances,
Westmoreland began so visibly to despond, that many of his men slunk
away, though Northumberland still kept up his resolution, and was
master of the field till December 13, when the Earl of Sussex, accom-
panied with Lord Hunsden and others, having marched out of York at
the head of a large body of forces, and being followed by a still larger
army under the command of Ambrose Dudley, Earl of Warwick, the
insurgents retreated northward towards the borders, and there dismiss-
ing their followers, made their escape into Scotland. Though this
insurrection had been suppressed with so little bloodshed, the Earl of
Sussex and Sir George Bowes, marshal of the army, put vast numbers
to death by martial law, without any regular trial. The former of
these caused at Durham sixty -three constables to be hanged at once.
And the latter made his boast, that for sixty miles in length, and forty
in breadth, betwixt Newcastle and Whetherby, there was hardly a
town or village wherein he had not executed some of the inhabitants.
This exceeds the cruelties practised in the West after Monmouth's
rebellion.

" Such is the account collected from Stow, Speed, Camden, Guthrie,
Carte, and Rapin ; it agrees, in most particulars, with the following
Ballad, apparently the production of some northern minstrel. —

" LISTEN, lively lordings all,

LiLlie and listen unto mee,
And I will sing of a noble earle,

The noblest earle in the north countrie.

186 THE WHITE DOE.

Earle Percy is into his garden gone,
And after him walks his fair leddie ;

I heard a bird sing in mine ear,
That I must either fight or flee.

Now heaven forfend, my dearest lord,
That ever such harm should hap to tbee

But goe to London to the court,
And fair fall truth and honestie.

Now nay, now nay, my ladye gay,
Alas ! thy counsell suits not nice ;

Mine enemies prevail so fast,
That at the court I may not bee.

O goe to the court yet, good my lord,
And take thy gallant men with thee ;

If any dare to do you wrong,
Then your warrant they may bee.

Now nay, now nay, thou ladye faire,
The court is full of subtiltie :

And if I goe to the court, ladye,
Never more I may thee see.

Yet goe to the court, my lord, she sayes
And I myself e will r}rde wi' thee :

At court then for my dearest lord,
His faithful borrowe I will bee.

Now nay, now nay, my ladye deare ;

Far lever had I lose my life,
Than leave among my cruell foes

My love in jeopardy and strife.

But come thou hither, my little foot-page,
Come thou hither unto mee,

To Maister Norton thou must goe
In all the haste that ever may bee.

Commend me to that gentleman,
And beare this letter here fro mee ;

And say that earnestly I praye,
He will ryde in my companie.

One while the little foot-page went,
And another while he ran ;

Untill he came to his journey's end,
The little foot- page never blan.

THE WHITE DOE. 187

"When to that gentleman he came,

Down he kneeled on his knee ;
And took the letter betwixt his hands,

And lett the gentleman it see.

And when the letter it was redd,

Affore that goodlye companie,
I wis if you the truthe wold know,

There was many a weeping eye.

He sayd, Come thither, Christopher Norton,

A gallant youth thou seem'st to bee ;
What dost thou counsell me my sonne,

Now that good carle's in jeopardy ]

Father, my counselled fair and free ;

That erle he is a noble lord,
And whatsoever to him you hight,

I would not have you breake your word.

Gramercy, Christopher, my sonne,

Thy counsell well it liketh mee,
And if we speed and 'scape with life,

Well advanced shalt thou bee.

Come you hither, my nine good sonnes,

Gallant men I trowe you bee :
How many of you, my children deare,

Will stand by that good erle and mee

Eight of them did answer make,

Eight of them spake hastilie,
O Father, till the day we dye

We'll stand by that good erle and thee.

Gramercy, now, my children deare,

You shew yourselves right bold and brave,

And whethersoe'er I live or dye,
A father's blessing you shall have.

But what say'st thou, O Francis Norton,

Thou art mine eldest sonne and heire :
Somewhat lies brooding in thy breast ;

Whatever it bee, to mee declare.

Father, you are an aged man,

Your head is white, your beard is gray ;
It were a shame at these your years

For you to ryse in such a fray. •

188 THE WHITE DOE.

Now fye upon thee, coward Francis,
Thou never learned'st this of mee ;

When thou wert young and tender of age,
Why did I make soe much of thee 1

But, father, I will wend with you,
Unarm'd and naked will I bee ;

And he that strikes against the crowne,
Ever an ill death may he dee.

Then rose that reverend gentleman,
And with him came a goodlye band

To join with the brave Earle Percy,
And all the flower o' Northumberland.

With them the noble Nevill came,
The erle of Westmoreland was hee ;

At Wetherbye they mustered their host,
Thirteen thousand fair to see.

Lord Westmorland his ancyent raisde,
The Dun Bull he rays'd on hye,

And three Dogs with golden collars
Were there set out most royallye.

Erie Percy there his ancyent spread,
The Half Moone shining all soe faire ;

The Nortons ancyent had the Crosse,
And the five wounds our Lord did beare.

Then Sir George Bowes he straitwaye rose,
After them some spoile to make :

Those noble erles turned back againe,
And aye they vowed that knight to take.

That baron he to his castle fled,
To Barnard castle then fled hee.

The uttermost walles were eathe to win,
The carles have woiine them presentlie.

The uttermost walles were lime and bricke
But though they won them soon anone,

Long ere they wan their innermost walles,
For they were cut in rocke and stone.

Then news unto leeve London came
In all the speed that ever might bee,

And word is brought to our royall queene
Of the rysing in the North countrie.

THE WHITE DOE. 189

Her grace she turned her round about,

And like a royall queene shee swore,
I will ordayne them such a breakfast,

As never was in the north before.

Shee caused thirty thousand men be rays'd,

"With horse and harneis faire to see ;
She caused thirty thousand men be raised

To take the earles i' th' North countrie.

Wi' them the false Erie Warwicke went,
The Erie Sussex and the Lord Hunsdeu,

Untill they to Yoi-k castle came
I wiss they never stint ne blan.

Now spred thy aucyent, Westmoreland,

Thy dun Bull faine would we spye :
And thou, the Erie of Northumberland,

Now rayse thy Halfe Moone on hye.

But the dun bulle is fled and gone,
And the halfe moone vanished away :

The Erles, though they were brave and bold,
Against soe many could not stay.

Thee, Norton, wi' thine eight good sonnes,

They doomed to dye, alas ! for ruth !
Thy reverend lockes thee could not save,

Nor them their faire and blooming youthe.

Wi' them full many a gallant wight

They cruellye bereav'd of life :
And many a child made fatherlesse,

And widowed many a tender wife.

" ' Bolton Priory,' says Dr Whitaker in his excellent book — The His-
tory and Antiquities of the Deanry of Craven — ' stands upon a beauti-
ful curvature of the Wharf, on a level sufficiently elevated to protect
it from inundations, and low enough for every purpose of picturesque
effect.

" ' Opposite to the East window of the Priory Church, the river
washes the foot of a rock nearly perpendicular, and of the richest
purple, where several of the mineral beds, which break out, instead of
maintaining their usual inclination to the horizon, are twisted by some
inconceivable process, into undulating and spiral lines. To the South
all is soft and delicious ; the eye reposes upon a few rich pastures, a
moderate reach of the river, sufficiently tranquil to form a mirror to the

190 THE WHITE DOE.

sun, and the bounding hills beyond, neither too near nor too lofty to
exclude, even in winter, any portion of his rays.

" ' But, after all, the glories of Bolton are on the North. Whatever
the most fastidious taste could require to constitute a perfect landscape
is not only found here, but in its proper place. In front, and immedi-
ately under the eye, is a smooth expanse of park*like enclosure, spotted
with native elm, ash, &c. of the finest growth: on the right a skirting
oak wood, with jutting points of grey rock ; on the left a rising copse.
Still forward are seen the aged groves of Bolton Park, the growth of
centuries ; and farther yet, the barren and rocky distances of Simon-
seat and Barden Fell contrasted with the warmth, fertility, and luxu-
riant foliage of the valley below.

" ' About half a mile above Bolton the Valley closes, and either side
of the Wharf is overhung by solemn woods, from which huge perpen-
dicular masses of grey rock jut out at intervals.

" ' This sequestered scene was almost inaccessible till of late, that
ridings have been cut on both sides of the River, and the most interest-
ing points laid open by judicious thinnings in the woods. Here a
tributary stream rushes from a waterfall, and bursts through a woody
glen to mingle its waters with the Wharf : there the Wharf itself
is nearly lost in a deep cleft in the rock, and next becomes a horned
flood enclosing a woody island — sometimes it reposes for a moment,
and then resumes its native character, lively, irregular, and impetuous.

" ' The cleft mentioned above is the tremendous STRID. This chasm,
being incapable of receiving the winter floods, has formed, on either
side, a broad strand of naked gritstone full of rock-basons, or " pots
of the Linn," which bear witness to the restless impetuosity of so
many Northern torrents. But, if here Wharf is lost to the eye, it
amply repays another sense by its deep and solemn roar, like " the
Voice of the angry Spirit of the Waters," heard far above and be-
neath, amidst the silence of the surrounding woods.

" ' The terminating object of the landscape is the remains of Barden
Tower, interesting from their form and situation, and still more so
from the recollections which they excite.' "

The White Doe has been assigned chronologically to the year 1808;
although part of it — probably the larger half — was written during the
previous autumn, and it remained unfinished in 1810, while the dedica-
tion was not written till 1815. In the Fenwick note, Wordsworth tells
us that it was begun at Stockton-on-Tees in the autumn of 1807, and
" continued " at Dove Cottage, after his return to Grasmere, which was
in April 1808. But on the 28th February, 1810, Dorothy Wordsworth,
writing from Allan Bank to Lady Beaumont, says, " Before my brother
tunis to any other labour, I hope he will have finished three Books of
the Recluse. He seldom writes less than 50 lines every day. After
this task is finished he hopes to complete the ' White Doe,' and proud

THE WHITE DOE.

191

should we all be if it should be honoured by a frontispiece from the
pencil of Sir George Beaumont. Perhaps this is not impossible, if you
come into the north next summer."

The frontispiece referred to was drawn by Sir George Beaumont for
the quarto edition of 1815.

From the " advertisement " which "Wordsworth prefixed to that edi-
tion, I infer that the larger part of the poem was written at Stockton.
In the advertisement he says that " the poem of the White Doe was
composed at the close of the year" (1807). In constructing the Chrono-
logical Table, I accepted this (his own) statement as to the date of the
poem. It is, however, another illustration of the vague manner in which
he was in the habit of assigning dates. The Fenwick note, and the evi-
dence of his sister's letter, is conclusive ; although the fact that The
Force of Prayer — written in 1807 — is called in the Fenwick note "an
appendage to the 'White Doe,'" is farther confirmation of the belief that
the principal part of the latter poem was finished in 1807. All things
considered, it may be most conveniently placed after the poems belong-
ing to the year 1807, and before those known to have been written in
1808 ; while The Force of Prayer naturally follows it.

TJie White Doe of Ryktoiie — first published in quarto in 1815 — was
scarcely altered in the editions of 1820, 1827, and 1832. In 1836,
however, it was revised throughout, and in that year the text was
virtually settled ; the subsequent changes being few and insignificant,
while those introduced in 1836 were numerous and important. A glance
at the foot-notes will show that many passages were entirely rewritten
in that year, and that a good many lines of the earlier text were
altogether omitted. All the poems were subjected to minute revision
in 1836 ; but few, if any, were more thoroughly recast, and improved,
in that year than The White Doe. As a sample of the best kind of
changes — where a new thought was added to the earlier text with
admirable felicity — compare the lines in Canto VII., as it stood in
1815, when the Lady Emily first saw the White Doe at the old Hall
of Eylstone, after her terrible losses and desolation —

Lone Sufferer ! will not she believe

The promise in that speaking face,

And take this gift of Heaven with grace ?
with the additional thought conveyed in the version of 1836 —

Lone Sufferer ! will not she believe

The promise in that speaking face ;

And welcome as a gift of grace,

The saddest thought the Creature brings ?

In the " Reminiscences " of Wordsworth — written by the Hon. Mr
Justice Coleridge for the Bishop of Lincoln's Memoirs of his uncle — the
following occurs. (See Vol. II. p. 311.) " His conversation was on critical
subjects, arising out of his attempts to alter his poems. He said he

192 THE WHITE DOE.

considered The White Doe as, in conception, the highest work he had
ever produced. The mere physical action was all unsuccessful : but
the true action of the poem was spiritual — the subduing of the will, and
all inferior fancies, to the perfect purifying and spiritualizing of the
intellectual nature ; while the Doe, by connection with Emily, is raised
as it were from its mere animal nature into something mysterious and
saint-like. He said he should devote much labour to perfecting the
execution of it in the mere business parts, in which, from anxiety ' to
get on ' with the more important parts, he was sensible that imper-
fections had crept in which gave the style a feebleness of character."

From this conversation — which took place in 1836, but before the
revision of the poem in that year — it will be seen that Wordsworth
knew very well that there were feeble passages in the earlier editions
of The White Doe ; and that, in the thorough revision which he gave
to all his poems in that year, this one was specially singled out for
" much labour." The result is seen by a glance at the changes of
the text.

The notes appended to the edition of 1815 explain some of the his-
torical and topographical allusions in the poem. To these the following
may be added —

Solton's mouldering Priory.

The tower
Is standing with a voice of power,

And in the shattered fabric's heart
Jtemaineth one protected part ;
A Chapel, like a wild-bird's nest,
Closely embowered and trimly drest.

(p. 104.)

In 1153, the canons of the Augustinian Priory at Embsay, near
Skipton, were removed to Bolton, by William Fitz Duncan, and his
wife, Cecilia de BomiUe", who granted it by charter in exchange for the
Manors of Skibdem and Stretton. The establishment at Bolton con-
sisted of a prior and about 15 canons, over 200 persons (including
servants and lay brethren) being supported at Bolton. During the
Scottish raids of the fourteenth century, the prior and canons had
frequently to retreat to Skipton for safety. In 1542 the site of the
priory and demesnes were sold to Harry Clifford, first Earl of Cumber-
land. From the last Earl of Cumberland it passed to the second Earl of
Cork, and then to the Devonshire family, to whom it still belongs.
The following is part of the excellent account of the Priory, given in
Murray's Yorkshire: —

" The chief relic of the Priory is the church, the nave of which after
the Dissolution was retained as the chapel of this so-called ' Saxon-Cure.'

THE WHITE DOE. 193

This nave remains perfect, but the rest of the church is in complete
ruin. The lower walls of the choir are Trans-Norman, and must have
been built immediately after (if not before) the removal from Embsay.
The upper walls and windows (the tracery of which is destroyed)
are decorated. The nave is early English, and decorated ; and the
original west front remains with an elaborate Perpendicular front of
excellent design, intended as the base of a western tower, which was
never finished. . . The nave (which has been restored under the
direction of Grace) — the

" ' One protected part
In the shattered fabric's heart,'

is Early English on the south side, and Decorated on the north. . . At
the end of the nave aisle, enclosed by a Perpendicular screen, is a chantry,
founded by the Mauleverers ; and below it is the vault, in which, accord-
ing to tradition, the Claphams of Beamsley and their ancestors the
Mauleverers were interred upright —

" ' Pass, pass who will, yon chantry door ;

And through the chink in the fractured floor
Look down, and see a grisely sight ;
A vault where the bodies are buried upright !
There, face by face, and hand by hand,
The Claphams and Mauleverers stand.'

Whitaker, however, could never see this ' grisely sight ' through the
chink in the floor; and it is perhaps altogether traditional. The
ruined portion of the church is entirely Decorated, with the exception
of the lower walls of the choir. The transepts had eastern aisles. The
north transept is nearly perfect : the south retains only its western
wall, in which are two decorated windows. The piers of a central
tower remain ; but at what period it was destroyed, or if it was ever
completed, is uncertain. The choir is long and aisleless. Some frag-
ments of tracery remain in the south window, which was a very fine
one. Below the window runs a Transitional Norman arcade. Some
portions of tomb-slabs remain in the choir. . . The church-yard lies on
the north side of the ruins. This has been made classic ground by
Wordsworth's poem."

/ . . . Thefolk
Who sate in the shade of the Prior's Oak. (p. 105.)

The place where this Oak tree grew is uncertain. Whitaker says
it stood "at a small distance from the great gateway." This old
entrance or gateway to the Abbey was through a part of Bolton
Hall (now inhabited) under the Tower ; and the old sexton at the
Abbey tells me that the tree stood near that gateway, at some distance
from the ruins of the Abbey.

IV. N

194 THE WHITE DOE.

She sees a warrior carved in stone,

Among the thick weeds stretched alone. (p. 108.)

It was a solitary mound. (p. 110.)

These are not topographical allusions. At least no " warrior carved
in stone " can now be seen amongst the ruins of Bolton Abbey, what-
ever may have been the case in 1807. There is no trace of Francis
Norton's grave in the Abbey grounds.

The shy recess
Of Bar den's lowly quietness. (p. 116.)

Barden Tower is about two miles north-west of Boltou Priory, a little
beyond the Strid. (See the poem The Force of Prayer, or the Founding
of Bolton Priory.} Whitaker writes thus of the district of Upper
Wharfedale at Barden. " Grey tower-like projections of rock, stained
with the various hues of lichens, and hung with loose and streaming
canopies of ling, start out at intervals." Before the restoration of Henry
Clifford, " the Shepherd Lord," — to the estates of his ancestors — on the
accession of Henry VII. — there was only a keeper's lodge or tower at
Bardeu — " one of six which existed in different parts of Barden Forest.
The Shepherd Lord, whose early life among the Cumberland Fells led
him to seek quiet and retirement after his restoration, preferred Barden
to his greater castles, and enlarged (or rather rebuilt) it so as to provide
accommodation for a moderate train of attendants."

It was the time when England's Queen
Twelve years had reigned, a Sovereign dread ;

But now the inly-working North

Was ripe to send its thousands forth,

A potent vassalage, to fight

In Percy's and in Ntvillds right, <Scc. (p. 119.)

The circumstances which led to The Rising in the North, and the
chief incidents of that unfortunate episode in English history are traced
in detail by Mr Froude, in the fifty-third chapter of his History of
England. They are also summarized, in a lecture on the White Doe of
Rylstone, by Principal Shairp, in his Aspects of Poetry, from which the
following passage is an extract (pp. 346-8).

" The incidents on which the White Doe is founded belong to the
year 1569, the twelfth of Queen Elizabeth.

"It is well known that as soon as Queen Mary of Scotland was
imprisoned in England, she became the centre around which gathered
all the intrigues which were then on foot, not only in England but
throughout Catholic Europe, to dethrone the Protestant Queen Eliza-
beth. Abroad, the Catholic world was collecting all its strength to

THE WHITE DOE. 195

crush the heretical island. The bigot Pope, Pius V., with the dark
intriguer, Philip II. of Spain, and the savage Duke of Alva, were ready
to pour their forces on the shores of England.

" At home, a secret negotiation for a marriage between Queen Mary
and the Duke of Norfolk had received the approval of many of the
chief English nobles. The Queen discovered the plot, threw Norfolk
and some of his friends into the Tower, and summoned Percy, Earl of
Northumberland, and Neville, Earl of Westmoreland, immediately to
appear at court. These two earls were known to be holding secret
communications with Mary, and longing to see the old faith restored.

" On receiving the summons, Northumberland at once withdrew to
Brancepeth Castle, a stronghold of the Earl of Westmoreland. Straight-
way all their vassals rose, and gathered round the two great earls.
The whole of the North was in arms. A proclamation went forth that
they intended to restore the ancient religion, to settle the succession to
the crown, and to prevent the destruction of the old nobility. As
they marched forward they were joined by all the strength of the
Yorkshire dales, and, among others, by a gentleman of ancient name,
.Richard Norton, accompanied by eight brave sons. He came bearing
the common banner, called the Banner of the Five Wounds, because
on it was displayed the Cross with the five wounds of our Lord. The
insurgents entered Durham, tore the Bible, caused mass to be said in
the cathedral, and then set forward as for York. Changing their
purpose on the way, they turned aside to lay siege to Barnard Castle,
which was held by Sir George Bowes for the Queen. While they
lingered there for eleven days, Sussex marched against them from
York, and the earls, losing heart, retired towards the Border, and
disbanded their forces, which were left to the vengeance of the enemy,
while they themselves sought refuge in Scotland. Northumberland,
after a confinement of several years in Loch Leven Castle, was betrayed
by the Scots to the English, and put to death. Westmoreland died an
exile in Flanders, the last of the ancient house of the Nevilles, earls of
Westmoreland. Norton, with his eight sons, fell into the hands of
Sussex, and all suffered death at York. It is the fate of this ancient
family on which Wordsworth's poem is founded."

This statement as to the fate of Norton's sons, however, is not borne
out by the historians. Mr Froude says (History of England, chap. 53),
" Two sons of old Norton and two of his brothers, after long and close
cross-questioning in the Tower, were tried and convicted at West-
minster. Two of these Nortons were afterwards pardoned. Two, one
of whom was Christopher, the poor youth who had been bewildered
by the fair eyes of the Queen of Scots at Bolton, were put to death at
Tyburn, with the usual cruelties."

For we muxtfall, both we ami ours —

This Mansion and these pleasant bowers,

Walks, pools, and arbours, homestead, hall —

Our fate is theirs, will reach them oil. (p. 126.)

196 THE WHITE DOE.

Little now remains of Eylstone Hall but the site. " Some garden
flowers still, as when Whitaker wrote, mark the site of the pleas-
aunce. The house fell into decay immediately after the attainder of
the Nortons ; and, with the estates here, remained in the hands of the
Crown until the second year of James I., when they were granted to
the Earl of Cumberland. Although "Wordsworth makes the Nortons
raise their famous banner here, they assembled their followers in fact
at Eipon (November 18, 1569), but their Eylstone tenants rose with
them."

Seven hundred JZnights, Retainers all

Of Neville, at their Master's call

Had sate together in Raby Hall I (p. 131.)

Eaby Hall is now called Eaby Castle, the seat of the Duke of Cleve-
land, in the county of Durham.

Stood by their Sire, on Clifford-moor. (p. 132.)

The village of Clifford is three miles from Wetherby, where the host
was mustered.

Until Lord Dacre with his power

From Naworth came; and Howard's aid

Be with them openly displayed. (p. 135.)

Naworth Castle, at the head of the vale of Llanercort, in the Gilsland
district of Cumberland, was the seat of the Dacres from the reign of
Edward III. George, Lord Dacre, the last heir-male of that family,
was killed in 1559 ; and Lord William Howard (the third son of
Thomas, Duke of Norfolk), who was made Warden of the Borders by
Queen Elizabeth, and did much to introduce order and good government
into the district, married the heiress of the Dacre family, and succeeded
to the castle and estate of Naworth. The arms over the entrance of
the castle are the Howard's and Dacre's quartered.

Mitred Thurston — what a Host
He conquered

while to battle moved
The Standard, in the Sacred Wain
That bore it (p. 136.)

The Battle of the Standard was fought in 1137.

" One gleam of national glory broke the darkness of the time. King
David of Scotland stood first among the partizans of his kinswoman
Matilda, and on the accession of Stephen his army crossed the border
to enforce her claim. The pillage and cruelties of the wild tribes of
Galloway and the Highlands roused the Spirit of the North ; baron and
freeman gathered at York round Archbishop Thurstan, and marched to
the field of Northallerton to await the foe. The sacved banner of S.
Cuthbert of Durham, S. Peter of York, S. John of Beverly, and S.

THE WHITE DOE. 197

Wilfred of Kipon, hung from a pole fixed in a four-wheeled car, which
stood in the centre of the tent. ' I who wear no armour,' shouted the
chief of the Galwegians, ' will go as far this day as any one with breast-
plate of mail.1 His men charged with wild shouts of ' Albin, Albin,'
and were followed by the Norman knighthood of the Lowlands. The
route, however, was complete ; the fierce hordes dashed in vain against
the close English ranks around the standard, and the whole army fled
in confusion to Carlisle." (J. B. Green's Short History of the English
People, p. 99.)

A soft and lulling sound is heard

Of streams inaudible by day. (p. 144.)

Compare the lines in The Excursion (Despondency corrected) —

The little rills, and waters numberless,
Inaudible by daylight,
and in The Evening Walk —

The song of mountain-streams, unheard by day,
Now hardly heard, beguiles my homeward way,
as in the Sonnet —

The unremitting voice of mighty streams

That wastes, so oft, we think, its tuneful powers.

Also Gray's Tour in the Lakes, "At distance heard the murmur of

many waterfalls, not audible in the day-time."

In Craven's wilds is many a den

To shelter persecuted men, (p. 150.)

In the limestone ridges and hills of the Craven district of Yorkshire,
there are many caverns and underground recesses, such as the Yordas
cave, referred to in The Prelude. (See VoL III., p. 302.)

Are now besieging Barnard's Towers, (p. 150.)

The towers of Barnard Castle on the Tees in Yorkshire.

High on a point of rugged ground

Among the wastes of Rylstone Fell

Above the loftiest ridge or mound

Where foresters or shepherds dwell,

An edifice of warlike frame

Stands single — Norton Tower its name —

It fronts all quarters, and looks round

O'er path and road, and plain and dell,

Dark moor, and gleam of pool and stream

Upon a prospect without bound. (p. 152.)

The remains of Norton Tower — four bare, rectangular, roofless walls
— are not on the highest point of Rylstone Fells, but on a ridge on the

198 THE WHITE DOE.

western side of these Fells. It was, doubtless, originally built both for
a watch-tower and a hunting-tower. " Some mounds near the tower are
thought to have been used as butts for archers ; and there are traces
of a strong wall, running from the tower to the edge of a deep glen,
whence a ditch runs to another ravine. This was once a pond, used
by the Nortons for detaining the red deer within the township of
Rylstone, which they asserted was not within the forest of Skipton,
and consequently that the Cliffords had no right to hunt therein. The
Cliffords eventually became lords of all the Norton lands here." From
the old tower of Norton, looking towards Eylstone and Malham, to the
north and north-west, the view is exactly as described in the poem.
See "Wordsworth's own note on Norton Tower.

A hut, by tufted trees defended,

Where Rylstone brook with Wharf is blended, (p. 175.)

There are two small streams which rise near Rylstone. One, called
Eylstone beck, flows westwards into the Aire. Another makes its way
eastwards towards the Wharfe, joins Linton beck, and so enters Wharfe
between Linton Church and Grassington Bridge. It is to the latter
that Wordsworth refers, although the former is now called Rylstone
beck.

Up to another cottage, hidden

In the deep fork of Amerdale. (p. 176.)

See Wordsworth's own note. The valley of Littondale once bore
the name of Amerdale. Though the name is not now given to the
beck, it survives singularly enough in one pool in the stream, where
it joins the Wharfe, which is still called "Amerdale Dub." From
this valley of Litton a small lateral one runs up in a south-westerly
direction at Arncliffe, making a " deep fork," and is called Dernbrook.
Dern means seclusion, and two or three miles up this ghyll is a farm-
house bearing the name of Dernbrook House.

By lurking Dernbrook's pathless side. (p. 176.)

See last note. " The phrase is so appropriate," says the present
incumbent of Arncliffe, the Ven. Archdeacon Boyd, in a letter to the
editor, " that it would almost seem that Wordsworth had been there."
Mr Boyd adds, "In the illustrated edition of The White Doe, published by
Longman a few years ago, there is an illustration by Birket Foster of
the Dernbrook House, the original of which I had the honour to supply.
It is but a short distance — two or three miles — from Malham Tarn."

When the bells of Rylstone played

Their Sabbath music, " GOD us AYDE,"

That was the sound they seemed to speak,

Inscriptive legend which I ween

May on those holy bells be seen. (p. 178.)

THE WHITE DOE.

See "Wordsworth's note. " A ring, bearing the same motto, was sold
at a sale of antiquities from Bramhope Manor, Feb. 1865. The Norton
Shield of Arms is in Eylstone Church."

To look upon Saint Mary's shrine. (p. 181.)

Archdeacon Boyd writes of this, " There never can have been a Lady
Chapel in the usual place at Bolton, for the altar was close to the east
window. I never heard of a Saint Mary's Shrine ; but, most probably,
the church was dedicated to S. Mary, in which case she" (the Lady
Emily) " would be speaking of the building. Tn proof of this, the
Priory of Embsay was dedicated to S. Mary ; and naturally the dedica-
tion, on the removal from Embsay to Bolton, would be renewed. See
Whitaker, p. 369, in extracting from the compotus, ' Comp. Monasterii
be' Mar' de Boulton in Craven.'" It may be added that the whole
church being dedicated to S. Mary — as in the case of the Cistercian
buildings — there would be no Lady Chapel. The mention in detail of
" prostrate altars," " shrines defaced," " fret-work imagery," " plates of
ornamental brass," and " sculptured forms of warriors " in the closing
canto of The White Doe is — like the " one sequestered hillock green "
where Francis Norton was supposed to " sleep in his last abode " — part
of the imaginative drapery of the poem.

Wordsworth wrote thus, in January 1816, to his friend Archdeacon
Wrangham, about The White Doe: —

" Of the ' White Doe ' I have little to say, but that I hope it will
be acceptable to the intelligent, for whom alone it is written. It starts
from a high point of imagination, and comes round, through various
wanderings of that faculty, to a still higher — nothing less than the
apotheosis of the animal who gives the first of the two titles to the
poem. And as the poem thus begins and ends with pure and lofty
imagination, every motive and impetus that actuates the persons intro-
duced is from the same source ; a kindred spirit pervades, and is
intended to harmonise the whole. Throughout objects (the banner,
for instance) derive their influence, not from properties inherent in
them, not from what they are actually in themselves, but from such as
are bestowed upon them by the minds of those who are conversant
with, or affected by, these objects. Thus the poetry, if there be any
in the work, proceeds, as it ought to do, from the soul of man, com-
municating its creative energies to the images of the external world."

The following is from a letter to Southey in the same year : — " Do
you know who reviewed ' The White Doe ' in the ' Quarterly ' ? After
having asserted that Mr W. uses his words without any regard to their
sense, the writer says that on no other principle can he explain that
Emily is always called ' the consecrated Emily.' Now, the name Emily
occurs just fifteen times in the poem ; and out of these fifteen, the
epithet is attached to it once, and that for the express purpose of re-
calling the scene in which she had been consecrated by her brother'^

200 THE WHITE DOE.

solemn adjuration, that she would fulfil her destiny, and become a soul,

» " ' By force of sorrows high

Uplifted to the purest sky
Of undisturbed mortality.'

The point upon which the whole moral interest of the piece hinges,
when that speech is closed, occurs in this line, —

" ' He kissed the consecrated maid ; '

And to bring back this to the reader, I repeated the epithet."

In a letter to Wordsworth about The Waggoner (see Vol. III.
Appendix I.), Charles Lamb wrote in 1819, "I read "The White
Doe of Rylstone ; ' the title should be always written at length. . . .
Manning has just sent it home, and it came as fresh to me as the im-
mortal creature it speaks of. M. sent it home with a note bearing this
passage in it : 'I cannot help writing to you while I am reading
Wordsworth's poem. . . "Tis broad, noble, poetical, with a masterly
scanning of human actions, absolutely above common readers.' "

The following is from Principal Shairp's estimate of The White Doe,
in his Oxford Lectures, Aspects of Poetry (chapter xii. pp. 373-376).
" What is it that gives to it " (the poem) " its chief power and charm ?
Is it not the imaginative use which the poet has made of the White
Doe ] With her appearance the poem opens, with her re-appearance it
closes. And the passages in which she is introduced are radiant with
the purest light of poetry. A mere floating tradition she was, which
the historian of Craven had preserved. How much does the poet bring
out of how little ! It was a high stroke of genius to seize on this
slight traditionary incident, and make it the organ of so much. What
were the objects which he had to describe and blend into one harmoni-
ous whole 1 They were these :

"1. The last expiring gleam of feudal chivalry, ending in the ruin of
an ancient race, and the desolation of an ancestral home.

" 2. The sole survivor, purified and exalted by the sufferings she had
to undergo.

" 3. The pathos of the decaying sanctities of Bolton, after wrong and
outrage, abandoned to the healing of nature and time.

" 4. Lastly, the beautiful scenery of pastoral Wharfedale, and of the
fells around Bolton, which blend so well with these affecting memories.

" All these were before him — they had melted into his imagination,
and waited to be woven into one harmonious creation . He takes the
White Doe, and makes her the exponent, the symbol, the embodiment
of them all The one central aim — to represent the beatification of the
heroine — how was this to be attained ? Had it been a drama, the poet
would have made the heroine give forth in speeches, her hidden mind
and character. But this was a romantic narrative. Was the poet to
make her soliloquise, analyse her own feelings, lay bare her heart in

THE FORCE OF PRAYER. 201

metaphysical monologue 1 This might have been done by some
modern poets, but it was not Wordsworth's way of exhibiting character,
reflective though he was. When he analyses feelings they are gene-
rally his own, not those of his characters. To shadow forth that which
is invisible, the sanctity of Emily's chastened soul, he lays hold of this
sensible image — a creature, the purest, most innocent, most beautiful in
the whole realm of nature — and makes her the vehicle in which he
embodies the saintliness which is a thing invisible. It is the hardest of
all tasks to make spiritual things sensuous, without degrading them.
I know not where this difficulty has been more happily met ; for we are
made to feel that, before the poem closes, the Doe has ceased to be a
mere animal, or a physical creature at all, but in the light of the poet's
imagination, has been transfigured into a heavenly apparition — a type
of all that is pure, and affecting, and saintly. And not only the
chastened soul of her mistress, but the beautiful Priory of Bolton, the
whole Vale of Wharfe, and all the surrounding scenery, are illumined
by the glory which she makes ; her presence irradiates them all with a
beauty and an interest more than the eye discovers. Seen through her
as an imaginative transparency, they become spiritualized ; in fact, she
and they alike become the symbol and expression of the sentiment which
pervades the poem — a sentiment broad and deep as the world. And
yet, any one who visits .these scenes, in a mellow autumnal day, will
feel that she is no alien or adventitious image, imported by the caprice
of the poet, but altogether native to the pJace, one which gathers up
and concentrates all the undefined spirit and sentiment which lie spread
around it. She both glorifies the scenery by her presence, and herself
seems to be a natural growth of the scenery, so that it finds in her its
most appropriate utterance. This power of imagination to divine and
project the very corporeal image which suits and expresses the image
of a scene, Wordsworth has many times shown. . . .

" And so the poem has no definite end, but passes off, as it were,
into the illimitable. It rises out of the perturbations of time and
transitory things, and, passing upward itself, takes our thoughts with
it to calm places and eternal sunshine." — ED.

THE FOECE OF PKAYEE;*

OR, THE FOUNDING OF BOLTON PRIORY.

A TRADITION.
Comp. 1807. Pub. 1815.

[An appendage to the " White Doe." My friend, Mr Rogers, has
also written on the subject. The story is preserved in Dr Whitaker's

* See the White Doe of Rylstone.

202 THE FORCE OF PRAYER.

History of Craven — a topographical writer of first-rate merit in all that
concerns the past ; but such was his aversion from the modern spirit,
as shown in the spread of manufactories in those districts of which he
treats, that his readers are left entirely ignorant both of the progress
of these arts and their real bearing upon the comfort, virtues, and
happiness of the inhabitants. While wandering on foot through the
fertile valleys and over the moorlands of the Apennine that divides
Yorkshire from Lancashire, I used to be delighted with observing the
number of substantial cottages that had sprung up on every side, each
having its little plot of fertile ground won from the surrounding waste.
A bright and warm fire, if needed, was always to be found in these
dwellings. The father was at his loom ; the children looked healthy
and happy. Is it not to be feared that the increase of mechanic power
had done away with many of these blessings, and substituted many
ills ? Alas ! if these evils grow, how are they to be checked, and where
is the remedy to be found ? Political economy will not supply it ;
that is certain ; we must look to something deeper, purer, and higher.]

w Qoolb for a bootU00 bent ?"
With these dark words begins my Tale ;
And their meaning is, whence can comfort spring
When Prayer is of no avail ?

t0 0,00b f0r a b0otle00 bate ?"
The Falconer to the Lady said ;
And she made answer "ENDLESS SORROW !"
For she knew that her Son was dead.

She knew it by the Falconer's words,
And from the look of the Falconer's eye ;
And from the love which was in her soul
For her youthful Romilly.

— Young Eomilly through Barden woods
Is ranging high and low ;
And holds a greyhound in a leash,
To let slip upon buck or doe.

THE FORCE OF PRAYER. 203

The pair have reached that fearful chasm,
How tempting to bestride !
For lordly Wharf is there pent in
With rocks on either side.

This striding-place is called THE STRID,
A name which it took of yore :
A thousand years hath it borne that name,
And shall a thousand more.

And hither is young Eomilly come,
And what may now forbid
That he, perhaps for the hundredth time,
Shall bound across THE STRID ?

He sprang in glee, — for what cared he

That the river was strong, and the rocks were steep ? —

But the greyhound in the leash hung back,

And checked him in his leap.

The Boy is in the arms of Wharf,
And strangled by a merciless force ;
For never more was young Romilly seen
Till he rose a lifeless corse.

Now there is stillness in the vale,
And long, unspeaking, sorrow :
Wharf shall be to pitying hearts
A name more sad than Yarrow.

If for a lover the Lady wept

A solace she might borrow

From death, and from the passion of death ;-

Old Wharf might heal her sorrow.

204 THE FORCE OF PRAYER.

She weeps not for the wedding-day
Which was to be to-morrow :
Her hope was a further-looking hope,
And hers is a mother's sorrow.

He was a tree that stood alone,
And proudly did its branches wave ;
And the root of this delightful tree
Was in her husband's grave !

Long, long in darkness did she sit,
And her first words were, " Let there be
In Bolton, on the field of Wharf,
A stately Priory !"

The stately Priory was reared ;
And Wharf, as he moved along,
To matins joined a mournful voice,
Nor failed at even-song.

And the Lady prayed in heaviness
That looked not for relief !
But slowly did her succour come,
And a patience to her grief.

Oh ! there is never sorrow of heart
That shall lack a timely end,
If but to God we turn, and ask
Of Him to be our friend !

The Force of Prayer was included by Wordsworth amongst the " Poems
proceeding from Sentiment and Reflection." There were no variations
in the text of the poem from 1815 to 1850 ; but I have found, in a
letter of Dorothy Wordsworth's to her friend, Miss Jane Pollard, the
mother of Lady Moateagle — who has kindly lent it to me — the earliest

THE FORCE OF PRAYER. 205

version of the poem, -which differs considerably from the form in which
it was first published in 1815. The letter is dated October 18th, 1807.
It is as follows : —

" What is good for a bootless bene ? "

The Lady answer'd, " endless sorrow."

Her words are plain ; but the Falconer's words

Are a path that is dark to travel thorough.

These words I bring from the Banks of Wharf,
Dark words to front an ancient tale :
And their meaning is, whence can comfort spring
When prayer is of no avail 1

" What is good for a bootless bene ? "
The Falconer to the Lady said,
And she made answer as ye have heard,
For she knew that her Son was dead.

She knew it from the Falconer's words
And from the look of the Falconer's eye,
And from the love that was in her heart
For her youthful Eomelli.

Young Romelli to the Woods is gone,
And who doth on his steps attend ?
He hath a greyhound in a leash,
A chosen forest Friend.

And they have reach'd that famous Chasm
Where he who dares may stride
Across the River Wharf, pent in
With rocks on either side.

