at Greta Hall after Coleridge had begun to reside there, and he knew Coleridge before he met with Wordsworth. He was one of the first to appreciate the genius of these two men; and knowing that they had lived near each other in Somersetshire, when they wrote the Lyrical Ballads in concert and were desirous to resume the easy and familiar intercourse of former days-he purchased a small property at Applethwaite, about three miles to the west of Greta Hall, on the southern flank of Skiddaw, and presented it to Wordsworth, whom he had not as yet seen. Sir George wrote thus to Wordsworth on the 24th October 1803: "I had a most ardent desire to bring you and Coleridge together. I thought with pleasure on the increase of enjoyment you would receive from the beauties of Nature, by being able to communicate more frequently your sensations to each other; and that this would be a means of contributing to the pleasure and improvement of the world, by stimulating you both to poetical exertions." This wish, however, was not to be realised. Several concurrent causes led Coleridge to leave Cumberland; while Wordsworth, as we have seen, lived on at Dove Cottage, Grasmere. It was thus that he described the Applethwaite property to Miss Fenwick : "This little property lies beautifully upon the banks of a rill that gurgles down the side of Skiddaw; and the orchard and other parts of the grounds command a magnificent prospect of Derwent Water, the mountains of Borrowdale, and Newlands." It was formally conveyed to Wordsworth in 1803 or 1804, and it is still in the possession of the family. Dora Wordsworth pencilled on the MS. of one of the Fenwick notes that her father had made it over to her when she was a "frail, feeble monthling." The Beaumont family visited Grasmere at intervals from 1803 to 1806, and Wordsworth hoped they might be his permanent neighbours during the summer or autumn months. Sir George had been specially struck with the beauty of Loughrigg Tarn-so often likened to Lake Nemi in Italy, the Speculum Diana-and he purchased the property, intending to build a summer cottage upon it. In his Epistle to Sir George Beaumont from the South-West Coast of Cumberland, written in 1811, Wordsworth refers to this once contemplated cottage, and in imagination sees it completed. A glimpse I caught of that abode, by thee Of neighbourhood, and intermingling arts, The house, however, was not built. The tarn was resold. and the money obtained from it-given by Beaumont to Wordsworth-was spent by him in the purchase of yew trees, which he planted in Grasmere churchyard. There they still grow, and one of them now overshadows the poet's grave. Sir George Beaumont had been occupying the farm house adjoining Coleorton Hall for some time, while the family mansion was being rebuilt and extended; but, during the winter of 1806-7 and the spring and summer following, he lived either in his town house in London, or at Dunmow in Essex, and (as already mentioned) he handed over the Coleorton farm house to the Wordsworths. Thither they all migrated from Grasmere, Sarah Hutchinson accompanying them, in the end of October 1806. It was a good sample of a Leicestershire farm-house, and still stands, as do Racedown, Alfoxden, Dove Cottage, the Parsonage, and Rydal Mount-the Wordsworths' successive residences very much as it was when they lived in it. Whatever the cause, that winter of 1806-7 was not so productive poetically as the earlier years at Grasmere had been, but some poems were composed, and others advanced several stages. The Song at the Feast of Brougham Castle was murmured out on the path between the farm-house and the Hall, where also the sonnet beginning Two voices are there; one is of the sea, One of the mountains, was composed. Other sonnets, as well as the poem entitled Gipsies, and the lines to the nightingale beginning O Nightingale ! thou surely art A creature of a fiery heart, were thought out in the glades, or amid the shadowy recesses of the garden. But it is with Wordsworth's Inscriptions for the grounds at Coleorton that the place is chiefly associated. Two of these were written during his residence, in 1808; the other two at Grasmere in 1811. Only three of them, however, were actually cut on stone, and set up in the grounds. The one commencing The embowering rose, the acacia, and the pine was placed near a magnificent cedar-tree, which was unfortunately blown down in a gale in 1854. Though replanted, it fell a second time, during the great storm of 1880, and perished. The memorial stone remains, somewhat injured, and the inscription is more than half obliterated. The second inscription, written in 1808, "at the request of Sir George Beaumont, and in his name, for an Urn, placed by him at the termination of a newly-planted avenue," began thus: Ye Lime-trees, ranged before this hallowed Urn, Till they have learned to frame a darksome aisle ; Where Reynolds, 'mid our country's noblest dead, These "lime-trees," planted eighty years ago, now form "a stately growth of pillars," "a darksome aisle," as described in the lines; and the " urn " remains where it was placed in 1807, at the end of the avenue. The last of the inscriptions set up at Coleorton was written by Wordsworth in 1811, during a morning walk with his sister from Brathay to Grasmere, and sent by her to Lady Beaumont. It was cut in stone at the end of a terrace walk, at right angles to the avenue of lime-trees, overlooking the garden, where it is still to be seen, lichencovered and weather-worn. Perhaps the most interesting poem, however, connected with Coleorton is the sonnet which Wordsworth addressed to Lady Beaumont in 1807, and which he published that year. It requires no comment. Lady! the songs of spring were in the grove I gave this paradise for winter hours, A labyrinth, lady! which your feet shall rove. In 1815 Wordsworth inscribed the first collected edition of his Poems to Sir George, with the following Epistle Dedicatory: "MY DEAR SIR GEORGE,-Accept my thanks for the permission given me to dedicate these Poems to you. In addition to a lively pleasure derived from general considerations, I feel a particular satisfaction; for, by inscribing them 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 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 neighbourhood; and, we may be assured, did not wander with indifference 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—who have composed so many admirable Pictures from the suggestions of the same scenery. 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 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, RYDAL MOUNT, WESTMORELAND, February 1, 1815." WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. |