Chapter 5

“This spot of orchard ground is ours;My trees they are, my sister’s flowers.”

In the first book of the “Recluse,” still unpublished, he thus expresses his feelings in settling in this house at Grasmere, and in looking down from the hills which embosom the lake.

“On Nature’s invitation do I come,By reason sanctioned. Can the choice mislead,That made the calmest, fairest spot on earth,With all its unappropriated good,My own, and not mine only, for with meEntrenched—say rather peacefully embowered—Under yon orchard, in yon humble cot,A younger orphan of a home extinctThe only daughter of my parents, dwells;Aye, think on that, my heart, and cease to stir;Pause upon that, and let the breathing frameNo longer breathe, but all be satisfied.O, if such silence be not thanks to GodFor what hath been bestowed, then where, where then,Shall gratitude find rest? Mine eyes did ne’erFix on a lovely object, nor my mindTake pleasure in the midst of happy thoughts,But either she, whom now I have, who nowDivides with me that loved abode was there,Or not far off. Where’er my footsteps turned,Her voice was like a hidden bird that sung;The thought of her was like a flash of lightOr an unseen companionship, a breathOr fragrance independent of the wind.In all my goings, in the new and oldOf all my meditations, and in thisFavourite of all, in this the most of all....Embrace me then, ye hills, and close me in.Now in the clear and open day I feelYour guardianship; I take it to my heart;’Tis like the solemn shelter of the night,But I would call thee beautiful; for mild,And soft, and gay, and beautiful thou art,Dear valley, having in thy face a smile,Though peaceful, full of gladness. Thou art pleased,Pleased with thy crags, and woody steeps, thy lakeIts one green island, and its winding shores,The multitude of little rocky hills,Thy church, and cottages of mountain stoneClustered like stars, some few, but single most,And lurking dimly in their shy retreats,Or glancing at each other cheerful looks,Like separated stars with clouds between.”

All this is a burst of quiet, yet beautiful, and almost ecstatic, enthusiasm—the like of which is not to be met with elsewhere, I think, in poetry. Surely, Wordsworth was worthy of hissweet cottage, and sweeter and dearer sister, and his glorious lake, with its one green island,—his mountains, and woods, and dales,—his church, and the cottages, “clustered like stars,” around it; for he had the great heart, and large brain, which Nature makes the condition for all those who would share her communion. And, then, his tastes were so simple, natural, and unaffected; he lived so close to Nature, and knew so many of her secrets, and loved her too, with the passion of a first and only love. Yes, surely, he was worthy of all he enjoyed.

During the three years which elapsed, between the poet’s entering upon the cottage at Grasmere, and his marriage, he was very industriously, and even laboriously, employed in cultivating his art; for he had resolved that poetry should be the business and not the pastime of his life. We find Coleridge urging him to continue the “Recluse,”—by which he meant, as Dr. Wordsworth informs us, the “Prelude;”—in the summer of 1799, and again in October of the same year, he says he will hear of nothing else but the “Recluse;” for in the mood he was in at that time, he was wholly against the publication of any small poems. He desiredthat his friend should build, what my friend J. H. Stirling calls an “Opus;” but Wordsworth, though still at work upon the foundations of hisopus, cannot rest without making little oratories—holy cells—in the pauses of his labour. Hence a new volume of poems was soon ready for publication; and as the 12mo. edition of the “Lyrical Ballads,” was by this time exhausted, Wordsworth determined to reprint them, and add this new volume to the work, calling the two conjointly “Lyrical Ballads, in two Volumes.” The pieces now presented to the public, included some of his finest lyrical effusions. Amongst others, “Lucy Gray,” “Nutting,” “The Brothers,” “Ruth,” “Poor Susan,” “The Waterfall, and the Eglantine.” This new edition was published, in 1800, by Messrs. Longmans, who offered the poet £100 for two editions of the two volumes.

