The Prose Works of William Wordsworth Part 64

At the close of each strathspey, or jig, a particular note from the fiddle summons the Rustic to the agreeable duty of saluting his partner.

127. _Ghimmer-Crag _(c. iii. l. 21).

The crag of the ewe-lamb.

VI. POEMS OF THE IMAGINATION.

128. *_There was a Boy_. [I.]

Written in Germany, 1799. This is an extract from the Poem on my own poetical education. This practice of making an instrument of their own fingers is known to most boys, though some are more skilful at it than others. William Rainc.o.c.k of Rayrigg, a fine spirited lad, took the lead of all my schoolfellows in this art.

129. *_To the Cuckoo_. [II.] Composed in the Orchard at Town-End, 1804.

130. *_A Night-piece_. [III.]

Composed on the road between Nether Stowey and Alfoxden, extempore. I distinctly remember the very moment when I was struck, as described, 'He looks up at the clouds,' &c.

131. *_Yew-trees_. [V.]

Grasmere, 1803. These Yew-trees are still standing, but the spread of that at Lorton is much diminished by mutilation. I will here mention that a little way up the hill on the road leading from Rossthwaite to Stonethwaite lay the trunk of a yew-tree which appeared as you approached, so vast was its diameter, like the entrance of a cave, and not a small one. Calculating upon what I have observed of the slow growth of this tree in rocky situations, and of its durability, I have often thought that the one I am describing must have been as old as the Christian era. The tree lay in the line of a fence. Great ma.s.ses of its ruins were strewn about, and some had been rolled down the hill-side and lay near the road at the bottom. As you approached the tree you were struck with the number of shrubs and young plants, ashes, &c. which had found a bed upon the decayed trunk and grew to no inconsiderable height, forming, as it were, a part of the hedgerow. In no part of England, or of Europe, have I ever seen a yew-tree at all approaching this in magnitude, as it must have stood. By the bye, Hutton, the Old Guide of Keswick, had been so imprest with the remains of this tree that he used gravely to tell strangers that there could be no doubt of its having been in existence before the Flood.

132. *_Nutting_. [VI.]

Written in Germany: intended as part of a poem on my own life, but struck out as not being wanted there. Like most of my schoolfellows I was an impa.s.sioned Nutter. For this pleasure the Vale of Esthwaite, abounding in coppice wood, furnished a very wide range. These verses arose out of the remembrance of feelings I had often had when a boy, and particularly in the extensive woods that still stretch from the side of Esthwaite Lake towards Graythwaite, the seat of the ancient family of Sandys.

133. *_She was a Phantom of Delight_. [VIII.]

1804. Town-End. The germ of this Poem was four lines composed as a part of the verses on the Highland Girl. Though beginning in this way, it was written from my heart, as is sufficiently obvious.

134. *_The Nightingale_. [IX.]

Town-End, 1806. [So, but corrected in pencil 'Written at Coleorton.']

135. *_Three Years she grew, &c._ [X.]

1799. Composed in the Hartz Forest. [In pencil on opposite page--Who?]

136. _I wandered lonely as a Cloud_. [XII.] [= 'The Daffodils.']

Town-End, 1804. 'The Daffodils.' The two best lines in it are by Mary.

The daffodils grew and still grow on the margin of Ulswater, and probably may be seen to this day as beautiful in the month of March nodding their golden heads beside the dancing and foaming waves. [In pencil on opposite page--Mrs. Wordsworth--but which? See the answer to this, _infra_.]

137. _The Daffodils_. [xii.]

Grasmere, Nov. 4.

MT DEAR WRANGHAM,

I am indeed much pleased that Mrs. Wrangham and yourself have been gratified by these breathings of simple nature; the more so, because I conclude from the character of the Poems which you have particularised that the Volumes cannot but improve upon you. I see that you have entered into the spirit of them. You mention 'The Daffodils.' You know Butler, Montagu's friend: not Tom Butler, but the Conveyancer: when I was in town in spring, he happened to see the Volumes lying on Montagu's mantle-piece, and to glance his eye upon the very poem of 'The Daffodils.' 'Aye,' says he, 'a fine morsel this for the Reviewers.' When this was told me (for I was not present), I observed that there were _two lines_ in that little poem which, if thoroughly felt, would annihilate nine-tenths of the reviews of the kingdom, as they would find no readers; the lines I alluded to were these:

'They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude.'

[These two lines were composed by Mrs. Wordsworth: _Memoirs_, i. 183-4.]

138. *_The Reverie of poor Susan_. [XIII.]

Written 1801 or 1802. This arose out of my observations of the affecting music of these birds, hanging in this way in the London streets during the freshness and stillness of the Spring morning.

139. *_Power of Music_. [XIV.]

Taken from life, 1806.

140. *_Star-gazers_. [XV.] Observed by me in Leicester Square, as here described, 1806.

141. *_Written in March_. [XVI.]

Extempore, 1801. This little poem was a favourite with Joanna Baillie.

142. *_Beggars_. [XVIII.]

Town-End, 1802. Met and described by me to my sister near the Quarry at the head of Rydal Lake--a place still a chosen resort of vagrants travelling with their families.

143. *_Gipsies_. [XX.]

Composed at Coleorton, 1807. I had observed them, as here described, near Castle Donnington on my way to and from Derby.

144. *_Ruth_.

Written in Germany, 1799. Suggested by an account I had of a wanderer in Somersetshire.