book ii

. stanza 18--

A veil obscured the sunshine of her eyes, The rose within herself her sweetness closed.--ED.

[684] This "votive Tablet" may still be seen, with its "green ivy," "fringing the lettered stone." Compare the Sonnet _To the Author's Portrait_, p. 318.--ED.

[685] 1827.

Shall ... 1835.

"CHATSWORTH! THY STATELY MANSION, AND THE PRIDE"

Composed 1830.--Published 1835.

[I have reason to remember the day that gave rise to this Sonnet, the 6th of November, 1830. Having undertaken, a great feat for me, to ride my daughter's pony from Westmoreland to Cambridge, that she might have the use of it while on a visit to her uncle at Trinity Lodge, on my way from Bakewell to Matlock I turned aside to Chatsworth, and had scarcely gratified my curiosity by the sight of that celebrated place before there came on a severe storm of wind and rain which continued till I reached Derby, both man and pony in a pitiable plight. For myself, I went to bed at noon-day. In the course of that journey I had to encounter a storm worse if possible, in which the pony could (or would) only make his way slantwise.

I mention this merely to add that notwithstanding this battering I composed, on horseback, the lines to the memory of Sir George Beaumont, suggested during my recent visit to Coleorton.--I.F.]

One of the "Miscellaneous Sonnets."--ED.

Chatsworth! thy stately mansion, and the pride Of thy domain, strange contrast do present To house and home in many a craggy rent Of the wild Peak; where new-born waters glide Through fields whose thrifty occupants abide 5 As in a dear and chosen banishment, With every semblance of entire content; So kind is simple Nature, fairly tried! Yet He whose heart in childhood gave her troth To pastoral dales, thin-set with modest farms, 10 May learn, if judgment strengthen with his growth, That, not for Fancy only, pomp hath charms; And, strenuous to protect from lawless harms The extremes of favoured life, may honour both.

1831

The Poems of 1831 included _The Primrose of the Rock_, a few Sonnets, and _Yarrow Revisited, and other Poems, composed during a tour in Scotland, and on the English Border, in the Autumn of 1831_.--ED.

THE PRIMROSE OF THE ROCK

Composed 1831.--Published 1835

[Written at Rydal Mount. The Rock stands on the right hand a little way leading up the middle road from Rydal to Grasmere. 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 the heavy rains.--I.F.]

One of the "Poems of the Imagination."--ED.

A rock there is whose homely front[686] The passing traveller slights; Yet there the glow-worms hang their lamps, Like stars, at various heights; And one coy Primrose to that Rock 5 The vernal breeze invites.

What hideous warfare hath been waged, What kingdoms overthrown, Since first I spied that Primrose-tuft And marked it for my own;[687] 10 A lasting link in Nature's chain From highest heaven let down!

The flowers, still faithful to the stems, Their fellowship renew; The stems are faithful to the root, 15 That worketh out of view; And to the rock the root adheres In every fibre true.

Close clings to earth the living rock, Though threatening still to fall; 20 The earth is constant to her sphere; And God upholds them all: So blooms this lonely Plant, nor dreads Her annual funeral.

* * * * *

Here closed the meditative strain; 25 But air breathed soft that day, The hoary mountain-heights were cheered, The sunny vale looked gay; And to the Primrose of the Rock I gave this after-lay. 30

I sang--Let myriads of bright flowers, Like Thee, in field and grove Revive unenvied;--mightier far, Than tremblings that reprove Our vernal tendencies to hope, 35 Is[688] God's redeeming love;

That love which changed--for wan disease, For sorrow that had bent O'er hopeless dust, for withered age-- Their moral element, 40 And turned the thistles of a curse To types beneficent.

Sin-blighted though we are, we too, The reasoning Sons of Men, From one oblivious winter called 45 Shall rise, and breathe again; And in eternal summer lose Our threescore years and ten.

To humbleness of heart descends This prescience from on high, 50 The faith that elevates the just, Before and when they die; And makes each soul a separate heaven, A court for Deity.

FOOTNOTES:

[686] 1835.

... lonely front 1836. The edition of 1841 returns to the text of 1835.

