The Prose Works of William Wordsworth Part 66

162. _Fair is the Swan, &c._ [x.x.xIII.] (See _supra_, 161.)

163. *_The Pa.s.s of Kirkstone_.

Rydal Mount, 1817. Thoughts and feelings of many walks in all weathers by day and night over this Pa.s.s alone, and with beloved friends.

164. *_To_ ----. [x.x.xV.]

Rydal Mount, 1816. The lady was Miss Blackett, then residing with Mr.

Montague Burgoyne, at Fox-Ghyll. We were tempted to remain too long upon the mountain, and I imprudently, with the hope of shortening the way, led her among the crags and down a steep slope, which entangled us in difficulties, that were met by her with much spirit and courage.

165. *_To a Young Lady_. [x.x.xVI.]

Composed at the same time, and on the same vein, as 'I met Louisa in the Shade.' Indeed they were designed to make one piece. [See No. 52.]

166. *_Water-fowl_. [x.x.xVII.]

Observed frequently over the lakes of Rydal and Grasmere.

167. *_View from the Top of Black Comb_. [x.x.xVIII.]

1813. Mary and I, as mentioned in the Epistle to Sir G. Beaumont, lived some time under its shadow.

168. *_The Haunted Tree_. [x.x.xIX.]

1819. This tree grew in the park of Rydal, and I have often listened to its creaking as described.

169. *_The Triad_. [XL.]

'Rydal Mount, 1828. The girls Edith Mary Southey, my daughter Dora, and Sarah Coleridge.' More fully on this and others contemporaneously written, is the following letter:

To G.H. GORDON, ESQ.

Rydal Mount, Dec. 15, 1828.

How strange that any one should be puzzled with the name 'Triad' _after_ reading the poem! I have turned to Dr. Johnson, and there find '_Triad, three united_,' and not a word more, as nothing more was needed. I should have been rather mortified if _you_ had not liked the piece, as I think it contains some of the happiest verses I ever wrote. It had been promised several years to two of the party before a fancy fit for the performance struck me; it was then thrown off rapidly, and afterwards revised with care. During the last week I wrote some stanzas on the _Power of Sound_, which ought to find a place in my larger work if aught should ever come of that.

In the book on the Lakes, which I have not at hand, is a pa.s.sage rather too vaguely expressed, where I content myself with saying, that after a certain point of elevation the effect of mountains depends much more upon their form than upon their absolute height. This point, which ought to have been defined, is the one to which fleecy clouds (not thin watery vapours) are accustomed to descend. I am glad you are so much interested with this little tract; it could not have been written without long experience.

I remain, most faithfully, Your much obliged, WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

170. _The Wishing-gate_. [XLI.]

In the Vale of Grasmere, by the side of the old highway leading to Ambleside, is a gate which, time out of mind, has been called the 'Wishing-gate,' from a belief that wishes formed or indulged there have a favourable issue.

171. _The Wishing-gate destroyed_.

Having been told, upon what I thought good authority, that this gate had been destroyed, and the opening, where it hung, walled up, I gave vent immediately to my feelings in these stanzas. But going to the place some time after, I found, with much delight, my old favourite unmolested.

[*Rydal Mount, 1828.]

172. *_The Primrose of the Rock_. [XLIII.]

Rydal Mount, 1821. It stands on the right hand, a little way leading up the vale from Grasmere to Rydal. We have been in the habit of calling it the glow-worm rock, from the number of glow-worms we have often seen hanging on it as described. The tuft of primrose has, I fear, been washed away by heavy rains.

173. *_Presentiments_. [XLIV.]

Rydal Mount, 1830.

174. *_Vernal Ode_. [XLV.]

Rydal Mount, 1817. Composed to place in view the immortality of succession where immortality is denied, so far as we know, to the individual creature.

175. *_Devotional Incitements_. [XLVI.]

Rydal Mount, 1832.

176. *_The Cuckoo-Clock_. [XLVII.]

Of this clock I have nothing further to say than what the poem expresses, except that it must be here recorded that it was a present from the dear friend for whose sake these notes were chiefly undertaken, and who has written them from my dictation.

177. *_To the Clouds_. [XLVIII.]

These verses were suggested while I was walking on the foot-road between Rydal Mount and Grasmere. The clouds were driving over the top of Nab-Scar across the vale; they set my thoughts agoing, and the rest followed almost immediately.

178. *_Suggested by a Picture of the Bird of Paradise_. [XLIX.]

This subject has been treated of before (see a former note). I will here only, by way of comment, direct attention to the fact, that pictures of animals and other productions of Nature, as seen in conservatories, menageries and museums, &c., would do little for the national mind, nay, they would be rather injurious to it, if the imagination were excluded by the presence of the object, more or less out of the state of Nature.

If it were not that we learn to talk and think of the lion and the eagle, the palm-tree, and even the cedar, from the impa.s.sioned introduction of them so frequently in Holy Scripture, and by great poets, and divines who write as poets, the spiritual part of our nature, and therefore the higher part of it, would derive no benefit from such intercourse with such subjects.

179. *_A Jewish Family_. [L.]

Coleridge and my daughter and I in 1828 pa.s.sed a fortnight upon the banks of the Rhine, princ.i.p.ally under the hospitable roof of Mr. Aders at Gotesburg, but two days of the time were spent at St. Goa or in rambles among the neighbouring vallies. It was at St. Goa that I saw the Jewish family here described. Though exceedingly poor, and in rags, they were not less beautiful than I have endeavoured to make them appear. We had taken a little dinner with us in a basket, and invited them to partake of it, which the mother refused to do both for herself and her children, saying it was with them a fast-day; adding diffidently, that whether such observances were right or wrong, _she_ felt it her duty to keep them strictly. The Jews, who are numerous in this part of the Rhine, greatly surpa.s.s the German peasantry in the beauty of their features and in the intelligence of their countenances. But the lower cla.s.ses of the German peasantry have, here at least, the air of people grievously opprest. Nursing mothers at the age of seven or eight and twenty often look haggard and far more decayed and withered than women of c.u.mberland and Westmoreland twice their age. This comes from being under-fed and over-worked in their vineyards in a hot and glaring sun.

[In pencil on opposite page--The three went from my house in Bryanston-street, London--E.Q.]