And that striding place is call'd THE STRID,
A name which it took of yore ;
A thousand years hath it borne that name,
And shall a thousand more.

And thither is young Romelli come ;
And what may now forbid
That He, perhaps for the hundredth time,
Shall bound across the Strid ]

He sprang in glee ; for what cared he

That the River was strong, and the Rocks were steep ?

But the greyhound in the Leash hung back

And check'd him in his leap.

206 THE FORCE OF PRAYER.

The Boy is in the arms of Wharf,
And strangled with a merciless force ;
For never more was young Eomelli seen,
Till he was a lifeless corse.

Now is there stillness in the vale
And long unspeaking sorrow,
Wharf has buried fonder hopes
Than e'er were drown'd in Yarrow. *

If for a Lover the Lady wept

A comfort she might borrow

From death, and from the passion of death ;

Old Wharf might heal her sorrow.

She weeps not for the Wedding-day
That was to be to-morrow, t
Her hope was a farther-looking hope
And hers is a Mother's sorrow.

Oh was he not a comely tree 1
And proudly did his branches wave ;
And the Root of this delightful Tree
Is in her Husband's grave.

Long, long in darkness did she sit,
And her first word was, " Let there be
At Bolton, in the Fields of Wharf
A stately Priory.

And the stately Priory was reared,
And Wharf as he moved along,
To Matins joined a mournful voice,
Nor fail'd at Even-song.

And the Lady pray'd in heaviness
That wish'd not for relief ;
But slowly did her succour come,
And a patience to her grief.

Oh ! there is never sorrow of heart
That shall lack a timely end,
If but to God we turn, and ask
Of him to be our Friend.

* Alluding to a Ballad of Logan,
t From the same Ballad.

NOT MID THE WORLD S VAIN OBJECTS.

207

The poem of Samuel .Rogers, to which Wordsworth refers in the
Fenwick note, is named The Boy of Egremond. In begins —

" Say, what remains when Hope is fled ?"
She answered, " endless weeping ! "

See Charles Iamb's remarks on The Force of Prayer, quoted in the
Appendix to this volume. — ED.

COMPOSED WHILE THE AUTHOR WAS ENGAGED IN
WRITING A TRACT, OCCASIONED BY THE CONVEN-
TION OF CINTRA.

Comp. 1808 Pub. 1815.

NOT 'mid the World's vain objects that enslave l

The free-born Soul — that World whose vaunted skill

In selfish interest perverts the will,

Whose factions lead astray the wise and brave —

Not there ; but in dark wood and rocky cave,

And hollow vale which foaming torrents fill

With omnipresent murmur as they rave

Down their steep beds, that never shall be still ;

Here, mighty Nature ! in this school sublime

I weigh the hopes and fears of suffering Spain ;

For her consult the auguries of time,

And through the human heart explore my way ;

And look and listen — gathering, whence I may,2

Triumph, and thoughts no bondage can restrain.

Wordsworth began to write on the Convention of Cintra in November
1808, and sent two articles on the subject to the December (1808) and
January (1809) numbers of The Courier. The subject grew in import-
ance to him as he discussed it : and he threw his reflections on the

1820.

. . which enslave
gathering where I may,

1815.
(See errata.)

1815.

208 i DROPPED MY PEN; AND LISTENED.

subject into the form of a small treatise, the preface to which was dated
20th May 1809. The full title of this (so-called) "Tract" is " Con-
cerning the Eelations of Great Britain, Spain, and Portugal to each
other, and to the common Enemy, at this crisis ; and specifically as
affected by the Convention of Cintra : the whole brought to the test of
those Principles, by which alone the Independence and Freedom of
Nations can be Preserved or Recovered." — ED.

COMPOSED AT THE SAME TIME AND ON THE
SAME OCCASION.

Comp. 1808. Pub. 1815.

I DROPPED my pen ; and listened to the Wind

That sang of trees up-torn and vessels tost —

A midnight harmony ; and wholly lost

To the general sense of men by chains confined

Of business, care, or pleasure ; or resigned

To timely sleep. Thought I, the impassioned strain,

Which, without aid of numbers, I sustain,

Like acceptation from the World will find.

Yet some with apprehensive ear shall drink

A dirge devoutly breathed o'er sorrows past ;

And to the attendant promise will give heed —

The prophecy, — like that of this wild blast,

Which, while it makes the heart with sadness shrink,

Tells also of bright calms that shall succeed.

Compare the sonnet No. vn., of those " Dedicated to National Inde-
pendence and Liberty," beginning —

Not 'mid the world's vain objects that enslave.

—ED.

GEOEGE AND SARAH GREEN.

209

GEORGE AND SARAH GREEK

Coinp. 1808. Pub. 1839.

WHO weeps for strangers ? Many wept
For George and Sarah Green ;

Wept for that pair's unhappy fate,
Whose grave may here be seen.1

By night, upon these stormy fells,2

Did wife and husband roam ;
Six little ones at home had left,

And could not find that home.8

For any dwelling-place of man

As vainly did they seek.
He perish'd ; and a voice was heard —

The widow's lonely shriek.4

Not many steps, and she was left 5
A body without life —

Wept for that Pair's unhappy end,
Whose Grave may here be seen.

MS. letter of Dorothy Wordsworth's.

these stormy Heights,

Six little ones the Pair had left,
And could not find their home.

MS.

MS.

IV.

Down the dark precipice he fell,

And she was left alone,
Not long to think of her children dear,

Not long to pray, or groan. Added in MS.

A few wild steps — she too was left, MS.

0

210 GEORGE AND SARAH GREEN.

A few short steps were the chain that bound l
The husband to the wife.2

Now do those 3 sternly-featured hills

Look gently on this grave ;
And quiet now are the depths of air,4

As a sea without a wave.

But deeper lies the heart of peace

In quiet more profound ; 5
The heart of quietness is here

Within this churchyard bound.6

And from all agony of mind

It keeps them safe, and far
From fear and grief, and from all need

Of sun or guiding star.7

0 darkness of the grave ! how deep,8

After that living night —
That last and dreary living one

Of sorrow and affright !

1 The chain of but a few wild steps. MS.

2 Four stanzas are here added in MS., only one of which need be
given —

Our peace is of the immortal soul,

Our anguish is of clay ;
Such bounty is in Heaven : so pass

The bitterest pangs away.
Now do the sternly-featured hills MS.

4 And quiet now is the depth of air, MS.

6 In shelter more profound. MS.

6 Within this churchyard ground. MS.

7 From fear, and from all need of hope

From sun or guiding star. Ma

8 O darkness of the Grave ! how calm, MS.

GEORGE AND SARAH GREEN. 211

0 sacred marriage-bed of death,

That keeps them side by side l
In bond of peace, in bond of love,2

That may not be untied !

This poem is not included in any volume or collection of the works
of Wordsworth. It was printed in De Quincey's " Recollections of
Grasmere," which first appeared in Taifs Edinburgh Magazine, Sep-
tember 1839, p. 573.

The text is printed as it is found in De Quincey's article. Doubtless
Wordsworth, or some member of the family, had supplied him with a
copy of these verses. Wordsworth himself seemed to have thought
them unworthy of publication. A copy of the poem was transcribed at
Grasmere by Dorothy Wordsworth for Lady Beaumont on the 20th
April 1808. In this copy there are numerous variations from the text
as published by De Quincey, and these are indicated in the ordinary
way. I have, however, omitted three stanzas from the MS. copy, for
the same reason that The Convict and the Early Sonnet in the European
Magazine are not reproduced. In the letter to Lady Beaumont,
Dorothy Wordsworth says, " I am going to transcribe a poem composed
by my brother a few days after his return. It was begun in the church-
yard when he was looking at the grave of the Husband and Wife, and is
in fact supposed to be entirely composed there." Wordsworth returned
to the old home at Dove Cottage, Grasmere, from a short visit to London,
on the 6th April 1808 ; and there he remained, till Allan Bank was
ready for occupation. I therefore conclude that this poem was written
in April 1808.

Compare De Quincey's account of the disaster that befell the Greens,
as reported in his Early Recollections of Grasmere. The Words worths
had evidently taken part in the effort to raise subscriptions in behalf
of the orphan children. The following is an extract from a letter of
Dorothy Wordsworth's to Lady Beaumont on the subject : —

" GRASMERE, April 20th, 1808.

" We received your letter this morning, enclosing the half of a £5
note. I am happy to inform you that the orphans have been fixed
under the care of very respectable people. The baby is with its sister
—she who filled the Mother's place in the house during their two days
of fearless solitude. It has clung to her ever since, and she has been
its sole nurse. I went with two ladies of the Committee (in my sister's

1 That holds them side by side MS.

In bond of love, in bond of God, MS.

212 TYROLESE SONNETS.

place, who was then confined to poor John's bedside) to conduct the
family to their separate homes. The two Girls are together, as I have
said ; two Boys at another Home ; and the third Boy by himself at the
house of an elderly man who had a particular friendship for their
father. The kind reception that the children met with was very affect-
ing."—ED.

1809.

The poems belonging to the years 1809 and 1810 are mainly Son-
nets ; although The Excursion was being added to at intervals. The
twenty-four sonnets which follow — fourteen belonging to the year 1809,
and ten to 1810 — were included by Wordsworth, in the final arrange-
ment of his poems, amongst those " Dedicated to National Independence
and Liberty." It is difficult to ascertain the principle which guided
him in determining the succession of these sonnets. They were not
placed in chronological order ; nor is there any historical or topographi-
cal reason for their being arranged as they were. I have therefore
departed from his order to a certain extent.

The six referring to the Tyrolese have been brought together in one
group. Those containing allusions to Spain might have been similarly
treated ; but the sonnets on Schill, the King of Sweden, and Napoleon
— as arranged by Wordsworth himself — do not break the continuity of
the series on Spain, in the same way that the insertion of those on Pala-
fox and Zaragoza interferes with the unity of the Tyrolean group ; and
the re-arrangement of the latter series enables me more conveniently to
append to it a German translation of the sonnets, and a paper upon
them by Alois Brandl.

TYEOLESE SONNETS.
I.

HOFFER.
Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

OF mortal parents is the Hero born
By whom the undaunted Tyrolese are led ?
Or is it Tell's great Spirit, from the dead
Returned to animate an age forlorn ?

TYROLESE SONNETS. 213

He comes like Phoebus through the gates of morn

When dreary darkness is discomfited,

Yet mark his modest state ! upon his head,

That simple crest, a heron's plume, is worn.

0 Liberty ! they stagger at the shock

From van to rear — and with one mind would flee,

But half their host is buried :l — rock on rock

Descends : — beneath this godlike Warrior, see !

Hills, torrents, woods, embodied to bemock

The Tyrant, and confound his cruelty.

The expectation that the Germans would rise in 1807 against the
French was realised only in the Tyrol. Andrew Hofer, an innkeeper
in the Passeierthal, was the chief of the Tyrolese leaders. More than
once he called his countrymen to arms, and was successful for a time.
The Bavarians, however, defeated him, in October 1809. He was tried
by court-martial, and shot in 1810. — ED.

II.
Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

ADVANCE — come forth from thy Tyrolean ground,
Dear Liberty ! stern Nymph of soul untamed ;
Sweet Nymph, 0 rightly of the mountains named !
Through the long chain of Alps from mound to mound
And o'er the eternal snows, like Echo, bound ;
Like Echo, when the hunter train at dawn
Have roused her from her sleep : and forest-lawn,
Cliffs, woods and caves, her viewless steps resound
And babble of her pastime ! — On, dread Power !
With such invisible motion speed thy flight,

1 1836.

The Murderers are aghast ; they strive to flee,

And half their Host is buried. 1815.

214 TYKOLESE SONNETS.

Through hanging clouds, from craggy height to height,
Through the green vales and through the herdsman's bower-
That all the Alps may gladden in thy might,
Here, there, and in all places at one hour.

in.

FEELINGS OF THE TYEOLESE.
Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

THE Land we from our fathers had in trust,

And to our children will transmit, or die ;

This is our maxim, this our piety ;

And God and Nature say that it is just.

That which we would perform in arms — we must !

We read the dictate in the infant's eye ;

In the wife's smile ; and in the placid sky ;

And, at our feet, amid the silent dust

Of them that were before us. — Sing aloud

Old songs, the precious music of the heart !

Give, herds and flocks, your voices to the wind !

While we go forth, a self -devoted crowd,

With weapons grasped in fearless hands, to assert J

Our virtue, and to vindicate mankind.

IV.
Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

ALAS ! what boots the long laborious quest

Of moral prudence, sought through good and ill ;

1 1836.

With weapons in the fearless hand . . isi5.

TYROLESE SONNETS. 215

Or pains abstruse — to elevate the will,

And lead us on to that transcendent rest

Where every passion shall the sway attest

Of Eeason, seated on her sovereign hill ;

What is it but a vain and curious skill,

If sapient Germany must lie deprest,

Beneath the brutal sword ? — Her haughty Schools

Shall blush ; and may not we with sorrow say,

A few strong instincts and a few plain rules,

Among the herdsmen of the Alps, have wrought

More for mankind at this unhappy day

Than all the pride of intellect and thought ?

See the note by Alois Brandl appended to this series of sonnets.
Wordsworth had probably no means of knowing anything of Fichte's
"Addresses to the German Nation" delivered weekly in Berlin, from
December 1807 to March 1808. (See Fichte, by Professor Robert
Adamson, pp. 84-91.) — ED.

V.

ON THE FINAL SUBMISSION OF THE TYROLESE.
Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

IT was a moral end for which they fought ;

Else how, when mighty Thrones were put to shame,

Could they, poor Shepherds, have preserved an aim,

A resolution, or enlivening thought ?

Nor hath that moral good been vainly sought ;

For in their magnanimity and fame

Powers have they left, an impulse, and a claim

Which neither can be overturned nor bought.

Sleep, Warriors, sleep ! among your hills repose !

We know that ye, beneath the stern control

216 TYROLESE SONNETS.

Of awful prudence, keep the unvanquished soul :
And when, impatient of her guilt and woes,
Europe breaks forth : then, Shepherds ! shall ye rise
For perfect triumph o'er your Enemies.

VI.
Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

THE martial courage of a day is vain,

An empty noise of death the battle's roar,

If vital hope be wanting to restore,

Or fortitude be wanting to sustain,

Armies or kingdoms. We have heard a strain

Of triumph, how the labouring Danube bore

A weight of hostile corses ; drenched with gore

Were the wide fields, the hamlets heaped with slain.

Yet see (the mighty tumult overpast)

Austria a Daughter of her Throne hath sold !

And her Tyrolean Champion we behold

Murdered, like one ashore by shipwreck cast,

Murdered without relief. Oh ! blind as bold,

To think that such assurance can stand fast !

I append to this series of sonnets on the Tyrol and the Tyrolese the
translation of a paper contributed by Alois Brandl, a Tyrolean, to the
Neue Freie Presse of October 22, 1880. Herr Brandl was for some time
in England investigating the traces of a German literary influence on
Coleridge, Wordsworth, and their contemporaries.

" It was in the year 1809 j Napoleon was at the height of his career of
victory ; and England alone of all his opponents held the supremacy at sea.
For years the English were the only representatives of freedom in Europe.
At last it seemed that two fortunate allies arose to join their cause —
the insurgents in Spain and in the little land of Tyrol. No wonder
then that now British poets sympathised with the victors at the hill of
Isel, and praised their courage and their leaders, and at last, when they

TYROLESE SONNETS. 21 7

were overcome by superior forces, laid the laurel wreath of tragic
heroism on their graves.

" Thirty or forty years before, English poets would scarcely have
shown such a lively interest in a war of independence in a foreign
country. They stood under the curse of narrow-mindedness and one-
sidedness both in politics and in art, so that their smooth-running
verses neither sought nor found a response even in the hearts of their
own fellow-countrymen. The poets who appeared before the public in
the year 1798 with the famous "Lyrical Ballads" were the first to strike
out a new path. Although differing considerably from one another in
other respects, they agreed in their opposition to the conventionality of
the old school.

" Wordsworth lived in a simple little house on the romantic lake of
Grasmere, in the heart of the mountains of Westmoreland. He studied
more in his walks over heath and field than in books, and entered with
interest into the questions affecting the good of the country people
around him. All this of necessity impelled him to take a warm interest
in the herdsmen of the Alps.

" But the Tyrolese inspired him with still greater interest on political
grounds. Like all the lake poets, he was an enthusiastic admirer not
of the French revolution but of the republic, as long as it seemed to
desire the realization of the ideas of Liberty, Fraternity, Equality, and
the rest of Rousseau's Arcadian notions ; and it was a bitter disillusion
for him, as well as for Klopstock, when this much-praised home of
the free rights of man resolved itself into the empire of Napoleon.
From this moment he took his place on the side of the enemies of
France, and particularly on the side of the Tyrolese, since they had never
lost the natural simplicity of their habits, and had regained the heredi-
tary freedom, of which they had been deprived with the sword. Thus
arose the curious paradox, that a republican poet glorified spontaneously
the cause of an exceedingly monarchical and conservative country.

" Wordsworth gave vent to his enthusiasm in six sonnets, which, as
far as power of language and vigour of thought are concerned, form
interesting companion-pieces to the poems of the contemporary Tyrolese
poet Alois Weissenbach. In the first three sonnets the splendour of
the Alpine world, which he knew from his journeys in Switzerland,
forms the background of the picture. In the foreground he sees a band
of brave and daring men, in whose hearts he thought he could find all
his own moral pathos. Many of the features which he has introduced
certainly show more ideal fancy than knowledge of detail ; but it was
not his purpose to compose a correct report of the war, but to give an
exciting description of the heroes of this struggle for independence, in
order that, even though they themselves should be overpowered, their
spirit might arise again among his own fellow-countrymen. In the
fourth sonnet, in his enthusiasm for the Tyrolese, he has treated the

218

TYROLESE SONNETS.

German universities with unnecessary severity ; but this does not prove
any intentional want of fairness on his part, for at that time our univer-
sities stood under general discredit in England as the hotbeds of the
wildest metaphysics and political dreams. The events of the year 1813
would probably induce Wordsworth to view them in a more favourable
light. Similarly the sixth sonnet is not quite just to Austria ; in par-
ticular Wordsworth has made decidedly too little allowance for the fact
that the Emperor Franz I. ceded the Tyrol quite against his own will
under the pressure of circumstances. But in this case we must not
simply impute all the blame to the poet ; for as we see from the diary
of his friend Southey, his information as to the doings of Austria was
of a most vague and unfavourable character. We, however, cannot
have any wish to impute to Austria the sins of ill-advised diplomacy."

The following are Herr Brandl's German translations of Wordsworth's
sonnets : —

1.

StnbreaS £ofer.

93cn @terblid)en geboren fet bet $elb,

£)er ben Xirotern tobeSfufyn gebeut?

3ft etoa £eH'<3 ®eift aug ber (Stmgfeit
©efefyrt, ju ftecfen bie »etlct'ne 2Belt ?

(Sr fctnntt ime *pb,cbuS au3 bem SWorgenjett,
SBenn ficfy bie Sinftetnifi ber SRacfyt jerftreut,
Unb bod), ttie ©cfylicfyt ! @in 5alfenf^)*eif nur breut,

SBcn feinem §ut unb fitllt fein SSBa^enfetb.

D grei^eit! 2Bie ber geinb erBebt in {Rucfen
Unb Stont itnb gerne flcfy' in etnev ftluti),

SCdr' er ntc^t ^atb bebecft »on getfenftiicfen,
©eiualjt Bon biefeg ^dntpferg ©cttermutt) !

©eeint finb 93erg, SBalb, SBilbbac^, ju erbriicfen
ben Strewn unb feme

2.1

eit, erfteig aug betnem §eimat«Ianb

bn SKdbt^en ernft unb un^dtjmbar
Unb liebli^ beef), ber S3erge ^tnb furtt?a^r !
(fin (§fyo jtoifc^en %ei$ unb QUpentoanb.

(Sonette 2, 4 unb 6 finb unbetitett.

TYROLESE SONNETS.

Unb fiber ©letfdjern bift bu feftgebcmnt ;

(Sin (Sdjo, bag bie 3agb im SRorgengrau

SSotn ©cfjtaf auffd)eud)t, bajj 93erg unb 2Batb unb Vlu
Unb Qefyt brefynen, tt>o'$ unftdjtbar ftanb.

@ein Spiel tterfunbenb. <5o urptcfclid) ftratyl',
£>u I)^re SKac^t, ^er»oc im <Siege6kuf

2Bolfennjuft, son JMippenfnauf 511 Jtnauf,
SUtnenljutten, burd^ ba^ grune
3n bit bann jau^jen aUe Sltpen auf
ter, bort unb fiberall mit einem 9Wat!

219

3.

©efu^Ie ber !£troter.

,,!Dag 8anb ift itnS Vertraut com SHjngefd)ted)t :
@o fci'8 vererbt — unb foft' e3 aud^ ba3 Seben —

JCen ^inbern : ba$ ift $ jlii^t unb frontm unb eben ;
9latur unb ®ctt, fie nennen e« gered)t.

ffitr ntuffen tfjun, toa« tnoglid), im Oefed^t:
@ie^' bied ©ebot im ^inbe^auge teben,
93on grauenlippen, au^ bem Slettjer

3f)r SBater felbft aue ©tabegmobet fpred^t

(S3 taut em^cr. — @o fling' in
$>er atten Sieber Iierjli^e SKufif !

(Sinftimmen Jpirt unb §eerbe in ben SRetfyen !
Gin cpfertoiltig' Jpauflein jief)'n trir auS,
3)ie SBaffen in ben ^)duben, SKut^ im 3Micf,
JDer Sugenb treu, bie 3flenfd$eit ju befreien."

4.

3Ba3 nu^t, at^ ! Iange3 fittenf (nge3 ©treiten,
JDa3 man au<3 ,,gut" unb ,,bcfe" pre
2Ba« bummer gteif, gu i>cf)'n bie (Snergie

Unb ju trandcenbentater 9tu^' gu teiten,

£>af5 jebe Seibenf^affi fit^ taffe reiten
SBon ber 93ernunft in SUIfitprematie:
3ft ba« ni^t feltfam eitte S^eorie,

SSenn 5)eutf^lanb tro^ fo viel ©pi^ftnbigfeiten

220

£>em reljen <Sd)toert ertiegt? (Srrotfyen fatten
35ie fycljen <£cfyu(en! SKujfen toir nidjt fagen :
r'timf ten toenig {Regeln, ftarfeS SBotten
£>urd) fcfylicfyte Sltpenln'rten aitfjufufyren

9Wenfd)emtol)l in biefen UngliicE6tagen,
8U6 alto ftcfje 2RetaV^[iciren?

5.

bie f^He^li^e llntertoerfung ber Circlet.

3fl etner git ten <Sa(^e gatt i^r <S^tagen;
®ie fatten bei ber 3:^rone 9tieberfal»rt
<Scnft fie, bie artnen ©chafer, fid^ bewaljrt

fflegeiflernb ^ot;en ©inn unb fraftig ffiagen?

t>at i^)r Jtatnpf fur'e ©ute ^ruc^t getragen :
SBerft nic^t i^r 9Ju^nt, bie grcf e !Denfunggavt
Sliic^ un« ben SKittlj, wit 9ied§tSgefu^t gepaart,
£>er nic^t ju faufen ift, nicfyt jit getnagen?

<Sc§(aft, JlaTnpfer! llnter eiiren 93ergen rit^t!
JDem ftrengften 9lid)ter fann eS nic^t entgefyen :

9lie fannte euer 4?erj bag 9ietiriren.
tlnb brit^t in fyocfyfter $ein unb
(Suropa Ic«, fo foltt t^r a
©an§ uber euern $dnt> gu triump^iren!

Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

AND is it among rude untutored Dales,
There, and there only, that the heart is true ?
And, rising to repel or to subdue,
Is it by rocks and woods that man prevails ?
Ah no ! though Nature's dread protection fails,
There is a bulwark in the soul. This knew
Iberian Burghers when the sword they drew
In Zaragoza, naked to the gales

O'ER THE WIDE EARTH, ON MOUNTAIN AND ON PLAIN. 221

Of fiercely-breathing war. The truth was felt
By Palafox, and many a brave compeer,
Like him of noble birth and noble mind ;
By ladies, meek-eyed women without fear ;
And wanderers of the street, to whom is dealt
The bread which without industry they find.

Palafox -y-Melzi, Don Joseph (1780-1847), immortalized by his heroic
defence of Saragossa in 1808-9. He was of an old Arragon family, and
entered the Spanish army at an early age. In 1808, when twenty-nine
years of age, he was appointed governor of Saragossa, by the people of
the town, who were menaced by the French armies. He defended it with
a few men, against immense odds, and compelled the French to abandon
the siege, after sixty-one days attack, and the loss of thousands. Sara-
gossa, however, was too important to lose, and Marshals Mortier and
Money renewed the siege with a large army. Palafox (twice defeated
outside) retired to the fortress as before, where the men, women, and
children fought in defence, till the city was almost a heap of ruins.
Typhus attacked the garrison within, while the French army assailed it
from without. Palafox, smitten by the fever, had to give up the com-
mand to another, who signed a capitulation next day. He was sent a
prisoner toVincennes, and kept there for nearly five years, till the restora-
tion of Ferdinand VII., when he was sent back on a secret mission to
Madrid. In 1814 he was appointed Captain-General of Arragon; but
for about thirty years — till his death in 1847 — he took no part in public
affairs. — ED.

Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

O'ER the wide earth, on mountain and on plain,
Dwells in the affections and the soul of man
A Godhead, like the universal PAN ;
But more exalted, with a brighter train :
And shall his bounty be dispensed in vain,
Showered equally on city and on field,
And neither hope nor steadfast promise yield
In these usurping times of fear and pain ?

222 HAIL ZARAGOZA !

Such doom awaits us. Nay, forbid it, Heaven !
We know the arduous strife, the eternal laws
To which the triumph of all good is given,
High sacrifice, and labour without pause,
Even to the death : — else wherefore should the eye
Of man converse with immortality ?

Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

HAIL, Zaragoza ! If with unwet eye
We can approach, thy sorrow to behold,
Yet is the heart not pitiless nor cold ;
Such spectacle demands not tear or sigh.
These desolate remains are trophies high
Of more than martial courage in the breast
Of peaceful civic virtue : they attest
Thy matchless worth to all posterity.
Blood flowed before thy sight without remorse
Disease consumed thy vitals ; War upheaved
The ground beneath thee with volcanic force :
Dread trials ! yet encountered and sustained
Till not a wreck of help or hope remained,
And law was from necessity received.*

See note to sonnet (p. 221). Saragossa surrendered February 20, 1809,
after a heroic defence, which may recal the sieges of Numantia or
Saguntum. Every street, almost every house, had been hotly con-
tested ; the monks, and even the women, had taken a conspicuous
share in the defence ; more than 40,000 bodies of both sexes and every
age testified to the obstinate courage of the besieged. (See Dyer's
History of Modern Europe, Vol. IV. p. 496.) — ED.

* The beginning is imitated from an Italian sonnet. 1815.

BRAVE SCHILL ! BY DEATH DELIVERED. 223

Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

SAY, what is Honour ? — "Tis the finest sense
Of justice which the human mind can frame,
Intent each lurking frailty to disclaim,
And guard the way of life from all offence
Suffered or done. When lawless violence
Invades a Realm, so pressed that in the scale l
Of perilous war her weightiest armies fail,
Honour is hopeful elevation, — whence
Glory, and triumph. Yet with politic skill
Endangered States may yield to terms unjust ;.
Stoop their proud heads, but not unto the dust —
A Foe's most favourite purpose to fulfil :
Happy occasions oft by self-mistrust
Are forfeited ; but infamy doth kill.

Comp. 1809. • Pub. 1815.

BRAVE Schill ! by death delivered, take thy flight
From Prussia's timid region. Go and rest
With heroes, 'mid the islands of the Blest,
Or in the fields of empyrean light.
A meteor wert thou crossing a dark night : 2
Yet shall thy name, conspicuous and sublime,
Stand in the spacious firmament of time,
Fixed as a star : such glory is thy right.

1 1836.

A kingdom doth assault, and in the scale 1815.

2 3836.

A Meteor wert thou in a darksome night. isis

224 CALL NOT THE ROYAL SWEDE UNFORTUNATE.

Alas ! it may not be : for earthly fame

Is Fortune's frail dependant ; yet there lives

A Judge who, as man claims by merit, gives ;

To whose all-pondering mind a noble aim,

Faithfully kept, is as a noble deed ;

In whose pure sight all virtue doth succeed.

Ferdinand von Schill, a distinguished Prussian officer, born 1773,
entered the army 1789, was seriously wounded in the battle of Jena,
but took the field again at the head of a free corps. Indignant at the
subjection of his country to Bonaparte, he resolved to make a great
effort for the liberation of Germany, collected a small body of troops, and
commenced operations on the Elbe ; but after a few successes was over-
powered and slain at Stralsund, in May 1809. — ED.

Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

CALL not the royal Swede unfortunate,

Who never did to Fortune bend the knee ;

Who slighted fear ; rejected steadfastly

Temptation ; and whose kingly name and state

Have perished by his choice, and not his fate !

Hence lives He, to his inner self endeared ;

And hence, wherever virtue is revered,

He sits a more exalted Potentate,

Throned in the hearts of men. Should Heaven ordain

That this great Servant of a righteous cause

Must still have sad or vexing thoughts to endure,

Yet may a sympathizing spirit pause,

Admonished by these truths, and quench all pain

In thankful joy and gratulation pure.

The royal Swede, " who never did to fortune bend the knee," was
Gustavus IV. He abdicated in 1809, and came to London at the close
of the year 1810. See note to another sonnet on the same King of
Sweden, beginning —

The Voice of song from distant lands shall call.

(Vol. II. p. 294.)

LOOK NOW ON THAT ADVENTURER. 225.,

In the edition of 1836, Wordsworth added the following note :— " 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 superflu-
ous ; and will, I fear, be thrown away upon that other class, whose
besotted admiration of the intoxicated despot, hereafter placed in con-
trast with him, is the most melancholy evidence of degradation in British
feeling and intellect which the times have furnished." — ED.

Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

LOOK now on that Adventurer who hath paid
His vows to Fortune ; who, in cruel slight
Of virtuous hope, of liberty, and right,
Hath followed wheresoe'er a way was made
By the blind Goddess, — ruthless, undismayed ;
And so hath gained at length a prosperous height,
Round which the elements of worldly might
Beneath his haughty feet, like clouds, are laid.
0 joyless power that stands by lawless force !
Curses are his dire portion, scorn, and hate,
Internal darkness and unquiet breath ;
And, if old judgments keep their sacred course,
Him from that height shall Heaven precipitate
By violent and ignominious death.

The " Adventurer" who " paid his vows to Fortune," in contrast to the
royal Swede " who never did to Fortune bend the knee," was of course
Napoleon Bonaparte. — ED.

Comp. 1809. Pub. 1815.

Is there a power that can sustain and cheer
The captive chieftain, by a tyrant's doom,
IV. P

226 AH! WHERE IS PALAFOX ?

Forced to descend into his destined tomb — l
A dungeon dark ! where he must waste the year,
And lie cut off from all his heart holds dear ;
What time his injured country is a stage
Whereon deliberate Valour and the rage
Of righteous Vengeance side by side appear,
Filling from morn to night the heroic scene
With deeds of hope and everlasting praise : —
Say can he think of this with mind serene
And silent fetters ? Yes, if visions bright
Shine on his soul, reflected from the days
When he himself was tried in open light.

This may refer to Palafox, alluded to in a preceding sonnet (p. 221),
and in the one next in order ; although, from the latter sonnet, it
would seem that Wordsworth did not know that Palafox was, in 1810,
a prisoner at Vincennes. — ED.

1810.

As already indicated, the poems belonging to the year 1810, like
those of 1809, were mainly Sonnets, suggested by the events occurring
on the Continent of Europe, and the patriotic efforts of the Spaniards
to resist Napoleon. I have assigned the two sonnets referring to
Flaminius, entitled " On a Celebrated Event in Ancient History," to
the same year. They were first published in 1815, and seem to have
been due to the same impulse which led Wordsworth to write the
" Sonnets dedicated to Liberty and Order."— ED.

Comp. 1810. Pub. 1815.

AH ! where is Palafox ? Nor tongue nor pen
Reports of him, his dwelling or his grave !
Does yet the unheard-of vessel ride the wave ?
Or is she swallowed up, remote from ken

1 1836.

Forced to descend alive into his tomb. isis.

IN DUE OBSERVANCE OF AN ANCIENT RITE. 227

Of pitying human nature ? Once again
Methinks that we shall hail thee, Champion brave,
Eedeemed to baffle that imperial Slave,
And through all Europe cheer desponding men
With new-born hope. Unbounded is the might
Of martyrdom, and fortitude, and right.
Hark, how thy Country triumphs ! — Smilingly
The Eternal looks upon her sword that gleams,
Like his own lightning, over mountains high,
On rampart, and the banks of all her streams.
See note to sonnets (pp. 221-222).— ED.

Comp. 1810. Pub. 1815.

IN due observance of an ancient rite,

The rude Biscayans, when their children lie

Dead in the sinless time of infancy,

Attire the peaceful corse in vestments white ;

And, in like sign of cloudless triumph bright,

They bind the unoffending creature's brows

With happy garlands of the pure white rose :

Then do a festal company unite *

In choral song ; and, while the uplifted cross

Of Jesus goes before, the child is borne

Uncovered to his grave : 'tis closed, — her loss

The Mother then mourns, as she needs must mourn ;

But soon, through Christian faith, is grief subdued ;2

And joy returns, to brighten fortitude.3

1 1836.

This done, a festal company unite 1815.

* 1843.

Uncovered to his grave : — Her piteous loss

The lonesome Mother cannot choose but mourn ;

Yet soon by Christian faith is grief subdued, 1815.

8 C. and 1843.

And joy attends upon her fortitude. isis.

Or joy returns to brighten fortitude. 1836.

228 A ROMAN MASTER STANDS ON GRECIAN GROUND.

FEELINGS OF A NOBLE BISCAYAN AT ONE OF

THOSE FUNEKALS.
Comp. 1810. Pub. 1815.

YET, yet, Biscayans ! we must meet our Foes

With firmer soul, yet labour to regain

Our ancient freedom ; else 'twere worse than vain

To gather round the bier these festal shows.

A garland fashioned of the pure white rose

Becomes not one whose father is a slave :

Oh, bear the infant covered to his grave !

These venerable mountains now enclose

A people sunk in apathy and fear.

If this endure, farewell, for us, all good !

The awful light of heavenly innocence

Will fail to illuminate the infant's bier ;

And guilt and shame, from which is no defence,

Descend on all that issues from our blood.

ON A CELEBEATED EVENT IN ANCIENT

HISTOKY.
Comp. 1810. Pub. 1815.

A EOMAN Master stands on Grecian ground,
And to the people at the Isthmian Games
Assembled, He, by a herald's voice, proclaims l
THE LIBEKTY OF GKEECE : — the words rebound
Until all voices in one voice are drowned ;
Glad acclamation by which air was rent !
And birds, high flying in the element,

1 1836.

And to the Concourse of the Isthmian Games

He, by his Herald's voice, aloud proclaims 1815.

WHEN, FAR AND WIDE. 229

Dropped to the earth, astonished at the sound !

Yet were the thoughtful grieved ; and still that voice

Haunts, with sad echoes, musing Fancy's ear : l

Ah ! that a Conqueror's words should be so dear :

Ah ! that a boon could shed such rapturous joys !

A gift of that which is not to be given

By all the blended powers of Earth and Heaven.

This "Boman Master" "on Grecian ground" was T. Quintius
Flaminius, one of the ablest and noblest of the Roman generals,
(230-174 B.C.) He was successful against Philip of Macedon, overran
Thessaly in 198, and conquered the Macedonian army in 197, defeating
Philip at Cynoscephalse. He concluded a peace with the vanquished.
"In the spring of 196, the Roman commission arrived in Greece to arrange,
conjointly with Flaminius, the affairs of the country : they also brought
with them the terms on which a definite peace was to be concluded with
Philip. . . The ^Etolians exerted themselves to excite suspicions among
the Greeks as to the sincerity of the Romans in their dealings with
them. Flaminius, however, insisted upon immediate compliance with
the terms of the peace. . . In this summer, the Isthmian games were
celebrated at Corinth, and thousands from all parts of Greece flocked
thither. Flaminius, accompanied by the ten commissioners, entered the
assembly, and, at his command, a herald, in name of the Roman
Senate, proclaimed the freedom and independence of Greece. The joy
and enthusiasm at this unexpected declaration was beyond all descrip-
tion : the throngs of people that crowded around Flaminius to catch a
sight of their liberator or touch his garment were so enormous, that even
his life was endangered." (Smith's Die. of Greek and Roman Bio-
graphy : Art. Flaminius.)— ED.

UPON THE SAME EVENT.

Comp. (probably) 1810. Pub. 1815.

WHEN, far and wide, swift as the beams of morn
The tidings passed of servitude repealed,
And of that joy which shook the Isthmian Field,
The rough JEtolians smiled with bitter scorn.

1 1836.

— A melancholy Echo of that voice

Doth sometimes hang on musing Fancy's ear : 1815.

230 THE OAK OF GUERNICA.

" Tis known," cried they, " that he who would adorn

His envied temples with the Isthmian crown,

Must either win, through effort of his own,

The prize, or be content to see it worn

By more deserving brows. — Yet so ye prop,

Sons of the brave who fought at Marathon,

Your feeble spirits ! Greece her head hath bowed,

As if the wreath of liberty thereon

Would fix itself as smoothly as a cloud

Which, at Jove's will, descends on Pelion's top."

The ^Etolians were the only Greeks that entertained suspicion of the
Roman designs from the first. When Flaminius was wintering in
Phocis in 196, and an insurrection broke out at Opus, some of the citizens
had called in the aid of the ^Etolians against the Macedonian garrison ;
but the gates of the city were not opened to admit the ^Etolian volunteers
till Flaminius arrived. Then in the battle at the heights of Cynosce-
phalae, where the Macedonian army was routed, the ^Etolian contingent,
which had helped Flaminius, claimed the sole credit of the victory ; and
wished no truce made with Philip, as they were bent on the destruction
of the Macedonian power. The jEtolians aimed subsequently at
exciting suspicion against the sincerity of Flaminius. In the second
sonnet, Wordsworth's sympathy seems to have been with the ^Etolians,
as much as it was with the Swiss and the Tyrolese in their attitude to
Bonaparte. But Flaminius was not a Napoleon. — ED.

THE OAK OF GUERNICA.

Comp. 1810. Pub. 1815.

The ancient oak of Guernica, says Laborde in his account of Biscay, is
a most venerable natural monument. Ferdinand and Isabella, in
the year 1476, after hearing mass in the church of Santa Maria de
la Antigua, repaired to this tree, under which they swore to the
Biscayans to maintain their fueros (privileges). What other in-
terest belongs to it in the minds of this people will appear from
the following

SUPPOSED ADDRESS TO THE SAME.

OAK of Guernica ! Tree of holier power
Than that which in Dodona did enshrine

INDIGNATION OF A HIGH-MINDED SPANIARD. 231

(So faith too fondly deemed) a voice divine
Heard from the depths of its aerial bower —
How canst thou flourish at this blighting hour ?
What hope, what joy can sunshine bring to thee,
Or the soft breezes from the Atlantic sea,
The dews of morn, or April's tender shower ?
Stroke merciful and welcome would that be
Which should extend thy branches on the ground,
If never more within their shady round
Those lofty-minded Lawgivers shall meet,
Peasant and lord, in their appointed seat,
Guardians of Biscay's ancient liberty.