[687] In Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal the following occurs:--April 24, 1802.--"We walked in the evening to Rydal. Coleridge and I lingered behind. We all stood to look at Glow-worm Rock--a primrose that grew there, and just looked out on the road from its own sheltered bower."

The Primrose had disappeared when the Fenwick note was dictated, and Glow-worms have now almost deserted the district; but the _Rock_ is unmistakable, and it is one of the most interesting spots connected with Wordsworth in the Lake District.--ED.

[688] 1836.

In ... 1835.

TO B. R. HAYDON, ON SEEING HIS PICTURE OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE ON THE ISLAND OF ST. HELENA

Composed 1831.--Published 1832

[This Sonnet, though said to be written on seeing the Portrait of Napoleon, was, in fact, composed some time after, extempore, in the wood at Rydal Mount.--I.F.]

Haydon! let worthier judges praise the skill Here by thy pencil shown in truth of lines And charm of colours; _I_ applaud those signs Of thought, that give the true poetic thrill; That unencumbered whole of blank and still, 5 Sky without cloud--ocean without a wave; And the one Man that laboured to enslave The World, sole-standing high on the bare hill-- Back turned, arms folded, the unapparent face Tinged, we may fancy, in this dreary place 10 With light reflected from the invisible sun Set, like his fortunes; but not set for aye Like them. The unguilty Power pursues his way, And before _him_ doth dawn perpetual run.[689]

FOOTNOTES:

[689] Haydon, as he tells us in his Autobiography, received a commission from Sir Robert Peel, in December 1830, "to paint Napoleon musing, the size of life." He finished it in June 1831, and thus described it himself:--

"Napoleon was peculiarly alive to poetical association as produced by scenery or sound; village bells with their echoing ding, dong, dang, now bursting full on the ear, now dying in the wind, affected him as they affect everybody alive to natural impressions, and on the eve of all his great battles you find him stealing away in the dead of the night, between the two hosts, and indulging in every species of poetical reverie. It was impossible to think of such a genius in captivity, without mysterious associations of the sky, the sea, the rock, and the solitude with which he was enveloped. I never imagined him but as if musing at dawn, or melancholy at sunset, listening at midnight to the beating and roaring of the Atlantic, or meditating as the stars gazed and the moon shone on him; in short Napoleon never appeared to me but at those seasons of silence and twilight, when nature seems to sympathise with the fallen, and when if there be moments in this turbulent earth fit for celestial intercourse, one must imagine these would be the times immortal spirits might select to descend within the sphere of mortality, to soothe and comfort, to inspire and support the afflicted.

"Under such impressions the present picture was produced.... I imagined him standing on the brow of an impending cliff, and musing on his past fortunes, ... sea-birds screaming at his feet, ... the sun just down, ... the sails of his guard-ship glittering on the horizon, and the Atlantic, calm, silent, awfully deep, and endlessly extensive."--_Life of Benjamin Robert Haydon_, vol. ii. pp. 301, 302.

This picture, one of the noblest which Haydon painted, is still at Drayton Manor.--ED.

YARROW REVISITED, AND OTHER POEMS

COMPOSED (TWO EXCEPTED) DURING A TOUR IN SCOTLAND, AND ON THE ENGLISH BORDER, IN THE AUTUMN OF 1831.

