board perished. It is clear that the latter part of the poem, "When, to the attractions of the busy world," was written between John Wordsworth's departure from Grasmere and the loss of the Abergavenny, i.e. between September 1800 and February 1805, as there are references in it both to what his brother did at Grasmere and to his return to sea Back to the joyless Ocean thou art gone. There are some things in the earlier part of the poem that appear to negative the idea of its having been written in 1800. The opening lines seem to hint at an experience somewhat distant. He speaks of being "wont to do certain things. But, on the other hand, I find an entry in Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal, which leads me to believe that the poem may have been begun in 1800, and that the first part, ending (as it did then) with the line While she is travelling through the dreary sea, may have been finished before John Wordsworth left Grasmere ; the second part being written afterwards, while he was at sea; and that this is the explanation of the date given in the editions of 1815 and 1820, viz. 1802. Passages occur in Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal to the following effect :-- 'Monday Morning, 1st September.-We walked in the wood by the lake. William read Joanna and 'the Firgrove' to Coleridge.' A little earlier there is the record, "Saturday, 22nd August.-William was composing all the morning. William read us the poem of Joanna beside the Rothay by the roadside." Then, on Friday, the 28th August, there is the entry, "We walked over the hill by the Firgrove, I sate upon a rock and observed a flight of swallows gathering together high above my head. We walked through the wood to the stepping stones, the lake of Rydale very beautiful, partly still. I left William to compose an inscription, that about the path. Then, next day, "Saturday morning, 30th August. William finished his inscription of the Pathway, then walked in the wood, and when John returned he sought him, and they bathed together." To what poem Dorothy Wordsworth referred under the name of the 66 'Inscription of the Pathway "has puzzled me much. There is no poem amongst his "Inscriptions" (written in or before August 1800) that corresponds to it in the least. But, if my conjecture is right that this "Poem on the Naming of Places," beginning When, to the attractions of the busy world, was composed at two different times, it is quite possible that "the Firgrove " which was read along with Joanna-to Coleridge on September 1st, 1800, was the first part of this very poem. If this supposition is correct, some light is cast both on the "Inscription of the Pathway," and on the date assigned by Wordsworth himself to the poem. There is a certain fitness, however, in this poem being placed-as it now is in sequence to the Elegiac Verses in memory of John Wordsworth, beginning, "The Sheep-boy whistled loud," and near the fourth poem To the Daisy, beginning, "Sweet Flower! belike one day to have." 66 a The "Fir-grove" still exists. It is between Wishing Gate and White Moss Common, and almost exactly opposite the former. Standing at the gate and looking eastwards, the grove is to the left, not forty yards distant. Some of the firs (Scotch ones) still survive, and several beech trees, not single beech-tree," as in the poem. From this, one might infer that the present colony had sprung up since the beginning of the century, and that the special tree, in which was the thrush's nest, had perished; but Dr. Cradock wrote to me that "Wordsworth pointed out the tree to Miss Cookson a few days before Dora Wordsworth's death. The tree is near the upper wall and tells its own tale." The Fir-grove-"John's Grove -can easily be entered by a gate about a hundred yards beyond the Wishing-gate, as one goes toward Rydal. The view from it, the "visionary scene,' Of clouded splendour, Of solemn loveliness, the spectacle is now much interfered with by the new larch plantations immediately below the firs. It must have been very different in Wordsworth's time, and is constantly referred to in his sister's Journal as a favourite retreat, resorted to when cloudless suns Shone hot, or wind blew troublesome and strong. In the absence of contrary testimony, it might be supposed that "the track" which the brother had " worn," By pacing here, unwearied and alone, faced Silver-How and the Grasmere Island, and that the single Had been so thickly planted, and had thriven Dr. Cradock remarks, 66 As to there being more than one beech, Wordsworth would not have hesitated to sacrifice servile exactness to poetical effect." He had a fancy for " one Fair as a star when only one Is shining in the sky; "One abode, no more;" Grasmere's " one green "one green field." Since the above note was printed, new light has been cast on the "Inscription of the Pathway," for which see volume viii. of this edition. -ED. THE COTTAGER TO HER INFANT BY MY SISTER Composed 1805.-Published 1815 [Suggested to her, while beside my sleeping children.—I. F.] One of the Poems founded on the Affections."-ED. THE days are cold, the nights are long, Then hush again upon my breast; All merry things are now at rest, The kitten sleeps upon the hearth, The crickets long have ceased their mirth; 5 Save one wee, hungry, nibbling mouse, Nay! start not at that sparkling light; And wake when it is day. This poem underwent no change in successive editions. The title in all the earlier ones (1815 to 1843) was The Cottager to her Infant. By a Female Friend; and in the preface to the edition of 1815, Wordsworth wrote, "Three short pieces (now first published) are the work of a Female Friend; . . . if any one regard them with dislike, or be disposed to condemn them, let the 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." In the edition of 1845, he disclosed the authorship; and gave the more natural title, By my Sister. Other two poems by her were introduced into the edition of 1815, and subsequent ones, viz. the Address to a Child, and The Mother's Return. In an appendix to a MS. copy of the Recollections of a Tour made in Scotland, by Dorothy Wordsworth, transcribed by Mrs. Clarkson, I find the poem The Cottager to her Infant with two additional stanzas, which are there attributed to Wordsworth. The appendix runs thus "To my Niece Dorothy, a sleepless Baby THE COTTAGER TO HER INFANT (The third and fourth stanzas which follow by W. W.) · Ah! if I were a lady gay I should not grieve with thee to play; Right gladly would I lie awake Thy lively spirits to partake, And ask no better cheer. But, Babe! there's none to work for me, And I must rise to industry; Soon as the cock begins to crow To tend the sheep and kine." ED. The impatient Merchant, wondering, waits in vain, THOMSON.† TO CHARLES LAMB, ESQ. MY DEAR FRIEND, When I sent you, a few weeks ago, the Tale of Peter Bell, you asked "why THE WAGGONER was not added?"-To say the truth,-from the higher tone of imagination, and the deeper touches of passion aimed at in the former, I apprehended, this little Piece could not accompany it without disadvantage. In the year 1806, if I am not mistaken, THE WAGGONER was read to you in manuscript; and, as you have remembered it for so long a time, I am the more encouraged to hope, that, since the localities on which it partly depends did not prevent its being interesting to you, it may prove acceptable to others. Being therefore in some measure the cause of its present appearance, you must allow me the gratification of inscribing it to you; in acknowledgment of the pleasure I have derived from your Writings, and of the high esteem with which I am Very truly yours, WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. RYDAL MOUNT, May 20th, 1819. CANTO FIRST 'TIS spent this burning day of June! Soft darkness o'er its latest gleams is stealing; The buzzing dor-hawk, round and round, is wheeling, * The title page of the edition of 1819 runs as follows: The Waggoner, A Poem. To which are added, Sonnets. By William Wordsworth. "What's in a NAME?" Brutus will start a Spirit as soon as Cæsar!" London, etc. etc., 1819.-ED. + See The Seasons (Summer), ll. 977-79.-ED. |