Prophetic power was believed to reside within the grove which
surrounded the temple of Jupiter near Dodona, in Epirus, and oracles
were given forth from the boughs of the sacred oak. — ED.

INDIGNATION OF A HIGH-MINDED SPANIARD.
Comp. 1810. Pub. 1815.

WE can endure that He should waste our lands,

Despoil our temples, and by sword and flame

Return us to the dust from which we came ;

Such food a Tyrant's appetite demands :

And we can brook the thought that by his hands

Spain may be overpowered, and he possess,

For his delight, a solemn wilderness

Where all the brave lie dead. But, when of bands

Which he will break for us he dares to speak,

Of benefits, and of a future day

When our enlightened minds shall bless his sway ;

Then, the strained heart of fortitude proves weak ;

Our groans, our blushes, our pale cheeks declare

That he has power to inflict what we lack strength to bear.

232 AVAUNT ALL SPECIOUS PLIANCY OF MIND.

Compare the two sonnets " on a celebrated event in Ancient History"
(p. 228). The following note to the last line of this sonnet occurs in
Professor Eeed's American Edition of the Poems : — " The student of
English poetry will call to mind Cowley's impassioned expression of the
indignation of a Briton under the depression of disasters somewhat
similar.

" Let rather Roman come again,
Or Saxon, Norman, or the Dane :
In all the bonds we ever bore,
We grieved, we sighed, we wept, we never blushed before."

Discourse on the Government of Oliver Cromwell. — ED.

Comp. 1810. Pub. 1815.

AVAUNT all specious pliancy of mind

In men of low degree, all smooth pretence !

I better like a blunt indifference,

And self-respecting slowness, disinclined

To win me at first sight : and be there joined

Patience and temperance with this high reserve,

Honour that knows the path and will not swerve ;

Affections, which, if put to proof, are kind ;

And piety towards God. Such men of old

Were England's native growth ; and, throughout Spain,

(Thanks to high God) forests of such remain i1

Then for that Country let our hopes be bold ;

For matched with these shall policy prove vain,

Her arts, her strength, her iron, and her gold.

Comp. 1810. Pub. 1815.

O'EKWEENING Statesmen have full long relied
On fleets and armies, and external wealth :

1 1836

Forests of such do at this day remain. 1815.

THE FRENCH AND THE SPANISH GUERILLAS. 233

But from within proceeds a Nation's health ;

Which shall not fail, though poor men cleave with pride

To the paternal floor ; or turn aside,

In the thronged city, from the walks of gain,

As being all unworthy to detain

A Soul by contemplation sanctified.

There are who cannot languish in this strife,

Spaniards of every rank, by whom the good

Of such high course was felt and understood ;

Who to their Country's cause have bound a life

Erewhile, by solemn consecration, given

To labour, and to prayer, to nature, and to heaven.*

THE FEENCH AND THE SPANISH GUEKILLAS.

Comp. 1810. Pub. 1815.

HUNGER, and sultry heat, and nipping blast

From bleak hill-top, and length of march by night

Through heavy swamp, or over snow-clad height —

These hardships ill-sustained, these dangers past,

The roving Spanish Bands are reached at last,

Charged, and dispersed like foam : but as a flight

Of scattered quails by signs do reunite,

So these, — and, heard of once again, are chased

With combinations of long-practised art

And newly-kindled hope ; but they are fled —

Gone are they, viewless as the buried dead :

Where now ? — Their sword is at the Foeman's heart !

And thus from year to year his walk they thwart,

And hang like dreams around his guilty bed.

See note t appended to the sonnet entitled Spanish Guerillas (p. 247).
—ED.

* See Laborde's character of the Spanish people ; from him the senti-
ment of these two last lines is taken. 1815.

234 EPITAPHS FROM CHIABRERA.

EPITAPHS

TRANSLATED FROM CHIABRERA.

[Those from Chiabrera were chiefly translated when Mr Coleridge
was writing his " Friend" in which periodical my " Essay on Epitaphs,"
written about that time, was first published. For further notice of
Chiabrera, in connection with his Epitaphs, see " Musings at Aquapen-
dento."]

It is better to print all the Epitaphs from Chiabrera together, than
to spread them out over the years when they were first published, since
it is impossible to say in what year those written subsequently to 1810
were composed. — ED.

L
Pub. 1837.

WEEP not, beloved Friends ! nor let the air

For me with sighs be troubled. Not from life

Have I been taken ; this is genuine life

And this alone — the life which now I live

In peace eternal ; where desire and joy

Together move in fellowship without end. —

Francesco Ceni willed that, after death,

His tombstone thus should speak for him.1 And surely

Small cause there is for that fond wish of ours

Long to continue in this world ; a world

That keeps not faith, nor yet can point a hope

To good, whereof itself is destitute.

n.

Pub. 1815.

PERHAPS some needful service of the State
Drew TITUS from the depths of studious bowers,

1 1846.

Francesco Ceni after death enjoined
That thus his tomb should speak for him.

EPITAPHS FROM CHIABRERA.

235

And doomed him to contend in faithless courts,

Where gold determines between right and wrong.

Yet did at length his loyalty of heart,

And his pure native genius, lead him back

To wait upon the bright and gracious Muses,

Whom he had early loved. And not in vain

Such course he held ! Bologna's learned schools

Were gladdened by the Sage's voice, and hung

With fondness on those sweet Nestorian strains.

There pleasure crowned his days ; and all his thoughts

A roseate fragrance breathed.* — 0 human life,

That never art secure from dolorous change !

Behold a high injunction suddenly

To Arno's side hath brought him,1 and he charmed

A Tuscan audience : but full soon was called

To the perpetual silence of the grave.

Mourn, Italy, the loss of him who stood

A Champion stedfast and invincible,

To quell the rage of literary War !

in.

Pub. 1815.

0 THOU who movest onward with a mind
Intent upon thy way, pause, though in haste !
'Twill be no fruitless moment. I was born
Within Savona's walls, of gentle blood.

1836.

To Arno's side conducts him,

1816.

* Ivi vivea giocondo ei suoi pensieri

Erano tutti rose.
The Translator had not skill to come nearer to his original. 1815.

236

EPITAPHS FROM CHIABRERA.

On Tiber's banks my youth was dedicate
To sacred studies ; and the Eoman Shepherd
Gave to my charge Urbino's numerous flock.
Well did I watch,1 much laboured, nor had power
To escape from many and strange indignities ;
Was smitten by the great ones of the world,
But did not fall ; for Virtue braves all shocks,
Upon herself resting immovably.
Me did a kindlier fortune then invite
To serve the glorious Henry, King of France,
And in his hands I saw a high reward
Stretched out for my acceptance, — but Death came.
Now, Eeader, learn from this my fate, how false,
How treacherous to her promise, is the world ;
And trust in God — to whose eternal doom
Must bend the sceptred Potentates of earth.

Pub. 1815.

THEKE never breathed a man who, when his life
Was closing, might not of that life relate
Toils long and hard. — The warrior will report
Of wounds, and bright swords flashing in the field,
And blast of trumpets. He who hath been doomed
To bow his forehead in the courts of kings
Will tell of fraud and never-ceasing hate,
Envy and heart-inquietude, derived
From intricate cabals of treacherous friends.
I, who on shipboard lived from earliest youth,
Could represent the countenance horrible

1836.

Much did I watch

1815.

EPITAPHS FROM CHIABKERA. 237

Of the vexed waters, and the indignant rage

Of Auster and Bootes. Fifty years x

Over the well-steered galleys did I rule : —

From huge Pelorus to the Atlantic pillars,

Eises no mountain to mine eyes unknown ;

And the broad gulfs I traversed oft and oft :

Of every cloud which in the heavens might stir

I knew the force ; and hence the rough sea's pride

Availed not to my Vessel's overthrow.

What noble pomp and frequent have not I

On regal decks beheld ! yet in the end

I learned that one poor moment can suffice 2

To equalise the lofty and the low.

We sail the sea of life — a Calm One finds,

And One a Tempest — and, the voyage o'er,

Death is the quiet haven of us all.

If more of my condition ye would know,

Savona was my birth-place, and I sprang

Of noble parents : seventy years and three 3

lived I — then yielded to a slow disease.

v.

Pub. 1837.

TKUE is it that Ambrosio Salinero

With an untoward fate was long involved

In odious litigation ; and full long,

Fate harder still ! had he to endure assaults

Of racking malady. And true it is

1 1836.

Forty years 1815.

2 1832.

I learn isis.

3 1836.

sixty years and three 1815.

238 EPITAPHS FROM CHIABRERA.

That not the less a frank courageous heart

And buoyant spirit triumphed over pain ;

And he was strong to follow in the steps

Of the fair Muses. Not a covert path

Leads to the dear Parnassian forest's shade,

That might from him be hidden ; not a track

Mounts to pellucid Hippocrene, but he

Had traced its windings. — This Savona knows,

Yet no sepulchral honors to her Son

She paid, for in our age the heart is ruled

Only by gold. And now a simple stone

Inscribed with this memorial here is raised

By his bereft, his lonely, Chiabrera.

Think not, 0 Passenger ! who read'st the lines,

That an exceeding love hath dazzled me ;

No — he was One whose memory ought to spread

Where'er Permessus bears an honoured name,

And live as long as its pure stream shall flow.

VI.
Pub. 1815.

DESTINED to war from very infancy
Was I, Eoberto Dati, and I took
In Malta the white symbol of the Cross :
Nor in life's vigorous season did I shun
Hazard or toil ; among the sands was seen
Of Libya ; and not seldom, on the banks
Of wide Hungarian Danube, 'twas my lot
To hear the sanguinary trumpet sounded.
So lived I, and repined not at such fate :
This only grieves me, for it seems a wrong,
That stripped of arms I to my end am brought
On the soft down of my paternal home.

EPITAPHS FROM CHIABRERA.

Yet haply Arno sh&ll be spared all cause
To blush for. me. Thou, loiter not nor halt
In thy appointed way, and bear in mind
How fleeting and how frail is human life !

VII.

Pub. 1837.

0 FLOWER of all that springs from gentle blood,

And all that generous nurture breeds to make

Youth amiable ; 0 friend so true of soul

To fair Aglaia ; by what envy moved,

Lelius ! has death cut short thy brilliant day

In its sweet opening ? and what dire mishap

Has from Savona torn her best delight ?

For thee she mourns, nor e'er will cease to mourn ;

And, should the out-pourings of her eyes suffice not

For her heart's grief, she will entreat Sebeto

Not to withhold his bounteous aid, Sebeto

Who saw thee, on his margin, yield to death,

In the chaste arms of thy beloved Love !

What profit riches ? what does youth avail ?

Dust are our hopes ; — I, weeping bitterly,

Penned these sad lines, nor can forbear to pray

That every gentle Spirit hither led

May read them, not without some bitter tears.

VIII.

Pub. 1815.

NOT without heavy grief of heart did He
On whom the duty fell (for at that time
The Father sojourned in a distant land)
Deposit in the hollow of this tomb
A brother's Child, most tenderly beloved !
FRANCESCO was the name the Youth had borne,

239

240 EPITAPHS FROM CHIABRERA.

POZZOBONNELLI his illustrious house^

And, when beneath this stone the Corse was laid,

The eyes of all Savona streamed with tears.

Alas ! the twentieth April of his life

Had scarcely flowered : and at this early time,

By genuine virtue he inspired a hope

That greatly cheered his country : to his kin

He promised comfort ; and the flattering thoughts

His friends had in their fondness entertained *

He suffered not to languish or decay.

Now is there not good reason to break forth

Into a passionate lament ? — 0 Soul !

Short while a Pilgrim in our nether world,

Do thou enjoy the calm empyreal air ;

And round this earthly tomb let roses rise

An everlasting spring ! in memory

Of that delightful fragrance which was once

From thy mild manners quietly exhaled.

IX.

Pub. 1815.

PAUSE, courteous Spirit ! — Balbi supplicates
That Thou, with no reluctant voice, for him
Here laid in mortal darkness, wouldst prefer
A prayer to the Redeemer of the world.
This to the dead by sacred right belongs ;
All else is nothing. — Did occasion suit
To tell his worth, the marble of this tomb
Would ill suffice : for Plato's lore sublime,
And all the wisdom of the Stagyrite,

* In justice to the Author I subjoin the original —

E degli amici
Non laciava languire i bei pensieri. 1815.

EPITAPHS FROM CHIABRERA.

241

Enriched and beautified his studious mind :

With Archimedes also he conversed

As with a chosen friend ; nor did he leave

Those laureat wreaths ungathered which the Nymphs

Twine near their loved Permessus.1 — Finally,

Himself above each lower thought uplifting,

His ears he closed to listen to the songs 2

Which Sion's Kings did consecrate of old ;

And his Permessus found on Lebanon.3

A blessed Man ! who of protracted days

Made not, as thousands do, a vulgar sleep ;

But truly did He live his life. Urbino,

Take pride in him ! — 0 Passenger, farewell !

I have been unable to obtain any definite information in reference to
the persons commemorated in these epitaphs by Chiabrera : Titus,
Ambrosio Salinero, Eoberto Dati, Francesco Pozzobonnelli, and Balbi.
Mr W. M. Eossetti writes that he " supposes all the men named by
Chiabrera to be such as enjoyed a certain local and temporary reputa-
tion, which has hardly passed down to any sort of posterity, and
certainly not to the ordinary English reader."

Chiabrera was born at Savona on the 8th of June 1552, and educated at
Borne. He entered the service of Cardinal Cornaro, married in his 50th
year, lived to the age of 85, and died October 14, 1637. His poetical
faculty showed itself late. " Having commenced to read the Greek
writers at home, he conceived a great admiration for Pindar, and
strove successfully to imitate him. He was not less happy in catching
the nai've and pleasant spirit of Anacreon ; his canzonetti being dis-
tinguished for their ease and elegance, while his Lettere Famigliari
was the first attempt to introduce the poetical epistle into Italian
Literature. He wrote also several epics, bucolics, and dramatic poems.
His Opere appeared at Venice, in 6 vols., in 1768."

Wordsworth says of him, in his Essay on Epitaphs (see The Friend,
February 22, 1810 — where translations of some of those epitaphs of

1836.

1836.

1836.

Twine on the top of Pindus.

the Song

And fixed his Pindus upon Lebanon.
IV. Q

1815.
1815.
1815.

242 MATERNAL GRIEF.

Chiabrera first appeared — and notes to The Excursion) — " His life was
long, and every part of it bore appropriate fruits. Urbino, his birth-
place, might be proud of him, and the passenger who was entreated
to pray for his soul has a wish breathed for his welfare. . . . The
Epitaphs of Chiabrera are twenty-nine in number, and all of them,
save two, upon men probably little known at this day in their own
country, and scarcely at all beyond the limits of it ; and the reader is
generally made acquainted with the moral and intellectual excellence
which distinguished them by a brief history of the course of their lives,
or a selection of events and circumstances, and thus they are in-
dividualized ; but in the two other instances, namely, in those of Tasso
and Raphael, he enters into no particulars, but contents himself with
four lines expressing one sentiment, upon the principle laid down in
the former part of this discourse, when the subject of the epitaph is a
man of prime note. ..."

Compare the poem Musings near Aquapendente. In reference to
the places referred to in these Epitaphs of Chiabrera, it may be men-
tioned that Savona (Epitaphs v., vn., vm.) is a town in the Genovese
Territory. Permessus (Epitaph v.) is a river of Bceotia, rising in Mount
Helicon and flowing round it, hence sacred to the muses ; the fountain
of Hippocrene — also referred to in this epitaph — was not far distant.
Sebeto (Epitaph iv.), now cape Faro, is a Sicilian-promontory. — ED.

MATEKNAL GEIEF.
Comp. 1810. Pub. 1842.

[This was in part an overflow from the Solitary's description of his
own and his wife's feelings upon the decease of their children. (See
" Excursion," book 3d.)]

DEPARTED Child ! I could forget thee once

Though at my bosom nursed ; this woeful gain

Thy dissolution brings, that in my soul

Is present and perpetually abides

A shadow, never, never to be displaced

By the returning substance, seen or touched,

Seen by mine eyes, or clasped in my embrace.

Absence and death how differ they ! and how

Shall I admit that nothing can restore

MATERNAL GRIEF. 243

What one short sigh so easily removed ? —
Death, life, and sleep, reality and thought,
Assist me, God, their boundaries to know,
0 teach me calm submission to thy Will !

The Child she mourned had overstepped the pale
Of Infancy, but still did breathe the air
That sanctifies its confines, and partook
Eeflected beams of that celestial light
To all the Little-ones on sinful earth
Not unvouchsafed — a light that warmed and cheered
Those several qualities of heart and mind
Which, in her own blest nature, rooted deep,
Daily before the Mother's watchful eye,
And not hers only, their peculiar charms
Unfolded, — beauty, for its present self,
And for its promises to future years,
With not unfrequent rapture fondly hailed.

Have you espied upon a dewy lawn
A pair of Leverets each provoking each
To a continuance of their fearless sport,
Two separate Creatures in their several gifts
Abounding, but so fashioned that, in all
That Nature prompts them to display, their looks,
Their starts of motion and their fits of rest,
An undistinguishable style appears
And character of gladness, as if Spring
Lodged in their innocent bosoms, and the spirit
Of the rejoicing morning were their own ?

Such union, in the lovely Girl maintained
And her twin Brother, had the parent seen

244 MATERNAL GRIEF.

Ere, pouncing like a ravenous bird of prey,

Death in a moment parted them, and left

The Mother, in her turns of anguish, worse

Than desolate ; for oft-times from the sound

Of the survivor's sweetest voice (dear child,

He knew it not) and from his happiest looks

Did she extract the food of self-reproach,

As one that lived ungrateful for the stay

By Heaven afforded to uphold her maimed

And tottering spirit. And full oft the Boy,

Now first acquainted with distress and grief,

Shrunk from his Mother's presence, shunned with fear

Her sad approach, and stole away to find,

In his known haunts of joy where'er he might,

A more congenial object. But, as time

Softened her pangs and reconciled the child

To what he saw, he gradually returned,

Like a scared Bird encouraged to renew

A broken intercourse ; and, while his eyes

Were yet with pensive fear and gentle awe

Turned upon her who bore him, she would stoop

To imprint a kiss that lacked not power to spread

Faint colour over both their pallid cheeks,

And stilled his tremulous lip. Thus they were calmed

And cheered ; and now together breathe fresh air

In open fields ; and when the glare of day

Is gone, and twilight to the Mother's wish

Befriends the observance, readily they join

In walks whose boundary is the lost One's grave,

Which he with flowers had planted, finding there

Amusement, where the Mother does not miss

Dear consolation, kneeling on the turf

In prayer, yet blending with that solemn rite •*

Of pious faith the vanities of grief ;

CHARACTERISTICS OF A CHILD THREE YEARS OLD. 245

For such, by pitying Angels and by Spirits
Transferred to regions upon which the clouds
Of our weak nature rest not, must be deemed
Those willing tears, and unforbidden sighs,
And all those tokens of a cherished sorrow,
Which, soothed and sweetened by the grace of Heaven
As now it is, seems to her own fond heart,
Immortal as the love that gave it being.

" That celestial light, &c."

Compare the Ode on Immortality (p. 48). Maternal Grief was classed
amongst the " Poems founded on the Affections." — ED.

1811.

In the spring of 1811 "Wordsworth left Allan Bank, to reside for two
years in the Rectory, Grasmere. A small fragment on his daughter
Catherine, the Epistle to Sir George Beaumont, from the south-west
coast of Cumberland, and four Sonnets (mainly suggested by the events
of the year in Spain) comprise all the poems belonging to 1811. — ED.

CHAKACTERISTICS OF A CHILD THEEE
YEAES OLD.

Cornp. 1811. Pub. 1815.

[Written at Allanbank, Grasmere. Picture of my daughter,
Catherine, who died the year after.]

LOVING she is, and tractable, though wild ;
And Innocence hath privilege in her
To dignify arch looks and laughing eyes ;
And feats of cunning ; and the pretty round
Of trespasses, affected to provoke
Mock-chastisement and partnership in play.

246 SPANISH GUERILLAS.

And, as a faggot sparkles on the hearth,

Not less if unattended and alone

Than when both young and old sit gathered round

And take delight in its activity ;

Even so this happy Creature of herself

Is all-sufficient ; solitude to her

Is blithe society, who fills the air

With gladness and involuntary songs.

Light are her sallies as the tripping fawn's

Forth-startled from the fern where she lay couched ;

Unthought-of, unexpected, as the stir

Of the soft breeze ruffling the meadow-flowers,

Or from before it chasing wantonly

The many-coloured images imprest

Upon the bosom of a placid lake.

Classed amongst the " Poems referring to the period of Childhood."
—ED.

SPANISH GUEEILLAS.

Comp. 1811. Pub. 1815.

THEY seek, are sought ; to daily battle led,
Shrink not, though far outnumbered by their Foes,
For they have learned to open and to close
The ridges of grim war ; and at their head
Are captains such as erst their country bred
Or fostered, self-supported chiefs, — like those
Whom hardy Eome was fearful to oppose ;
Whose desperate shock the Carthaginian fled.
In One who lived unknown a shepherd's life
Redoubted Viriatus breathes again ; *

* Viriatus, for eight or fourteen years leader of the Lusitauians in the
war with the Romans in the middle of the second century B.C. He de-
feated many of the Roman generals, including Pompey. Some of the
historians say that he was originally a shepherd, and then a robber or
guerilla chieftain. (See Livy, Books 52 and 54.)— ED.

THE POWER OF ARMIES IS A VISIBLE THING. 247

And Mina, nourished in the studious shade,*
With that great Leader! vies, who, sick of strife
And bloodshed, longed in quiet to be laid
In some green island of the western main.

Comp. 1811. Pub. 1815.

THE power of Armies is a visible thing,

Formal, and circumscribed in time and space j1

But who the limits of that power shall trace 2

Which a brave People into light can bring

Or hide, at will, — for freedom combating

By just revenge inflamed ? No foot may chase,3

No eye can follow, to a fatal place

That power, that spirit, whether on the wing

11S27.

time and place ; isis.

2 1827.

can trace isis.

3 1827.

can chase, isis.

* " Whilst the chief force of the French was occupied in Portugal and
Andalusia, and there remained in the interior of Spain only a few weak
corps, the Guerilla system took deep root, and in the course of 1811
attained its greatest perfection. Left to itself the boldest and most enter-
prising of its members rose to command, and the mode of warfare best
adapted to their force and habits was pursued. Each province boasted of
a hero, in command of a formidable band — Old Castile, Don Julian
Sanches ; Arragon, Longa ; Navarre, Esprez y Mina, . . . with in-
numerable others, whose deeds spread a lustre over every part of the
kingdom. . . . Mina and Longa headed armies of 6 or 8000 men with
distinguished ability, and displayed manoeuvres oftentimes for months
together, in baffling the pursuit of more numerous bodies of French,
which would reflect credit on the most celebrated commanders." (See
Account of the War in Spain and Portugal, and in the south of France, from
1808 to 1814 inclusive, by Lieut. -Colonel John T. Jones. London, 1818.)
—ED.

t Sertorius. See note to The Prelude, Book I., Vol. III. p. 134.— ED.

248 EPISTLE TO SIK G. BEAUMONT.

Like the strong wind, or sleeping like the wind
Within its awful caves. — From year to year
Springs this indigenous produce far and near ;
No craft this subtile element can bind,
Eising like water from the soil, to find
In every nook a lip that it may cheer.

Comp. 1811. 1815.

HERE pause : the poet claims at least this praise,

That virtuous Liberty hath been the scope

Of his pure song, which did not shrink from hope

In the worst moment of these evil days ;

From hope, the paramount duty that Heaven lays,

For its own honour, on man's suffering heart.

Never may from our souls one truth depart —

That an accursed thing it is to gaze

On prosperous tyrants with a dazzled eye ;

Nor — touched with due abhorrence of their guilt

For whose dire ends tears flow, and blood is spilt,

And justice labours in extremity —

Forget thy weakness, upon which is built,

0 wretched man, the throne of tyranny !

EPISTLE

TO SIR GEORGE ROWLAND BEAUMONT, BART.

FROM THE SOUTH-WEST COAST OF CUMBERLAND.
Comp. 1811. Pub. 1842.

[This poem opened, when first written, with a paragraph that has
been transferred as an introduction to the first series of my Scotch
Memorials. The journey, of which the first part is here described, was
from Grasmere to Bootle on the south-west coast of Cumberland, the
whole among mountain roads through a beautiful country ; and we

EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT. 249

had fine weather. The verses end with our breakfast at the head of
Yewdale in a yeoman's house, which, like all the other property in that
sequestered vale, has passed or is passing into the hands of Mr James
Marshall of Monk Coniston— in Mr Knott's, the late owner's, time
called Waterhead. Our hostess married a Mr Oldfield, a lieutenant in
the Navy. They lived together for some time at Hacket, where she
still resides as his widow. It was in front of that house, on the
mountain side, near which stood the peasant who, while we were passing
at a distance, saluted us, waving a kerchief in her hand as described in
the poem. (This matron and her husband were then residing at the
Hacket. The house and its inmates are referred to in the fifth book of
the " Excursion," in the passage beginning —

You behold,

High on the breast of yon dark mountain, dark
"With stony barrenness, a shining speck " — J.C.)

The dog which we met with soon after our starting belonged to Mr
Rowlandson, who for forty years was curate of Grasmere in place of
the rector who lived to extreme old age in a state of insanity. Of this
Mr K. much might be said, both with reference to his character, and
the way in which he was regarded by his parishioners. He was a man
of a robust frame, had a firm voice and authoritative manner, of strong
natural talents, of which he was himself conscious, for he has been
heard to say (it grieves me to add) with an oath — " If I had been
brought up at college I should have been a bishop." Two vices
used to struggle in him for mastery, avarice and the love of strong
drink ; but, avarice, as is common in like cases, always got the better
of its opponent ; for, though he was often intoxicated, it was never I
.believe at his own expense. As has been said of one in a more exalted
station, he would take any given quantity. I have heard a story of him
which is worth the telling. One summer's morning, our Grasmere
curate, after a night's carouse in the vale of Langdale, on his return
home, having reached a point near which the whole of the vale of
Grasmere might be seen with the lake immediately below him, stepped
aside and sat down on the turf. After looking for some time at the
landscape, then in the perfection of its morning beauty, he ex-
claimed— " Good God, that I should have led so long such a life in
such a place ! " This no doubt was deeply felt by him at the time, but
I am not authorised to say that any noticeable amendment followed.
Penuriousness strengthened upon him as his body grew feebler with age.
He had purchased property and kept some land in his own hands, but
he could not find in his heart to lay out the necessary hire for labourers
at the proper season, and consequently he has often been seen in half-
dotage working his hay in the month of November by mooidight, a
melancholy sight which I myself have witnessed. Notwithstanding all

250 EPISTLE TO SIR, G. BEAUMONT.

that has been said, this man, on account of his talents and superior
education, was looked up to by his parishioners, who without a single
exception lived at that time (and most of them upon their own small
inheritances) in a state of republican equality, a condition favourable to
the growth of kindly feelings among them, and in a striking degree
exclusive to temptations to gross vice and scandalous behaviour. As a
pastor their curate did little or nothing for them ; but what could more
strikingly set forth the efficacy of the Church of England through its
Ordinances and Liturgy than that, in spite of the unworthiness of the
minister, his church was regularly attended \ and, though there was
not much appearance in the flock of what might be called animated
piety, intoxication was rare, and dissolute morals unknown. With the
Bible they were for the most part well acquainted ; and, as was strik-
ingly shown when they were under affliction, must have been supported
and comforted by habitual belief in those truths which it is the aim of the
Church to inculcate. Loughrigg Tarn. — This beautiful pool and the
surrounding scene are minutely described in my little Book on the
Lakes. Sir G. H. Beaumont, in the earlier part of his life, was in-
duced, by his love of nature and the art of painting, to take up his
abode at Old Brathay, about three miles from this spot, so that he
must have seen it under many aspects ; and he was so much pleased
with it that he purchased the Tarn with a view to build, near it, such a
residence as is alluded to in this Epistle. Baronets and knights were
not so common in that day as now, and Sir Michael le Fleming, not
liking to have a rival in that kind of distinction so near him, claimed a
sort of Lordship over the territory, and showed dispositions little in
unison with those of Sir G. Beaumont, who was eminently a lover of
peace. The project of building was in consequence given up, Sir
George retaining possession of the Tarn. Many years afterwards
a Kendal tradesman born upon its banks applied to me for the pur-
chase of it, and accordingly it was sold for the sum that had been
given for it, and the money was laid out under my direction upon a
substantial oak fence for a certain number of yew trees to be planted in
Grasmere church-yard ; two were planted in each enclosure, with a
view to remove, after a certain time, the one which throve least.
After several years, the stouter plant being left, the others were taken
up and placed in other parts of the same church-yard, and were
adequately fenced at the expense and under the care of the late Mr
Barber, Mr Greenwood, and myself : the whole eight are now thriving,
and are already an ornament to a place which, during late years has
lost much of its rustic simplicity by the introduction of iron palisades
to fence off family buryiug-grounds, and by numerous monuments,
some of them in very bad taste ; from which this place of burial was
in my memory quite free. See the lines in the sixth book of the
" Excursion " beginning — " Green is the church-yard, beautiful and

EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT. 251

green." The Epistle to which these notes refer, though written so far back
as 1804, was carefully revised so late as 1842, previous to its publication.
I am loth to add, that it was never seen by the person to whom it is
addressed. So sensible am I of the deficiencies in all that I write, and
so far does everything I attempt fall short of what I wish it to be, that
even private publication, if such a term may be allowed, requires more
resolution than I can command. I have written to give vent to my
own mind, and not without hope that, some time or other, kindred
minds might benefit by my labours : but I am inclined to believe I
should never have ventured to send forth any verses of mine to the
world if it had not been done on the pressure of personal occasions.
Had I been a rich man, my productions, like this " Epistle," the
tragedy of the " Borderers," &c., would most likely have been con-
fined to manuscript.]

FAR from our home by Grasmere's quiet Lake,

From the Yale's peace which all her fields partake,

Here on the bleakest point of Cumbria's shore

We sojourn stunned by Ocean's ceaseless roar ;

While, day by day, grim neighbour ! huge Black Comb

Frowns deepening visibly his native gloom,

Unless, perchance rejecting in despite

What on the Plain we have of warmth and light,

In his own storms he hides himself from sight.

Eough is the time ; and thoughts, that would be free

From heaviness, oft fly, dear Friend, to thee ;

Turn from a spot where neither sheltered road

Nor hedge-row screen invites my steps abroad ;

Where one poor Plane-tree, having as it might

Attained a stature twice a tall man's height,

Hopeless of further growth, and brown and sere

Through half the summer, stands with top cut sheer,

Like an unshifting weathercock which proves

How cold the quarter that the wind best loves,

Or like a Centinel that, evermore

Darkening the window, ill defends the door

Of this unfinished house — a Fortress bare,

Where strength has been the Builder's only care ;

252 EPISTLE TO SIR, G. BEAUMONT.

Whose rugged walls may still for years demand

The final polish of the Plasterer's hand.

— This Dwelling's Inmate more than three weeks' space

And oft a Prisoner in the cheerless place,

I — of whose touch the fiddle would complain,

Whose breath would labour at the flute in vain,

In music all unversed, nor blessed with skill

A bridge to copy, or to paint a mill,

Tired of my books, a scanty company !

And tired of listening to the boisterous sea —

Pace between door and window muttering rhyme,

An old resource to cheat a froward time !

Though these dull hours (mine is it, or their shame ?)

Would tempt me to renounce that humble aim.

— But if there be a Muse who, free to take

Her seat upon Olympus, doth forsake

Those heights (like Phoebus when his golden locks

He veiled, attendant on Thessalian flocks)

And, in disguise, a Milkmaid with her pail

Trips down the pathways of some winding dale ;

Or, like a Mermaid, warbles on the shores

To fishers mending nets beside their doors ;

Or, Pilgrim-like, on forest moss reclined,

Gives plaintive ditties to the heedless wind,

Or listens to its play among the boughs

Above her head and so forgets her vows —

If such a Visitant of Earth there be

And she would deign this day to smile on me

And aid my verse, content with local bounds

Of natural beauty and life's daily rounds,

Thoughts, chances, sights, or doings, which we tell

Without reserve to those whom we love well —

Then haply, Beaumont ! words in current clear

Will flow, and on a welcome page appear

Duly before thy sight, unless they perish here.

EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT. 253

What shall I treat of ? News from Mona's Isle ?
Such have we, but unvaried in its style ;
No tales of Eunagates fresh landed, whence
And wherefore fugitive or on what pretence ;
Of feasts, or scandal, eddying like the wind
Most restlessly alive when most confined.
Ask not of me, whose tongue can best appease
The mighty tumults of the HOUSE OF KEYS ;
The last year's cup whose Earn or Heifer gained,
What slopes are planted, or what mosses drained :
An eye of fancy only can I cast
On that proud pageant now at hand or past,
When full five hundred boats in trim array,
With nets and sails outspread and streamers gay,
And chanted hymns and stiller voice of prayer,
For the old Manx-harvest to the Deep repair,
Soon as the herring-shoals at distance shine
Like beds of moonlight shifting on the brine.

Mona from our Abode is daily seen,
But with a wilderness of waves between ;
And by conjecture only can we speak
Of aught transacted there in bay or creek ;
No tidings reach us thence from town or field,
Only faint news her mountain sunbeams yield,
And some we gather from the misty air,
And some the hovering clouds, our telegraph, declare.
But these poetic mysteries I withhold ;
For Fancy hath her fits both hot and cold,
And should the colder fit with You be on
When You might read, my credit would be gone.

Let more substantial themes the pen engage,
And nearer interests culled from the opening stage

254 EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT.

Of our migration. — Ere the welcome dawn
Had from the east her silver star withdrawn,
The Wain stood ready, at our Cottage-door,
Thoughtfully freighted with a various store ;
And long or e'er the uprising of the Sun
O'er dew-damped dust our journey was begun,
A needful journey, under favouring skies,
Through peopled Vales ; yet something in the guise
Of those old Patriarchs when from well to well
They roamed through Wastes where now the tented
Arabs dwell.

Say first, to whom did we the charge confide,
Who promptly undertook the Wain to guide
Up many a sharply-twining road and down,
And over many a wide hill's craggy crown,
Through the quick turns of many a hollow nook,
And the rough bed of many an unbridged brook ;
A blooming Lass — who in her better hand
Bore a light switch, her sceptre of command
When, yet a slender Girl, she often led,
Skilful and bold, the horse and burthened sled*
From the peat-yielding Moss on Gowdar's head.
What could go wrong with such a Charioteer
For goods and chattels, or those Infants dear,
A Pair who smilingly sate side by side,
Our hope confirming that the salt-sea tide,
Whose free embraces we were bound to seek,
Would their lost strength restore and freshen the pale

cheek ?

Such hope did either Parent entertain
Pacing behind along the silent lane.

* A local word for Sledge.

EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT. 255

Blithe hopes and happy musings soon took flight,
For lo ! an uncouth melancholy sight —
On a green bank a creature stood forlorn
Just half protruded to the light of morn,
Its hinder part concealed by hedge-row thorn.
The Figure called to mind a beast of prey
Stript of its frightful powers by slow decay,
And, though no longer upon rapine bent,
Dim memory keeping of its old intent.
We started, looked again with anxious eyes,
And in that griesly object recognised
The Curate's Dog — his long-tried friend, for they,
As well we knew, together had grown grey.
The Master died, his drooping servant's grief
Found at the Widow's feet some sad relief ; l
Yet still he lived in pining discontent,
Sadness which no indulgence could prevent ;
Hence whole day wanderings, broken nightly sleeps
And lonesome watch that out of doors he keeps ;
Not oftentimes, I trust, as we, poor brute !
Espied him on his legs sustained, blank, mute,
And of all visible motion destitute,
So that the very heaving of his breath
Seemed stopt, though by some other power than death.
Long as we gazed upon the form and face,
A mild domestic pity kept its place,
Unscared by thronging fancies of strange hue
That haunted us in spite of what we knew.

1 Inserted in edition 1842.

Until the vale she quitted, and this door

"Was closed, to which she will return no more ;

But first old Faithful to the neighbour's care

Was given in charge ; nor lacked he dainty fare,

And in the Chimney Nook was free to lie

And doze, or, if his turn was come, to die. 18*2.

256 EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT.

Even now I sometimes think of him as lost
In second-sight appearances, or crost
By spectral shapes of guilt, or to the ground,
On which he stood, by spells unnatural bound,
Like a gaunt shaggy Porter forced to wait
In days of old romance at Archimago's gate.

Advancing Summer, Nature's law fulfilled,
The choristers in every grove had stilled ;
But we, we lacked not music of our own,
For lightsome Fanny had thus early thrown,
Mid the gay prattle of those infant tongues,
Some notes prelusive, from the round of songs
With which, more zealous than the liveliest bird
That in wild Arden's 'brakes was ever heard,
Her work and her work's partners she can cheer,
The whole day long, and all days of the year.

Thus gladdened from our own dear vale we pass
And soon approach Diana's Looking-glass !
To Loughrigg-tarn, round clear and bright as heaven,
Such name Italian fancy would have given,
Ere on its banks the few grey cabins rose
That yet disturbed not its concealed repose
More than the feeblest wind that idly blows.

Ah, Beaumont ! when an opening in the road
Stopped me at once by charm of what it showed,
The encircling region vividly exprest
Within the mirror's depth, a world at rest —
Sky streaked with purple, grove and craggy Held*
And the smooth green of many a pendent field,

* A word common in the country, signifying shelter, as in Scotland.

EPISTLE TO SIB, G. BEAUMONT. 257

And, quieted and soothed, a torrent small,

A little daring would-be waterfall,

One chimney smoking and its azure wreath,

Associate all in the calm Pool beneath,

With here and there a faint imperfect gleam

Of water-lilies veiled in misty steam —

What wonder at this hour of stillness deep,

A shadowy link 'tween wakefulness and sleep,

When Nature's self, amid such blending, seems

To render visible her own soft dreams,

If, mixed with what appeared of rock, lawn, wood,

Fondly embosomed in the tranquil flood,

A glimpse I caught of that Abode, by Thee

Designed to rise in humble privacy,

A lowly Dwelling, here to be outspread,

Like a small Hamlet, with its bashful head

Half hid in native trees. Alas 'tis not,

Nor ever was ; I sighed, and left the spot

Unconscious of its own untoward lot,

And thought in silence, with regret too keen,

Of unexperienced joys that might have been ;

Of neighbourhood and intermingling arts,

And golden summer days uniting cheerful hearts.

But time, irrevocable time, is flown,

And let us utter thanks for blessings sown

And reaped — what hath been, and what is, our own.

Not far we travelled ere a shout of glee,
Startling us all, dispersed my reverie ;
Such shout as many a sportive echo meeting
Oft-times from Alpine chalets sends a greeting.
Whence the blithe hail ? behold a Peasant stand
On high, a kerchief waving in her hand !

IV. R

258 EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT.

Not unexpectant that by early day

Our little Band would thrid this mountain way,

Before her cottage on the bright hill side

She hath advanced with hope to be descried.