In 1801, Wordsworth presented a copy of the “Lyrical Ballads” to the Right Hon. C. J. Fox, accompanied by a characteristic letter; in reply to which, Mr. Fox expresses his high admiration of many of the poems, particularly of “Harry Gill,” “We are Seven,” “The Mad Mother,” and “The Idiot Boy.” Mr. Fox,however, takes exception to blank verse, as a vehicle for subjects which are to be treated with simplicity.

Other poems of deep interest succeeded these new lyrics; and I will name “The Leech Gatherer,” and the “Ode to Immortality,” because these poems have always been great favourites with me; and, further, because I wish to add here the notes which the poet has furnished respecting them. And first of all “The Leech Gatherer:”—speaking of this poem to his friends he says,—

“I will explain to you in prose, my feelings in writing that poem. I describe myself as having been exalted to the highest pitch of delight by the joyousness and beauty of Nature; and then as depressed, even in the midst of these beautiful objects, to the lowest dejection and despair. A young poet in the midst of the happiness of Nature is described as overwhelmed by the thoughts of the miserable reverses which have befallen the happiest of all men—viz., poets. I think of this till I am so deeply impressed with it, that I consider the manner in which I was rescued from my dejection and despair almost as an interposition ofProvidence. A person reading the poem with feelings like mine, will have been awed and controlled, expecting something spiritual or supernatural. What is brought forward? A lonely place, ‘a pond by which an old manwas, far from all house and home;’ notstood, norsat, butwas. The figure presented in the most naked simplicity possible. This feeling of spirituality or supernaturalness is again referred to as being strong in my mind in this passage. How came he here? thought I, or what can he be doing? I then describe him, whether ill or well is not for me to judge with perfect confidence; but this Icanconfidently affirm, that though I believe God has given me a strong imagination, I cannot conceive a figure more impressive than that of anoldman like this, the survivor of a wife and children, travelling alone among the mountains, and all lonely places, carrying with him his own fortitude in the necessities which an unjust state of society has laid upon him. You speak of his speech as tedious. Everything is tedious when one does not read with the feelings of the author. The ‘Thorn’ is tedious to hundreds; and so is the ‘Idiot Boy.’ It isin the character of the old man to tell his story, which an impatient reader must feel tedious. But, good heavens! should he ever meet such a figure in such a place; a pious, self-respecting, miserably infirm old man telling such a tale!”

Having thus shown the feelings of the poet in writing “The Thorn,” I will quote, secondly and lastly, the note to the celebrated “Ode.” “This,” he says, “was composed during my residence at Town End, Grasmere. Two years at least passed between the writing of the first four stanzas and the remaining part. To the attentive and competent reader the whole sufficiently explains itself; but there may be no harm in adverting here to particular feelings orexperiencesof my own mind on which the structure of the poem partly rests. Nothing was more difficult for me in childhood than to admit the notion of death as a state applicable to my own being. I have said elsewhere—

“A simple childThat lightly draws its breath,And feels its life in every limb,What should it know of death?”

But it was not so much from the source of animal vivacity that my difficulties came, as from a source of the indomitableness of the spirit within me. I used to brood over the stories of Enoch and Elijah, and almost to persuade myself that, whatever might become of others, I should be translated in something of the same way to heaven. With a feeling congenial to this, I was often unable to think of external things as having externally existence, and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from, but inherent in my own immaterial nature. Many times, when going to school, have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from this abyss of idealism to the reality. At that time I was afraid of such processes. In later periods of life I have deplored, as we have all reason to do, a subjugation of an opposite character, and have rejoiced over the remembrances, as is expressed in the lines “Obstinate Questionings,” &c. To that dream-like vividness of splendour which invests objects of sight in childhood, every one, I believe, if he would look back, could bear testimony, and I need not dwell upon it here; but having in the poem regarded it as presumptive evidence of a prior state of existence, I think it right to protest against such a conclusion which has given pain to some good and pious persons, that I meant to inculcate such a belief. It is far too shadowy a notion to be recommended to faith as more than an element in our instincts of immortality. But let us bear in mind that, though the idea is not advanced in revelation, there is nothing there to contradict it, and the fall of man presents an analogy in its favour. Accordingly, a pre-existent state has entered into the popular creeds of many nations, and among all persons acquainted with classic literature is known as an ingredient in Platonic philosophy. Archimedes said that he could move the world if he had a point whereon to rest his machine. Who has not felt the same aspirations as regards the world of his own mind? Having to wield some of its elements when I was impelled to write this poem on the ‘Immortality of the Soul,’ I took hold of the notion of pre-existence, as having sufficient foundation in humanity for authorising me to make for my purpose the best use of it I could as a poet.”