Composed 1831.--Published 1835

[In the autumn of 1831, my daughter and I set off from Rydal to visit Sir Walter Scott before his departure for Italy. This journey had been delayed by an inflammation in my eyes till we found that the time appointed for his leaving home would be too near for him to receive us without considerable inconvenience. Nevertheless we proceeded and reached Abbotsford on Monday. I was then scarcely able to lift up my eyes to the light. How sadly changed did I find him from the man I had seen so healthy, gay, and hopeful, a few years before, when he said at the inn at Paterdale, in my presence, his daughter Anne also being there, with Mr. Lockhart, my own wife and daughter, and Mr. Quillinan,--"I mean to live till I am _eighty_, and I shall write as long as I live." But to return to Abbotsford: the inmates and guests we found there were Sir Walter, Major Scott, Anne Scott, and Mr. and Mrs. Lockhart, Mr. Liddell, his Lady and Brother, and Mr. Allan the painter, and Mr. Laidlaw, a very old friend of Sir Walter's. One of Burns's sons, an officer in the Indian service, had left the house a day or two before, and had kindly expressed his regret that he could not wait my arrival, a regret that I may truly say was mutual. In the evening, Mr. and Mrs. Liddell sang, and Mrs. Lockhart chanted old ballads to her harp; and Mr. Allan, hanging over the back of a chair, told and acted old stories in a humorous way. With this exhibition and his daughter's singing, Sir Walter was much amused, as indeed were we all as far as circumstances would allow. But what is most worthy of mention is the admirable demeanour of Major Scott during the following evening when the Liddells were gone and only ourselves and Mr. Allan were present. He had much to suffer from the sight of his father's infirmities and from the great change that was about to take place at the residence he had built, and where he had long lived in so much prosperity and happiness. But what struck me most was the patient kindness with which he supported himself under the many fretful expressions that his sister Anne addressed to him or uttered in his hearing. She, poor thing, as mistress of that house, had been subject, after her mother's death, to a heavier load of care and responsibility and greater sacrifices of time than one of such a constitution of body and mind was able to bear. Of this, Dora and I were made so sensible, that, as soon as we had crossed the Tweed on our departure, we gave vent at the same moment to our apprehensions that her brain would fail and she would go out of her mind, or that she would sink under the trials she had passed and those which awaited her. On Tuesday morning Sir Walter Scott accompanied us and most of the party to Newark Castle on the Yarrow. When we alighted from the carriages he walked pretty stoutly, and had great pleasure in revisiting those his favourite haunts. Of that excursion the verses _Yarrow Revisited_ are a memorial. Notwithstanding the romance that pervades Sir Walter's works and attaches to many of his habits, there is too much pressure of fact for these verses to harmonise as much as I could wish with other poems. On our return in the afternoon we had to cross the Tweed directly opposite Abbotsford. The wheels of our carriage grated upon the pebbles in the bed of the stream that there flows somewhat rapidly: a rich but sad light of rather a purple than a golden hue was spread over the Eildon Hills at that moment; and, thinking it probable that it might be the last time Sir Walter would cross the stream, I was not a little moved, and expressed some of my feelings in the Sonnet beginning--"A trouble, not of clouds, or weeping rain." At noon on Thursday we left Abbotsford, and in the morning of that day Sir Walter and I had a serious conversation _tête-à-tête_, when he spoke with gratitude of the happy life which upon the whole he had led. He had written in my daughter's Album, before he came into the breakfast-room that morning, a few stanzas addressed to her, and, while putting the book into her hand, in his own study, standing by his desk, he said to her in my presence--"I should not have done anything of this kind but for your father's sake: they are probably the last verses I shall ever write." They show how much his mind was impaired, not by the strain of thought but by the execution, some of the lines being imperfect, and one stanza wanting corresponding rhymes: one letter, the initial S, had been omitted in the spelling of his own name. In this interview also it was that, upon my expressing a hope of his health being benefited by the climate of the country to which he was going, and by the interest he would take in the classic remembrances of Italy, he made use of the quotation from _Yarrow Unvisited_ as recorded by me in the _Musings of Aquapendente_ six years afterwards. Mr. Lockhart has mentioned in his life of him what I heard from several quarters while abroad, both at Rome and elsewhere, that little seemed to interest him but what he could collect or hear of the fugitive Stuarts and their adherents who had followed them into exile. Both the _Yarrow Revisited_ and the "Sonnet" were sent him before his departure from England. Some further particulars of the conversations which occurred during this visit I should have set down had they not been already accurately recorded by Mr. Lockhart. I first became acquainted with this great and amiable man--Sir Walter Scott--in the year 1803, when my sister and I, making a tour in Scotland, were hospitably received by him in Lasswade upon the banks of the Esk, where he was then living. We saw a good deal of him in the course of the following week; the particulars are given in my sister's Journal of that tour.--I.F.]

TO

SAMUEL ROGERS, Esq.

AS A TESTIMONY OF FRIENDSHIP, AND ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF INTELLECTUAL OBLIGATIONS, THESE MEMORIALS ARE AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED.

RYDAL MOUNT, _Dec._ 11, 1834.