Eight gladly answering signals we displayed,

Moving along a tract of morning shade,

And vocal wishes sent of like good will

To our kind Friend high on the sunny hill —

Luminous region, fair as if the prime

Were tempting all astir to look aloft or climb ;

Only the centre of the shining cot

With door left open makes a gloomy spot,

Emblem of those dark corners sometimes found

Within the happiest breast on earthly ground.

Eich prospect left behind of stream and vale,
And mountain-tops, a barren ridge we scale ;
Descend and reach, in Yewdale's depths, a plain
With haycocks studded, striped with yellowing grain —
An area level as a Lake and spread
Under a rock too steep for man to tread,
Where sheltered from the north and bleak north-west
Aloft the Eaven hangs a visible nest,
Fearless of all assaults that would her brood molest.
Hot sunbeams fill the steaming vale ; but hark,
At our approach, a jealous watch-dog's bark,
Noise that brings forth no liveried Page of state,.
But the whole household, that our coming wait.
With Young and Old warm greetings we exchange,
And jocund smiles, and toward the lowly Grange
Press forward by the teasing dogs unscared.
Entering, we find the morning meal prepared :
So down we sit, though not till each had cast
Pleased looks around the delicate repast —

EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT. 259

liich cream, and snow-white eggs fresh from the nest,
With amber honey from the mountain's breast ;
Strawberries from lane or woodland, offering wild
Of children's industry, in hillocks piled ;
Cakes for the nonce, and butter fit to lie
Upon a lordly dish ; frank hospitality
Where simple art with bounteous nature vied,
And cottage comfort shunned not seemly pride.

Kind Hostess ! Handmaid also of the feast,
If thou be lovelier than the kindling East,
Words by thy presence unrestrained may speak
Of a perpetual dawn from brow and cheek
Instinct with light whose sweetest promise lies,
Never retiring, in thy large dark eyes,
Dark but to every gentle feeling true,
As if their lustre flowed from ether's purest blue.

Let me not ask what tears may have been wept
By those bright eyes, what weary vigils kept,
Beside that hearth what sighs may have been heaved
For wounds inflicted, nor what toil relieved
By fortitude and patience, and the grace
Of heaven in pity visiting the place.
Not unadvisedly those secret springs
I leave unsearched : enough that memory clings,
Here as elsewhere, to notices that make
Their own significance for hearts awake
To rural incidents, whose genial powers
Filled with delight three summer morning hours.

More could my pen report of grave or gay
That through our gipsy travel cheered the way ;

260 EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT.

But, bursting forth above the waves, the Sun
Laughs at my pains, and seems to say, " Be done."
Yet, Beaumont, thou wilt not, I trust, reprove
This humble offering made by Truth to Love,
Nor chide the Muse that stooped to break a spell
Which might have else been on me yet : —

FAREWELL.

UPON PEEUSING THE FOKEGOING EPISTLE
THIETY YEAES AFTEE ITS COMPOSITION.

Comp. 1841. Pub. 1842.

Soon did tiie Almighty Giver of all rest

Take those dear young Ones to a fearless nest ;

And in Death's arms has long reposed the Friend

For whom this simple Eegister was penned.

Thanks to the moth that spared it for our eyes ;

And Strangers even the slighted Scroll may prize,

Moved by the touch of kindred sympathies.

For — save the calm, repentance sheds o'er strife

Eaised by remembrances of misused life,

The light from past endeavours purely willed

And by heaven's favour happily fulfilled ;

Save hope that we, yet bound to Earth, may share

The joys of the Departed — what so fair

As blameless pleasure, not without some tears,

Ee viewed through Love's transparent veil of years ?*

* LOUGHRIGG TARN, alluded to in the foregoing Epistle, resembles, though
much smaller in compass, the Lake Nemi, or Speculum Diance as it is often
called, not only in its clear waters and circular form, and the beauty im-
mediately surrounding it, but also as being overlooked by the eminence of
Langdale Pikes as Lake Nemi is by that of Monte Calvo. Since this Epistle
was written Loughrigg Tarn has lost much of its beauty by the felling of
many natural clumps of wood, relics of the old forest, particularly upon the

EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT.

261

The mighty tumult of the HOUSE OF KEYS ;

The Isle of Man has a constitution of its own, independent of the
Imperial Parliament. The House of twenty-four Keys is the popular
assembly, corresponding to the British House of Commons ; the Lieu-
tenant-Go vernor and Council constitute the upper* House. All legislative
measures must be first considered and passed by both branches, and
afterwards transmitted to the English Sovereign for the Royal Assent
before becoming law.

Mona from our Abode is daily seen,
But with a wilderness of waves between ;

In a letter written from Bootle to Sir George Beaumont on the 28th
August 1811, Wordsworth says: —

" This is like most others, a bleak and treeless coast, but abounding
in corn fields, and with a noble beach, which is delightful either for
walking or riding. The Isle of Man is right opposite our window ; and
though in this unsettled weather often invisible, its appearance has
afforded us great amusement. One afternoon above the whole length of
it was stretched a body of clouds, shaped and coloured like a mag-
nificent grove in winter, when whitened with snow and illuminated by
the morning sun, which, having melted the snow in part, has inter-
mingled black masses among the brightness. The whole sky was
scattered over with fleecy dark clouds, such as any sunshiny day
produces, and which were changing their shapes and positions every
moment. But this line of clouds immovably attached to the island, and
manifestly took their shape from the influence of its mountains. There
appeared to be just span enough of sky to allow the hand to slide between
the top Snafell, the highest peak in the island, and the base of this
glorious forest, in which little change was noticeable for more than ths
space of hah* an hour."

In the Fenwick note, Wordsworth tells us that this Epistle was
written in 1804 ; and by referring to the Note prefixed to the
first poem in the Memorials of a Tour in Scotland, 1803, (see Vol. II.

farm called "The Oaks," from the abundance of that tree which grew
there.

It is to be regretted, upon public grounds, that Sir George Beaumont
did not carry into effect his intention of constructing here a Summer
Retreat in the style I have described ; as his taste would have set an ex-
ample how buildings, with all the accommodations modern society requires,
might be introduced even into the most secluded parts of this country
without injuring their native character. The desigu was not abandoned
from failure of inclination on his part, but in consequence of local unto-
wardnesses which need not be particularized.

262 EPISTLE TO SIR G. BEAUMONT.

p. 326), it will be seen that the lines entitled "Departure from the Vale
of Grasmere, August 1803," beginning —

The gentlest Shade that walked Elysian plains,

were " not actually written for the occasion, but transplanted from my
' Epistle to Sir George *Beaumont.' "

It does not follow from this, however, that the lines belong to the
year 1803 or 1804 ; because they were not published along with the earlier
Memorials of the Scotch Tour, but appeared for the first time in the
edition of 1827. It is certain that Wordsworth travelled down with
his household from the Grasmere Parsonage to Bootle in August 1811
— mainly to get some sea-air for his invalid children — and that he
Jived there for some time during the autumn of that year. He may
have also gone down to the south-west coast of Cumberland in 1804,
and then written a part of the poem ; but we have no direct evidence
of this ; and I rather think that the mention of the year 1804 to Miss
Fenwick is just another instance in which Wordsworth's memory failed
him while dictating these memoranda. If the poem was not written
at different times, but was composed as a whole in 1811, we may partly
account for the date he gave to Miss Fenwick, when we remember
that in the year 1827 he transferred a part of it (viz., the introduction)
to these Memorials of the Scotch Tour of 1803.

Up many a sharply-twining road and down,
And over many a wide hill's craggy crown,
Through the quick turns of many a hollow nook,
And the rough bed of many an unbridged brook.

Their route would be from Grasmere by Red Bank, over by High
Close to Elter Water, by Colwith into Yewdale, on to Waterhead ; then
probably, from Coniston over Walna Scar, into Duddondale, and
thence to Bootle.

Like a gaunt shaggy Porter forced to wait
In days of old romance at Archimago's gate.
See Spencer's Faery Queen, Book I. canto i. st. 8.

The liveliest bird

That in wild Arden's brakes was ever heard.
Compare As you like it, act ii. sc. 5.

And soon approached Diana's Looking-glass !
To Loughrigg-tarn, &c.
See the note appended by Wordsworth to the sequel to this poem.

A glimpse I caught of that Abode, by Thee
Designed to rise in humble privacy.

He imagines the house which Sir George Beaumont intended to
build at Loughrigg Tarn, but which he never erected, to be really built by

UPON THE SIGHT OF A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE. 263

his friend, very much as in the sonnet named " Anticipation, October
1803," he supposes England to have been invaded, and the battle fought
in which " the Invaders were laid low."

Behold a Peasant stand
On high, a kerchief waving in her hand !
See the Fenwick note preceding the poem.

A barren ridge we scale ;
Descend and reach, in Yewdale's depths, a plain.

They went up Little Langdale, I think, past the Tarn to Fell Foot,
and crossed over the ridge of Tilberthwaite, into Yewdale by the
copper mines.

Under a rock too steep for man to tread,

Where sheltered from the north and bleak north-west

Aloft the Raven hangs a visible nest,

Fearless of all assaults that would her brood molest.

There is a Raven crag in Yewdale, evidently the one referred to in
this passage, and also in the passage in the First Book of the The Prelude
(see Vol. III. p. 141), beginning —

Oh ! when I have hung
Above the raven's nest, by knots of grass
And half-inch fissures in the slippery rock
But ill sustained, &c.

. . . Toward the lowly Grange
Press forward,

To Waterhead at the top of Coniston Lake.

In connection with Loughrigg Tarn, compare the note to the poem
beginning —

So fair, so sweet, withal so sensitive,

and also the Biographical Sketch of Professor Archer Butler, prefixed
to his Sermons, Vol. I. — ED.

UPON THE SIGHT OF A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE,

PAINTED BY SIR G. H. BEAUMONT, BART.

Conip. 1811. Pub. 1815.

[This was written when we dwelt in the Parsonage at Grasmere.
The principal features of the picture are Bredon Hill and Cloud Hill
near Coleorton. I shall never forget the happy feeling with which my
heart was filled when I was impelled to compose this Sonnet. We

264 UPON THE SIGHT OF A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE.

resided only two years in this house and during the last half of the
time, which was after this poem had been written, we lost our two
children, Thomas and Catherine . Our sorrow upon these events often
brought it to my mind, and cast me upon the support to which the last
line of it gives expression —

"The appropriate calm of blest eternity."
It is scarcely necessary to add that we still possess the Picture.]

PRAISED be the Art whose subtle power could stay
Yon cloud, and fix it in that glorious shape ;
Nor would permit the thin smoke to escape,
Nor those bright sunbeams to forsake the day ;
Which stopped that band of travellers on their way,
Ere they were lost within the shady wood ;
And showed the Bark upon the glassy flood
Eor ever anchored in her sheltering bay.
Soul-soothing Art ; whom Morning, Noon-tide, Even,1
Do serve with all their changeful pageantry ;
Thou, with ambition modest yet sublime,
Here, for the sight of mortal man, has given
To one brief moment caught from fleeting time
The appropriate calm of blest eternity.

Compare the Elegiac Stanzas, suggested by a picture of Peel Cattle
in a Storm, painted by Sir George Leaumont — especially the first three,
and the fifth, sixth, and seventh stanzas.

In the letter written to Sir George Beaumont from Bootle, in
1811 — referred to in the note to the previous poem— Wordsworth
says, " A few days after I had enjoyed the pleasure of seeing, in
different moods of mind, your Coleorton landscape from my fireside, it
suggested to me the following sonnet, which — having walked out to the
side of Grasmere brook, when it murmurs through the meadows near the
Church — I composed immediately —

Praised be the Art

" The images of the smoke and the travellers are taken from your
picture ; the rest were added, in order to place the thought in a clear
point of view, and for the sake of variety." — Er>.

1 C and 1843.

... which Morning, Noon-tide, Even,. 1815.

SONG FOR THE SPINNING WHEEL. 265

1812.

The years 1812 and 1813 were even less productive years to Words-
worth than 1811 had been. The first of them was saddened by domestic
losses, which deprived him for a time of the very power of work, and
almost of interest in the labour to which his life was devoted. Three
short pieces are all that belong to 1812 and 1813 respectively. — ED.

SONG FOE THE SPINNING WHEEL.

FOUNDED UPON A BELIEF PREVALENT AMONG THE PASTORAL VALES
OF WESTMORELAND.

Comp. 1812. Pub. 1820.

[The belief on which this is founded I have often heard expressed by
an old neighbour of Grasmere.]

SWIFTLY turn the murmuring wheel !
Night has brought the welcome hour
When the weary fingers feel
Help, as if from faery power ;
Dewy night o'ershades the ground ;
Turn the swift wheel round and round !
Now, beneath the starry sky,
Couch the widely-scattered sheep ; —
Ply the pleasant labour ply !
For the spindle, while they sleep,
Euns with speed more smooth and fine,1
Gathering up a trustier line.

Short-lived likings may be bred
By a glance from fickle eyes ;
But true love is like the thread
Which the kindly wool supplies,

1 1832.

With a motion smooth and fine, 1820.

Kuns with motion smooth and fine, 1827.

266 WHAT NEED OF CLAMOKOUS BELLS.

When the flocks are all at rest
Sleeping on the mountain's breast.

It was for Sarah Hutchinson that this song was written. She lived
for the most part either at Brinsop Court, Herefordshire, or at Rydal
Mount, Westmoreland, or at Greta Hall, Keswick. When living at
Greta Hall, she acted as Southey's amanuensis. She also frequently
transcribed poems for Wordsworth, at Grasmere, Coleorton, and
Eydal Mount.

The poem was placed by Wordsworth amongst those of the Fancy.
—Bo.

COMPOSED ON THE EVE OF THE MAERIAGE OF
A FRIEND IN THE VALE OF GRASMERE, 1812.

Comp. 1812. Pub. 1815.

WHAT need of clamorous bells or ribands gay,

These humble nuptials to proclaim or grace ?

Angels of love, look down upon the place ;

Shed on the chosen vale a sun-bright day !

Yet no proud gladness would the Bride display

Even for such promise :l — serious is her face,

Modest her mien ; and she, whose thoughts keep pace

With gentleness, in that becoming way

Will thank you. Faultless does the Maid appear ;

No disproportion in her soul, no strife :

But, when the closer view of wedded life

Hath shown that nothing human can be clear

From frailty, for that insight may the Wife

To her indulgent Lord become more dear.

This refers to the marriage of Thomas Hutchinson (Mrs Words-
worth's brother) to Mary Monkhouse, sister of the Mr Monkhouse
with whom Wordsworth afterwards travelled on the Continent. The
marriage took place on November 1, 1812. They lived at Naduorth

1 1827.

Even for such omen would the Bride display

No mirthful gladness : isis.

WATER-FOWL. 267

for eighteen years, and afterwards at Brinsop Court, Herefordshire, for
twenty -one years. To their son — the Eev. Thomas Hutchinson of
Kimbolton, Leominster, Herefordshire — and to their daughter — Miss
Elizabeth Hutchinson of Rock Villa, "West Malvern — I am indebted
for much information in reference to their uncle and aunts. The
portrait of "Wordsworth in his forty-seventh year, by Richard Carruthers,
is in Mr Hutchinson's possession at the Rectory, Kimbolton. — ED.

WATEK-FOWL.

Comp. 1812. Pub. 1827.

[Observed frequently over the lakes of Rydal and Grasmere.]

Let me be allowed the aid of verse to describe the evolutions which
these visitants sometimes perform on a fine day, towards the close
of winter." — Extract from the Author's Book on the Lakes.

MAKE how the feathered tenants of the flood,
With grace of motion that might scarcely seem
Inferior to angelical, prolong
Their curious pastime ! shaping in mid air
(And sometimes with ambitious wing that soars
High as the level of the mountain-tops)
A circuit ampler than the lake beneath — -
Their own domain ; but ever, while intent
On tracing and retracing that large round,
Their jubilant activity evolves
Hundreds of curves and circlets,1 to and fro,
Upward and downward, progress intricate
Yet unperplexed, as if one spirit swayed
Their indefatigable flight. 'Tis done —
Ten times, or more, I fancied it had ceased ;
But lo ! the vanished company again
Ascending ; they approach — I hear their wings,
Faint, faint at first ; and then an eager sound,

1 1832.

Hundreds of curves and circles, . . . 1827.

268 VIEW FROM THE TOP OF BLACK COMB.

Past in a moment — and as faint again !

They tempt the sun to sport amid their plumes ;

They tempt the water, or the gleaming ice,

To show them a fair image ; 'tis themselves,

Their own fair forms, upon the glimmering plain,

Painted more soft and fair as they descend

Almost to touch ; — then up again aloft,

Up with a sally and a flash of speed,

As if they scorned both resting-place and rest !

This was placed by Wordsworth amongst the " Poems of the
Imagination." — ED.

1813.

See the note to the previous year, 1812. — ED.

VIEW FROM THE TOP OF BLACK COMB.

Comp. 1813. Pub. 1815.

[Mrs Wordsworth and I, as mentioned in the " Epistle to Sir G.
Beaumont," lived sometime under its shadow.]

THIS Height a ministering Angel might select :

For from the summit of BLACK COMB (dread name

Derived from clouds and storms !) the amplest range

Of unobstructed prospect may be seen

That British ground commands : — low dusky tracts,

Where Trent is nursed, far southward ! Cambrian hills

To the south-west, a multitudinous show ;

And, in a line of eye-sight linked with these,

The hoary peaks of Scotland that give birth

To Tiviot's stream, to Annan, Tweed, and Clyde : —

Crowding the quarter whence the sun comes forth

Gigantic mountains rough with crags ; beneath,

Eight at the imperial station's western base

INSCRIPTION ON BLACK COMB. 269

Main ocean, breaking audibly, and stretched

Far into silent regions blue and pale ; —

And visibly engirding Mona's Isle

That, as we left the plain, before our sight

Stood like a lofty mount, uplifting slowly

(Above the convex of the watery globe)

Into clear view the cultured fields that streak

Her habitable shores,1 but now appears

A dwindled object, and submits to lie

At the spectator's feet. — Yon azure ridge,

Is it a perishable cloud ? Or there

Do we behold the line of Erin's coast ? 2

Land sometimes by the roving shepherd-swain

(Like the bright confines of another world)

Not doubtfully perceived. — Look homeward now !

In depth, in height, in circuit, how serene

The spectacle, how pure ! — Of Nature's works,

In earth, and air, and earth-embracing sea,

A revelation infinite it seems ;

Display august of man's inheritance,

Of Britain's calm felicity and power.

Black Comb stands at the southern extremity of Cumberland. These
lines were included among the " Poems of the Imagination." — ED.

WRITTEN WITH A SLATE PENCIL ON A STONE, ON THE

SIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN OF BLACK COMB.

Comp. 1813. Pub. 1815.

[The circumstance, alluded to at the conclusion of these verses, was
told me by Dr Satterthwaite, who was Incumbent of Bootle, a small
town at the foot of Black Comb. He had the particulars from one of
the engineers who was employed in making trigonometrical surveys of
that region.]

1 1827.

Its habitable .... 1815.

2 1832.

Do we behold the frame of Erin's coast ? isis.

270 INSCRIPTION ON BLACK COMB.

STAY, bold Adventurer ; rest awhile thy limbs

On this commodious Seat ! for much remains

Of hard ascent before thou reach the top

Of this huge Eminence, — from blackness named,

And, to far-travelled storms of sea and land,

A favourite spot of tournament and war !

But thee may no such boisterous visitants

Molest : may gentle breezes fan thy brow :

And neither cloud conceal, nor misty air

Bedim, the grand terraqueous spectacle,

From centre to circumference, unveiled !

Know, if thou grudge not to prolong thy rest,

That on the summit whither thou art bound

A geographic Labourer pitched his tent,

With books supplied and instruments of art,

To measure height and distance ; lonely task,

Week after week pursued ! — To him was given

Full many a glimpse (but sparingly bestowed

On timid man) of Nature's processes

Upon the exalted hills. He made report

That once, while there he plied his studious work

Within that canvas Dwelling, colours, lines,

And the whole surface of the out-spread map,

Became invisible :x for all around

Had darkness fallen — unthreatened, unproclaimed —

As if the golden day itself had been

Extinguished in a moment ; total gloom,

In which he sate alone, with unclosed eyes,

Upon the blinded mountain's silent top !

These lines were included from the first among the " Inscriptions."
—Eo.

1 1836.

Within that canvas Dwelling, suddenly
The many-coloured map before his eyes
Became invisible : ... 1815.

NOVEMBER, 1813. 271

NOVEMBEE, 1813.
Comp. Nov. 1813. Pub. 1815.

Now that all hearts are glad, all faces bright,

Our aged Sovereign sits, to the ebb and flow

Of states and kingdoms, to their joy or woe,

Insensible. He sits deprived of sight,

And lamentably wrapt in twofold night,

Whom no weak hopes deceived ; whose mind ensued,

Through perilous war, with regal fortitude,

Peace that should claim respect from lawless Might.

Dread King of Kings, vouchsafe a ray divine

To his forlorn condition ! let thy grace

Upon his inner soul in mercy shine ;

Permit his heart to kindle, and to embrace1

(Though it were only for a moment's space)

The triumphs of this hour ; for they are THINE !

The reference is to the rejoicings on the Leipsig victory of the Allied
Forces, October 16 to 19, 1813. Napoleon crossed the Ehiue on the
2nd November, and returned to Paris with the wreck of his army.
George III. was English Sovereign ; but, owing to his illness, the
Prince of Wales had been appointed Regent, and assumed executive
power in January 1811. The King died at Windsor in 1820, being 82
years of age. He had been entirely blind for some years before his
death. The " twofold night " referred to in the sonnet is sufficiently
obvious. — ED.

1 C. and 1843.

Permit hid heart to kindle and embrace 1815.

APPEND II.

IV.

APPENDIX.

NOTE.

THE Prose Writings of Wordsworth, which are printed as an Appendix
to this volume of his Poetical Works, include : —

1. The " Preface" to the second volume of the Lyrical Ballads, first

published in 1800.

2. The " Dedication " of the edition of 1815 to Sir George Beaumont.

3. The " Preface " to the edition of 1815.

4. The " Appendix " to the Preface of 1800, on " Poetic Diction,"

first published in 1815.

5. The " Essay supplementary to the Preface" of 1815.

6. The " Postscript, 1835."

When Wordsworth published a second edition of the Lyrical Ballads
in 1800, he prefixed to the first volume — which contained all his poems
of 1798, with the exception of The Convict, and the five poems by
Coleridge which were originally included in the Ballads — a Preface,
in which he explained his poetical theory. This preface was expanded
in the next edition (1802) by about 18 pages (the additions will all be
found indicated by footnotes). The enlarged preface was republished
with no alteration in 1805. But since the edition of 1815 contained
a new preface, dealing with some other aspects of Poetry, this earlier
essay — which Wordsworth thought inappropriate as an introduction
to his later poems — was transferred to the end of the second volume,
where it was printed as an appendix. In 1820 it closed the fourth and
last volume of the edition of that year. In 1827 it was printed at the
end of the fourth volume ; in 1832 at the close of the third ; and in
1836 at the end of the second volume. In 1849 it was printed with
all the other prefaces, appendices, &c., at the close of the fifth volume
of the collected works.

The " Dedication," the " Preface," and the " Essay Supplementary "
of 1815, with the appendix note on "Poetic Diction," were all brought in,
at one place or another, into every subsequent edition of the works. — ED.

PEEFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION OF THE
LYEICAL BALLADS (1800).

THE first volume of these poems has already been submitted
to general perusal. It was published, as an experiment,

276 APPENDIX.

which, I hoped, might be of some use to ascertain, how far,
by fitting to metrical arrangement a selection of the real
language of men in a state of vivid sensation, that sort of
pleasure and that quantity of pleasure may be imparted,
which a Poet may rationally endeavour to impart.

I had formed no very inaccurate estimate of the probable
effect of those Poems : I flattered myself that they who
should be pleased with them would read them with more
than common pleasure ; and, on the other hand, I was well
aware, that by those who should dislike them, they would
be read with more than common dislike. The result has
differed from my expectation in this only, that a greater
number have been pleased than I ventured to hope I
should please.*

Several of my Friends are anxious for the success of
these Poems, from a belief, that, if the views with which
they were composed were indeed realised, a class of Poetry
would be produced, well adapted to interest mankind per-
manently, and not unimportant in the quality, and in the
multiplicity of its moral relations : and on this account they
have advised me to add a systematic defence of the theory
upon which the Poems were written. But I was unwilling
to undertake the task, because I knew that on this occasion
the Eeader would look coldly upon my arguments, since I
might be suspected of having been principally influenced by

* For the sake of variety and from a consciousness of my own weakness,
I was induced to request the assistance of a Friend, who furnished me
with the Poems of the ANCIENT MARINER, the FOSTER-MOTHER'S TALE,
the NIGHTINGALE, the DUNGEON, and the Poem entitled LOVE. I should
not, however, have requested this assistance, had I not believed that the
poems of my Friend would in a great measure have the same tendency as
my own, and that, though there would be found a difference, there would
be found no discordance in the colours of our style ; as our opinions on the
subject of poetry do almost entirely coincide.

Inserted in editions 1800, 1802, 1805.— ED.

APPENDIX. 277

the selfish and foolish hope of reasoning him into an appro-
bation of these particular Poems : and I was still more
unwilling to undertake the task, because, adequately to
display my opinions, and fully to enforce my arguments,
would require a space wholly disproportionate to a preface.
For, to treat the subject with the clearness and coherence
of which it is susceptible, it would be necessary to give
a full account of the present state of the public taste
in this country, and to determine how far this taste
is healthy or depraved ; which, again, could not be de-
termined, without pointing out in what manner language
and the human mind act and re-act on each other, and with-
out retracing the revolutions, not of literature alone, but
likewise of society itself. I have therefore altogether
declined to enter regularly upon this defence ; yet I am
sensible, that there would be something like impropriety in
abruptly obtruding upon the Public, without a few words of
introduction, Poems so materially different from those upon
which general approbation is at present bestowed.

It is supposed, that by the act of writing in verse an
Author makes a formal engagement that he will gratify
certain known habits of association ; that he not only thus
apprises the reader that certain classes of ideas and expres-
sions will be found in his book, but that others will be
carefully excluded. This exponent or symbol held forth by
metrical language must in different eras of literature have
excited very different expectations : for example, in the age
of Catullus, Terence, and Lucretius, and that of Statius or
Claudian ; and in our own country, in the age of Shakspeare,
and Beaumont and Fletcher, and that of Donne and Cowley,
or Dryden, or Pope. I will not take upon me to determine
the exact import of the promise which, by the act of writing
in verse, an Author, in the present day, makes to his reader ;
but it will undoubtedly appear to many persons that I have

2*78 APPENDIX.

not fulfilled the terms of an engagement thus voluntarily
contracted. They who have been accustomed to the gaudi-
ness and inane phraseology of many modern writers, if they
persist in reading this book to its conclusion, will, no doubt,
frequently have to struggle with feelings of strangeness and
awkwardness : they will look round for poetry, and will be
induced to inquire by what species of courtesy these attempts
can be permitted to assume that title. I hope therefore the
reader will not censure me for attempting to state what I
have proposed to myself to perform ; and also (as far as the
limits of a preface will permit) to explain some of the
chief reasons which have determined me in the choice of
my purpose : that at least he may be spared any unpleasant
feeling of disappointment, and that I myself may be pro-
tected from one of the most dishonourable accusations which
can be brought against an Author ; namely, that of an in-
dolence which prevents him from endeavouring to ascertain
what is his duty, or, when his duty is ascertained, prevents
him from performing it.

The principal object, then, proposed in these Poems was
to choose incidents and situations from common life, and
to relate or describe them, throughout, as far as was
possible, in a selection of language really used by men,
and, at the same time, to throw over them a certain
colouring of imagination, whereby ordinary things should be
presented to the mind in an unusual aspect; and, further, and
above all, to make these incidents and situations interesting
by tracing in them, truly though not ostentatiously, the
primary laws of our nature : chiefly as far as regards the
manner in which we associate ideas in a state of excitement.
Humble and rustic life was generally chosen, because, in that
condition, the essential passions of the heart find a better
soil in which they can attain their maturity, are less under
restraint, and speak a plainer and more emphatic language ;

APPENDIX. 279

because in that condition of life our elementary feelings co-
exist in a state of greater simplicity, and, consequently, may
be more accurately contemplated, and more forcibly com-
municated ; because the manners of rural life germinate
from those elementary feelings ; and, from the necessary
character of rural occupations, are more easily comprehended,
and are more durable ; and lastly, because in that condition
the passions of men are incorporated with the beautiful and
permanent forms of nature. The language, too, of these
men is adopted (purified indeed from what appears to be its
real defects, from all lasting and rational causes of dislike or
disgust) because such men hourly communicate with the best
objects from which the best part of language is originally
derived ; and, because, from their rank in society and the
sameness and narrow circle of their intercourse, being less
under the influence of social vanity, they convey their feel-
ings and notions in simple and unelaborated expressions.
Accordingly, such a language, arising out of repeated ex-
perience and regular feelings, is a more permanent and a
far more philosophical language than that which is fre-
quently substituted for it by Poets, who think that they are
conferring honour upon themselves and their art, in propor-
tion as they separate themselves from the sympathies of
men, and indulge in arbitrary and capricious habits of
expression, in order to furnish food for fickle tastes, and
fickle appetites, of their own creation.*

I cannot, however, be insensible to the present outcry
against the triviality and meanness, both of thought and
language, which some of my contemporaries have occasion-
ally introduced into their metrical compositions ; and I
acknowledge that this defect, where it exists, is more dis-

* It is worth while here to observe, that the affecting parts of Chaucer
are almost always expressed in language pure and universally intelligible
even to this day.

280 APPENDIX.

honourable to the Writer's own character than false refine-
ment or arbitrary innovation, though I should contend at the
same time, that it is far less pernicious in the sum of its
consequences. From such verses the Poems in these volumes
will be found distinguished at least by one mark of difference,
that each of them has a worthy purpose. Not that I always
began to write with a distinct purpose formally conceived ;
but habits of meditation have, I trust, so prompted and
regulated my feelings, as that my descriptions of such
objects as strongly excite those feelings, will be found
to carry along with them a purpose. If this opinion is
erroneous, I can have little right to the name of a Poet.
For all good poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful
feelings ; and though this be true, Poems to which any value
can be attached were never produced on any variety of sub-
jects but by a man who, being possessed of more than usual
organic sensibility, had also thought long and deeply. For
our continued influxes of feeling are modified and directed
by our thoughts, which are indeed the representatives of all
our past feelings ; and, as by contemplating the relation of
these general representatives to each other, we discover what
is really important to men, so, by the repetition and con-
tinuance of this act, our feelings will be connected with
important subjects, till at length, if we be originally pos-
sessed of much sensibility, such habits of mind will be
produced, that, by obeying blindly and mechanically the
impulses of those habits, we shall describe objects, and utter
sentiments, of such a nature, and in such connection with
each other, that the understanding of the Eeader must
necessarily be in some degree enlightened, and his affections
strengthened and purified.

It has been said that each of these poems has a purpose.*
I have also informed my reader what this purpose will be

* What follows from "I have also" (p. 280) to " upon this subject " (foot
of page 281), printed in edd. 1800 to 1843, was omitted in 1846.— ED.

APPENDIX. 281

found principally to be: namely, to illustrate the manner
in which our feelings and ideas are associated in a state of
excitement. But, speaking in language somewhat more
appropriate, it is to follow the fluxes and refluxes of the
mind when agitated by the great and simple affections of
our nature. This object I have endeavoured in these short
essays to attain by various means ; by tracing the maternal
passion through many of its more subtle windings, as in the
poems of the Idiot Boy and the Mad Mother ; * by accom-
panying the last struggles of a human being, at the approach
of death, cleaving in solitude to life and society, as in the
Poem of the Forsaken Indian ; by showing, as in the stanzas
entitled " We are Seven," the perplexity and obscurity which
in childhood attend our notion of death, or rather our utter
inability to admit that notion ; or by displaying the strength
of fraternal, or to speak more philosophically, of moral
attachment when early associated with the great and beauti-
ful objects of nature, as in " The Brothers ;" or, as in the
incident of Simon Lee, by placing my reader in the way of
receiving from ordinary moral sensations another and more
salutary impression than we are accustomed to receive from
them. It has also been part of my general purpose to
attempt to sketch characters under the influence of less
impassioned feelings as in the Two April mornings, The
Fountain, The Old Man Travelling, The Two Thieves, &c.,
characters of which the elements are simple, belonging
rather to nature than to manners, such as exist now, and
will probably always exist, and which from their constitu-
tion may be distinctly and profitably contemplated. I will
not abuse the indulgence of my reader by dwelling longer
upon this subject ; but it is proper that I should mention
one other circumstance which distinguishes these Poems
from the popular poetry of the day ; it is this, that the
feeling therein developed gives importance to the action and

* "And the one beginning ' Her eyes are wild,'" &c., in edd. 1836-43. — ED.

282 APPENDIX.

situation, and not the action and situation to the feeling.
My meaning will be rendered perfectly intelligible by refer-
ring my reader to the Poems entitled Poor Susan and the
Childless Father, particularly to the last stanza of the latter
Poem.

I will not suffer a sense of false modesty to prevent me
from asserting, that I point my reader's attention to this
mark of distinction, far less for the sake of these particular
Poems than from the general importance of the subject.
The subject is indeed important ! For the human mind is
capable of being excited without the application of gross
and violent stimulants ; and he must have a very faint per-
ception of its beauty and dignity who does not know this,
and who does not further know, that one being is elevated
above another, in proportion as he possesses this capability.
It has therefore appeared to me, that to endeavour to pro-
duce or enlarge this capability is one of the best services in
which, at any period, a Writer can be engaged ; but this
service, excellent at all times, is especially so at the present
day. For a multitude of causes, unknown to former times,
are now acting with a combined force to blunt the discrimi-
nating powers of the mind, and, unfitting it for all voluntary
exertion, to reduce it to a state of almost savage torpor.
The most effective of these causes are the great national
events which are daily taking place, and the increasing
accumulation of men in- cities, where the uniformity of
their occupation produces a craving for extraordinary in-
cident, which the rapid communication of intelligence hourly
gratifies. To this tendency of life and manners the litera-
ture and theatrical exhibitions of the country have conformed
themselves. The invaluable works of our elder writers, I
had almost said the works of Shakspeare and Milton, are
driven into neglect by frantic novels, sickly and stupid
German Tragedies, and deluges of idle and extravagant stories

APPENDIX. 283

in verse. — When I think upon this degrading thirst after
outrageous stimulation, I am almost ashamed to have
spoken of the feeble endeavour made in these volumes to
counteract it ; and, reflecting upon the magnitude of the
general evil, I should be oppressed with no dishonourable
melancholy, had I not a deep impression of certain inherent
and indestructible qualities of the human mind, and like-
wise of certain powers in the great and permanent objects
that act upon it, which are equally inherent and indestruc-
tible ; and did I not further add to this impression a belief,
that the time is approaching when the evil will be syste-
matically opposed, by men of greater powers, and with far
more distinguished success.

Having dwelt thus long on the subjects and aim of these
Poems, I shall request the reader's permission to apprise him
of a few circumstances relating to their style, in order,
among other reasons, that I may not be censured for not
having performed what I never attempted. The reader will
find that personifications of abstract ideas rarely occur in
these volumes ; and, I hope, are utterly rejected, as an or-
dinary device to elevate the style, and raise it above prose. I
have proposed to myself to intimate, and, as far as is possible,
to adopt the very language of men ; and assuredly such
personifications do not make any natural or regular part of
that language. They are, indeed, a figure of speech occa-
sionally prompted by passion, and I have made use of them
as such ; but have endeavoured utterly to reject them as
a mechanical device of style, or as a family language which
Writers in metre seem to lay claim to by prescription. I
have wished to keep the reader in the company of flesh
and blood, persuaded that by so doing I shall interest him.
Others who pursue a different track will interest him like-
wise ; I do not interfere with their claim, but wish to
prefer a different claim of my own. There will also be

284 APPENDIX.

found in these pieces little of what is usually called poetic
diction ; as much pains has been taken to avoid it as is
ordinarily taken to produce it ; this has been done for the
reason already alleged, to bring my language near to the
language of men, and further, because the pleasure which
I have proposed to myself to impart, is of a kind very
different from that which is supposed by many persons to
be the proper object of poetry. Without being culpably
particular, I do not know how, to give my reader a more
exact notion of the style in which it was my wish and
intention to write, than by informing him that I have
at all times endeavoured to look steadily at my subject ;
consequently, there is, I hope, in these Poems little
falsehood of description, and my ideas are expressed in
language fitted to their respective importance. Something
must have been gained by this practice, as it is friendly to
one property of all good poetry, namely, good sense ; but it
has necessarily cut me off from a large portion of phrases
and figures of speech which from father to son have long been
regarded as the common inheritance of Poets. I have also
thought it expedient to restrict myself still further, having
abstained from the use of many expressions, in themselves
proper and beautiful, but which have been foolishly repeated
by bad Poets, till such feelings of disgust are connected with
them as it is scarcely possible by any art of association to
overpower.

If in a poem there should be found a series of lines, or
even a single line, in which the language, though naturally
arranged, and according to the strict laws of metre, does not
differ from that of prose, there is a numerous class of critics,
who, when they stumble upon these prosaisms, as they call
them, imagine that they have made a notable discovery, and
exult over the Poet as over a man ignorant of his own
profession. Now, these men would establish a canon of

APPENDIX. 285

criticism which the reader will conclude he must utterly
reject, if he wishes to be pleased with these volumes. And
it would be a most easy task to prove to him, that not only
the language of a large portion of every good poem, even of
the most elevated character, must necessarily, except with
reference to the metre, in no respect differ from that of good
prose, but likewise that some of the most interesting parts
of the best poems will be found to be strictly the language
of prose, when prose is well written. The truth of this
assertion might be demonstrated by innumerable passages
from almost all the poetical writings, even of Milton him-
self. To illustrate the subject in a general manner, I will
here adduce a short composition of Gray, who was at the
head of those who, by their reasonings, have attempted to
widen the space of separation betwixt prose and metrical
composition, and was more than any other man curiously
elaborate in the structure of his own poetic diction : —

' In vain to me the smiling mornings shine,
And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire :
The birds, in vain their amorous descant join,
Or cheerful fields resume their green attire.
These ears, alas ! for other notes repine ;
A different object do these eyes require;
My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine ;
And in my breast the imperfect joys expire;
Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer,
And new-born pleasure brings to happier men ;
The fields to all their wonted tribute bear ;
To warm their little loves the birds complain.
I fruitless mourn to him that cannot hear,
And weep the more because I weep in vain.'

It will easily be perceived, that the only part of this
Sonnet which is of any value is the lines printed in italics :
it is equally obvious, that, except in the rhyme, and in the
use of the single word " fruitless " for fruitlessly, which is
so far a defect, the language of these lines does in no respect
differ from that of prose.

286 APPENDIX.

By the foregoing quotation I have shown that the language
of Prose may yet be well adapted to. Poetry ; and it was
previously asserted, that a large portion of the language of
every good poem can in no respect differ from that of good
Prose. We will go further. It may be safely affirmed,
that there neither is, nor can be, any essential difference
between the language of prose and metrical composition.
We are fond of tracing the resemblance between Poetry
and Painting, and, accordingly, we call them sisters : but
where shall we find bonds of connexion sufficiently strict
to typify the affinity betwixt metrical and prose composition?
They both speak by and to the same organs ; the bodies in
which both of them are clothed may be said to be of the
same substance, their affections are kindred, and almost
identical, not necessarily differing in degree; Poetry* sheds
no tears " such as Angels weep," but natural and human
tears ; she can boast of no celestial ichor that distinguishes
her vital juices from those of prose ; the same human blood
circulates through the veins of them both.