Now, in this note, and in the “Ode” whichit illustrates, will be found the key to all Wordsworth’s philosophy, and to the secret of his mind as a poet. The mystic spiritualism which imbues all his writings, is the great distinguishing feature which marks and separates him from merely didactic and descriptive poets; and, were this element wanting in him, we should have a fine reporter of Nature’s doings—a fine painter of objective effects—but no creator—no idealist, and therefore, properly speaking, nopoet, in the high signification of that term. Luckily, however, for Wordsworth and for the world, he possessed the spiritual faculty, and kept it always active; so that his eye, even in the presence of the meanest objects, was open to the ideal things of which the symbols they were. Theinfinitewas ever present to his mind, and he saw all objects through that medium of light and relationship. But the great band of critics outside the fine region in which Wordsworth dwelt, could not of course understand this “Ode,” or the general tone of Wordsworth’s poetry, and therefore they denounced it, as incomprehensible, mystic, and absurd. But because they had no faculty with which to appreciate spiritual representation, oreven to believe in spirituality as a fact belonging to the nature of man, that was no reason in the estimation of our poet, that he should cease to sing his wonted strains in his wonted manner. In alluding to this depreciation of his poems, he very sorrowfully says, somewhere in his letters or notes, that it is a fact that “nineteen out of every twenty persons are unable to appreciate poetry;” and we are bound to confess that this hard judgment is truth. Even the better sort of “Reviews,” in which we should have expected at least a recognition of the genius and noble aims of the poet, stood out dead against him; and Jeffrey’s “This will never do,” in speaking of “The Excursion,” shows how blindly bigotted and intolerant were such critics in those days. As a sample of the abuse, and utter want of judgment which characterised Wordsworth’s critics, take the following anecdotes, which are recorded by the writer on “Wordsworth,” (Chamber’s Tracts) as a good joke, or I will hope, as a picture of the folly of the time.

“A writer in Blackwood for November, 1829, gives an amusing sketch of a party where the ‘Intimations of Immortality,’ revered bythe initiated asthe‘Revelation,’ was read aloud by a true disciple, in a kind of unimaginable chant then peculiar to the sect. There were one or two believers present, with a few neophytes, and one or two absolute and wicked sceptics! No sooner had the recitation fairly commenced, than one of the sceptics, of laughing propensities, crammed his handkerchief half-way down his throat; the others looked keen and composed: the disciples groaned, and the neophytes shook their heads in deep conviction.’ The reciter proceeded with deeper unction, till on being asked by a neophyte to give an explanation, which he was unable to give, he got angry, and ‘roundly declared, that things so out of the common way, so sublime, and so abstruse, could be conveyed in no language but their own. When the reciter came to the words, ‘Callings from us,’ the neophyte again timidly requested an explanation, and was informed by one of the sceptics, that they meant the child’s transitory gleams of a glorious pre-existence, that fall away and vanish almost as soon as they appear. The obstinate neophyte only replied, in a tone of melancholy, ‘When I think of my childhood, I have only visions of traps and balls, and whippings. I never remember being “haunted by the eternal mind.” To be sure I did ask a great many questions, and was tolerably obstinate, but I fear these are not the “obstinate questionings” of which Mr. Wordsworth speaks.’ This is but a small sample of the Wordsworthian scenes and disputations then of every-day occurrence. In 1816 a kind of shadow of Horace Smith again took the field. It seems that Hogg intended to publish an anthology of the living British bards, and had written to some of them for specimens. A wag, who had heard of the project, immediately issued an anthology, purporting to be this, but containing merely the coinage of his own brain. As may be imagined, Wordsworth occupied a prominent corner; and indeed some of the imitations—for most were imitations rather than parodies—did him no discredit. ‘The Flying Tailor,’ however, was not an infelicitous burlesque of the poet’s blank verse:—