I

"THE GALLANT YOUTH, WHO MAY HAVE GAINED"

[The following Stanzas are a memorial of a day passed with Sir Walter Scott, and other Friends visiting the Banks of the Yarrow under his guidance, immediately before his departure from Abbotsford, for Naples.

The title _Yarrow Revisited_ will stand in no need of explanation, for Readers acquainted with the Author's previous poems, suggested by that celebrated Stream.--I.F.]

The gallant Youth, who may have gained, Or seeks, a "winsome Marrow," Was but an Infant in the lap When first I looked on Yarrow; Once more, by Newark's Castle-gate 5 Long left without a warder, I stood, looked, listened, and with Thee, Great Minstrel of the Border![690]

Grave thoughts ruled wide on that sweet day, Their dignity installing 10 In gentle bosoms, while sere leaves Were on the bough, or falling; But breezes played, and sunshine gleamed-- The forest to embolden; Reddened the fiery hues, and shot 15 Transparence through the golden.

For busy thoughts the Stream flowed on In foamy agitation; And slept in many a crystal pool For quiet contemplation:[691] 20 No public and no private care The freeborn mind enthralling, We made a day of happy hours, Our happy days recalling.

Brisk Youth appeared, the Morn of youth, 25 With freaks of graceful folly,-- Life's temperate Noon, her sober Eve, Her Night not melancholy; Past, present, future, all appeared In harmony united, 30 Like guests that meet, and some from far, By cordial love invited.

And if, as Yarrow, through the woods And down the meadow ranging, Did meet us with unaltered face, 35 Though we were changed and changing; If, _then_, some natural shadows spread Our inward prospect over, The soul's deep valley was not slow Its brightness to recover. 40

Eternal blessings on the Muse, And her divine employment! The blameless Muse, who trains her Sons For hope and calm enjoyment; Albeit sickness, lingering yet, 45 Has o'er their pillow brooded; And Care waylays[692] their steps--a Sprite Not easily eluded.

For thee, O SCOTT! compelled to change Green Eildon-hill and Cheviot 50 For warm Vesuvio's vine-clad slopes; And leave thy Tweed and Tiviot For mild Sorento's breezy waves; May classic Fancy, linking With native Fancy her fresh aid, 55 Preserve thy heart from sinking!

O! while they minister to thee, Each vying with the other, May Health return to mellow Age, With Strength, her venturous brother; 60 And Tiber, and each brook and rill Renowned in song and story, With unimagined beauty shine, Nor lose one ray of glory!

For Thou, upon a hundred streams, 65 By tales of love and sorrow, Of faithful love, undaunted truth, Hast shed the power of Yarrow; And streams unknown, hills yet unseen, Wherever they[693] invite Thee, 70 At parent Nature's grateful call, With gladness must requite Thee.

A gracious welcome shall be thine, Such looks of love and honour As thy own Yarrow gave to me 75 When first I gazed upon her; Beheld what I had feared to see, Unwilling to surrender Dreams treasured up from early days, The holy and the tender. 80

And what, for this frail world, were all That mortals do or suffer, Did no responsive harp, no pen, Memorial tribute offer? Yea, what were mighty Nature's self? 85 Her features, could they win us, Unhelped by the poetic voice That hourly speaks within us?

Nor deem that localised Romance Plays false with our affections; 90 Unsanctifies our tears--made sport For fanciful dejections: Ah, no! the visions of the past Sustain the heart in feeling Life as she is--our changeful Life, 95 With friends and kindred dealing.

Bear witness, Ye, whose thoughts that day In Yarrow's groves were centred; Who through the silent portal arch Of mouldering Newark enter'd; 100 And clomb the winding stair that once Too timidly was mounted By the "last Minstrel," (not the last!) Ere he his Tale recounted.

Flow on for ever, Yarrow Stream! 105 Fulfil thy pensive duty, Well pleased that future Bards should chant For simple hearts thy beauty; To dream-light dear while yet unseen, Dear to the common sunshine, 110 And dearer still, as now I feel, To memory's shadowy moonshine!