If it be affirmed that rhyme and metrical arrangement of
themselves constitute a distinction which overturns what
has just been said on the strict affinity of metrical language
with that of prose, and paves the way for other artificial
distinctions which the mind voluntarily admits, I answer
that t the language of such Poetry as is here recommended
is, as far as is possible, a selection of the language really

* I here use the word ' Poetry ' (though against my own judgment) as
opposed to the word Prose, and synonymous with metrical composition.
But much confusion has been introduced into criticism by this contradis-
tinction of Poetry and Prose, instead of the more philosophical one of Poetry
and Matter of Fact, or Science. The only strict antithesis to Prose is
Metre : nor is this, in truth, a strict antithesis : because lines and passages
of metre so naturally occur in writing prose, that it would be scarcely
possible to avoid them, even were it desirable.

t What follows from "the language of such," &c., down to "proper to
remind the reader" (p. 295), was added in the edition of 1802. — ED.

APPENDIX. 287

spoken by men ; that this selection, wherever it is made with
true taste and feeling, will of itself form a distinction far
greater than would at first be imagined, and will entirely
separate the composition from the vulgarity and meanness
of ordinary life ; and, if metre be superadded thereto, I
believe that a dissimilitude will be produced altogether
sufficient for the gratification of a rational mind. What
other distinction would we have ? Whence is it to come ?
And where is it to exist ? Not surely, where the Poet speaks
through the mouths of his characters ; it cannot be neces-
sary here, either for elevation of style, or any of its supposed
ornaments : for if the Poet's subject be judiciously chosen, it
will naturally, and upon fit occasion, lead him to passions
the language of which, if selected truly and judiciously, must
necessarily be dignified and variegated, and alive with meta-
phors and figures. I forbear to speak of an incongruity
which would shock the intelligent reader, should the Poet
interweave any foreign splendour of his own with that which
the passion naturally suggests : it is sufficient to say that
such addition is unnecessary. And, surely, it is more pro-
bable that those passages, which with propriety abound with
metaphors and figures, will have their due effect, if, upon
other occasions where the passions are of a milder character,
the style also be subdued and temperate.

But, as the pleasure which I hope to give by the Poems
now presented to the reader must depend entirely on just
notions upon this subject, and, as it is in itself of high
importance to our taste and moral feelings, I cannot content
myself with these detached remarks. And if, in what I am
about to say, it shall appear to some that my labour is un-
necessary, and that I am like a man fighting a battle without
enemies, such persons may be reminded that, whatever may
be the language outwardly holden by men, a practical faith
in the opinions which I am wishing to establish is almost

288 APPENDIX.

unknown. If my conclusions are admitted, and carried as
far as they must be carried if admitted at all, our judgments
concerning the works of the greatest Poets both ancient and
modern will be far different from what they are at present,
both when we praise, and when we censure : and our moral
feelings influencing and influenced by these judgments will,
I believe, be corrected and purified.

Taking up the subject, then, upon general grounds, let me
ask what is meant by the word Poet ? What is a Poet ? To
whom does he address himself ? And what language is to
be expected from him ? He is a man speaking to men : a
man, it is true, endowed with more lively sensibility, more
enthusiasm and tenderness, who has a greater knowledge of
human nature, and a more comprehensive soul, than are
supposed to be common among mankind; a man pleased
with his own passions and volitions, and who rejoices more
than other men in the spirit of life that is in him ; delight-
ing to contemplate similar volitions and passions as mani-
fested in the goings-on of the Universe, and habitually
impelled to create them where he does not find them. To
these qualities he has added, a disposition to be affected
more than other men by absent things as if they were
present ; an ability of conjuring up in himself passions,
which are indeed far from being the same as those produced
by real events, yet (especially in those parts of the general
sympathy which are pleasing and delightful) do more nearly
resemble the passions produced by real events, than any-
thing which, from the motions of their own minds merely,
other men are accustomed to feel in themselves; — whence,
and from practice, he has acquired a greater readiness and
power in expressing what he thinks and feels, and especially
those thoughts and feelings which, by his own choice, or
from the structure of his own mind, arise in him without
immediate external excitement.

APPENDIX. 289

But, whatever portion of this faculty we may suppose
even the greatest Poet to possess, there cannot be a doubt but
that the language which it will suggest to him, must often,
in liveliness and truth, fall short of that which is uttered
by men in real life, under the actual pressure of those
passions, certain shadows of which the Poet thus produces,
or feels to be produced, in himself.

However exalted a notion we would wish to cherish of
the character of a Poet, it is obvious, that, while he describes
and imitates passions, his employment is in some degree
mechanical, compared with the freedom and power of real
and substantial action and suffering. So that it will be the
wish of the Poet to bring his feelings near to those of the
persons whose feelings he describes, nay, for short spaces of
time, perhaps to let himself slip into an entire delusion, and
even confound and identify his own feelings with theirs;
modifying only the language which is thus suggested to him
by a consideration that he describes for a particular purpose,
that of giving pleasure. Here, then, he will apply the
principle of selection which has been already insisted upon.
He will depend upon this for removing what would
otherwise be painful or disgusting in the passion ; he will
feel that there is no necessity to trick out or to elevate
nature : and the more industriously he applies this principle,
the deeper will be his faith that no words, which his fancy
or imagination can suggest, will be to be compared with
those which are the emanations of reality and truth.

But it may be said by those who do not object to the
general spirit of these remarks, that, as it is impossible for
the Poet to produce upon all occasions language as exqui-
sitely fitted for the passion as that which the real passion
itself suggests, it is proper that he should consider himself
as in the situation of a translator, who does not scruple
to substitute excellencies of another kind for those which

IV. T

290 APPENDIX.

are unattainable by him ; and endeavours occasionally to
surpass his original, in order to make some amends for the
general inferiority to which he feels that he must submit.
But this would be to encourage idleness and unmanly despair.
Further, it is the language of men who speak of what they
do not understand ; who talk of Poetry as of a matter of
amusement and idle pleasure ; who will converse with us as
gravely about a taste for Poetry, as they express it, as if it
were a thing as indifferent as a taste for rope-dancing, or
Frontinac, or Sherry. Aristotle, I have been told, has said,
that Poetry is the most philosophic of all writing : it is so :
its object is truth, not individual and local, but general, and
operative ; not standing upon external testimony, but carried
alive into the heart by passion; truth which is its own
testimony, which gives competence and confidence * to the
tribunal to which it appeals, and receives them from the
same tribunal. Poetry is the image of man and nature.
The obstacles which stand in the way of the fidelity of the
Biographer and Historian, and of their consequent utility,
are incalculably greater than those which are to be en-
countered by the Poet who comprehends the dignity of his
art. The Poet writes under one restriction only, namely,
that of the necessity of giving immediate pleasure to a
human Being possessed of that information which may be
expected from him, not as a lawyer, a physician, a mariner,
an astronomer, or a natural philosopher, but as a Man.
Except this one restriction, there is no object standing
between the Poet and the image of things ; between this,
and the Biographer and Historian there are a thousand.

Nor let this necessity of producing immediate pleasure be
considered as a degradation of the Poet's art. It is far
otherwise. It is an acknowledgment' of the beauty of the
universe, an acknowledgment the more sincere, because

* " Which gives strength and divinity," in edd. 1802 to 1832. —liD.

APPENDIX. 291

not formal, but indirect ; it is a task light and easy to him
who looks at the world in the spirit of love : further, it is
a homage paid to the native and naked dignity of man, to
the grand elementary principle of pleasure, by which he
knows, and feels, and lives, and moves. We have no sym-
pathy but what is propagated by pleasure : I would not be
misunderstood : but wherever we sympathise with pain, it
will be found that the sympathy is produced and carried on
by subtle combinations with pleasure. We have no know-
ledge, that is, no general principles drawn from the contem-
plation of particular facts, but what has been built up by
pleasure, and exists in us by pleasure alone. The man of
science, the Chemist and Mathematician, whatever difficulties
and disgusts they may have had to struggle with, know and
feel this. However painful may be the objects with which
the Anatomist's knowledge is connected, he feels that his
knowledge is pleasure ; and where he has no pleasure he
has no knowledge. What then does the Poet ? He con-
siders man and the objects that surround him as acting and
re-acting upon each other, so as to produce an infinite
complexity of pain and pleasure; he considers man in his
own nature and in his ordinary life as contemplating this
with a certain quantity of immediate knowledge, with certain
convictions, intuitions, and deductions, which from habit
acquire the quality of intuitions ; he considers him as
looking upon this complex scene of ideas and sensations,
and finding everywhere objects that immediately excite in
him sympathies which, from the necessities of his nature,
are accompanied by an overbalance of enjoyment.

To this knowledge which all men carry about with them,
and to these sympathies in which, without any other disci-
pline than that of our daily life, we are fitted to take delight,
the Poet principally directs his attention. He considers man
and nature as essentially adapted to each other, and the

292 APPENDIX.

mind of man as naturally the mirror of the fairest and most
interesting qualities of nature. And thus the Poet, prompted
by this feeling of pleasure which accompanies him through
the whole course of his studies, converses with general
nature, with affections akin to those, which, through labour
and length of time, the man of science has raised up in
himself, by conversing with those particular parts of nature
which are the objects of his studies. The knowledge both
of the Poet and the man of science is pleasure ; but the
knowledge of the one cleaves to us as a necessary part of
our existence, our natural and inalienable inheritance ; the
other is a personal and individual acquisition, slow to come
to us, and by no habitual and direct sympathy connecting
us with our fellow-beings. The man of science seeks truth
as a remote and unknown benefactor; he cherishes and loves
it in his solitude: the Poet, singing a song in which all
human beings join with him, rejoices in the presence of
truth as our visible friend and hourly companion. Poetry
is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge ; it is the
impassioned expression which is in the countenance ^of all
Science. Emphatically may it be said of the Poet, as
Shakspeare hath said of man, ' that he looks before and
after.' He is the rock of defence of human nature ; an up-
holder and preserver, carrying everywhere with him relation-
sliip and love. In spite of difference of soil and climate, of
language and manners, of laws and customs, in spite of
things silently gone out of mind, and things violently
destroyed, the Poet binds together by passion and knowledge
the vast empire of human society, as it is spread over the
whole earth, and over all time. The objects of the Poet's
thoughts are everywhere ; though the eyes and senses of
man are, it is true, his favourite guides, yet he will follow
wheresoever he can find an atmosphere of sensation in
which to move his wings. Poetry is the first and last of

APPENDIX. 293

all knowledge — it is as immortal as the heart of man. If
the labours of men of science should ever create any
material revolution, direct or indirect, in our condition, and
in the impressions which we habitually receive, the Poet
will sleep then no more than at present, but he will be
ready to follow the steps of the man of science, not only in
those general indirect effects, but he will be at his side,
carrying sensation into the midst of the object of the science
itself. The remotest discoveries of the Chemist, the Botanist,
or Mineralogist, will be as proper objects of the Poet's art as
any upon which it can be employed, if the time should ever
come when these things shall be familiar to us, and the re-
lations under which they are contemplated by the followers
of these respective sciences shall be manifestly and palpably
material to us as enjoying and suffering beings. If the
time should ever come when what is now called science,
thus familiarised to men, shall be ready to put on, as it
were, a form of flesh and blood, the Poet will lend his
divine spirit to aid the transfiguration, and will welcome the
Being thus produced, as a dear and genuine inmate of the
household of man. — It is not, then, to be supposed that any
one, who holds that sublime notion of Poetry which I have
attempted to convey, will break in upon the sanctity and
truth of his pictures by transitory and accidental ornaments,
and endeavour to excite admiration of himself by arts, the
necessity of which must manifestly depend upon the assumed
meanness of his subject

What I have thus far said applies to Poetry in general ;
but especially to those parts of composition where the
Poet speaks through the mouths of his characters ; and
upon this point it appears to authorise the conclusion that
there are few persons of good sense, who would not allow
that the dramatic parts of composition are defective, in pro-
portion as they deviate from the real language of nature, and

294 APPENDIX.

are coloured by a diction of the Poet's own, eitaer peculiar
to him as an individual Poet or belonging simply to Poets in
general; to a body of men who, from the circumstance of
their compositions being in metre, it is expected will employ
a particular language.

It is not, then, in the dramatic parts of composition that
we look for this distinction of language ; but still it
may be proper and necessary where the Poet speaks to us
in his own person and character. To this I answer by
referring my reader to the description which I have before
given of a Poet. -Among the qualities there enumerated as
principally conducing to form a Poet, is implied nothing
differing in kind from other men, but only in degree. The
sum of what I have there said is, that the Poet is chiefly
distinguished from other men by a greater promptness to
think and feel without im*nediate external excitement, and
a greater power in expressing such thoughts and feelings as
are produced in him in that manner. But these passions
and thoughts and feelings are the general passions and
thoughts and feelings of men. And with what are they
connected ? Undoubtedly with our moral sentiments and
animal sensations, and with the causes which excite these ;
with the operations of the elements, and the appearances of
the visible universe : with storm and sunshine, with the
revolutions of the seasons, with cold and heat, with loss of
friends and kindred, with injuries and resentments, gratitude
and hope, with fear and sorrow. These, and the like, are
the sensations and objects which the Poet describes, as they
are the sensations of other men, and the objects which
interest them. The Poet thinks and feels in the spirit of
the passions of men. How, then, can his language differ
in any material degree from that of all other men who feel
vividly and see clearly ? It might be proved that it is im-
possible. But supposing that this were not the case, the

APPENDIX. 295

Poet might then be allowed to use a peculiar language when
expressing his feelings for his own gratification, or that of
men like himself. But Poets do not write for Poets alone,
but for men. Unless therefore we are advocates for that
admiration which subsists upon ignorance, and that pleasure
which arises from hearing what we do not understand, the
Poet must descend from this supposed height; and, in order
to excite rational sympathy, he must express himself as
other men express themselves. To this it may be added,
that while he is only selecting from the real language of
men, or, which amounts to the same thing, composing
accurately in the spirit of such selection, he is treading upon
safe ground, and we know what we are to expect from him.
Our feelings are the same with respect to metre ; for, as it
may be proper to remind the reader, the distinction of metre
is regular and uniform, and not like that which is produced
by what is usually called POETIC DICTION, arbitrary, and sub-
ject to infinite caprices upon which no calculation whatever
can be made. In the one case, the reader is utterly at the
rnercy of the Poet respecting what imagery or diction he
may choose to connect with the passion ; whereas, in the
other, the metre obeys certain laws, to which the Poet and
reader both willingly submit because they are certain, and
because no interference is made by them with the passion
but such as the concurring testimony of ages has shown to
heighten and improve the pleasure which co-exists with it.

It will now be proper to answer an obvious question,
namely, Why, professing these opinions, have I written in
verse ? To this, in addition to such answer as is included
in what I have already said, I reply, in the first place,
Because, however I may have restricted myself, there
is still left open to me what confessedly constitutes the
most valuable object of all writing, whether in prose or
verse ; the great and universal passions of men, the most

296 APPENDIX.

general and interesting of their occupations, and the entire
world of nature before me, to supply endless combinations
of forms and imagery. Now, supposing for a moment that
whatever is interesting in these objects may be as vividly
described in prose, why should I be condemned for attempt-
ing to superadd to such description the charm which, by the
consent of all nations, is acknowledged to exist in metrical
language ? To this, by such as are yet unconvinced, it
may be answered that a very small part of the pleasure
given by Poetry depends upon the metre, and that it is
injudicious to write in metre, unless it be accompanied with
the other artificial distinctions of style with which metre is
usually accompanied, and that, by such deviation, more will
be lost from the shock which will thereby be given to the
reader's associations than will be counterbalanced by any
pleasure which he can derive from the general power of
numbers. In answer to those who still contend for the
necessity of accompanying metre with certain appropriate
colours of style in order to the accomplishment of its appro-
priate end, and who also, in my opinion, greatly underrate
the power of metre in itself, it might, perhaps, as far as
relates to these volumes, have been almost sufficient to
observe, that poems are extant, written upon more humble
subjects, and in a more naked and simple style than I have
aimed at, which have continued to give pleasure from
generation to generation. Now, if nakedness and simplicity
be a defect, the fact here mentioned affords a strong pre-
sumption that poems somewhat less naked and simple are
capable of affording pleasure at the present day ; and,
what I wished chiefly to attempt, at present, was to justify
myself for having written under the impression of this belief.
But various causes might be pointed out why, when the
style is manly, and the subject of some importance, words
metrically arranged will long continue to impart such a

APPENDIX. 297

pleasure to mankind as he who is sensible of the extent of
that pleasure will be desirous to impart. The end of
poetry is to produce excitement in co-existence with an
overbalance of pleasure. Now, by the supposition, excite-
ment is an unusual and irregular state of the mind : ideas
and feelings do not, in that state, succeed each other in ac-
customed order. If the words, however, by which this excite-
ment is produced be in themselves powerful, or the images
and feelings have an undue proportion of pain connected
with them, there is some danger that the excitement may
be carried beyond its proper bounds. Now the co-presence
of something regular, something to which the mind has
been accustomed in various moods and in a less excited
state, cannot but have great efficacy in tempering and
restraining the passion by an intertexture of ordinary feel-
ing,* and of feeling not strictly and necessarily connected
with the passion. This is unquestionably true ; and hence,
though the opinion will at first appear paradoxical, from
the tendency of metre to divest language, i% a certain
degree, of its reality, and thus to throw a sort of half
consciousness of unsubstantial existence over the whole
composition, there can be little doubt, but that more
pathetic situations and sentiments, that is, those which
have a greater proportion of pain connected with them, may
be endured in metrical composition, especially in rhyme,
than in prose. The metre of the old ballads is very art-
less ; yet they contain many passages which would illustrate
this opinion ; and, I hope, if the following poems be atten-
tively perused, similar instances will be found in them.
This opinion may be further illustrated by appealing to the
reader's own experience of the reluctance with which he
comes to the re-perusal of the distressful parts of ' Clarissa

* What follows, down to " found in them," was added in the edition
of 1802. -Eo.

298 APPENDIX.

Harlowe,' or the ' Gamester ' ; while Shakspeare's writings,
in the most pathetic scenes, never act upon us, as pathetic,
beyond the bounds of pleasure — an effect which, in a much
greater degree than might at first be imagined, is to be
ascribed to small, but continual and regular impulses of
pleasurable surprise from the metrical arrangement. — On
the other hand (what it must be allowed will much more
frequently happen), if the Poet's words should be incommen-
surate with the passion, and inadequate to raise the reader
to a height of desirable excitement, then (unless the Poet's
choice of his metre has been grossly injudicious), in the
feelings of pleasure which the reader has been accustomed
to connect with metre in general, and in the feeling, whether
cheerful or melancholy, which he has been accustomed to
connect with that particular movement of metre, there will
be found something which will greatly contribute to impart
passion to the words, and to effect the complex end which
the Poet proposes to himself.

If I hadjjpundertaken a SYSTEMATIC defence of the theory
here maintained, it would have been my duty to develop the
various causes upon which the pleasure received from
metrical language depends. Among the chief of these
causes is to be reckoned a principle which must be well
known to those who have made any of the Arts the
object of accurate reflection ; I mean the pleasure which the
mind derives from the perception of similitude in dis-
similitude. This principle is the great spring of the
activity of our minds, and their chief feeder. From this
principle the direction of the sexual appetite, and all the
passions connected with it, take their origin ; it is the life
of our ordinary conversation ; and upon the accuracy with
which similitude in dissimilitude, and dissimilitude in simili-
tude are perceived, depend our taste and our moral feelings.
It would not be a useless employment to apply this principle

APPENDIX. 299

to the consideration of metre, and to show that metre is
hence enabled to afford much pleasure, and to point out
in what manner that pleasure is produced. But my limits
will not permit me to enter upon this subject, and I must
content myself with a general summary.

I have said that poetry is the spontaneous overflow of
powerful feelings ; it takes its origin from emotion re-
collected in tranquillity ; the emotion is contemplated till, by
a species of re-action, the tranquillity gradually disappears,
and an emotion, kindred to that which was before the sub-
ject of contemplation, is gradually produced, and does itself
actually exist in the mind. In this mood successful com-
position generally begins, and in a mood similar to this it is
carried on ; but the emotion of whatever kind, and in what-
ever degree, from various causes, is qualified by various
pleasures, so that in describing any passions whatsoever,
which are voluntarily described, the mind will, upon the
whole, be in a state of enjoyment. If Nature be thus
cautious to preserve in a state of enjoyment a being so
employed, the Poet ought to profit by the lesson held
forth to him, and ought especially to take care, that, what-
ever passions he communicates to his reader, those passions,
if his reader's mind be sound and vigorous, should always
be accompanied with an over-balance of pleasure. Now the
music of harmonious metrical language, the sense of diffi-
culty overcome, and the blind association of pleasure which
has been previously received from works of rhyme or metre
of the same or similar construction, an indistinct perception
perpetually renewed of language closely resembling that of
real life, and yet, in the circumstance of metre, differing
from it so widely — all these imperceptibly make up a
complex feeling of delight, which is of the most im-
portant use in tempering the painful feeling always found
intermingled with powerful descriptions of the deeper

300 APPENDIX.

passions. This effect is always produced in pathetic and
impassioned poetry ; while, in lighter compositions, the ease
and gracefulness with which the Poet manages his numbers
are themselves confessedly a principal source of the gratifica-
tion of the reader. All that it is necessary to say, however,
upon this subject, may be effected by affirming what few
persons will deny, that of two descriptions either of passions,
manners, or characters, each of them equally well executed,
the one in prose and the other in verse, the verse will be
read a hundred times where the prose is read once. We *
see that Pope, by the power of verse alone, has contrived to
render the plainest common sense interesting, and even fre-
quently to invest it with the appearance of passion. In
consequence of these convictions I related in metre the tale of
Goody Blake and Harry Gill, which is one of the rudest of
this collection. I wished to draw attention to the truth
that the power of the human imagination is sufficient to
produce such changes even in our physical nature as might
almost appear miraculous. The truth is an important one 5
the fact (for it is a fact} is a valuable illustration of it ; and
I have the satisfaction of knowing that it has been com-
municated to many hundreds of people who would never
have heard of it, had it not been narrated as a Ballad, and
in a more impressive metre than is usual in Ballads.

Having thus explained a few of the reasons for writing
in verse, and why I have chosen subjects from common
life, and endeavoured to bring my language near to the
real language of men, if I have been too minute in plead-
ing my own cause, I have at the same time been treating a
subject of general interest ; and for this reason a few words
shall be added with reference solely to these particular
Poems, and to some defects which will probably be found

* From "we see that Pope," to "usual in Ballads," included in edd.
1800 to 1843, omitted in 1846.— ED.

APPENDIX. 301

in them. I am sensible that my associations must have
sometimes been particular instead of general, and that,
consequently, giving to things a false importance,* I may
have sometimes written upon unworthy subjects ; but I am
less apprehensive on this account, than that my language
may frequently have suffered from those arbitrary connec-
tions of feelings and ideas with particular words and
phrases, from which no man can altogether protect himself.
Hence, I have no doubt, that, in some instances, feelings,
even of the ludicrous, may be given to my readers by ex-
pressions which appeared to me tender and pathetic. Such
faulty expressions, were I convinced they were faulty at
present, and that they must necessarily continue to be so, I
would willingly -take all reasonable pains to correct. But
it is dangerous to make these alterations on the simple
authority of a few individuals, or even of certain classes of
men : for where the understanding of an author is not con-
vinced, or his feelings altered, this cannot be done without
great injury to himself ; for his own feelings are his stay
and support ; and, if he set them aside in one instance, he
may be induced to repeat this act till his mind shall lose all
confidence in itself, and becomes utterly debilitated. To this
it may be added, that the reader ought never to forget that
he is himself exposed to the same errors as the Poet, and,
perhaps, in a much greater degree : for there can be no
presumption in saying of most readers, that it is not pro-
bable they will be so well acquainted with the various stages
of meaning through which words have passed, or with the
fickleness or stability of the relations of particular ideas to
each other ; and, above all, since they are so much less in-
terested in the subject, they may decide lightly and carelessly.
Long as the reader has been detained, I hope he will

* Added here, in edd. 1800 to 1832, "sometimes from diseased impulses."
—ED.

302 . APPENDIX.

permit me to caution him against a mode of false criticism
which has been applied to Poetry, in which the language
closely resembles that of life and nature. Such verses have
been triumphed over in parodies, of which Dr Johnson's
stanza is a fair specimen.

' I put my hat upon my head
And walked into the Strand,
And there I met another man
Whose hat was in his hand.'

Immediately under these lines I will place one of the
most justly-admired stanzas of the Babes in the Wood.

' These pretty Babes with hand in hand
Went wandering up and down :
But never more they saw the Man
Approaching from the Town.'

In both these stanzas the words, and the order of the
words, in no respect differ from the most unimpassioned
conversation. There are words in both, for example, " the
Strand," and " the Town," connected with none but the most
familiar ideas ; yet the one stanza we admit as admirable,
and the other as a fair example of the superlatively con-
temptible. Whence arises this difference ? Not from the
metre, not from the language, not from the order of the
words ; but the matter expressed in Dr Johnson's stanza is
contemptible. The proper method of treating trivial and
simple verses, to which Dr Johnson's stanza would be a fair
parallelism, is not to say, this is a bad kind of poetry, or,
this is not poetry ; but this wants sense ; it is neither in-
teresting in itself, nor can lead to anything interesting ;
the images neither originate in that sane state of feeling
which arises out of thought, nor can excite thought or
feeling in the reader. This is the only sensible manner of
dealing with such verses. Why trouble yourself about the
species till you have previously decided upon the genus ?

APPENDIX. 303

Why take pains to prove that an ape is not a Newton, when
it is self-evident that he is not a man ?

One request I must make of my reader, which is, that in
judging these Poems he would decide by his own feelings
genuinely, and not by reflection upon what will probably be
the judgment of others. How common is it to hear a person
say, I myself do not object to this style of composition, or
this or that expression, but, to such and such classes of
people, it will appear mean or ludicrous ! This mode of
criticism, so destructive of all sound unadulterated judgment,
is almost universal : let the reader then abide, independently,
by his own feelings, and, if he finds himself affected, let him
not suffer such conjectures to interfere with his pleasure.

If an Author, by any single composition, has impressed us
with respect for his talents, it is useful to consider this as
affording a presumption, that on other occasions where we
have been displeased, .he, nevertheless, may not have written
ill or absurdly ; and, further, to give him so much credit for
this one composition as may induce us to review what has
displeased us, with more care than we should otherwise have
bestowed upon it. This is not only an act of justice, but,
in our decisions upon Poetry especially, may conduce, in a
high degree, to the improvement of our own taste : for an
accurate taste in Poetry, and in all the other arts, as Sir
Joshua Reynolds has observed, is an acquired talent, which
can only be produced by thought and a long-continued
intercourse with the best models of composition. This is
mentioned, not with so ridiculous a purpose as to prevent
the most inexperienced reader from judging for himself (I
have already said that I wish him to judge for himself); but
merely to temper the rashness of decision, and to suggest,
that, if Poetry be a subject on which much time has not
been bestowed, the judgment may be erroneous ; and that,
in many cases, it necessarily will be so.

304 APPENDIX.

Nothing would, I know, have so effectually contributed
to further the end which I have in view, as to have shown
of what kind the pleasure is, and how that pleasure is
produced, which is confessedly produced by metrical com-
position essentially different from that which I have here
endeavoured to recommend : for the reader will say that he
has been pleased by such composition ; and what more can
be done for him ? The power of any art is limited; and he
will suspect, that, if it be proposed to furnish him with new
friends, that can be only upon condition of his abandoning his
old friends. Besides, as I have said, the reader is himself
conscious of the pleasure which he has received from such
composition, composition to which he has peculiarly attached
the endearing name of Poetry ; and all men feel an habitual
gratitude, and something of an honourable bigotry for the
objects which have long continued to please them ; we not
only wish to be pleased, but to be pleased in that particular
way in which we have been accustomed to be pleased. There
is in these feelings enough to resist a host of arguments ; and
I should be the less able to combat them successfully, as I am
willing to allow, that, in order entirely to enjoy the Poetry
which I am recommending, it would be necessary to give up
much of what is ordinarily enjoyed. But, would my limits
have permitted me to point out how this pleasure is produced,
many obstacles might have been removed, and the reader
assisted in perceiving that the powers of language are not so
limited as he may suppose; and that it is possible for Poetry
to give other enjoyments, of a purer, more lasting, and more
exquisite nature. This part of the subject has not been
altogether neglected ; but it has not been so much my present
aim to prove, that the interest excited by some other kinds
of Poetry is less vivid, and less worthy of the nobler powers
of the mind, as to .offer reasons for presuming, that, if my
purpose were fulfilled, a species of Poetry would be produced,

APPENDIX. 305

which is genuine Poetry; in its nature well adapted to
interest mankind permanently, and likewise important in
the multiplicity and quality of its moral relations.

From what has been said, and from a perusal of the
Poems, the reader will be able clearly to perceive the object
which I had in view: he will determine how far it has
been attained ; and, what is a much more important question,
whether it be worth attaining : and upon the decision of
these two questions will rest my claim to the approbation
of the Publie.

ON POETIC DICTION.

See p. 295 — ' by what is usually called POETIC DICTION.'
(FIRST PUBLISHED IN 1815.)

PERHAPS, as I have no right to expect that attentive perusal
without which, — confined as I have been to the narrow
limits of a preface, — my meaning cannot be thoroughly
understood, I am anxious to give an exact notion of the
sense in which the phrase poetic diction has been used ; and
for this purpose, a few words shall here be added con-
cerning the origin and characteristics of the phraseology
which I have condemned under that name.

The earliest poets of all nations generally wrote from
passion excited by real events ; they wrote naturally, and
as men : feeling powerfully as they did, their language was
daring, and figurative. In succeeding times, Poets, and men
ambitious of the fame of Poets, perceiving the influence of
such language, and desirous of producing the same effect
without being animated by the same passion, set themselves
to a mechanical adoption of these figures of speech, and
made use of them, sometimes with propriety, but much
more frequently applied them to feelings and thoughts with

IV. U

306 APPENDIX.

which they had no natural connexion whatsoever. A
language was thus insensibly produced, differing materially
from the real language of men in any situation. The
reader or hearer of this distorted language found himself in
a perturbed and unusual state of mind ; when affected by
the genuine language of passion he had been in a perturbed
and unusual state of mind also : in both cases he was willing
that his common judgment and understanding should be
laid asleep, and he had no instinctive and infallible percep-
tion of the true to make him reject the false; the one served
as a passport for the other. The emotion was in both cases
delightful, and no wonder if he confounded the one with
the other, and believed them both to be produced by the
same, or similar causes. Besides, the Poet spake to him in
the character of a man to be looked up to, a man of genius
and authority. Thus, and from a variety of other causes,
this distorted language was received with admiration : and
Poets, it is probable, who had before contented themselves
for the most part with misapplying only expressions which
at first had been dictated by real passion, carried the abuse
still further, and introduced phrases composed apparently
in the spirit of the original figurative language of passion,
yet altogether of their own invention, and characterised
by various degrees of wanton deviation from good sense and
nature.

It is indeed true that the language of the earliest Poets
was felt to differ materially from ordinary language, because
it was the language of extraordinary occasions ; but it was
really spoken by men — language which the Poet himself
had uttered when he had been affected by the events which
he described, or which he had heard uttered by those around
him. To this language it is probable that metre of some
sort or other was early superadded. This separated the
genuine language of Poetry still further from common life,
so that whoever read or heard poems of these earliest Poets

APPENDIX. 307

felt himself moved in a way in which he had not been
accustomed to be moved in real life, and by causes mani-
festly different from those which acted upon him in real life.
This was the great temptation to all the corruptions which
have followed : under the protection of this feeling succeed-
ing Poets constructed a phraseology which had one thing, it
is true, in common with the genuine language of poetry,
namely, that it was not heard in ordinary conversation; that
it was unusual. But the first Poets, as I have said, spake
a language which, though unusual, was still the language of
men. This circumstance, however, was disregarded by their
successors ; they found that they could please by easier
means : they became proud of modes of expression which
they themselves had invented, and which was uttered only
by themselves.* In process of time metre became a symbol
or promise of this unusual language, and whoever took upon
him to write in metre, according as he possessed more or
less of true poetic genius, introduced less or more of this
adulterated phraseology into his compositions, and the true
and the false were inseparably interwoven until the taste
of men becoming gradually perverted, this language was
received as a natural language : and at length, by the
influence of books upon men, did to a certain degree
really become so. Abuses of this kind were imported from
one nation to another, and with the progress of refinement this
diction became daily more and more corrupt, thrusting out of
sight the plain humanities of nature by a motley masquerade
of tricks, quaintnesses, hieroglyphics, and enigmas.

It would not be uninteresting to point out the causes of
the pleasure given by this extravagant and absurd diction.
It depends upon a great variety of causes, but upon none
perhaps more than its influence in impressing a notion of

* Added in edd. 1815-1832, "and, with the spirit of a fraternity, they
arrogated it to themselves as their own." — ED.

308 APPENDIX.

the peculiarity and exaltation of the Poet's character, and in
flattering the reader's self-love by bringing him nearer to a
sympathy with that character ; an effect which is accom-
plished by unsettling ordinary habits of thinking, and thus
assisting the reader to approach to that perturbed and dizzy
state of mind in which if he does not find himself, he
imagines that he is balked of a peculiar enjoyment which
poetry can and ought to bestow.

The sonnet quoted from Gray, in the Preface, except
the lines printed in Italics, consists of little else but
this diction, though not of the worst kind ; and, indeed,
if one may be permitted to say so, it is far too common in
the best writers, both ancient and modern. Perhaps in
no way, by positive example, could more easily be given
a notion of what I mean by the phrase poetic diction, than
by referring to a comparison between the metrical paraphrase
which we have of passages in the Old and New Testament,
and those passages as they exist in our common Translation.
See Pope's ' Messiah ' throughout ; Prior's ' Did sweeter
sounds adorn my flowing tongue,' &c. &c. 'Though I
speak with the tongues of men and of angels,' &c. &c. See
1st Corinthians, chapter xiii. By way of immediate ex-
ample, take the following of Dr Johnson : —

' Turn on the prudent Ant thy heedless eyes,
Observe her labours, Sluggard, and be wise ;
No stern command, no monitory voice,
Prescribes her duties, or directs her choice ;
Yet, timely provident, she hastes away
To snatch the blessings of a plenteous day ;
When fruitful Summer loads the teeming plain,
She crops the harvest and she stores the grain.
How long shall sloth usurp thy useless hours,
Unnerve thy vigour, and enchain thy powers ?
While artful shades thy downy couch inclose,
And soft solicitation courts repose,
Amidst the drowsy charms of dull delight,
Year chases year with unremitted flight,
Till Want now following, fraudulent and slow,
Shall spring to seize thee, like an ambushed foe.'

APPENDIX. 309

From this hubbub of words pass to the original. ' Go
to the ant, thou sluggard, consider her ways, and be wise :
which having no guide, overseer, or ruler, provideth her
meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest.
How long wilt thou sleep, 0 Sluggard? When wilt thou arise
out of thy sleep ? Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a
little folding of the hands to sleep. So shall thy poverty
come as one that travaileth, and thy want as an armed
man.' Proverbs, chap. vi.

One more quotation, and I have done. It is from
Cowper's Verses, supposed to be written by Alexander
Selkirk : —

' Religion ! what treasure untold
Besides in that heavenly word ?
More precious than silver and gold,
Or all that this earth can afford'.

' But the sound of the church-going bell
These valleys and rocks never heard,
Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell,
Or smiled when a sabbath appeared.

' Ye winds, that have made me your sport,
Convey to this desolate shore
Some cordial endearing report
Of a land I must visit no more.

' My Friends, do they now and then send
A wish or a thought after me ?
Oh, tell me I yet have a friend,
Though a friend I am never to see/

I have quoted this passage as an instance of three different
styles of composition. The first four lines are poorly
expressed ; some Critics would call the language prosaic ;
the fact is, it would be bad prose, so bad, that it is scarcely
worse in metre. The epithet " church-going " applied to a
bell, and that by so chaste a writer as Cowper, is an instance
of the strange abuses which Poets have introduced into their
language till they and their readers take them as matters of
course, if they do not single them out expressly as objects

310 APPENDIX.

of admiration. The two lines, " Ne'er sighed at the sound,"
&c., are, in my opinion, an instance of the language of
passion wrested from its proper use, and, from the mere
circumstance of the composition being in metre, applied
upon an occasion that does not justify such violent expres-
sions ; and I should condemn the passage, though perhaps
few readers will agree with me, as vicious poetic diction.
The last stanza is throughout admirably expressed ; it would
be equally good whether in prose or verse, except that the
reader has an exquisite pleasure in seeing such natural
language so naturally connected with metre. The beauty of
this stanza tempts me to conclude with a principle which
ought never to be lost sight of, and which has been my
chief guide in all I have said, — namely, that in works of
imagination and sentiment, for of these only have I been
treating, in proportion as ideas and feelings are valuable,
whether the composition be in prose or in verse, they require
and exact one and the same language. Metre is but adven-
titious to composition, and the phraseology for which that
passport is necessary, even where it may be graceful at all,
will be little valued by the judicious.

DEDICATION TO THE EDITION OF 1815.

To SIK GEORGE HOWLAND BEAUMONT, BART.
MY DEAR SIR GEORGE, — Accept my thanks for the permis-
sion given me to dedicate these Volumes to you. In addition
to a lively pleasure derived from general considerations, I feel
a particular satisfaction ; for, by inscribing these Poems with
your Name, I seem to myself in some degree to repay, by an
appropriate honour, the great obligation which I owe to one
part of the Collection — as having been the means of first
making us personally known to each other. Upon much of
the remainder, also, you have a peculiar claim, — for some
of the best pieces were composed under the shade of your

APPENDIX. 311

own groves, upon the classic ground of Coleorton ; where I
was animated by the recollection of those illustrious Poets of
your name and family, who were born in that neighbour-
hood ; and, we may be assured, did not wander with in-
difference, by the dashing stream of Grace Dieu, and among
the rocks that diversify the forest of Charnwood — Nor is
there any one to whom such parts of this Collection as have
been inspired or coloured by the beautiful Country from
which I now address you, could be presented with more
propriety than to yourself — to whom it has suggested so many
admirable pictures. Early in life, the sublimity and beauty
of this region excited your admiration; and I know that you
are bound to it in mind by a still-strengthening attachment.
Wishing and hoping that this Work, with the embellish-
ments it has received from your pencil,* may survive as a
lasting memorial of a friendship, which I reckon among the
blessings of my life, —

I have the honour to be,

My dear Sir George,

Yours most affectionately
And faithfully,
WILLIAM WOEDSWORTH.

RTDAL MOUNT, WESTMORELAND,
February 1, 1815.

PKEFACE TO THE EDITION OF 1815.

THE observations prefixed to that portion of these Volumes
which was published many years ago, under the title of
" Lyrical Ballads," have so little of a special application to
the greater part of the present enlarged and diversified
collection, that they could not with propriety stand as an
Introduction to it Not deeming it, however, expedient to

* " The state of the plates has, for some time, not allowed them to be
repeated" (in edd. 1832 to 1845).— ED.