“Ere he was putBy his mother into breeches, Nature strungThe muscular part of his anatomyTo an unusual strength; and he could leap,All unimpeded by his petticoats,Over the stool on which his mother sat,More than six inches—o’er the astonished stool!”

Enough, however, has been said about these critics, for the present, at least. Wordsworth’s was a struggle to get for poetry, once more, a true utterance; to annihilate the old dead, mechanical form which it had for the most part assumed, from the time of Pope downwards to him; for although Burns and Cowper had sounded the first trumpet in this morning of the resurrection, it was reserved for Wordsworth to awake the dead, and infuse into them a new and living soul.

During the residence of the poet at Grasmere, his sister kept a diary of the proceedings of their little household, which, with Wordsworth’s letters, are the chief biographical records of this period, respecting the poet himself. The following extracts will give some idea of the calm and beautiful life which they led together:—

“As we were going along, we were stopped at once, at the distance, perhaps of fifty yards from our favourite birch-tree; it was yieldingto the gust of wind, with all its tender twigs; the sun shone upon it, and it glanced in the wind like a flying sunshiny shower; it was a tree in shape, with a stem and branches, but it was like a spirit of water....

When we were in the woods before Gowbarrow Park, we saw a fewdaffodilsclose to the water-side.... As we went along there were more, and yet more; and at last, under the boughs of the trees, we saw there was a long belt of them along the shore. I never saw daffodils so beautiful. They grew among the mossy stones about them; some rested their heads on these stones, as on a pillow; the rest tossed, and reeled, and danced, and seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind, they looked so gay and glancing.”

The poet was frequently indebted to this beautiful sister for thematerialof his poems; and many of the minor pieces are a musical transformation of her descriptions of natural scenery, and the feelings with which she beheld it. The poem of “The Beggars” is an instance of this; and if the reader will peruse “The Daffodils,” and compare it with Miss Wordsworth’s description of these fair flowers,as quoted above, he will perhaps discover how much the poet is indebted to her, in this instance also. Here is the poem.

“I wandered lonely as a cloudThat floats on high o’er vales and hills,When all at once I saw a crowd,A host, ofgolden daffodils,Beside the lake, beneath the trees,Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.Continuous as the stars that shineAnd twinkle on the milky way,They stretch’d in never ending lineAlong the margin of a bay:Ten thousand saw I at a glance,Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.The waves beside them danced; but theyOutdid the sparkling waves in glee:A poet could not but feel gay,In such a jocund company:I gazed—and gazed—but little thoughtWhat wealth the show to me had brought.For oft, when on my couch I lieIn vacant, or in passive mood,They flash upon that inward eyeWhich is the bliss of solitude;And then my heart with pleasure fills,And dances with the daffodils.”

Continuous as the stars that shineAnd twinkle on the milky way,They stretch’d in never ending lineAlong the margin of a bay:Ten thousand saw I at a glance,Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but theyOutdid the sparkling waves in glee:A poet could not but feel gay,In such a jocund company:I gazed—and gazed—but little thoughtWhat wealth the show to me had brought.

For oft, when on my couch I lieIn vacant, or in passive mood,They flash upon that inward eyeWhich is the bliss of solitude;And then my heart with pleasure fills,And dances with the daffodils.”

