PREFATORY NOTE. WHILE reserving for the last volume my acknowledgments in detail to those who have assisted me in various ways, I take this opportunity of expressing my special thanks to Mrs Wordsworth, and to Mr Gordon Wordsworth (the Stepping Stones, Ambleside), for the access they have generously given me to the MSS. of the Poet's works, some results of which may, I trust, be seen in Volumes VI. and VII. I have also specially to thank Mr J. R. Tutin, of Hull, for his assistance. Mr Tutin has compared the proof with the text of the successive editions; and, owing to his careful revision, I have been able to make both corrections and - additions to that part of the work in Volumes III., IV., and V. What I owe to the suggestions and researches of Mr Henry Reed, Philadelphia, will be seen in the Notes to The Excursion; but I am indebted to him for much besides, which can only be adequately acknowledged in the Life of the Poet in Volume VIII. W. K. CHRISTMAS, 1883. [Something must now be said of this poem, but chiefly, as has been done through the whole of these notes, with reference to my personal friends, and especially to her who has perseveringly taken them down from my dictation. Towards the close of the first book, stand the lines that were first written,-beginning "Nine tedious years," and ending “Last human tenant of these ruined walls." These were composed in 1795, at Racedown; and for several passages describing the employment and demeanour of Margaret during her affliction, I was indebted to observations made in Dorsetshire, and afterwards at Alfoxden, in Somersetshire, where I resided in 1797 and 1798. The lines towards the conclusion of the fourth book, Despondency corrected, -beginning "For the man who in this spirit," to the words "intellectual soul,"—were in order of time composed the next, either at Racedown or Alfoxden, I do not remember which. The rest of the poem was written in the vale of Grasmere, chiefly during our residence at Allan Bank. The long poem on my own education was, together with many minor poems, composed while we lived at the cottage at Town-End. Perhaps my purpose of giving an additional interest to these my poems, in the eyes of my nearest and dearest friends, may be promoted by saying a few words upon the character of the Wanderer, the Solitary, and the Pastor, and some other of the persons introduced. And first of the principal one, the Wanderer. My lamented friend Southey (for this is written a month after his decease*) used to say that had he been a Papist, the course of life which would in all probability have been his, was the one for which he was most fitted and most to his mind, that of a Benedictine monk, in a convent, furnished, as many once were, and some still are, with an inexhaustible library. Books, as appears from many passages in his writings, and was evident to those who had opportunities of observing his daily life, were in fact his passion; and wandering, I can with truth affirm, was mine; but this propensity in me was happily counteracted by inability from want of fortune to fulfil my wishes. But had I been born in a class which would have deprived me of * Southey died on the 21st of March, 1843.-ED. |