312 APPENDIX.

suppress that exposition, slight and imperfect as it is, of the
feelings which had determined the choice of the subjects, and
the principles which had regulated the composition of those
Pieces, I have placed it so as to form an Essay supple-
mentary to the Preface, to be attended to, or not, at the
pleasure of the reader.

In the preface to that part of " The Eecluse," lately
published under the title of " The Excursion," I have alluded
to a meditated arrangement of my minor Poems, which
should assist the attentive reader in perceiving their con-
nection with each other, and also their subordination to that
work. I shall here say a few words explanatory of this
arrangement, as carried into effect in the present Volumes.

The powers requisite for the production of poetry are,
first, those of Observation and Description ; i.e., the ability
to observe with accuracy things as they are in themselves, and
with fidelity to describe them, unmodified by any passion or
feeling existing in the mind of the describer ; whether the
things depicted be actually present to the senses, or have
a place only in the memory. This power, although indis-
pensable to a Poet, is one which he employs only in submis-
sion to necessity, and never for a continuance of time : as its
exercise supposes all the higher qualities of the mind to be
passive, and in a state of subjection to external objects,
much in the same way as a translator or engraver ought
to be to his original. 2dly, Sensibility, — which, the more
exquisite it is, the wider will be the range of a Poet's per-
ceptions ; and the more will he be incited to observe objects,
both as they exist in themselves and as re-acted upon by
his own mind. (The distinction between poetic and human
sensibility has been marked in the character of the Poet
delineated in the original preface before mentioned.) 3dly,
Eeflection, — which makes the Poet acquainted with the
value of actions, images, thoughts, and feelings ; and assists
the sensibility in perceiving their connection with each

APPENDIX. 313

other. 4thly, Imagination and Fancy, — to modify, to create,
and to associate. 5thly, Invention, — by which characters
are composed out of materials supplied by observation ;
whether of the Poet's own heart and mind, or of external
life and nature ; and such incidents and situations produced
as are most impressive to the imagination, and most fitted
to do justice to the characters, sentiments, and passions,
which the Poet undertakes to illustrate. And, lastly, Judg-
ment,— to decide how and where, and in what degree, each
of these faculties ought to be exerted ; so that the less shall
not be sacrificed to the greater, nor the greater, slighting the
less, arrogate, to its own injury, more than its due. By
judgment, also, is determined what are the laws and appro-
priate graces of every species of composition.*

The materials of Poetry, by these powers collected and
produced, are cast, by means of various moulds, into divers
forms. The moulds may be enumerated, and the forms
specified, in the following order. 1st, the Narrative, —
including the Epopoeia, the Historic Poem, the Tale, the
Eomance, the Mock heroic, and, if the spirit of Homer will
tolerate such neighbourhood, that dear production of our
days, the metrical Novel. Of this class' the distinguishing
mark is, that the Narrator, however liberally his speaking
agents be introduced, is himself the source from which
everything primarily flows. Epic poets, in order that their
mode of composition may accord with the elevation of their
subject, represent themselves as singing from the inspiration
of the Muse, 'Anna virumque cano;' but this is a fiction, in
modern times, of slight value : the Iliad or the Paradise
Lost would gain little in our estimation by being chanted.
The other poets who belong to this class are commonly
content to tell their tale ; — so that of the whole it may be

* As sensibility to harmony of numbers, and the power of producing it,
are invariably attendants upon the faculties above specified, nothing has
been said upon these requisites (in edd. 1836 to 1845). — ED.

314 APPENDIX.

affirmed that they neither require nor reject the accompani-
ment of music.

2dly, The Dramatic, — consisting of Tragedy, Historic
Drama, Comedy, and Masque, in which the Poet does not
appear at all in his own person, and where the whole action
is carried on by speech and dialogue of the agents ; music
being admitted only incidentally and rarely. The Opera may
be placed here, inasmuch as it proceeds by dialogue; though,
depending, to the degree that it does, upon music, it has a
strong claim to be ranked with the Lyrical. The cha-
racteristic and impassioned Epistle, of which Ovid and Pope
have given examples, considered as a species of a mono-
drama, may, without impropriety, be placed in this class.

3dly, The Lyrical, — containing the Hymn, the Ode, the
Elegy, the Song, and the Ballad ; in all which, for the pro-
duction of their full effect, an accompaniment of music is
indispensable.

4thly, The Idyllium, — descriptive chiefly either of the
processes and appearances of external nature, as The
Seasons of Thomson ; or of characters, manners, and senti-
ments, as are Shenstone's Schoolmistress, The Cotter's
Saturday Night of Burns, The Twa Dogs of the same
author ; or of these in conjunction with the appearances of
Nature, as most of the pieces of Theocritus, the Allegro
and Penseroso of Milton, Beattie's Minstrel, Goldsmith's
Deserted Village. The Epitaph, the Inscription, the Sonnet,
most of the Epistles of poets writing in their own persons,
and all loco-descriptive poetry, belong to this class.

5thly, Didactic, — the principal object of which is direct
instruction ; as the poem of Lucretius, The Georgics of
Virgil, The Fleece of Dyer, Mason's English Garden, &c.

And, lastly, philosophical Satire, like that of Horace and
Juvenal : personal and occasional Satire rarely comprehend-
ing sufficient of the general in the individual to be dignified
with the name of poetry.

APPENDIX. 315

Out of the three last has been constructed a composite
order, of which Young's Night Thoughts, and Cowper's
Task, are excellent examples.

It is deducible from the above, that Poems, apparently
miscellaneous, may, with propriety, be arranged either with
reference to the powers of mind predominant in the produc-
tion of them ; or to the mould in which they are cast ; or,
lastly, to the subjects to which they relate. From each of
these considerations, the following Poems have been divided
into classes ; which, that the work may more obviously
correspond with the course of human life, and for the sake
of exhibiting in it the three requisites of a legitimate whole,
a beginning, a middle, and an end, have been also arranged,
as far as it was possible, according to an order of time,
commencing with Childhood, and terminating with Old Age,
Death, and Immortality. My guiding wish was, that the
small pieces thus discriminated, might be regarded under a
two-fold view ; as composing an entire work within them-
selves, and as adjuncts to the philosophical Poem, "The
Eecluse." This arrangement has long presented itself
habitually to my own mind. Nevertheless, I should have
preferred to scatter the contents of these volumes at random,
if I had been persuaded that, by the plan adopted, anything
material would be taken from the natural effect of the
pieces, individually, on the mind of the unreflecting reader.
I trust there is a sufficient variety in each class to prevent
this : while, for him who reads with reflection, the arrange-
ment will serve as a commentary unostentatiously directing
his attention to my purposes, both particular and general.
But, as I wish to guard against the possibility of misleading
by this classification, it is proper first to remind the reader,
that certain poems are placed according to the powers of
mind, in the Author's conception, predominant in the pro-
duction of them; predominant, which implies the exertion of

316 APPENDIX.

other faculties in less degree. Where there is more imagina-
tion than fancy in a poem, it is placed under the head of
imagination, and vice versd. Both of the above classes might
without impropriety have been enlarged from that consisting
of " Poems Founded on the Affections ; " as might this latter
from those, and from the class " Proceeding from Sentiment
and Eeflection." The most striking characteristics of each
piece, mutual illustration, variety, and proportion, have
governed me throughout.

It may be proper in this place to state, that the Extracts
in the second class, entitled " Juvenile Pieces," are in many
places altered from the printed copy, chiefly by omission
and compression. The slight alterations of another kind
were for the most part made not long after the publication
of the Poems from which the extracts are taken.* These
extracts seem to have a title to be placed here, as they were
the productions of youth, and represent implicitly some of
the features of a youthful mind, at a time when images of
nature supplied to it the place of thought, sentiment, and
almost of action ; or, as it will be found expressed, of a state

of mind when

' the sounding cataract
Haunted me like a passion : the tall rock,
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,
Their colours and their forms, were then to me
An appetite, a feeling, and a love,
That had no need of a remoter charm,
By thought supplied, or any interest
Unborrowed from the eye.1

I will own that I was much at a loss what to select of these
descriptions : and perhaps it would have been better either to
have reprinted the whole, or suppressed what I have given.!
None of the other classes, except those of Fancy and
Imagination, require any particular notice. But a remark

* These poems are now printed entire (ed. 1820 and onwards),
t The preceding paragraph omitted in ed. 1845. — ED.

APPENDIX. 317

of general application may be made. All Poets, except
the dramatic, have been in the practice of feigning that
their works were composed to the music of the harp or
lyre: with what degree of affectation this has been done
in modern times, I leave to the judicious to determine.
For my own part, I have not been disposed to violate pro-
bability so far, or to make such a large demand upon the
reader's charity. Some of these pieces are essentially
lyrical ; and therefore, cannot have their due force without
a supposed musical accompaniment ; but, in much the
greatest part, as a substitute for the classic lyre or romantic
harp, I require nothing more than an animated or impas-
sioned recitation, adapted to the subject. Poems, however
humble in their kind, if they be good in that kind, cannot
read themselves ; the law of long syllable and short must
not be so inflexible, — the letter of metre must not be so
impassive to the spirit of versification, — as to deprive the
reader of a voluntary power to modulate, in subordination
to the sense, the music of the poem ; — in the same manner
as his mind is left at liberty, and even summoned, to act
upon its thoughts and images. But, though the accompani-
ment of a musical instrument be frequently dispensed with,
the true Poet does not therefore abandon his privilege
distinct from that of the mere Proseman —

' He murmurs near the running brooks
A music sweeter than their own.'

I come now to the consideration of the words Fancy and
Imagination, as employed in the classification of the follow-
ing Poems. ' A man,' says an intelligent author, ' has ima-
gination in proportion as he can distinctly copy in idea the
impressions of sense : it is the faculty which images within
the mind the phenomena of sensation. A man has fancy in
proportion as he can call up, connect, or associate, at

318 APPENDIX.

pleasure, those internal images (<f>avrd£eiv is to cause to
appear) so as to complete ideal representations of absent
objects. Imagination is the power of depicting, and fancy
of evoking and combining. The imagination is formed by
patient observation ; the fancy by a voluntary activity in
shifting the scenery of the mind. The more accurate the
imagination, the more safely may a painter, or a poet, un-
dertake a delineation, or a description, without the presence
of the objects to be characterized. The more versatile the
fancy, the more original and striking will be the decorations
produced.' — British Synonyms discriminated, by W. Taylor.

Is not this as if a man should undertake to supply an
account of a building, and be so intent upon what he had
discovered of the foundation as to conclude his task without
once looking up at the superstructure ? Here, as in other
instances, throughout the volume, the judicious Author's
mind is enthralled by Etymology ; he takes up the original
word as his guide and escort, and too often does not per-
ceive how soon he becomes its prisoner, without liberty to
tread in any path but that to which it confines him. It is
not easy to find out how imagination, thus explained, differs
from distinct remembrance of images ; or fancy from quick
and vivid recollection of them : each is nothing more than
a mode of memory. If the two words bear the above
meaning, and no other, what term is left to designate that
faculty of which the Poet is ' all compact ;' he whose eye
glances from earth to heaven, whose spiritual attributes
body forth what his pen is prompt in turning to shape ; or
what is left to characterize Fancy, as insinuating herself into
the heart of objects with creative activity ? Imagination,
in the sense of the word as giving title to a class of the
following Poems, has no reference to images that are merely
a faithful copy, existing in the mind, of absent external
objects ; but is a word of higher import, denoting operations

APPENDIX. 319

of the mind upon those objects, and processes of creation or
of composition, governed by certain fixed laws. I proceed to
illustrate my meaning by instances. A parrot hangs from
the wires of his cage by his beak or by his claws ; or a
monkey from the bough of a tree by his paws or his tail.
Each creature does so literally and actually. In the first
Eclogue of Virgil, the shepherd thinking of the time when
he is to take leave of his farm, thus addresses his goats : —

* Non ego vos posthac viridi projectus in antro
Dumosa pendere procul de rape videbo.'

' Half way down
Hangs one who gathers samphire,'

is the well-known expression of Shakespeare, delineating an
ordinary image upon the cliffs of Dover. In these two
instances is a slight exertion of the faculty which I denomi-
nate imagination, in the use of the words ; neither the
goats nor the samphire-gatherer do literally hang, as does
the parrot or the monkey ; but, presenting to the senses
something of such an appearance, the mind in its activity,
for its own gratification, contemplates them as hanging.

' As when, far off at sea, a fleet descried,
Jiangs in the clouds, by equinoctial winds
Close sailing from Bengala, or the isles
Of Ternate or Tidore, whence merchants bring
Their spicy drugs : they on the trading flood
Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape
Ply, stemming nightly toward the Pole : so seemed
Far off the flying Fiend.'

Here is the full strength of the imagination involved in
the word hangs, and exerted upon the whole image : First,
the fleet, an aggregate of many ships, is represented as
one mighty person, whose track, we know and feel, is upon
the waters ; but, taking advantage of its appearance to the
senses, the Poet dares to represent it as hanging in the
clouds, both for the gratification of the mind in contemplat-

320 APPENDIX.

ing the image itself, and in reference to the motion and
appearance of the sublime object to which it is compared.
From images of sight we will pass to those of sound.*

' Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove broods ;
of the same bird,

' His voice was buried among trees,

Yet to be come at by the breeze ; '
' 0 Cuckoo ! shall I call thee Bird,

Or but a wandering Voice ? '

The stock-dove is said to coo, a sound well imitating the
note of the bird : but, by the intervention of the metaphor
broods, the affections are called in by the imagination to
assist in marking the manner in which the bird reiterates
and prolongs her soft note, as if herself delighting to listen
to it, and participating of a still and quiet satisfaction, like
that which may be supposed inseparable from the continuous
process of incubation. " His voice was buried among trees," a
metaphor expressing the love of seclusion by which this Bird
is marked ; and characterizing its note as not partaking of the
shrill and the piercing, and therefore more easily deadened
by the intervening shade ; yet a note so peculiar, and withal
so pleasing, that the breeze, gifted with that love of the
sound which the Poet feels, penetrates the shade in which
it is entombed, and conveys it to the ear of the listener.

« Shall I call thee Bird,
Or but a wandering Voice ? '

This concise interrogation characterizes the seeming
ubiquity of the voice of the cuckoo, and dispossesses the
creature almost of a corporal existence ; the Imagination
being tempted to this exertion of her power by a conscious-
ness in the memory that the cuckoo is almost perpetually
heard throughout the season of spring, but seldom becomes
an object of sight.

* Added in edd. 1836-45, "which, as they must necessarily be of a less
definite character, shall be selected from other volumes." — ED.

APPENDIX.

321

Thus far of images independent of each other, and imme-
diately endowed by the mind with properties that do not
inhere in them, upon an incitement from properties and
qualities the existence of which is inherent and obvious.
These processes of imagination are carried on either by con-
ferring additional properties upon an object, or abstracting
from it some of those which it actually possesses, and thus
enabling it to re-act upon the mind which hath performed
the process, like a new existence.

I pass from the Imagination acting upon an individual
image to a consideration of the same faculty employed upon
images in a conjunction by which they modify each other.
The reader has already had a fine instance before him in the
passage quoted from Virgil, where the apparently perilous
situation of the goat, hanging upon the shaggy precipice, is
contrasted with that of the shepherd, contemplating it from
the seclusion of the cavern in which he lies stretched at ease
and in security. Take these images separately, and how
unaffecting the picture compared with that produced by their
being thus connected with, and opposed to, each other !

'Asa 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, which on a shelf
Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun himself.

' Such seemed this Man : not all alive or dead,
Nor all asleep, in his extreme old age.

Motionless as a cloud the old Man stood,

That heareth not the loud winds when they call,

And moveth altogether if it move at all.'

In these images, the conferring, the abstracting, and the
modifying powers of the Imagination, immediately and
mediately acting, are all brought into conjunction. The

IV. X

322 APPENDIX.

stone is endowed with something of the power of life to
approximate it to the sea-beast ; and the sea-beast stripped
of some of its vital qualities to assimilate it to the stone ;
which intermediate image is thus treated for the purpose of
bringing the original image, that of the stone, to a nearer
resemblance to the figure and condition of the aged Man,
who is divested of so much of the indications of life and
motion as to bring him to the point where the two objects
unite and coalesce in just comparison. After what has been
said, the image of the cloud need not be commented upon.

Thus far of an endowing or modifying power ; but the
imagination also shapes and creates ; and how ? By in-
numerable processes ; and in none does it more delight than
in that of consolidating numbers into unity, and dissolving
and separating unity into number, — alterations proceeding
from, and governed by, a sublime consciousness of the soul
in her own mighty and almost divine powers. Recur to the
passage already cited from Milton. When the compact
Fleet, as one person, has been introduced ' Sailing from
Bengala,' 'They,' i.e., the 'merchants,' representing the
fleet resolved into a multitude of ships, ' ply ' their voyage
towards the extremities of the earth : ' So ' (referring to the
word ' As ' in the commencement) ' seemed the flying
fiend ; ' the image of his Person acting to recombine the
multitude of ships into one body, — the point from which
the comparison set out. 'So seemed,' and to whom seemed?
To the heavenly Muse who dictates the poem, to the eye of
the Poet's mind, and to that of the reader, present at one
moment in the wide Ethiopian, and the next in the solitudes,
then first broken in upon, of the infernal regions !

' Modo me Thebis, modo ponit Athenis.'

Hear again this mighty poet, — speaking of the Messiah
going forth to expel from heaven the rebellious angels,

APPENDIX. 323

' Attended by ten thousand thousand Saints
He onward came : far off his coming shone,' —

the retinue of Saints and the Person of the Messiah himself,
lost almost and merged in the splendour of that indefinite
abstraction, ' His coming ! '

As I do not mean here to treat this subject further than
to throw some light upon the present Volumes, and especially
upon one division of them, I shall spare myself and the reader
the trouble of considering the Imagination as it deals with
thoughts and sentiments, as it regulates the composition of
characters, and determines the course of actions ; I will not
consider it (more than I have already done by implication)
as that power which, in the language of one of my most
esteemed Friends, ' draws all things to one ; which makes
things animate or inanimate, beings with their attributes,
subjects with their accessories, take one colour and serve to
one effect.'* The grand store-houses of enthusiastic and medi-
tative Imagination, of poetical, as contradistinguished from
human and dramatic Imagination, are the prophetic and
lyrical parts of the Holy Scriptures, and the works of
Milton, to which I cannot forbear to add those of Spenser.
I select these writers in preference to those of ancient
Greece and Eome, because the anthropomorphitism of the
Pagan religion subjected the minds of the greatest poets in
those countries too much to the bondage of definite form ;
from which the Hebrews were preserved by their abhorrence
of idolatry. This abhorrence was almost as strong in our
great epic Poet, both from circumstances of his life, and
from the constitution of his mind. However imbued the
surface might be with classical literature, he was a Hebrew
in soul ; and all things tended in him towards the sublime.
Spenser, of a gentler nature, maintained his freedom by aid
of his allegorical spirit, at one time inciting him to create

* Charles Lamb upon the genius of Hogarth.

324 APPENDIX.

persons out of abstractions ; and, at another, by a superior
effort of genius, to give the universality and permanence of
abstractions to his human beings, by means of attributes
and emblems that belong to the highest moral truths and
the purest sensations, — of which his character of Una is a
glorious example. Of the human and dramatic Imagination
the works of Shakespeare are an inexhaustible source.

' I tax not you, ye Elements, with unkindness ;
I never gave you kingdoms, called you Daughters ! '

And if, bearing in mind the many Poets distinguished by
this prime quality, whose names I omit to mention ; yet
justified by a recollection of the insults which the ignorant,
the incapable, and the presumptuous, have heaped upon
these and my other writings, I may be permitted to antici-
pate the judgment of posterity upon myself, I shall declare
(censurable, I grant, if the notoriety of the fact above stated
does not justify me) that I have given, in these unfavourable
times, evidence of exertions of this faculty upon its worthiest
objects, the external universe, the moral and religious senti-
ments of Man, his natural affections, and his acquired
passions ; which have the same ennobling tendency as the
productions of men, in this kind, worthy to be holden in
undying remembrance.

This subject may be dismissed with observing * — that, in
the series of Poems placed under the head of Imagination,
I have begun with one of the earliest processes of Nature in
the development of this faculty. Guided by one of my own
primary consciousnesses, I have represented a commutation
.and transfer of internal feelings, co-operating with external
accidents, to plant, for immortality, conjoined impressions
of sound and sight, in the celestial soil of the Imagination.
The Boy, there introduced, is listening, with something of a
feverish and restless anxiety, for the recurrence of the riotous
* The following paragraph was omitted in edition 1845. — ED.

I

APPENDIX. 325

sounds which he had previously excited ; and, at the moment
when the intenseness of his mind is beginning to remit, he is
surprised into a perception of the solemn and tranquillizing
images which the Poem describes. — The Poems next in
succession exhibit the faculty exerting itself upon various
objects of the external universe ; then follow others, where it
is employed upon feelings, characters, and actions ; * and the
class is concluded with imaginative pictures of moral, politi-
cal, and religious sentiments.

To the mode in which Fancy has already been cha-
racterised as the power of evoking and combining, or, as
my friend Mr Coleridge has styled it, ' the aggregative and
associative power,' my objection is only that the definition
is too general To aggregate and to associate, to evoke and
to combine, belong as well to the Imagination as to the
Fancy ; but either the materials evoked and combined are
different; or they are brought together under a different
law, and for a different purpose. Fancy does not require
that the materials which she makes use of should be
susceptible of change in their constitution, from her touch :
and, where they admit of modification, it is enough for her
purpose if it be slight, limited, and evanescent. Directly
the reverse of these, are the desires and demands of the
Imagination. She recoils from everything but the plastic,
the pliant, and the indefinite. She leaves it to Fancy to
describe Queen Mab as coming,

' In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger pf an alderman.'

Having to speak of stature, she does not tell you that her
gigantic Angel was as tall as Pompey's Pillar ; much less
that he was twelve cubits, or twelve hundred cubits high ;
or that his dimensions equalled those of Teneriffe or Atlas ;

* Such of these as were furnished by Scottish subjects have since been
arranged in a class, entitled, Memorials of Tours in Scotland.

326 APPENDIX.

— because these, and if they were a million times as high it
would be the same, are bounded. The expression is, ' His
stature reached the sky ! ' the illimitable firmament ! —
When the Imagination frames a comparison, if it does not
strike on the first presentation, a sense of the truth of the
likeness, from the moment that it is perceived grows — and
continues to grow — upon the mind ; the resemblance de-
pending less upon outline of form and feature, than upon
expression and effect; less upon casual and outstanding,
than upon inherent and internal properties : moreover, the
images invariably modify each other. — The law under which
the processes of Fancy are carried on is as capricious as the
accidents of things, and the effects are surprising, playful,
ludicrous, amusing, tender, or pathetic, as the objects happen
to be appositely produced or fortunately combined. Fancy
depends upon the rapidity and profusion with which she
scatters her thoughts and images ; trusting that their number
and the felicity with which they are linked together, will
make amends for the want of individual value: or she prides
herself upon the curious subtilty and the successful elabora-
tion with which she can detect their lurking affinities. If
she can win you over to her purpose, and impart to you her
feelings, she cares not how unstable or transitory may be her
influence, knowing that it will not be out of her power to
resume it upon an apt occasion. But the Imagination is
conscious of an indestructible dominion ; — the Soul may fall
away from it, not being able to sustain its grandeur ; but, if
once felt and acknowledged, by no act of any other faculty
of the mind can it be relaxed, impaired, or diminished. —
Fancy is given to quicken and to beguile the temporal part
of our nature, Imagination to incite and to support the
eternal — Yet is it not the less true that Fancy, as she is an
active, is also, under her own laws and in her own spirit, a
creative faculty. In what manner Fancy ambitiously aims

APPENDIX. 327

at a rivalship with the Imagination, and Imagination stoops
to work with the materials of Fancy, might be illustrated
from the compositions of all eloquent writers, whether in
prose or verse ; and chiefly from those of our own Country.
Scarcely a page of the impassioned parts of Bishop Taylor's
works can be opened that shall not afford examples. Kefer-
ring the reader to those inestimable volumes, I will content
myself with placing a conceit (ascribed to Lord Chesterfield)
in contrast with a passage from the Paradise Lost : —

' The dews of the evening most carefully shun,
They are the tears of the sky for the loss of the sun.'

After the transgression of Adam, Milton, with other appear-
ances of sympathising Nature, thus marks the immediate
consequence,

' Sky lowered, and, muttering thunder, some sad drops
Wept at completion of the mortal sin.'

The associating link is the same in each instance ; Dew and
rain, not distinguishable from the liquid substance of tears, are
employed as indications of sorrow. A flash of surprise is
the effect in the former case ; a flash of surprise and nothing
more ; for the nature of things does not sustain the com-
bination. In the latter, the effects of the act, of which
there is this immediate consequence and visible sign, are so
momentous, that the mind acknowledges the justice and
reasonableness of the sympathy in nature so manifested ;
and the sky weeps drops of water as if with human eyes, as
' Earth had, before, trembled from her entrails, and Nature
given a second groan.'

Awe-stricken as I am by contemplating the operations of
the mind of this truly divine Poet, I scarcely dare venture
to add that " An Address to an Infant," which the reader
will find under the class of Fancy in the present volumes,
exhibits something of this communion and interchange of
instruments and functions between the two powers ; and is

328 APPENDIX.

accordingly placed last in the class, as a preparation for that
of Imagination, which follows.*

Finally, I will refer to Cotton's " Ode upon Winter," an
admirable composition, though stained with some peculiari-
ties of the age in which he lived, for a general illustration
of the characteristics of Fancy. The middle part of this ode
contains a most lively description of the entrance of Winter,
with his retinue as 'A palsied king,' and yet a military
monarch, — advancing for conquest with his army ; the several
bodies of which, and their arms and equipments, are de-
scribed with a rapidity of detail, and a profusion of fanciful
comparisons, which indicate on the part of the Poet extreme
activity of intellect, and a corresponding hurry of delightful
feeling. Winter retires from the foe into his fortress,

where

' a magazine

Of sovereign juice is cellared in ;
Liquor that will the siege maintain
Should Phrebus ne'er return again.'

Though myself a water-drinker, I cannot resist the pleasure
of transcribing what follows, as an instance still more happy
of Fancy employed in the treatment of feeling than, in its
preceding passages, the Poem supplies of her management of
forms.

* 'Tis that that gives the poet rage,
And thaws the jellied blood of age ;
Matures the young, restores the old,
And makes the fainting coward bold.

' It lays the careful head to rest,
Calms palpitations in the breast,
Benders our lives' misfortune sweet ;

' Then let the chill Sirocco blow,
And gird us round with hills of snow,
Or else go whistle to the shore,
And make the hollow mountains roar.

* The preceding paragraph is omitted in the edition of 1845. — ED.

APPENDIX. 329

' Whilst we together jovial sit
Careless, and crowned with mirth and wit ;
Where, though bleak winds confine us home,
Our fancies round the world shall roam.

' We'll think of all the Friends we know,
And drink to all worth drinking to ;
When having drunk all thine and mine,
We rather shall want healths than wine.

' But where Friends fail us, we'll supply
Our friendships with our charity :
Men that remote in sorrows live,
Shall by our lusty brimmers thrive.

' We'll drink the wanting into wealth,
And those that languish into health,
The afflicted into joy : th' opprest
Into security and rest

' The worthy in disgrace shall find
Favour return again more kind,
And in restraint who stifled lie,
Shall taste the air of liberty.

' The brave shall triumph in success,
The lovers shall have mistresses,
Poor unregarded Virtue, praise,
And the neglected Poet, bays.

4 Thus shall our healths do others good,
Whilst we ourselves do all we would ;
For, freed from envy and from care,
What would we be but what we are ?'

It remains that I should express my regret at the
necessity of separating my compositions from some beautiful
Poems of Mr Coleridge, with which they have been long
associated in publication. The feelings with which that
joint publication was made, have been gratified ; its end is
answered, and the time is come when considerations of
general propriety dictate the separation. Three short pieces
(now first published) are the work of a female Friend ;
and the reader, to whom they may be acceptable, is
indebted to me for his pleasure ; if any one regard
them with dislike, or be disposed to condemn them, let the

330 APPENDIX.

censure fall upon him, who, trusting in his own sense of
their merit and their fitness for the place which they
occupy, extorted them from the authoress.*

When I sat down to write this Preface, it was my inten-
tion to have made it more comprehensive ; but, thinking
that I ought rather to apologise for detaining the reader so
long, I will here conclude.

ESSAY SUPPLEMENTAEY TO THE PREFACE

WITH the young of both sexes, Poetry is, like love, a passion;
but, for much the greater part of those who have been
proud of its power over their minds, a necessity soon arises
of breaking the pleasing bondage : or it relaxes of itself ; the
thoughts being occupied in domestic cares, or the time en-
grossed by business. Poetry then becomes only an occa-
sional recreation ; while to those whose existence passes
away in a course of fashionable pleasure, it is a species of
luxurious amusement. In middle and declining age, a
scattered number of serious persons resort to Poetry, as to
religion, for a protection against the pressure of trivial
employments, and as a consolation for the afflictions of life,
And, lastly, there are many, who, having been enamoured of
this art in their youth, have found leisure, after youth was
spent, to cultivate general literature ; in which Poetry has
continued to be comprehended as a study.

Into the above classes the readers of Poetry may be
divided ; Critics abound in them all ; but from the last only
can opinions be collected of absolute value, and worthy to
be depended upon, as prophetic of the destiny of a new
work. The young, who in nothing can escape delusion, are
especially subject to it in their intercourse with Poetry.
The cause, not so obvious as the fact is unquestionable, is

* The preceding paragraph was omitted in the edition of 1845. — ED.

APPENDIX. 331

the same as that from which erroneous judgments in this art,
in the minds of men of all ages, chiefly proceed; but upon
Youth it operates with peculiar force. The appropriate
business of Poetry (which nevertheless, if genuine, is as
permanent as pure science) her appropriate employment,
her privilege and her duty, is to treat of things not as they
are, but as they appear ; not as they exist in themselves,
but as they seem to exist to the senses, and to the passions.
What a world of delusion does this acknowledged obligation*
prepare for the inexperienced ! what temptations to go
astray are here held forth for them whose thoughts have
been little disciplined by the understanding, and whose
feelings revolt from the sway of reason ! — When a juvenile
reader is in the height of his rapture with some vicious
passage, should experience throw in doubts, or common-
sense suggest suspicions, a lurking consciousness that the
realities of the Muse are but shows, and that her liveliest
excitements are raised by transient shocks of conflicting
feeling and successive assemblages of contradictory thoughts
— is ever at hand to justify extravagance, and to sanction
absurdity. But, it may be asked, as these illusions are un-
avoidable and, no doubt, eminently useful to the mind as a
process, what good can be gained by making observations,
the tendency of which is to diminish the confidence of youth
in its feelings, and thus to abridge its innocent and even
profitable pleasures ? The reproach implied in the question
could not be warded off, if Youth were incapable of being
delighted with what is truly excellent ; or, if these errors
always terminated of themselves in due season. But, with
the majority, though their force be abated, they continue
through life. Moreover, the fire of youth is too vivacious
an element to be extinguished or damped by a philosophical
remark ; and, while there is no danger that what has been
* In edd. 1820-1832, "this acknowledged principle. "— ED.

332 APPENDIX.

said will be injurious or painful to the ardent and the con-
fident, it may prove beneficial to those who, being enthusi-
astic, are, at the same time, modest and ingenuous. The
intimation may unite with their own misgivings to regulate
their sensibility, and to bring in, sooner than it would
otherwise have arrived, a more discreet and sound judgment.

If it should excite wonder that men of ability, in later
life, whose understandings have been rendered acute by
practice in affairs, should be so easily and so far imposed
upon when they happen to take up a new work in verse,
this appears to be the cause ; — that, having discontinued
their attention to poetry, whatever progress may have been
made in other departments of knowledge, they have not, as
to this art, advanced in true discernment beyond the age of
youth. If, then, a new poem fall in their way, whose attrac-
tions are of that kind which would have enraptured them
during the heat of youth, the judgment not being improved
to a degree that they shall be disgusted, they are dazzled ;
and prize and cherish the faults for having had power to
make the present time vanish before them, and to throw the
mind back, as by enchantment, into the happiest season of
life. As they read, powers seem to be revived, passions are
regenerated, and pleasures restored. The Book was probably
taken up after an escape from the burden of business, and
with a wish to forget the world, and all its vexations and
anxieties. Having obtained this wish, and so much more, it
is natural that they should make report as they have felt.

If Men of mature age, through want of practice, be thus
easily beguiled into admiration of absurdities, extravagances,
and misplaced ornaments, thinking it proper that their
understandings should enjoy a holiday, while they are un-
bending their minds with verse, it may be expected that
such readers will resemble their former selves also in
strength of prejudice, and an inaptitude to be moved by the

APPENDIX. 333

unostentatious beauties of a pure style. In the higher
Poetry, an enlightened Critic chiefly looks for a reflection of
the wisdom of the heart and the grandeur of the imagina-
tion. Wherever these appear, simplicity accompanies them;
Magnificence herself, when legitimate, depending upon a
simplicity of her own, to regulate her ornaments. But it is
a well-known property of human nature, that our estimates
are ever governed by comparisons, of which we are con-
scious, with various degrees of distinctness. Is it not, then,
inevitable (confining these observations to the effects of style
merely) that an eye, accustomed to the glaring hues of diction
by which such readers are caught and excited, will for the
most part be rather repelled than attracted by an original
work, the colouring of which is disposed according to a pure
and refined scheme of harmony ? It is in the fine arts as
in the affairs of life, no man can serve (i.e., obey with zeal
and fidelity) two masters.

As Poetry is most just to its own divine origin when it
administers the comforts and breathes the spirit of religion,
they who have learned to perceive this truth, and who be-
take themselves to reading verse for sacred purposes, must
be preserved from numerous illusions to which the two classes
of readers, whom we have been considering, are liable. But,
as the mind grows serious from the weight of life, the range
of its passions is contracted accordingly ; and its sympathies
become so exclusive, that many species of high excellence
wholly escape, or but languidly excite, its notice. Besides,
men who read from religious or moral inclinations, even
when the subject is of that kind which they approve, are
beset with misconceptions and mistakes peculiar to them-
selves. Attaching so much importance to the truths which
interest them, they are prone to overrate the Authors by
whom these truths are expressed and enforced. They come
prepared to impart so much passion to the Poet's language,

334 APPENDIX.

that they remain unconscious how little, in fact, they
receive from it. And, on the other hand, religious faith is
to him who holds it so momentous a thing, and error
appears to be attended with such tremendous consequences,
that, if opinions touching upon religion occur which the
reader condemns, he not only cannot sympathise with them,
however animated the expression, but there is, for the most
part, an end put to all satisfaction and enjoyment. Love,
if it before existed, is converted into dislike ; and the heart
of the reader is set against the Author and his book. — To
these excesses, they, who from their professions ought to be
the most guarded against them, are perhaps the most liable ;
I mean those sects whose religion, being from the calculating
understanding, is cold and formal. For when Christianity, the
religion of humility, is founded upon the proudest faculty of
our nature, what can be expected but contradictions ? Accord-
ingly, believers of this cast are at one time contemptuous ;
at another, being troubled, as they are, and must be, with
inward misgivings, they are jealous and suspicious : — and at
all seasons, they are under temptation to supply, by the heat
with which they defend their tenets, the animation which is
wanting to the constitution of the religion itself.

Faith was given to man that his affections, detached from
the treasures of 'time, "might be inclined to settle upon those
of eternity : — the elevation of his nature, which this habit
produces on earth, being to him a presumptive evidence of
a future state of existence; and giving him a title to partake
of its holiness. The religious man values what he sees
chiefly as an " imperfect shadowing forth " of what he is
incapable of seeing. The concerns of religion refer to
indefinite objects, and are too weighty for the mind to
support them without relieving itself by resting a great
part of the burden upon words and symbols. The commerce
between Man and his Maker cannot be carried on but by a

APPENDIX. 335

process where much is represented in little, and the Infinite
Being accommodates himself to a finite capacity. In all
this may be perceived the affinity between Eeligion and
Poetry ; — between Eeligion — making up the deficiencies of
reason by faith ; and Poetry — passionate for the instruction

of reason, between Keligion — whose element is infinitude, and

9
whose ultimate trust is the supreme of things, submitting

herself to circumscription and reconciled to substitutions; and
Poetry — ethereal and transcendent, yet incapable to sustain
her existence without sensuous incarnation. In this com-
munity of nature maybe perceived also the lurking incitements
of kindred error ; — so that we shall find that no poetry has
been more subject to distortion, — than that species, the argu-
ment and scope of which is religious; and no lovers of the
art have gone farther astray than the pious and the devout.
Whither then shall we turn for that union of qualifica-
tions which must necessarily exist before the decisions of a
critic can be of absolute value ? For a mind at once
poetical and philosophical ; for a critic whose affections are
as free and kindly as the spirit of society, and whose
understanding is severe as that of dispassionate government?
Where are we to look for that initiatory composure of mind
which no selfishness can disturb ? For a natural sensibility
that has been tutored into correctness without losing any-
thing of its quickness ; and for active faculties capable of
answering the demands which an Author of original imagina-
tion shall make upon them, associated with a judgment
that cannot be duped into admiration by aught that is
unworthy of it ? — among those and those only, who, never
having suffered their youthful love of Eoetry to remit much
of its force, have applied to the consideration of the laws of
this art the best power of their understandings. At the same
time it must be observed — that, as this class comprehends
the only judgments which are trustworthy, so does it include

336 APPENDIX.

the most erroneous and perverse. For to be mis-taught is
worse than to be untaught ; and no perverseness equals that
which is supported by system, no errors are so difficult to
root out as those which the understanding has pledged its
credit to uphold. In this class are contained censors, who,
if they be pleased with what is good, are pleased with it

v%

only by imperfect glimpses, and upon false principles ; who,
should they generalise rightly, to a certain point, are sure to
suffer for it in the end ; who, if they stumble upon a sound
rule, are fettered by misapplying it, or by straining it too
far ; being incapable of perceiving when it ought to yield to
one of higher order. In it are found critics too petulant to
be passive to a genuine poet, and too feeble to grapple with
him ; men, who take upon them to report of the course
which he holds whom they are utterly unable to accompany, —
confounded if he turn quick upon the wing, dismayed if he
soar steadily 'into the region;' — men of palsied imaginations
and indurated hearts ; in whose minds all healthy action is
languid, who therefore feed as the many direct them, or,
with the many, are greedy after vicious provocatives ;
— judges, whose censure is auspicious, and whose praise
ominous ! In this class meet together the two extremes of
best and worst.

The observations presented in the foregoing series are of
too ungracious a nature to have been made without reluct-
ance ; and, were it only on this account, I would invite the
reader to try them by the test of comprehensive experience.
If the number of judges who can be confidently relied upon
be in reality so small, it ought to follow that partial notice
only, or neglect, perhaps long continued, or attention wholly
inadequate to their merits — must have been the fate of
most works in the higher departments of poetry ; and that,
on the other hand, numerous productions have blazed into
popularity, and have passed away, leaving scarcely a trace

APPENDIX.

337

behind them : it will be further found, and when Authors
shall have, at length, raised themselves into general admira-
tion and maintained their ground, errors and prejudices have
prevailed concerning their genius and their works, which
the few who are conscious of those errors and prejudices
would deplore ; if they were- not recompensed by perceiving
that there are select Spirits for whom it is ordained that
their fame shall be in the world an existence like that of
Virtue, which owes its being to the struggles it makes, and
its vigour to the enemies whom it provokes ; — a vivacious
quality, ever doomed to meet with opposition, and still
triumphing over it ; and, from the nature of its dominion,
incapable of being brought to the sad conclusion of Alexander,
when he wept that there were no more worlds for him to
conquer.