FOOTNOTES:

[690] Wordsworth arrived at Abbotsford with his daughter to say farewell to Scott on the 21st September 1831. "On the 22nd," says Mr. Lockhart, "these two great poets, who had through life loved each other well, and in spite of very different theories as to art, appreciated each other's genius more justly than infirm spirits ever did either of them, spent the morning together in a visit to Newark. Hence the last of the three poems by which Wordsworth has connected his name to all time with the most romantic of Scottish streams."--_Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott_, vol. x. ch. lxxx. p. 104.

Compare the note to _Musings near Aquapendente_, in the Poems of the Italian Tour of 1837.--ED.

[691] Compare Tennyson's _Brook_, and Burns's _Epistle to William Simpson, Ochiltree_, stanza 15.--ED.

[692] 1837.

... waylay ... 1835.

[693] 1837.

Where'er thy path ... 1835.

II

ON THE DEPARTURE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT FROM ABBOTSFORD, FOR NAPLES

A trouble, not of clouds, or weeping rain, Nor of the setting sun's pathetic light Engendered, hangs o'er Eildon's triple height: Spirits of Power, assembled there, complain For kindred Power departing from their sight; 5 While Tweed, best pleased in chanting a blithe strain, Saddens his voice again, and yet again. Lift up your hearts, ye Mourners! for the might Of the whole world's good wishes with him goes; Blessings and prayers in nobler retinue 10 Than sceptred king or laurelled conqueror knows, Follow this wondrous Potentate. Be true, Ye winds of ocean, and the midland sea, Wafting your Charge to soft Parthenope!

With the closing lines of this sonnet addressed to the "winds of ocean," and Sir Walter's departure for Naples, compare Horace's ode to the Ship carrying Virgil to Athens (_Odes_, I. 3).

On the 19th October 1833, Henry Crabb Robinson wrote thus to his friend Masquerier--"It is, I think, the most perfect sonnet in the language. Every word is a gem, from the 'pathetic light' in the second to the 'soft Parthenope' in the last line. It is composed with that deep feeling and perfection of style united that bespeak the master." (_Diary, Reminiscences, etc._, vol. iii. p. 32.)

The sonnet was sent to Alaric Watts for his _Souvenir_ in 1832. Wordsworth wrote, "I enclose a sonnet for your next volume if you choose to insert it. It would have appeared with more advantage in this year's, but was not written in time. It is proper that I should mention it has been sent to Sir Walter Scott, and one or two of my other friends." (See _Alaric Watts, a Narrative of his Life_, vol. ii. p. 190.)--ED.

III

A PLACE OF BURIAL IN THE SOUTH OF SCOTLAND

[Similar places for burial are not unfrequent in Scotland. The one that suggested this sonnet lies on the banks of a small stream called the Wauchope that flows into the Esk near Langholme. Mickle, who, as it appears from his poem on Sir Martin, was not without genuine poetic feelings, was born and passed his boyhood in this neighbourhood, under his father who was a minister of the Scotch Kirk. The Esk, both above and below Langholme, flows through a beautiful country, and the two streams of the Wauchope and the Ewes, which join it near that place, are such as a pastoral poet would delight in.--I.F.]

Part fenced by man, part by a rugged steep That curbs a foaming brook, a Grave-yard lies; The hare's best couching-place for fearless sleep; Which moonlit elves, far seen by credulous eyes, Enter in dance. Of church, or sabbath ties, 5 No vestige now remains; yet thither creep Bereft Ones, and in lowly anguish weep Their prayers out to the wind and naked skies. Proud tomb is none; but rudely-sculptured knights, By humble choice of plain old times, are seen 10 Level with earth, among the hillocks green: Union not sad, when sunny daybreak smites The spangled turf, and neighbouring thickets ring With _jubilate_ from the choirs of spring!