Let us take a hasty retrospect of the poetical literature of
this Country for the greater part of the last two centuries,
and see if the facts support these inferences.

Who is there that can now endure to read "The Creation"
of Dubartas ? Yet all Europe once resounded with his
praise ; he was caressed by kings ; and, when his Poem was
translated into our language, " The Faery Queen " faded
before it. The name of Spenser, whose genius is of a higher
order than even that of Ariosto, is at this day scarcely
known beyond the limits of the British Isles. And if the
value of his works is to be estimated from the attention now
paid to them by his countrymen, compared with that which
they bestow on those of some other writers, it must be
pronounced small indeed.

' The laurel meed of mighty conquerors
And poets sage '

are his own words ; but his wisdom has, in this particular,
been his worst enemy ; while its opposite, whether in the

IV. Y

338 APPENDIX.

shape of folly or madness, has been their best friend. But
he was a great power ; and bears a high name : the .laurel
has been awarded to him.

A dramatic Author, if he write for the stage, must adapt
himself to the taste of the audience, or they will not endure
him ; accordingly the mighty genius of Shakspeare was
listened to. The people were delighted ; but I am not
sufficiently versed in stage antiquities to determine whether
they did not flock as eagerly to the representation of many
pieces of contemporary Authors, wholly undeserving to
appear upon the same boards. Had there been a formal
contest for superiority among dramatic writers, that Shaks-
peare, like his predecessors, Sophocles and Euripides, would
have often been subject to the mortification of seeing the
prize adjudged to sorry competitors, becomes too probable,
when we reflect that the admirers of Settle and Shadwell
were, in a later age, as numerous, and reckoned as respect-
able in point of talent, as those of Dryden. At all events,
that Shakspeare stooped to accommodate himself to the
People, is sufficiently apparent ; and one of the most striking
proofs of his almost omnipotent genius, is, that he could
turn to such glorious purpose those materials which the
prepossessions of the age compelled him to make use of.
Yet even this marvellous skill appears not to have been
enough to prevent his rivals from having some advantage
over him in public estimation ; else how can we account for
passages and scenes that exist in his works, unless upon a
supposition that some of the grossest of them, a fact which
in my own mind I have no doubt of, were foisted in by the
Players, for the gratification of the many ?

But that his Works, whatever might be their reception on
the stage, made little impression upon the ruling Intellects
of the time, may be inferred from the fact that Lord Bacon,
in his multifarious writings, nowhere either quotes or alludes

APPENDIX. 339

to him.* — His dramatic excellence enabled him to resume
possession of the stage after the Eestoration ; but Dryden
tells us that in his time two of the plays of Beaumont and
Fletcher were acted for one of Shakspeare. And so faint
and limited was the perception of the poetic beauties of his
dramas in the time of Pope, that, in his Edition of the Plays,
with a view of rendering to the general reader a necessary
service, he printed between inverted commas those passages
which he thought most worthy of notice.

At this day, the French Critics have abated nothing of
their aversion to this darling of our nation : ' the English,
with their buffon de Shakspeare,' is as familiar an expres-
sion among them as in the time of Voltaire. Baron Grimm
is the only French writer who seems to have perceived his
infinite superiority to the first names of the French Theatre ;
an advantage which the Parisian critic owed to his German
blood and German education. The most enlightened Italians,
though well acquainted with our language, are wholly in-
competent to measure the proportions of Shakspeare. The
Germans only, of foreign nations, are approaching towards a
knowledge and feeling of what he is. In some respects
they have acquired a superiority over the fellow-countrymen
of the Poet : for among us it is a current, I might say, an
established opinion, that Shakspeare is justly praised whep
he is pronounced to be ' a wild, irregular genius, in whom
great faults are compensated by great beauties.' How long
may it be before this misconception passes away, and it
becomes universally acknowledged that the judgment of
Shakespeare in the selection of his materials, and in the
manner in which he has made them, heterogeneous as they

* The learned Hakewill (a third edition of whose book bears date 1635),
writing to refute the error ' touching Nature's perpetual and universal
decay,' cites triumphantly the names of Ariosto, Tasso, Bartas, and
Spenser, as instances that poetic genius had not degenerated; but he makes
no mention of Shakspeare.

340 APPENDIX.

often are, constitute a unity of their own, and contribute all
to one great end, is not less admirable than his imagination,
his invention, and his intuitive knowledge of human Nature !

There is extant a small Volume of miscellaneous poems,
in which Shakspeare expresses his own feelings in his own
person. It is not difficult to conceive that the Editor, George
Steevens, should have been insensible to the beauties of one
portion of that Volume, the Sonnets; though in no part of
the writings of this Poet is found, in an equal compass, a
greater number of exquisite feelings felicitously expressed.
But, from regard to the Critic's own credit, he would not
have ventured to talk of an act of parliament not being
strong enough to compel the perusal of these little pieces,*
or any production of Shakspeare, if he had not known that
the people of England were ignorant of the treasures con-
tained in them ; and if he had not, moreover, shared the
too common propensity of human nature to exult over a
supposed fall into the mire of a genius whom he had been
compelled to regard with admiration, as an inmate of the
celestial regions — ' there sitting where he durst not soar.'

Nine years before the death of Shakspeare, Milton was
born ; and early in life he published several small Poems,
which, though on their first appearance they were praised by
a few of the judicious, were afterwards neglected to that de-
gree, that Pope, in his youth, could pilfer from them without
risk of its being known. Whether these Poems are at this
day justly appreciated I will not undertake to decide ; nor
would it imply a severe reflection upon the mass of readers to
suppose the contrary; seeing that a man of the acknowledged

* This flippant insensibility was publicly reprehended by Mr Coleridge,
in a course of Lectures upon Poetry, given by him at the .Royal Institution.
For the various merits of thought and language in Shakspeare's Sonnets
see Numbers 27, 29, 30, 32, 33, 54, 64, 66, 68, 73, 76, 86, 91, 92, 93, 97, 98,
105, 107, 108, 109, 111, 113, 114, 116, 117, 129, and many others.

APPENDIX. 341

genius of Voss, the German Poet, could suffer their spirit to
evaporate ; and could change their character, as is done in
the translation made by him of the most popular of those
pieces. At all events, it is certain that these Poems of Milton
are now much read, and loudly praised ; yet they were little
heard of till more than 150 years after their publication ;
and of the Sonnets, Dr Johnson, as appears from Boswell's
Life of him, was in the habit of thinking and speaking as
contemptuously as Steevens wrote upon those of Shakspeare.
About the time when the Pindaric Odes of Cowley and
his imitators, and the productions of that class of curious
thinkers whom Dr Johnson has strangely styled metaphysical
Poets, were beginning to lose something of that extravagant
admiration which they had excited, The Paradise Lost
made its appearance. ' Fit audience find though few,' was
the petition addressed by the Poet to his inspiring Muse. I
have said elsewhere that he gained more than he asked ;
this I believe to be true; but Dr Johnson has fallen into a
gross mistake when he attempts to prove, by the sale of the
work, that Milton's Countrymen were 'just to it ' upon its
first appearance. Thirteen hundred copies were sold in two
years; an uncommon example, he asserts, of the prevalence
of genius in opposition to so much recent enmity as Milton's
public conduct had excited. But, be it remembered that, if
Milton's political and religious opinions, and the manner in
which he announced them, had raised him many enemies,
they had procured him numerous friends; who, as all per-
sonal danger was passed away at the time of publication,
would be eager to procure the master-work of a man whom
they revered, and whom they would be proud of praising.
Take, from the number of purchasers, persons of this class,
and also those who wished to possess the Poem as a religious
work, and but few I fear would be left who sought for it
on account of its poetical merits. The demand did not

342 APPENDIX.

immediately increase ; ' for,' says Dr Johnson, ' many more
readers ' (he means persons in the habit of reading Poetry)
'than were supplied at first the Nation did not afford'
How careless must a writer be who can make this assertion
in the face of so many existing title-pages to belie it !
Turning to my own shelves, I find the folio of Cowley,
seventh Edition, 1681. A book near it is Flatman's
Poems, fourth Edition, 1686; Waller, fifth Edition, same
date. The poems of Norris of Bemerton not long after
went, I believe, through nine editions. What further de-
mand there might be for these works I do not know ; but I
well remember, that, twenty-five years ago, the booksellers'
stalls in London swarmed with the folios of Cowley. This
is not mentioned in disparagement of that able writer and
amiable man ; but merely to show — that, if Milton's work
was not more read, it was not because readers did not exist
at the time. The early editions of " The Paradise Lost "
were printed in a shape which allowed them to be sold at a
low price, yet only three thousand copies of the work were
sold in eleven years ; and the nation, says Dr Johnson, had
been satisfied from 1623 to 1644, that is, forty-one years,
with only two editions of the works of Shakspeare ; which
probably did not together make one thousand copies ; facts
adduced by the critic to prove the 'paucity of readers.' There
were readers in multitudes ; but their money went for other
purposes, as their admiration was fixed elsewhere. We are
authorised, then, to affirm that the reception of The Paradise
Lost, and the slow progress of its fame, are proofs as strik-
ing as can be desired that the positions which I am
attempting to establish are not erroneous.* — How amusing

* Hughes is express upon this subject : in his dedication of Spenser's
Works to Lord Somers, he writes thus : — ' It was your lordship's en-
couraging a beautiful edition of Paradise Lost that first brought that
incomparable Poem to be generally known and esteemed.'

APPENDIX. 343

to shape to one's self such a critique as a Wit of Charles's
days, or a Lord of the Miscellanies or trading Journalist of
King "William's time, would have brought forth, if he had
set his faculties industriously to work upon this Poem, every
where impregnated with original excellence.

So strange, indeed, are the obliquities of admiration, that
they whose opinions are much influenced by authority will
often be tempted to think that there are no fixed principles*
in human nature for this art to rest upon. I have been
honoured by being permitted to peruse, in MS., a tract com-
posed between the period of the Kevolution and the close of
that century. It is the work of an English Peer of high
accomplishments, its object to form the character and direct
the studies of his son. Perhaps nowhere does a more
beautiful treatise of the kind exist. The good sense and
wisdom of the thoughts, the delicacy of the feelings, and the
charm of the style, are, throughout, equally conspicuous.
Yet the author, selecting among the Poets of his own
country those whom he deems most worthy of his son's
perusal, particularises only Lord Rochester, Sir John Den-
ham, and Cowley. Writing about the same time, Shaftes-
bury, an author at present unjustly depreciated, describes
the English Muses as only yet lisping in their cradles.

The arts by which Pope, soon afterwards, contrived to
procure to himself a more general and a higher reputation
than perhaps any English Poet ever attained during his life-
time, are known to the judicious. And as well known is it
to them, that the undue exertion of these arts is the cause
why Pope has for some time held a rank in literature,
from which, if he had not been seduced by an over-love of
immediate popularity, and had confided more in his native
genius, he never could have descended. He bewitched the

* This opinion seems actually to have been entertained by Adam
Smith, the worst critic, David Hume not excepted, that Scotland, a
soil to which this sort of weed seems natural, has produced.

344 APPENDIX.

nation by his melody, and dazzled it by his polished style,
and was himself blinded by his own success. Having
wandered from humanity in his Eclogues with boyish inex-
perience, the praise, which these compositions obtained,
tempted him into a belief that Nature was not to be trusted,
at least in pastoral Poetry. To prove this by example, he
put his friend Gay upon writing those Eclogues which the
author intended to be burlesque. The instigator of the
work, and his admirers, could perceive in them nothing but
what was ridiculous. Nevertheless, though these Poems
contain some detestable passages, the effect, as Dr Johnson
well observes, 'of reality and truth became conspicuous,
even when the intention was to show them grovelling and
degraded.' The Pastorals, ludicrous to those who prided
themselves upon their refinement, in spite of those disgust-
ing passages, ' became popular, and were read with delight,
as just representations of rural manners and occupations.'

Something less than sixty years after the publication of
The Paradise Lost, appeared Thomson's Winter ; which was
speedily followed by his other Seasons. It is a work of
inspiration ; much of it is written from himself, and nobly
from himself. How was it received ? ' It was no sooner
read,' said one of his contemporary biographers, 'than univer-
sally admired : those only excepted who had not been used
to feel, or to look for anything in Poetry, beyond a point of
satirical or epigrammatic wit, a smart antithesis richly
trimmed with rhyme, or the softness of an elegiac complaint.
To such his manly classical spirit could not readily commend
itself ; till, after a more attentive perusal, they had got the
better of their prejudices, and either acquired or affected a
truer taste. A few others stood aloof, merely because they
had long before fixed the articles of their poetical creed, and
resigned themselves to an absolute despair of ever seeing
anything new and original. These were somewhat mortified
4 to find their notions disturbed by the appearance of a Poet,

APPENDIX. 345

who seemed to owe nothing but to nature and his own
genius. But, in a short time, the applause became un-
animous ; every one wondering how so many pictures, and
pictures so familiar, should have moved them but faintly to
what they felt in his descriptions. His digressions too, the
overflowings of a tender benevolent heart, charmed the
reader no less ; leaving him in doubt, whether he should
more admire the Poet or love the Man.'

This case appears to bear strongly against us : — but we
must distinguish between wonder and legitimate admiration.
The subject of the work is the changes produced in the
appearances of nature by the revolution of the year : and,
by undertaking to write in verse, Thomson pledged himself
to treat his subject as became a Poet. Now it is remarkable
that, excepting the nocturnal Eeverie of Lady "Winchelsea,
and a passage or two in the Windsor Forest of Pope, the
Poetry of the period intervening between the publication of
The Paradise Lost and the Seasons does not contain a
single new image of external nature ; and scarcely presents
a familiar one, from which it can be inferred that the eye of
the Poet had been steadily fixed upon his object, much less
that his feelings had urged him to work upon it in the
spirit of genuine imagination. To what a low state
knowledge of the most obvious and important phenomena
had sunk, is evident from the style in which Dryden
has executed a description of Night in one of his tragedies,
and Pope his translation of the celebrated moonlight scene
in the ' Iliad.' A blind man, in the habit of attending
accurately to descriptions casually dropped from the lips of
those around him, might easily depict these appearances with
more truth. Dryden's lines are vague, bombastic, and
senseless ; * those of Pope, though lie had Homer to guide

* CORTES alone in a night-gown.
All things are hushed as nature's self lay dead ;
The mountains seem to nod their drowsy head.

346 APPENDIX.

him, are throughout false and contradictory. The verses of
Dryden, once highly celebrated, are forgotten ; those of Pope
still retain their hold upon public estimation, — nay, there is
not a passage of descriptive Poetry, which at this day finds so
many and such ardent admirers. Strange to think of an en-
thusiast, as may have been the case with thousands, reciting
those verses under the cope of a moonlight sky, without
having his raptures in the least disturbed by a suspicion of
their absurdity ? If these two distinguished writers could
habitually think that the visible universe was of so little
consequence to a Poet, that it was scarcely necessary for
him to cast his eyes upon it, we may be assured that those
passages of the elder Poets which faithfully and poetically
describe the phenomena of nature, were not at that time
holden in much estimation, and that there was little accurate
attention paid to those appearances.

Wonder is the natural product of Ignorance ; and as the
soil was in such good condition at the time of the publica-
tion of The Seasons, the crop was doubtless abundant.
Neither individuals nor nations become corrupt all at once,
nor are they enlightened in a moment. Thomson was
an inspired poet, but he could not work miracles ; in cases
where the art of seeing had in some degree been learned, the
teacher would further the proficiency of his pupils, but he
could do little more ; though so far does vanity assist men in
acts of self-deception, that many would often fancy they
recognised a likeness when they knew nothing of the original
Having shown that much of what his biographer deemed
genuine admiration must in fact have been blind wonder-
ment,— how is the rest to be accounted for ? — Thomson was

The little Birds in dreams their songs repeat,
And sleeping Flowers beneath the Night-dew sweat :
Even Lust and Envy sleep ; yet Love denies
liest to my soul, and slumber to my eyes.

DKYDEN'S Indian Emperor.

APPENDIX. 347

fortunate in the very title of his poem, which seemed to
bring it home to the prepared sympathies of every one ; in
the next place, notwithstanding his high powers, he writes
a vicious style ; and his false ornaments are exactly of that
kind which would be most likely to strike the undiscerning.
He likewise abounds with sentimental common-places, that,
from the manner in which they were brought forward, bore
an imposing air of novelty. In any well used copy of
the Seasons the book generally opens of itself with the
rhapsody on love, or with one of the stories (perhaps
Damon and Musidora) ; these also are prominent in
our collections of Extracts ; and are the parts of his
Work, which, after all, were probably most efficient in
first recommending the author to general notice. Pope,
repaying praises which he had received, and wishing to
extol him to the highest, only styles him 'an elegant
and philosophical poet ; ' nor are we able to collect any un-
questionable proofs that the true characteristics of Thomson's
genius as an imaginative poet* were perceived, till the elder
Warton, almost forty years after the publication of the
Seasons, pointed them out by a note in his Essay on the
Life and Writings of Pope. In the Castle of Indolence
(of which Gray speaks so coldly) these characteristics were
almost as conspicuously displayed, and in verse more
harmonious, and diction more pure. Yet that fine poem
was neglected on its appearance, and is at this day the
delight only of a few.

When Thomson died, Collins breathed forth his regrets in
an Elegiac Poem, in which he pronounces a poetical curse
upon him who should regard with insensibility the place where

* Since these observations upon Thomson were written, I have perused
the second edition of his Seasons, and find that even that does not con-
tain the most striking passages which Warton points out for admiration ;
these, with other improvements, throughout the whole work, must have
been added at a later period.

348 APPENDIX.

the Poet's remains were deposited. The Poems of the
mourner himself have now passed through innumerable
editions, and are universally known ; but if, when Collins
died, the same kind of imprecation had been pronounced by
a surviving admirer, small is the number whom it would
not have comprehended. The notice which his poems
attained during his life-time was so small, and of course the
sale so insignificant, that not long before his death he
deemed it right to repay to the bookseller the sum which
he had advanced for them, and threw the edition into the
fire.

Next in importance to the Seasons of Thomson, though
at considerable distance from that work in order of time,
come the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry ; collected
new-modelled, and in many instances (if such a contradic-
tion in terms may be used) composed by the Editor, Dr
Percy. This work did not steal silently into the world,
as is evident from the number of legendary tales, that
appeared not long after its publication ; and had been
modelled, as the authors persuaded themselves, after the old
Ballad. The Compilation was, however, ill suited to the then
existing taste of city society; and Dr Johnson, 'mid the little
senate to which he gave laws, was not sparing in his exer-
tions to make it an object of contempt. The critic
triumphed, the legendary imitators were deservedly disre-
garded, and, as undeservedly, their ill-imitated models sank,
in this country, into temporary neglect ; while Burger, and
other able writers of Germany, were translating or imitating
these Reliques, and composing, with the aid of inspiration
thence derived, poems which are the delight of the German
nation. Dr Percy was so abashed by the ridicule flung
upon his labours from the ignorance and insensibility of the
persons with whom he lived, that, though while he was
writing under a mask he had not wanted resolution to follow

APPENDIX. 349

his genius into the regions of true simplicity and genuine
pathos (as is evinced by the exquisite ballad of Sir Cauline,
and by many other pieces), yet when he appeared in his
own person and character as a poetical writer, he adopted,
as in the tale of the Hermit of Warkworth, a diction
scarcely in any one of its features distinguishable from the
vague, the glossy, and unfeeling language of his day. I
mention this remarkable fact * with regret, esteeming the
genius of Dr Percy in this kind of writing superior to that
of any other man by whom in modern times it has been
cultivated. That even Burger (to whom Klopstock gave, in
my hearing, a commendation which he denied to Goethe
and Schiller, pronouncing him to be a genuine poet, and one
of the few among the Germans whose works would last)
had not the fine sensibility of Percy, might be shown from
many passages, in which he has deserted his original only
to go astray. For example,

Now daye was gone, and night was come,
And all were fast asleepe,
All save the Lady Emeline,
Who sate in her bowre to weepe :

And soone she heard her true Love's voice
Low whispering at the walle,
' Awake, awake, my dear Ladye
Tis I thy true-love call.'

Which is thus tricked out and dilated : —

Als nun die Nacht Gebirg' und Thai
Vermummt in Rabenschatten,
Und Hochburgs Lampen uberall
Schon ausgeflimmert hatten,

* Shenstone, in his Schoolmistress, gives a still more remarkable
instance of this timidity. On its first appearance (See Disraeli's second
series of The Curiosities of Literature), the Poem was accompanied
with an absurd prose commentary, showing, as indeed some incongruous
expressions in the text imply, that the whole was intended for burlesque.
In subsequent editions, the commentary was dropped, and the People have
since continued to read in seriousness, doing for the Author what he had
not courage openly to venture upon for himself.

350 APPENDIX.

Und alles tief entschlaf en war ;

Doch nur das Fraulein immerdar,

Voll Fieberangst, noch wachte,

Und seinen Ritter dachte :

Da horch ! Ein slisser Liebeston

Kam leis' empor geflogen.

" Ho, Triidchen, ho ! Da bin ich schon !

Frisch auf ! Dich angezogen ! "

But from humble ballads we must ascend to heroics.

All hail, Macpherson ! hail to thee, Sire of Ossian ! The
Phantom was begotten by the snug embrace of an impudent
Highlander upon a cloud of tradition — it travelled south-
ward, where it was greeted with acclamation, and the thin
Consistence took its course through Europe, upon the breath
of popular applause. The Editor of the "Keliques" had
indirectly preferred a claim to the praise of invention,
by not concealing that his supplementary labours were
considerable ! how selfish his conduct, contrasted with that
of the disinterested Gael, who, like Lear, gives his kingdom
away, and is content to become a pensioner upon his own
issue for a beggarly pittance ! Open this far-famed Book !
I have done so at random, and the beginning of the " Epic
Poem Temora," in eight Books, presents itself. ' The blue
waves of Ullin roll in light. The green hills are covered
with day. Trees shake their dusky heads in the breeza
Gray torrents pour their noisy streams. Two green hills
with aged oaks surround a narrow plain. The blue course
of a stream is there. On its banks stood Cairbar of Atha.
His spear supports the king : the red eyes of his fear are
sad Cormac rises on his soul with all his ghastly wounds/
Precious memorandums from the pocket-book of the blind
Ossian !

If it be unbecoming, as I acknowledge that for the most
part it is, to speak disrespectfully of Works that have
enjoyed for a length of time a widely-spread reputation,

APPENDIX. 351

without at the same time producing irrefragable proofs of
their unworthiness, let me be forgiven upon this occasion.
Having had the good fortune to be born and reared in a
mountainous country, from my very childhood I have felt
the falsehood that pervades the volumes imposed upon the
world under the name of Ossian. From what I saw with
my own eyes, I knew that the imagery was spurious. In
nature everything is distinct, yet nothing defined into
absolute independent singleness. In Macpherson's work it
is exactly the reverse ; everything (that is not stolen) is in
this manner defined, insulated, dislocated, deadened, — yet
nothing distinct. It will always be so when words are
substituted for things. To say that the characters never
could exist, that the manners are impossible, and that a
dream has more substance than the whole state of society,
as there depicted, is doing nothing more than pronouncing a
censure which Macpherson defied ; when, with the steeps of
Morven before his eyes, he could talk so familiarly of his
Car-borne heroes ; — of Morven, which, if one may judge of
its appearance at the distance of a few miles, contains
scarcely an acre of ground sufficiently accommodating for a
sledge to be trailed along its surface. — Mr Malcolm Laing
has ably shown that the diction of this pretended transla-
tion is a motley assemblage from all quarters ; but he
is so fond of making out parallel passages as to call poor
Macpherson to account for his very "ands" and his " buts!"
and he has weakened his argument by conducting it as if
he thought that every striking resemblance was a conscious
plagiarism. It is enough that the coincidences are too re-
markable for its being probable or possible that they could
arise in different minds without communication between
them. Now as the Translators of the Bible, and Shakspeare,
Milton, and Pope, could not be indebted to Macpherson, it
follows that he must have owed his fine feathers to them ;

352 APPENDIX.

unless we are prepared gravely to assert, with Madame de
Stael, that many of the characteristic beauties of our most
celebrated English Poets are derived from the ancient
Fingallian ; in which case the modern translator would
have been but giving back to Ossian his own. It is con-
sistent that Lucien Buonaparte, who could censure Milton
for having surrounded Satan in the infernal regions with
courtly and regal splendour, should pronounce the modern
Ossian to be the glory of Scotland ; — a country that has
produced a Dunbar, a Buchanan, a Thomson, and a Burns.
These opinions are of ill omen for the Epic ambition of him
who has given them to the world.

Yet, much as these pretended treasures of antiquity have
been admired, they have been wholly uninfluential upon the
literature of the Country. No succeeding writer appears to
have caught from them a ray of inspiration ; no Author, in
the least distinguished, has ventured formally to imitate
them — except the boy, Chatterton, on their first appearance.
He had perceived, from the successful trials which he him-
self had made in literary forgery, how few critics were able
to distinguish between a real ancient medal and a counterfeit
of modern manufacture ; and he set himself to the work of
filling a magazine with Saxon Poems, — counterparts of those
of Ossian, as like his as one of his misty stars is to another.
This incapability to amalgamate with the literature of the
Island, is, in my estimation, a decisive proof that the book
is essentially unnatural ; nor should I require any other to
demonstrate it to be a forgery, audacious as worthless. —
Contrast, in this respect, the effect of Macpherson's publica-
tion with the Reliques of Percy, so unassuming, so modest
in their pretensions! — I have already stated how much
Germany is indebted to this latter work ; and for our own
country, its Poetry has been absolutely redeemed by it. I
do not think that there is an able writer in verse of the

APPENDIX. 353

present day who would not be proud to acknowledge his
obligations to the Reliques ; I know that it is so with my
friends ; and, for myself, I am happy on this occasion to
make a public avowal of my own.

Dr Johnson, more fortunate in his contempt of the
labours of Macpherson than those of his modest friend, was
solicited not long after to furnish Prefaces, biographical and
critical, for the works of some of the most eminent English
Poets. The booksellers took upon themselves to make the
collection : they referred probably to the most popular
miscellanies, and, unquestionably, to their books of accounts ;
and decided upon the claim of authors to be admitted into
a body of the most eminent, from the familiarity of their
names with the readers of that day, and by the profits,
which, from the sale of his works, each had brought and was
bringing to the Trade. The Editor was allowed a limited
exercise of discretion, and the Authors whom he recommended
are scarcely to be mentioned without a smile. We open
the volume of Prefatory Lives, and to our astonishment the
first name we find is that of Cowley ! — What is become of
the morning-star of English Poetry ? Where is the bright
Elizabethan constellation ? Or, if names be more accept-
able than images, where is the ever-to-be-honoured Chaucer ?
where is Spenser ? where Sidney ? and, lastly, where he,
whose rights as a Poet, contradistinguished from those which
he is universally allowed to possess as a Dramatist, we have
vindicated, — where Shakspeare ? These and a multitude
of others not unworthy to be placed near them, their con-
temporaries and successors, we have not. But in their
stead, we have (could better be expected when precedence
was to be settled by an abstract of reputation at any given
period made, as in this case before us ?) Roscommon, and
Stepney, and Phillips, and Walsh, and Smith, and Duke,
and King, and Spratt — Halifax, Granville, Sheffield, Con-
iv. z

354 APPENDIX.

greve, Broome, and other reputed Magnates ; metrical
writers utterly worthless and useless, except for occasions
like the present, when their productions are referred to as
evidence what a small quantity of brain is necessary to
procure a considerable stock of admiration, provided the
aspirant will accommodate himself to the likings and
fashions of his day.

As I do not mean to bring down this retrospect to our
own times, it may with propriety be closed at the era of
this distinguished event. From the literature of other ages
and countries, proofs equally cogent might have been
adduced, that the opinions announced in the former part of
this Essay are founded upon truth. It was not an agree-
able office, nor a prudent undertaking to declare them ;
but their importance seemed to render it a duty. It may
still be asked, where lies the particular relation of what has
been said to these Volumes ? The question will be easily
answered by the discerning Eeader who is old enough to
remember the taste that prevailed when some of these
pieces were first published, seventeen years ago ; who has
also observed to what degree the poetry of this Island has
since that period been coloured by them ; and who is
further aware of the unremitting hostility with which, upon
some principle or other, they have each and all been
opposed. A sketch of my own notion of the constitution of
Fame has been given : and, as far as concerns myself, I
have cause to be satisfied. The love, the admiration, the
indifference, the slight, the aversion, and even the contempt,
with which these Poems have been received, knowing, as I
do, the source within my own mind, from which they have
proceeded, and the labour and pains which, when labour and
pains appeared needful, have been bestowed upon them,
must all, if I think consistently, be received as pledges and
tokens, bearing the same general impression, though widely

APPENDIX.

355

different in value : — they are all proofs that for the present
time I have not laboured in vain ; and afford assurances,
more or less authentic, that the products of my industry
will endure.

If there be one conclusion more forcibly pressed upon us
than another by the review which has been given of the
fortunes and fate of poetical Works, it is this, — that every
author, as far as he is great and at the same time original,
has had the task of creating the taste by which he is to be
enjoyed : so has it been, so will it continue to ba This
remark was long since made to me by the philosophical
Friend for the separation of whose poems from my own I.
have previously expressed my regret The predecessors of
an original Genius of a high order will have smoothed the
way for all that he has in common with them ; — and much
he will have in common ; but, for what is peculiarly his own,
he will be called upon to clear and often to shape his own
road: — he will be in the condition of Hannibal among the
Alps.

And where lies the real difficulty of creating that taste
by which a truly original Poet is to be relished ? Is it in
breaking the bonds of custom, in overcoming the prejudices
of false refinement, and displacing the aversions of inex-
perience ? Or, if he labour for an object which here and
elsewhere I have proposed to myself, does it consist in
divesting the reader of the pride that induces him to dwell
upon those points wherein men differ from each other, to the
exclusion of those in which all men are alike, or the same;
and in making him ashamed of the vanity that renders him
insensible of the appropriate excellence which civil arrange-
ments, less unjust than might appear, and Nature illimitable
in her bounty, have conferred on men who stand below him
in the scale of society ? Finally, does it lie in establishing
that dominion over the spirits of readers by which they are

356 APPENDIX.

to be humbled and humanised, in order that they may be
purified and exalted.

If these ends are to be attained by the mere communi-
cation of knowledge, it does not lie here. TASTE, I would
remind the reader, like IMAGINATION, is a word which has
been forced to extend its services far beyond the point to
which philosophy would have confined them. It is a
metaphor, taken from a passive sense of the human body,
and transferred to things which are in their essence not
passive, — to intellectual acts and operations. The word,
Imagination, has been overstrained, from impulses honour-
able to mankind, to meet the demands of the faculty which
is perhaps the noblest of our nature. In the instance of
Taste, the process has been reversed ; and from the preva-
lence of dispositions at once injurious and discreditable, —
being no other than that selfishness which is the child of
apathy, — which, as Nations decline in productive and creative
power, makes them value themselves upon a presumed
refinement of judging. Poverty of language is the primary
cause of the use which we make of the word, Imagination :
but the word, Taste, has been stretched to the sense that it
bears in modern Europe by habits of self-conceit, inducing
that inversion in the order of things whereby a passive
faculty is made paramount among the faculties conversant
with the fine arts. Proportion and congruity, the requisite
knowledge being supposed, are subjects upon which taste
may be trusted ; it is competent to this office ; — for in its
intercourse with these the mind is passive, and is affected
painfully or pleasurably as by an instinct. But the pro-
found and the exquisite in feeling, the lofty and universal
in thought and imagination ; or, in ordinary language, the
pathetic and the sublime ; — are neither of them, accurately
speaking, objects of a faculty which could ever without a
sinking in the spirit of Nations have been designated by the

APPENDIX. 357

metaphor — Taste. And why ? Because without the exer-
tion of a co-operating power in the mind of the reader,
there can be no adequate sympathy with either of these
emotions: without this auxiliary impulse, elevated or pro-
found passion cannot exist.

Passion, it must be observed, is derived from a word
which signifies suffering: but the connection which suffering
has with effort, with exertion, and action, is immediate and
inseparable. How strikingly is this property of human
nature exhibited by the fact, that, in popular language, to be
in a passion, is to be angry! But,

* Anger in hasty words or blows
Itself discharges on its foes.'

To be moved, then, by a passion, is to be excited, often to
external, and always to internal, effort ; whether for the
continuance and strengthening of the passion, or for its
suppression, accordingly as the course which it takes may
be painful or pleasureabla If the latter, the soul must con-
tribute to its support, or it never becomes vivid, — and soon
languishes, and dies. And this brings us to the point. If
every great poet with whose writings men are familiar, in
the highest exercise of his genius, before he can be thoroughly
enjoyed, has to call forth and to communicate power, this
service, in a still greater degree, falls upon an original
writer, at his first appearance in the world. Of genius the
only proof is, the act of doing well what is worthy to be
done, and what was never done before : of genius, in the
fine arts, the only infallible sign is the widening the sphere
of human sensibility, for the delight, honour, and benefit of
human nature. Genius is the introduction of a new element
into the intellectual universe: or, if that be not allowed, it is
the application of powers to objects on which they had not
before been exercised, or the employment of them in such a

358 APPENDIX.

manner as to produce effects hitherto unknown. What is
all this but an advance, or a conquest, made by the soul of
the Poet ? Is it to be supposed that the reader can make
progress of this kind, like an Indian prince or general —
stretched on his palanquin, and borne by his slaves ? No ;
he is invigorated and inspirited by his leader, in order that
he may exert himself; for he cannot proceed in quiescence,
he cannot be carried like a dead weight. Therefore, to create
Taste is to call forth and bestow power, of which knowledge
is the effect ; and there lies the true difficulty.

As the pathetic participates of an animal sensation, it
might seem — that, if the springs of this emotion were
genuine, all men, possessed of competent knowledge of
the facts and circumstances, would be instantaneously
affected. And, doubtless, in the works of every true poet
will be found passages of that species of excellence, which is
proved by effects immediate and universal. But there are
emotions of the pathetic that are simple and direct, and
others — that are complex and revolutionary ; some — to
which the heart yields with gentleness; others — against
which it struggles with pride : these varieties are infinite as
the combinations of circumstance and the constitutions of
character. Remember, also, that the medium through
which, in Poetry, the heart is to be affected — is language ; a
thing subject to endless fluctuations and arbitrary asso-
ciations. The genius of the Poet melts these down for his
purpose ; but they retain their shape and quality to him
who is not capable of exerting, within his own mind, a
corresponding energy. There is also a meditative, as well
as a human pathos ; an enthusiastic as well as an ordinary,
sorrow ; a sadness that has its seat in the depths of reason,
to which the mind cannot sink gently of itself — but to
which it must descend by treading the steps of thought.
And for the sublime, — if we consider what are the cares

APPENDIX. 359

that occupy the passing day, and how remote is the practice
and the course of life from the sources of sublimity, in the
soul of Man, can it be wondered that there is little existing
preparation for a Poet charged with a new mission to
extend its kingdom, and to augment and spread its enjoy-
ments ?

Away, then, with the senseless iteration of the word
popular, applied to new works in Poetry, as if there were no
test of excellence in this first of the fine arts but that all
men should run after its productions, as if urged by an
appetite, or constrained by a spell ! — The qualities of writing
best fitted for eager reception are either such as startle the
world into attention by their audacity and extravagance ; or
they are chiefly of a superficial kind, lying upon the surfaces
of manners ; or arising out of a selection and arrangement
of incidents, by which the mind is kept upon the stretch of
curiosity, and the fancy amused without the trouble of
thought. But in every thing which is to send the soul into
herself, to be admonished of her weakness, or to be made
conscious of her power ; — wherever life and nature are
described as operated upon by the creative or abstracting
virtue of the imagination ; wherever the instinctive wisdom
of antiquity and her heroic passions uniting, in the heart of
the Poet, with the meditative wisdom of later ages, have
produced that accord of sublimated humanity, which is at
once a history of the remote past and a prophetic annuncia-
tion of the remotest future, 'there the Poet must reconcile
himself for a season to few and scattered hearers. Grand
thoughts, (and Shakspeare must often have sighed over this
truth) as they are most naturally and most fitly conceived in
solitude, so can they not be brought forth in the midst of
plaudits, without some violation of their sanctity. Go to a
silent exhibition of the productions of the sister Art, and be
convinced that the qualities which dazzle at first sight, and

360 APPENDIX.

kindle the admiration of the multitude, are essentially
different from those by which permanent influence is
secured. Let us not shrink from following up these prin-
ciples as far as they will carry us, and conclude with
observing — that there never has been a period, and perhaps
never will be, in which vicious poetry, of some kind or other,
has not excited more zealous admiration, and been far more
generally read, than good ; but this advantage attends the
good, that the mdMdual, as well as the species, survives
from age to age ; whereas, of the depraved, though the
species be immortal, the individual quickly perishes ; the
object of present admiration vanishes, being supplanted by
some other as easily produced ; which, though no better,
brings with it at least the irritation of novelty — with adap-
tation, more or less skilful, to the changing humours of the
majority of those who are most at leisure to regard poetical
works when they first solicit their attention.

Is it the result of the whole, that, in the opinion of the
writer, the judgment of the People is not to be respected ?
The thought is most injurious ; and, could the charge be
brought against him, he would repel it with indignation.
The People have already been justified, and, their eulogium
pronounced by implication, when it was said, above — that,
of good poetry, the individual, as well as the species, survives.
And how doth* it survive but through the People ? what
preserves it but their intellect and their wisdom ?

' Past and future, are the wings

On whose support, harmoniously conjoined,

Moves the great Spirit of human knowledge '

MS.

The voice that issues from this Spirit, is that Vox Populi
which the Deity inspires. Foolish must he be who can
mistake for this a local acclamation, or a transitory outcry —
transitory though it be for years, local though from a Nation.

APPENDIX. 361

Still more lamentable is his error who can believe that there
is any thing of divine infallibity in the clamour of that
small though loud portion of the community, ever governed
by factitious influence, which, under the name of the PUBLIC,
passes itself, upon the unthinking, for the PEOPLE. Towards
the Public, the writer hopes that he feels as much deference
as it is entitled to : but to the People, philosophically
characterized, and to the embodied spirit of their knowledge,
so far as it exists and moves, at the present, faithfully
supported by its two wings, the past and the future, his
devout respect, his reverence, is due. He offers it willingly
and readily ; and, this done, takes leave of his Eeaders, by
assuring them — that, if he were not persuaded that the
contents of these Volumes, and the Work to which they
are subsidiary, evince something of the ' Vision and the
Faculty divine ; ' and that, both in words and things,
they will operate in their degree, to extend the domain of
sensibility for the delight, the honour, and the benefit of
human nature, notwithstanding the many happy hours which
he has employed in their composition, and the manifold
comforts and enjoyments they have procured to him, he
would not, if a wish could do it, save them from immediate
destruction ; — from becoming at this moment, to the world,
as a thing that had never been. — 1815.

POSTSCEIPT.
1835.

IN the present volume, as in those that have preceded it, the
reader will have found occasionally opinions expressed upon
the course of public affairs, and feelings given vent to as
national interests excited them. Since nothing, I trust, has
been uttered but in the spirit of reflective patriotism, those

362 APPENDIX.

notices are left to produce their own effect ; but, among the
many objects of general concern, and the changes going
forward, which I have glanced at in verse, are some
especially affecting the lower orders of society : in reference
to these, I wish here to add a few words in plain prose.

Were I conscious of being able to do justice to those im-
portant topics, I might avail myself of the periodical press
for offering anonymously my thoughts, such as they are, to
the world ; but I feel that in procuring attention, they may
derive some advantage, however small, from my name, in
addition to that of being presented in a less fugitive shape.
It is also not impossible that the state of mind which some of
the foregoing poems may have produced in the reader, will
dispose him to receive more readily the impression which I
desire to make, and to admit the conclusions I would
establish.

I. The first thing that presses upon ray attention is the
Poor-Law Amendment Act. I am aware of the magnitude
and complexity of the subject, and the unwearied attention
which it has received from men of far wider experience
than my own ; yet I cannot forbear touching upon one point
of it, and to this I will confine myself, though not insensible
to the objection which may reasonably be brought against treat-
ing a portion of this, or any other, great scheme of civil polity
separately from the whole. The point to which I wish to
draw the reader's attention is, that all persons who cannot find
employment, or procure wages sufficient to support the body
in health and strength, are entitled to a maintenance by law.

This dictate of humanity is acknowledged in the Eeport
of the Commissioners : but is there not room for appre-
hension that some of the regulations of the new act have a
tendency to render the principle nugatory by difficulties
thrown in the way of applying it ? If this be so, persons

APPENDIX. 363

will not be wanting to show it, by examining the provisions
of the act in detail, — an attempt which would be quite out
of place here ; but it will not, therefore, be deemed unbecom-
ing in one who fears that the prudence of the head may, in
framing some of those provisions, have supplanted the wisdom
of the heart, to enforce a principle which cannot be violated
without infringing upon one of the most precious rights of
the English people, and opposing one of the most sacred
claims of civilised humanity.

There can be no greater error, in this department of legis-
lation, than the belief that this principle does by necessity
operate for the degradation of those who claim, or are so
circumstanced as to make it likely they may claim, through
laws founded upon it, relief or assistance. The direct con-
trary is the truth : it may be unanswerably maintained that
its tendency is to raise, not to depress ; by stamping a value
upon life, which can belong to it only where the laws have
placed men who are willing to work, and yet cannot find
employment, above the necessity of looking for protection
against hunger and other natural evils, either to individual
and casual charity, to despair and death, or to the breach of
law by theft, or violence.

And here, as, in the Eeport of the Commissioners, the
fundamental principle has been recognised, I am not at issue
with them any farther than I am compelled to believe that
their ' remedial measures ' obstruct the application of it more
than the interests of society require.

And, calling to mind the doctrines of political economy
which are now prevalent, I cannot forbear to enforce the
justice of the principle, and to insist upon its salutary
operation.

And first for its justice : If self-preservation be the first
law of our nature, would not every one in a state of nature
be morally justified in taking to himself that which is indis-

364 APPENDIX.

pensable to such preservation, where, by so doing, he would
not rob another of that which might be equally indispensable
to his preservation ? And if the value of life be regarded
in a right point of view, may it not be questioned whether
this right of preserving life, at any expense short of
endangering the life of another, does not survive man's
entering into the social state ; whether this right can be
surrendered or forfeited, except when it opposes the divine
law, upon any supposition of a social compact, or of any
convention for the protection of mere rights of property ?

But, if it be not safe to touch the abstract question of
man's right in a social state to help himself even in the last
extremity, may we not still contend for the duty of a
Christian government, standing in loco parentis towards all
its subjects, to make such effectual provision, that no one
shall be in danger of perishing either through the neglect or
harshness of its legislation ? Or, waiving this, is it not indis-
putable that the claim of the state to the allegiance, involves
the protection, of the subject ? And, as all rights in one
party impose a correlative duty upon another, it follows that
the right of the state to require the services of its members,
even to the jeoparding of their lives in the common defence,
establishes a right in the people (not to be gainsaid by
utilitarians and economists) to public support when, from
any cause, they may be unable to support themselves.

Let us now consider the salutary and benign operation of
this principle. Here we must have recourse to elementary
feelings of human nature, and to truths which from their
very obviousness are apt to be slighted, till they are forced
upon our notice by our own sufferings or those of others.
In the Paradise Lost, Milton represents Adam, after the Fall,
as exclaiming in the anguish of his soul —

4 Did I request Thee, Maker, from my clay
To mould me man ; did I solicit Thee

APPENDIX. 365

From darkness to promote me ?

My will

Concurred not to my being.'

Under how many various pressures of misery have men
been driven thus, in a strain touching upon impiety, to
expostulate with the Creator ! and under few so afflictive as
when the source and origin of earthly existence have been
brought back to the mind by its impending close in the
pangs of destitution. But as long as, in our legislation, due
weight shall be given to this principle, no man will be forced
to bewail the gift of life in hopeless want of the necessaries
of life.

Englishmen have, therefore, by the progress of civilisation
among them, been placed in circumstances more favourable
to piety and resignation to the divine will, than the inhabi-
tants of other countries, where a like provision has not been
established. And as Providence, in this care of our country-
men, acts through a human medium, the objects of that care
must, in like manner, be more inclined towards a grateful
love of their fellow-men. Thus, also, do stronger ties attach
the people to their country, whether while they tread its soil,
or, at a distance, think of their native land as an indulgent
parent, to whose arms, even they who have been imprudent
and undeserving may, like the prodigal son, betake themselves,
without fear of being rejected.

Such is the view of the case that would first present itself
to a reflective mind ; and it is in vain to show, by appeals
to experience, in contrast with this view, that provisions
founded upon the principle have promoted profaneness of life,
and dispositions the reverse of philanthropic, by spreading
idleness, selfishness, and rapacity : for these evils have arisen,
not as an inevitable consequence of the principle, but for
want of judgment in framing laws based upon it ; and, above
all, from faults in the mode of administering the law. The

366 APPENDIX.

mischief that has grown to such a height from granting relief
in cases where proper vigilance would have shown that it
was not required, or in bestowing it in undue measure, will
be urged by no truly enlightened statesman, as a sufficient
reason for banishing the principle itself from legislation.

Let us recur to the miserable states of consciousness that
it precludes.

There is a story told, by a traveller in Spain, of a female
who, by a sudden shock of domestic calamity, was driven
out of her senses, and ever after looked up incessantly to the
sky, feeling that her fellow-creatures could do nothing for
her relief. Can there be Englishmen who, with a good end
in view, would, upon system, expose their brother English-
men to a like necessity of looking upwards " only ; or down-
wards to the earth, after it shall contain no spot where the
destitute can demand, by civil right, what by right of nature
they are entitled to ?

Suppose the objects of our sympathy not sunk into this
blank despair, but wandering about as strangers in streets
and ways, with the hope of succour from casual charity ; what
have we gained by such a change of scene ? Woful is the
condition of the famished Northern Indian, dependent, among
winter snows, upon the chance-passage of a herd of deer,
from which one, if brought down by his rifle gun, may be
made the means of keeping him and his companions alive.
As miserable is that of some savage Islander, who, when the
land has ceased to afford him sustenance, watches for food
which the waves may cast up, or in vain endeavours to
extract it from the inexplorable deep. But neither of these
is in a state *of wretchedness comparable to that, which is so
often endured in civilised society : multitudes, in all ages,
have known it, of whom may be said : —

' Homeless, near a thousand homes they stood,
And near a thousand tables pined, and wanted food.'

ft.

APPENDIX. 367

Justly might I be accused of wasting time in an uncalled-
for attempt to excite the feelings of the reader, if systems of
political economy, widely spread, did not impugn the
principle, and if the safeguards against such extremities were
left unimpaired. * It is broadly asserted by many, that every
man who endeavours to find work, may find it : were this
assertion capable of being verified, there still would remain
a question, what kind of work, and how far may the labourer
be fit for it ? .For if sedentary work is to be exchanged for
standing ; and some light and nice exercise of the fingers, to
which an artisan has been accustomed all his life, for severe
labour of the arms ; the best efforts would turn to little
account, and occasion would be given for the unthinking and
the unfeeling unwarrantably to reproach those who are put
upon such employment, as idle, froward, and unworthy of
relief, either by law or in any other way ! Were this statement
correct, there would indeed be an end of the argument,
the principle here maintained would be superseded. But,
alas ! it is far otherwise. That principle, applicable to the
benefit of all countries, is indispensable for England, upon
whose coast families are perpetually deprived of their support
by shipwreck, and where large masses of men are so liable
to be thrown out of their ordinary means of gaining bread,
by changes in commercial intercourse, subject mainly or
solely to the will of foreign powers ; by new discoveries in
arts and manufactures ; and by reckless laws, in conformity
with theories of political economy, which, whether right or
wrong in the abstract, have proved a scourge to tens of
thousands, by the abruptness with which they have been
carried into practice.

But it is urged, — refuse altogether compulsory relief to
the able-bodied, and the number of those who stand in need
of relief will steadily diminish through a conviction of an
absolute necessity for greater forethought, and more prudent

368 APPENDIX.

care of a man's earnings. Undoubtedly it would, but so also
would it, and in much greater degree, if the legislative pro-
visions were retained and parochial relief administered under
the care of the upper classes, as it ought to be. For it has been
invariably found, that wherever the funds have been raised and
applied under the superintendence of gentlemen and sub-
stantial proprietors, acting in vestries, and as overseers, pauper-
ism has diminished accordingly. Proper care in that quarter
would effectually check what is felt in some districts to be
one of the worst evils in the poor law system, viz. the
readiness of small and needy proprietors to join in imposing
rates that seemingly subject them to great hardships, while,
in fact, this is done with a mutual understanding, that the
relief each is ready to bestow upon his still poorer
neighbours will be granted to himself, or his relatives, should
it hereafter be applied for.

But let us look to inner sentiments of a nobler quality, 'in
order to know what we have to build upon. Affecting
proofs occur in every one's experience, who is acquainted
with the unfortunate and the indigent, of their unwillingness
to derive their subsistence from aught but their own funds
or labour, or to be indebted to parochial assistance for the
attainment of any object, however dear to them. A case
was reported, the other day, from a coroner's inquest, of a
pair who, through the space of four years, had carried about
their dead infant from house to house, and from lodging to
lodging, as their necessities drove them, rather than ask
the parish to bear the expense of its interment : — the poor
creatures lived in the hope of one day being able to bury
their child at their own cost. It must have been heart-
rending to see and hear the mother, who had been called
upon to account for the state in which the body was found,
make this deposition. By some, judging coldly, if not
harshly, this conduct might be imputed to an unwarrant-

APPENDIX. 369

able pride, as she and her husband had, it is true, been once
in prosperity. But examples where the spirit of independ-
ence works with equal strength, though not with like
miserable accompaniments, are frequently to be found even
yet among the humblest peasantry and mechanics. There
is not, then, sufficient cause for doubting that a like sense of
honour may be revived among the people, and their ancient
habits of independence restored, without resorting to those
severities which the new Poor Law Act has introduced.

But even if the surfaces of things only are to be examined,
we have a right to expect that lawgivers should take into
account the various tempers and dispositions of mankind ;
while some are led, by the existence of a legislative provision,
into idleness and extravagance, the economical virtues might
be cherished in others by the knowledge that, if all their
efforts fail, they have in the Poor Laws a ' refuge from the
storm and a shadow from the heat.' Despondency and dis-
traction are no friends to prudence : the springs of industry
will relax, if cheerfulness be destroyed by anxiety ; without
hope men become reckless and have a sullen pride in adding
to the heap of their own wretchedness. He who feels that
he is abandoned by his fellow-men will be almost irresistibly
driven to care little for himself ; will lose his self-respect
accordingly, and with that loss what remains to him of
virtue ?

With all due deference to the particular experience, and
general intelligence of the individuals who framed the Act,
and of those who in and out of parliament have approved of
and supported it ; it may be said, that it proceeds too much
upon the presumption that it is a labouring man's own fault
if he be not, as the phrase is, beforehand with the world.
But the most prudent are liable to be thrown back by sick-
ness, cutting them off from labour, and causing to them
expense : and who but has observed how distress creeps upon
IV. 2 A

370 APPENDIX.

multitudes without misconduct of their own; and merely
from a gradual fall in the price of labour, without a corre-
spondent one in the price of provisions ; so that men who
may have ventured upon the marriage state with a fair
prospect of maintaining their families in comfort and
happiness, see them reduced to a pittance which no effort of
theirs can increase ? Let it be remembered, also, that there
are thousands with whom vicious habits of expense are not
the cause why they do not store up their gains ; but they are
generous and kind-hearted, and ready to help their kindred
and friends ; moreover, they have a faith in Providence that
those who have been prompt to assist others, will not be
left destitute, should they themselves come to need. By
acting from these blended feelings, numbers have rendered
themselves incapable of standing up against a sudden reverse.
Nevertheless, these men, in common with all who have the
misfortune to be in want, if many theorists had their wish,
would be thrown upon one or other of those three sharp
points of condition before adverted to, from which the inter-
vention of law has hitherto saved them.

All that has been said tends to show how the principle
contended for makes the gift of life more valuable, and has,
it may be hoped, led to the conclusion that its legitimate
operation is to make men worthier of that gift : in other
words, not to degrade but to exalt human nature. But the
subject must not be dismissed without adverting to the
indirect influence of the same principle upon the moral
sentiments of a people among whom it is embodied in law.
In our criminal jurisprudence there is a maxim, deservedly
eulogised, that it is better that ten guilty persons should
escape, than that one innocent man should suffer ; so, also,
might it be maintained with regard to the Poor Laws, that
it is better for the interests of humanity among the people at
large, that ten undeserving should partake of the funds pro-

APPENDIX. 371

vided, than that one morally good man, through want of
relief, should either have his principles corrupted, or his
energies destroyed ; than that such a one should either be
driven to do wrong, or be cast to the earth in utter hope-
lessness. In France, the English maxim of criminal juris-
prudence is reversed; there, it is deemed better that ten
innocent men should suffer, than one guilty escape : in France,
there is no universal provision for the poor; and we may judge
of the small value set upon human life in the metropolis of
that country, by merely noticing the disrespect with which,
after death, the body is treated, not by the thoughtless
vulgar, but in schools of anatomy, presided over by men
allowed to be, in their own art and in physical science,
among the most enlightened in the world. In the East,
where countries are overrun with population as with a weed,
infinitely more respect is shown to the remains of the
deceased ; and what a bitter mockery is it, that this insensi-
bility should be found where civil polity is so busy in
minor regulations, and ostentatiously careful to gratify the
luxurious propensities, whether social or intellectual, of the
multitude ! Irreligion is, no doubt, much concerned with
this offensive disrespect, shown to the bodies of the d^ad in
France ; but it is mainly attributable to the state in which
so many of the living are left by the absence of compulsory
provision for the indigent so humanely established by the
law of England.

Sights of abject misery, perpetually recurring, harden the
heart of the community. In the perusal of history, and of
works of fiction, we are not, indeed, unwilling to have our
commiseration excited by such objects of distress as they
present to us ; but in the concerns of real life, men know
that such emotions are not given to be indulged for
their own sakes : there, the conscience declares to them that
sympathy must be followed by action ; and if there exist a

372 APPENDIX.

previous conviction that the power to relieve is utterly
inadequate to the demand, the eye shrinks from communica-
tion with wretchedness, and pity and compassion languish,
like any other qualities that are deprived of their natural
aliment. Let these considerations be duly weighed by those
who trust to the hope that an increase of private charity,
with all its advantages of superior discrimination, would more
than compensate for the abandonment of those principles,
the wisdom of which has been here insisted upon. How
discouraging, also, would be the sense of injustice, which
could not fail to arise in the minds of the well-disposed, if
the burden of supporting the poor, a burden of which the
selfish have hitherto by compulsion borne a share, should
now, or hereafter, be thrown exclusively upon the benevolent.

By having put an end to the Slave Trade and Slavery,
the British people are exalted in the scale of humanity ; and
they cannot but feel so, if they look into themselves, and
duly consider their relation to God and their fellow-creatures.
That was a noble advance ; but a retrograde movement will
assuredly be made, if ever the principle, which has been
here defended, should be either avowedly abandoned or but
ostensibly retained.

But after all, there may be a little reason to apprehend
permanent injury from any experiment that may be tried.
On the one side will be human nature rising up in her own
defence, and on the other prudential selfishness acting to the
same purpose, from a conviction that, without a compulsory
provision for the exigencies of the labouring multitude, that
degree of ability to regulate the price of labour, which is
indispensable for the reasonable interest of arts and manu-
factures, cannot, in Great Britain, be upheld.

II. In a poem of the foregoing collection, allusion is made
to the state of the workmen congregated in manufactories.

APPENDIX. 373

In order to relieve many of the evils to which that class of
society are subject and to establish a better harmony between
them and their employers, it would be well to repeal such
laws as prevent the formation of joint-stock companies.
There are, no doubt, many and great obstacles to the forma-
tion and salutary working of these societies, inherent in the
mind of those whom they would obviously benefit. But the
combinations of masters to keep down, unjustly, the price of
labour would be fairly checked by them, as far as they were
practicable ; they would encourage economy, inasmuch as
they would enable a man to draw profit from his savings,
by investing them in buildings or machinery for processes
of manufacture with which he was habitually connected.
His little capital would then be working for him while he
was at rest or asleep ; he would more clearly perceive the
necessity of capital for carrying on great works ; he would
better learn to respect the larger portions of it in the hands
of others ; he would be less tempted to join in unjust com-
binations ; and, for the sake of his own property, if not for
higher reasons, he would be slow to promote local disturb-
ance, or endanger public tranquillity ; he would, at least, be
loth to act in that way knowingly : for it is not to be
denied that such societies might be nurseries of opinions un-
favourable to a mixed constitution of government, like that of
Great Britain. The democratic and republican spirit which
they might be apt to foster would not, however, be dangerous
in itself, but only as it might act without being sufficiently
counterbalanced, either by landed proprietorship, or by a
Church extending itself so as to embrace an ever-growing
and ever-shifting population of mechanics and artisans. But
if the tendencies of such societies would be to make the
men prosper who might belong to them, rulers and legis-
lators should rejoice in the result, and do their duty to the
state by upholding and extending the influence of that

374 APPENDIX.

Church to which it owes, in so great a measure, its safety, its
prosperity, and its glory.

This, in the temper of the present times, may be difficult,
but it is become indispensable, since large towns in great
numbers have sprung up, and others have increased tenfold,
with little or no dependence upon the gentry and the
landed proprietors ; and apart from those mitigated feudal
institutions, which, till of late, have acted so powerfully
upon the composition of the House of Commons. Now it
may be affirmed that, in quarters where there is not an
attachment to the Church, or the landed aristocracy, and a
pride in supporting them, there the people will dislike both,
and be ready, upon such incitements as are perpetually
recurring, to join in attempts to overthrow them. There is
no neutral ground here : from want of due attention to
the state of society in large towns and manufacturing
districts, and ignorance or disregard of these obvious
truths, innumerable well-meaning persons became zealous
supporters of a Eeform Bill, the qualities and powers of
which, whether destructive or constructive, they would other-
wise have been afraid of ; and even the framers of that bill,
swayed as they might be by party resentments and personal
ambition, could not have gone so far, had not they too been
lamentably ignorant or neglectful of the same truths both of
fact and philosophy.

But let that pass ; and let no opponent of the bill be
tempted to compliment his own foresight, by exaggerating
the mischiefs and dangers that have sprung from it : let not
time be wasted in profitless regrets ; and let those party
distinctions vanish to their very names that have separated
men who, whatever course they may have pursued, have ever
had a bond of union in the wish to save the limited
monarchy, and those other institutions that have, under
Providence, rendered for so long a period of time this

APPENDIX. 375

country the happiest and worthiest of which there is any
record since the foundation of civil society.

III. A philosophic mind is best pleased when looking at
religion in its spiritual bearing; as a guide of conduct, a
solace under affliction, and a support amid the instabilities
of mortal life : but the Church having been forcibly brought
by political considerations to my notice, while treating of the
labouring classes, I cannot forbear saying a few words upon
that momentous topic.

There is a loud clamour for extensive change in that
department. The clamour would be entitled to more respect
if they who are the most eager to swell it with their voices
were not generally the most ignorant of the real state of the
Church, and the service it renders to the community. Reform
is the word employed. Let us pause and consider what
sense it is apt to carry 5 and how tilings are confounded by a
lax use of it. The great religious Reformation, in the six-
teenth century, did not profess to be a new construction, but
a restoration of something fallen into decay, or put out of
sight. That familiar and justifiable use of the word seems
to have paved the way for fallacies with respect to the term
reform, which it is difficult to escape from. Were we to
speak of improvement, and the correction of abuses, we
should run less risk of being deceived ourselves, or of mis-
leading others. We should be less likely to fall blindly
into the belief, that the change demanded is a renewal of
something that has existed before, and, that, therefore, we
have experience on our side ; nor should we be equally
tempted to beg the question, that the change for which we
are eager must be advantageous. From generation to
generation, men are the dupes of words ; and it is
painful to observe, that so many of our species are most
tenacious of those opinions which they have formed with the

376 APPENDIX.

least consideration. They who are the readiest to meddle
with public affairs, whether in church or state, fly to
generalities, that they may be eased from the trouble of
thinking about particulars ; and thus is deputed to mechanical
instrumentality the work which vital knowledge only can do
well.

" Abolish pluralities, have a resident incumbent in every
parish," is a favourite cry ; but, without adverting to other
obstacles in the way of this specious scheme, it may be
asked what benefit would accrue from its indiscriminate
adoption to counterbalance the harm it would introduce, by
nearly extinguishing the order of curates, unless the revenues
of the church should grow with the population, and be
greatly increased in many thinly peopled districts, especially
among the parishes of the North.

The order of curates is so beneficial, that some particular
notice of it seems to be required in this place. For a
church poor as, relatively to the numbers of people, that of
England is, and probably will continue to be, it is no small
advantage to have youthful servants, who will work upon
the wages of hope and expectation. Still more advantageous
is it to have, by means of this order, young men scattered'
over the country, who being more detached from the
temporal concerns of the benefice, have more leisure for
improvement and study, and are less subject to be brought
into secular collision with those who are under their spiritual
guardianship. The curate, if he reside at a distance from
the incumbent, undertakes the requisite responsibilities of a
temporal kind, in that modified way which prevents him, as
a new-comer, from being charged with selfishness : while it
prepares him for entering upon a benefice of his own, with
something of a suitable experience. If he should act under
and in co-operation with a resident incumbent, the gain is
mutual. His studies will probably be assisted ; and his

APPENDIX. 377

training, managed by a superior, will not be liable to relapse
in matters of prudence, seemliness, or in any of the highest
cares of his functions; and by way of return for these
benefits to the pupil, it will often happen that the zeal of a
middle-aged or declining incumbent will be revived, by being
in near communion with the ardour of youth, when his own
efforts may have languished through a melancholy conscious-
ness that they have not produced as much good among his
flock as, when he first entered upon the charge, he fondly
hoped.

Let one remark, and that not the least important, be
added. A curate, entering for the first time upon his office,
comes from college after a course of expense, and with such
inexperience in the use of money, that, in his new situation,
he is apt to fall unawares into pecuniary difficulties. If this
happens to him, much more likely is it to happen to the
youthful incumbent j whose relations to his parishioners and
to society, are more complicated; and, his income being
larger and independent of another, a costlier style of living
is required of him by public opinion. If embarrassment
should ensue, and with that unavoidably some loss of
respectability, his future usefulness will be proportionably
impaired : not so with the curate, for he can easily remove
and start afresh with a stock of experience and an un-
blemished reputation ; whereas the early indiscretions of an
incumbent being rarely forgotten, may be impediments to the
efficacy of his ministry for the remainder of his life. The
same observations would apply with equal force to doctrine.
A young minister is liable to errors, from his notions being
either too lax or overstrained. In both cases it would prove
injurious that the errors should be remembered, after study
and reflection, with advancing years, shall have brought him
to a clearer discernment of the truth, and better judgment in
the application of it.

378 APPENDIX.

It must be acknowledged that, among the regulations of
ecclesiastical polity, none at first view are more attractive
than that which prescribes for every parish a resident
incumbent. How agreeable to picture one's self, as has
been done by poets and romance-writers, from Chaucer down
to Goldsmith, a man devoted to his ministerial office, with
not a wish or a thought ranging beyond the circuit of its
cares ! Nor is it in poetry and fiction only that such
characters are found ; they are scattered, it is hoped not
sparingly, over real life, especially in sequestered and rural
districts, where there is but small influx of new inhabitants,
and little change of occupation. The spirit of the Gospel,
unaided by acquisitions of profane learning and experience
in the world, — that spirit, and the obligations of the sacred
office may, in such situations, suffice to effect most of what
is needful. But for the complex state of society that pre-
vails in England, much more is required, both in large towns
and in many extensive districts of the country. A minister
there should not only be irreproachable in manners and
morals, but accomplished in learning, as far as is possible
without sacrifice of the least of his pastoral duties. As
necessary, perhaps more so, is it that he should be a citizen
as well as a scholar ; thoroughly acquainted with the
structure of society, and the constitution of civil government,
and able to reason upon both with the most expert ; all
ultimately in order to support the truths of Christianity, and
to diffuse its blessings.

A young man coming fresh from the place of his educa-
tion, cannot have brought with him these accomplishments ;
and if the scheme of equalising church incomes, which
many advisers are much bent upon, be realised, so that there
should be little or no secular inducement for a clergyman to
desire a removal from the spot where he may chance to
have been first set down ; surely not only opportunities for

APPENDIX. 379

obtaining the requisite qualifications would be diminished,
but the motives for desiring to obtain them would be pro-
portionably weakened. And yet these qualifications are
indispensable for the diffusion of that knowledge, by which
alone the political philosophy of the New Testament can be
rightly expounded, and its precepts adequately enforced. In
these times, when the press is daily exercising so great a
power over the minds of the people, for wrong or for right
as may happen, that preacher ranks among the first of
benefactors who, without stooping to the direct treatment of
current politics and passing events, can furnish infallible
guidance through the delusions that surround them ; and
who, appealing to the sanctions of Scripture, may place the
grounds of its injunctions in so clear a light, that disaffection
shall cease to be cultivated as a laudable propensity, and
loyalty cleansed from the dishonour of a blind and prostrate
obedience.

It is not, however, in regard to civic duties alone, that
this knowledge in a minister of the Gospel is important ; it is
still more so for softening and subduing private and personal
discontents. In all places, and at all times, men have
gratuitously troubled themselves, because their survey of the
dispensations of Providence has been partial and narrow ;
but now that readers are so greatly multiplied, men judge
as they are taught, and repinings are engendered everywhere,
by imputations being cast upon the government : and are
prolonged or aggravated by being ascribed to misconduct or
injustice in rulers, when the individual himself only is in
fault. If a Christian pastor be competent to deal with these
humours, as they may be dealt with, and by no members
of society so successfully, both from more frequent and more
favourable opportunities of intercourse, and by aid of the
authority with which he speaks; he will be a teacher of
moderation, a dispenser of the wisdom that blunts approaching

380 APPENDIX.

distress by submission to God's will, and lightens, by
patience, grievances which cannot be removed.

We live in times when nothing, of public good at least, is
generally acceptable, but what we believe can be traced to
preconceived intention, and specific acts and formal contriv-
ances of human understanding. A Christian instructor
thoroughly accomplished would be a standing restraint upon
such presumptuousness of judgment, by impressing the
truth that —

In the unreasoning progress of the world

A wiser spirit is at work for us,

A better eye than ours. M.S.

Eevelation points to the purity and peace of a future
world ; but our sphere of duty is upon earth ; and the
relations of impure and conflicting things to each other
must be understood, or we shall be perpetually going wrong,
in all but goodness of intention ; and goodness of intention
will itself relax through frequent disappointment. How
desirable, then, is it, that a minister of the Gospel should be
versed in the knowledge of existing facts, and be accustomed
to a wide range of social experience ! Nor is it less desirable
for the purpose of counterbalancing and tempering in his own
mind that ambition with which spiritual power is as apt to be
tainted as any other species of power which men covet or
possess.

It must be obvious that the scope of the argument is to
discourage an attempt which would introduce into the
Church of England an equality of income, and station, upon
the model of that of Scotland. The sounder part of the
Scottish nation know what good their ancestors derived
from their church, and feel how deeply the living generation
is indebted to it. They respect and love it, as accommo-
dated in so great a measure to a comparatively poor country,
through the far greater portion of which prevails a
uniformity of employment ; but the acknowledged deficiency

APPENDIX. 381

of theological learning among the clergy of that church is
easily accounted for by this very equality. What else may
be wanting there, it would be unpleasant to inquire, and
might prove invidious to determine : one thing, however, is
clear, that in all countries the temporalities of the Church
Establishment should bear an analogy to the state of society,
otherwise it cannot diffuse its influence through the whole
community. In a country so rich and luxurious as England,
the character of its clergy must unavoidably sink, and their
influence be everywhere impaired, if individuals from the
upper ranks, and men of leading talents, are to have no
inducements to enter into that body but such as are purely
spiritual. And this ' tinge of secularity ' is no reproach to
the clergy, nor does it imply a deficiency of spiritual endow-
ments. Parents and guardians, looking forward to sources of
honourable maintenance for their children and wards, often
direct their thoughts early towards the church, being deter-
mined partly by outward circumstances, and partly by
indications of seriousness, or intellectual fitness. It is
natural that a boy or youth, with such a prospect before
him, should turn his attention to those studies, and be led
into those habits of reflection, which will in some degree tend
to prepare him for the duties he is hereafter to undertake.
As he draws nearer to the time when he will be called to
these duties, he is both led and compelled to examine the
Scriptures. He becomes more and more sensible of their
truth. Devotion grows in him ; and what might begin in
temporal considerations, will end (as in a majority of
instances we trust it does) in a spiritual-rniiidedness not
unworthy of that Gospel, the lessons of which he is to
teach, and the faith of which he is to inculcate. Not
inappositely may be here repeated an observation which,
from its obviousness and importance, must have been
frequently made, viz. that the impoverishing of the clergy,

382 APPENDIX.

and bringing their incomes much nearer to a level, wonld not
cause them to become less worldly-minded : the emoluments,
howsoever reduced, would be as eagerly sought for, but by
men from lower classes in society ; men who, by their
manners, habits, abilities, and the scanty measure of their
attainments, would unavoidably be less fitted for their
station, and less competent to discharge its duties.

Visionary notions have in all ages been afloat upon the
subject of best providing for the clergy ; notions which have
been sincerely entertained by good men, with a view to the
improvement of that order, and eagerly caught at and dwelt
upon, by the designing, for its degradation and disparage-
ment. Some are beguiled by what they call the voluntary
system,, not seeing (what stares one in the very face at the
very threshold) that they who stand in most need of
religious instruction are unconscious of the want, and there-
fore cannot reasonably be expected to make any sacrifices in
order to supply it. Will the licentious, the sensual, and the
depraved, take from the means of their gratifications and
pursuits, to support a discipline that cannot advance without
uprooting the trees that bear the fruit which they devour so
greedily ? Will they pay the price of that seed whose
harvest is to be reaped in an invisible world ? A voluntary
system for the religious exigencies of a people numerous
and circumstanced as we are ! Not more absurd would it
be to expect that a knot of boys should draw upon the
pittance of their pocket money to build schools, or out of the
abundance of their discretion be able to select fit masters to
teach and keep them in order ! Some, who clearly perceive
the incompetence and folly of such a scheme for the agri-
cultural part of the people, nevertheless think it feasible in
large towns, where the rich might subscribe for the religious
instruction of the poor. Alas ! they know little of the thick
darkless that spreads over the streets and alleys of our large

APPENDIX. 383

towns. The parish of Lambeth, a few years since, contained
not more than one church, and three or four small proprie-
tary chapels, while dissenting chapels of every denomination
were still more scantily found there ; yet the inhabitants of
the parish amounted at that time to upwards of 50,000.
Were the parish church and the chapels of the Establish-
ment existing there, an impediment to the spread of the
Gospel among that mass of people ? Who shall dare to say
so ? But if any one, in the face of the fact which has just
been stated, and in opposition to authentic reports to the
same effect from various other quarters, should still contend,
that a voluntary system is sufficient for the spread and
maintenance of religion, we would ask, what kind of religion ?
wherein would it differ, among the many, from deplorable
fanaticism ?

For the preservation of the Church Establishment, all
men whether they belong to it or not, could they perceive
their true interest, would be strenuous ; but how inadequate
are its provisions for the needs of the country ! and how
much is it to be regretted that, while its zealous friends
yield to alarms on account of the hostility of dissent, they
should so much overrate the danger to be apprehended from
that quarter, and almost overlook the fact that hundreds
of thousands of our fellow-countrymen, though formally
and nominally of the Church of England, never enter her
places of worship, neither have they communication with her
ministers ! This deplorable state of things was partly pro-
duced by a decay of zeal among the rich and influential, and
partly by a want of due expansive power in the constitution
of the Establishment as regulated by law. Private bene-
factors, in their efforts to build and endow churches, have
been frustrated, or too much impeded by legal obstacles:
these, where they are unreasonable or unfitted for the times,
ought to be removed ; and, keeping clear of intolerance and

384 APPENDIX.

injustice, means should be used to render the presence and
powers of the church commensurate with the wants of a
shifting and still increasing population.

This cannot be effected, unless the English Government
vindicate the truth, that, as her church exists for the benefit
of all (though not in equal degree), whether of her com-
munion or not, all should be made to contribute to its
support. If this ground be abandoned, cause will be given
to fear that a moral wound may be inflicted upon the heart
of the English people, for which a remedy cannot be
speedily provided by the utmost efforts which the members
of the Church will themselves be able to make.

But let the friends of the church be of good courage.
Powers are at work, by which, under Divine Providence, she
may be strengthened and the sphere of her usefulness
extended ; not by alterations in her Liturgy, accommodated to
this or that demand of finical taste, nor by cutting off this
or that from her articles or Canons, to which the scrupulous
or the overweening may object. Covert schism, and open
nonconformity, would survive after alterations, however
promising in the eyes of those whose subtilty had been
exercised in making them. Latitudinarianism is the parheliou
of liberty of conscience, and will ever successfully lay claim to
a divided worship. Among Presbyterians, Socinians, Bap-
tists, and Independents, there will always be found numbers
who will tire of their several creeds, and some will corne over
to the Church. Conventicles may disappear, congregations
in each denomination may fall into decay or be broken up,
but the conquests which the National Church ought chiefly
to aim at, lie among the thousands and tens of thousands of the
unhappy outcasts who grow up with no religion at all. The
wants of these cannot but be feelingly remembered. What-
ever may be the disposition of the new constituencies under
the reformed parliament, and the course which the men of
their choice may he inclined or compelled to follow, it may

APPENDIX. 385

be confidently hoped that individuals acting in their private
capacities, will endeavour to make up for the deficiencies of
the legislature. It is too much to expect that proprietors of
large estates, where the inhabitants are without religious
instruction, or where it is sparingly supplied, will deem it
their duty to take part in this good work ; and that thriving
manufacturers and merchants will, in their several neighbour-
hoods, be sensible of the like obligation, and act upon it with
generous rivalry ?

Moreover, the force of public opinion is rapidly increasing,
and some may bend to it, who are not so happy as to be
swayed by a higher motive ; especially they who derive large
incomes from lay impropriations, in tracts of country where
ministers are few and meagrely provided for. A claim still
stronger may be acknowledged by those who, round their
superb habitations, or elsewhere, walk over vast estates which
were lavished upon their ancestors by royal favouritism or
purchased at insignificant prices after church-spoliation ; such
proprietors, though not conscious-stricken (there is no call for
that) may be prompted to make a return for which their
tenantry and dependents will learn to bless their names.
An impulse has been given ; an accession of means from
these several sources, co-operating with a weW-considered
change in the distribution of some parts of the property at
present possessed by the church, a change scrupulously
founded upon due respect to law and justice, will, we trust,
bring about so much of what her friends desire, that the rest
may be calmly waited for, with thankfulness for what shall
have been obtained.

Let it not be thought unbecoming in a layman, to have
treated at length a subject with which the clergy are more
intimately conversant. All may, without impropriety, speak
of what deeply concerns all ; nor need an apology be offered
for going over ground which has been trod before so ably and
IV. 2 B

386 APPENDIX.

so often: without pretending, however, to any thing of novelty,
either in matter or manner, something may have been offered
to view, which will save the writer from the imputation of
having little to recommend his labour, but goodness of
intention.

It was with reference to thoughts and feelings expressed
in verse, that I entered upon the above notices, and with
verse I will conclude. The passage is extracted from my
MSS. written above thirty years ago : it turns upon the
individual dignity which humbleness of social condition does
not preclude, but frequently promotes. It has no direct
bearing upon clubs for the discussion of public affairs, nor
upon political or trade-unions ; but if a single workman —
who, being a member of one of those clubs, runs the risk of
becoming an agitator, or who, being enrolled in a union,
must be left without a will of his own, and therefore a slave
— should read these lines, and be touched by them, I should
indeed rejoice, and little would I care for losing credit as a
poet with intemperate critics, who think differently from me
upon political philosophy or public measures, if the sober-
minded admit that, in general views, my affections have been
moved, and my imagination exercised, under and for the
guidance of reason.

' Here might I pause, and bend in reverence
To Nature, and the power of human minds ;
To men as they are men within themselves.
How oft high service is performed within,
When all the external man is rude in show •
Not like a temple rich with pomp and gold,
But a mere mountain chapel that protects
Its simple worshippers from sun and shower !
Of these, said I, shall be my song ; of these,
If future years mature me for the task,
Will I record the praises, making verse
Deal boldly with substantial things — in truth
And sanctity of passion, speak of these,
That justice may be done, obeisance paid

. APPENDIX. 387

"Where it is due. Thus haply shall I teach,

Inspire, through unadulterated ears

Pour rapture, tenderness, and hope ; my theme

No other than the very heart of man,

As found among the best of those who live,

Not unexalted by religious faith,

Nor uninformed by books, good books, though few,

In Nature's presence : thence may I select

Sorrow that is not sorrow, but delight,

And miserable love that is not pain

To hear of, for the glory that redounds

Therefrom to human kind, and what we are.

Be mine to follow with no timid step

Where knowledge leads me ; it shall be my pride

That I have dared to tread this holy ground,

Speaking no dream, but things oracular,

Matter not lightly to be heard by those

Who to the letter of the outward promise

Do read the invisible soul ; by men adroit

In speech, and for communion with the world

Accomplished, minds whose faculties are then

Most active when they are most eloquent,

And elevated most when most admired.

Men may be found of other mould than these ,

Who are their own upholders, to themselves

Encouragement and energy, and will ;

Expressing liveliest thoughts in lively words

As native passion dictates. Others, too,

There are, among the walks of homely life,

Still higher, men for contemplation framed ;

Shy, and unpractised in the strife of phrase ;

Meek men, whose very souls perhaps would sink

Beneath them, summoned to such intercourse.

Theirs is the language of the heavens, the power,

The thought, the image, and the silent joy :

Words are but under-agents in their souls ;

When they are grasping with their greatest strength

They do not breathe among them ; this I speak

In gratitude to God, who feeds our hearts

For his own service, knoweth, loveth us,

When we are unregarded by the world.

TCRNBUI.L AND SI-EAUS, 1'EISTERS, EI>IKDCl«iII.