IV

ON THE SIGHT OF A MANSE IN THE SOUTH OF SCOTLAND

[The Manses in Scotland and the gardens and grounds about them have seldom that attractive appearance which is common about our English parsonages, even when the clergyman's income falls below the average of the Scotch minister's. This is not merely owing to the one country being poor in comparison with the other, but arises rather out of the equality of their benefices, so that no one has enough to spare for decorations that might serve as an example for others; whereas, with us, the taste of the richer incumbent extends its influence more or less to the poorest. After all, in these observations the surface only of the matter is touched. I once heard a conversation in which the Roman Catholic Religion was decried on account of its abuses. "You cannot deny, however," said a lady of the party, repeating an expression used by Charles II., "that it is the religion of a gentleman." It may be left to the Scotch themselves to determine how far this observation applies to their Kirk, while it cannot be denied, if it is wanting in that characteristic quality, the aspect of common life, so far as concerns its beauty, must suffer. Sincere christian piety may be thought not to stand in need of refinement or studied ornament; but assuredly it is ever ready to adopt them, when they fall within its notice, as means allow; and this observation applies not only to manners, but to everything a christian (truly so in spirit) cultivates and gathers round him, however humble his social condition.--I.F.]

Say, ye far-travelled clouds, far-seeing hills-- Among the happiest-looking homes of men Scatter'd all Britain over, through deep glen, On airy upland, and by forest rills, And o'er wide plains cheered by the lark that trills 5 His sky-born warblings[694]--does aught meet your ken More fit to animate the Poet's pen, Aught that more surely by its aspect fills Pure minds with sinless envy, than the Abode Of the good Priest: who, faithful through all hours 10 To his high charge, and truly serving God, Has yet a heart and hand for trees and flowers, Enjoys the walks his predecessors trod, Nor covets lineal rights in lands and towers.

FOOTNOTES:

[694] 1845.

And o'er wide plains whereon the sky distils Her lark's loved warblings; ... 1835.

V

COMPOSED IN ROSLIN CHAPEL, DURING A STORM

[We were detained by incessant rain and storm at the small inn near Roslin Chapel, and I passed a great part of the day pacing to and fro in this beautiful structure, which, though not used for public service, is not allowed to go to ruin. Here, this sonnet was composed. If it has at all done justice to the feeling which the place and the storm raging without inspired, I was as a prisoner. A painter delineating the interior of the chapel and its minute features under such circumstances would have, no doubt, found his time agreeably shortened. But the movements of the mind must be more free while dealing with words than with lines and colours; such at least was then and has been on many other occasions my belief, and, as it is allotted to few to follow both arts with success, I am grateful to my own calling for this and a thousand other recommendations which are denied to that of the painter.--I. F.]

The wind is now thy organist;--a clank (We know not whence) ministers for a bell To mark some change of service. As the swell Of music reached its height, and even when sank The notes, in prelude, ROSLIN! to a blank 5 Of silence, how it thrilled thy sumptuous roof, Pillars, and arches,--not in vain time-proof, Though Christian rites be wanting! From what bank Came those live herbs? by what hand were they sown Where dew falls not, where rain-drops seem unknown? 10 Yet in the Temple they a friendly niche Share with their sculptured fellows, that, green-grown, Copy their beauty more and more, and preach, Though mute, of all things blending into one.[695]

FOOTNOTES:

[695] "I cannot agree with you in admiring the cathedral of Melrose more than the chapel at Roslin. As far as it goes, as a whole, the chapel at Roslin appeared to me to be _perfection_, most beautiful in form, and of entire simplicity." (Dorothy Wordsworth to Mrs. Marshall, Sept. 1807.)--ED.

VI

THE TROSACHS

[As recorded in my sister's Journal, I had first seen the Trosachs in her and Coleridge's company. The sentiment that runs through this Sonnet was natural to the season in which I again saw this beautiful spot; but this and some other Sonnets that follow were coloured by the remembrance of my recent visit to Sir Walter Scott, and the melancholy errand on which he was going.--I. F.]

There's not a nook within this solemn Pass, But were an apt confessional for One Taught by his summer spent, his autumn gone, That Life is but a tale of morning grass Withered at eve.[696] From scenes of art which chase[697] That thought away, turn, and with watchful eyes 6 Feed it 'mid Nature's old felicities, Rocks, rivers, and smooth lakes more clear than glass Untouched, unbreathed upon. Thrice happy quest,[698] If from a golden perch of aspen spray 10 (October's workmanship to rival May) The pensive warbler of the ruddy breast That[699] moral sweeten by a heaven-taught lay, Lulling the year, with all its cares, to rest!

FOOTNOTES:

[696] Compare _The Excursion_,