In writing to his friends the Wranghams, November 4, 1802, Wordsworth, after thanking them for their good opinion of this poem, alludes to “Butler, Montague’s friend,” as having said of it (the poem,) “Aye, a fine morsel this for the reviewers,”—and adds, “When this was told me (for I was not present) I observed that there weretwo linesin that little poem, which, if thoroughly felt, would annihilate nine-tenths of the reviews of the kingdom, as they would find no readers. The lines I alluded to were these—

‘They flash upon that inward eye,Which is the bliss of solitude.’”

And, now, I will make a few quotations from Miss Wordsworth’s journal:—

“1802. Wednesday, April 28.—Copied the ‘Prioress’ Tale.’ W. in the orchard tired. I happened to say, that when a child, I would not have pulled a strawberry blossom; left him, and wrote out the ‘Manciples’ Tale.’ At dinner he came in with the poem on children gathering flowers [the poem entitled ‘Foresight’].

“April 20.—We went into the orchard afterbreakfast, and sat there. The lake calm; sky cloudy. W. began poem on the “Celandine.”

“May 1.—Sowed flower seeds; W. helped me. We sat in the orchard. W. wrote the ‘Celandine.’ Planned an arbour,—the sun too hot for us.

“May 7.—W. wrote ‘The Leech Gatherer.’

“May 21.—W. wrote two sonnets, ‘On Buonaparte,’ after I had read Milton’s sonnets to him.

“May 29.—W. wrote his poem “On going to M. H.” I wrote it out.

“June 8.—W. wrote the poem ‘The sun has long been set.’

“June 17.—W. added to the ‘Ode’ he is writing [‘On the Immortality of the Soul’].

“June 19.—Read Churchill’s ‘Rosciad.’

“July 9.—W. and I set forth to Keswick, on our road to Gallow Hill (to the Hutchinsons’, near Malton, York). On Monday, the 11th, went to Eusemere (the Clarksons’). 13th, walked to Emont Bridge, thence by Greta Bridge. The sun shone cheerfully, and a glorious ride we had over the moors; every building bathed in golden light; we saw round us miles beyond miles, Darlington spire,&c. Thence to Thirsk; on foot to the Hamilton Hills—Rivaux. I went down to look at the ruins; thrushes singing, cattle feeding amongst the ruins of the abbey; green hillocks about the ruins—these hillocks scattered over with grovelets of wild roses, and covered with wild flowers: could have staid in this green quiet spot till evening, without a thought of moving, but W. was waiting for me....

July 30.—Left London between five and six o’clock of the morning, outside the Dover coach. A beautiful morning. The city, St. Paul’s, with the river—a multitude of little boats—made a beautiful sight, as we crossed Westminster Bridge [Wordsworth’s sonnet “On Westminster Bridge” was written on the roof of the Dover coach]; the houses, not overhung by their clouds of smoke, were spread out endlessly; yet the sun shone so brightly, with such a pure light, that there was something like the purity of one of Nature’s own grand spectacles.... Arrived at Calais at four in the morning of July 31st.

Delightful walks in the evening; seeing far off in the west the coast of England, like a cloud, crested with Dover Castle, the eveningstar, and the glory of the sky: the reflections in the water were more beautiful than the sky itself; purple waves, brighter than precious stones, for ever melting away on the sands.

August 29.—Left Calais, at twelve o’clock in the morning, for Dover ... bathed, and sat on the Dover Cliffs, and looked upon France; we could see the shores almost as plain as if it were but an English lake. Mounted the coach at half-past four; arrived in London at six, August 30. Stayed in London till 22nd September: arrived at Gallow Hill on Friday, September 24th.

On Monday, October 4th, 1802, W. was married, at Brompton church, to Mary Hutchinson.... We arrived at Grasmere, at six in the evening, on October 6th, 1802.”

And that the reader may hereafter have a clear perception of the persons of the poetic household at Grasmere, I will now go to De Quincy, who has drawn portraits of them, which, in the absence of any similar literary venture, are invaluable. Speaking of Mrs. Wordsworth, he says,—she was a tall young woman, with the most winning expression of benignity upon her features that he had everbeheld; her manner frank, and unembarrassed. “She was neither handsome or comely, according to the rigour of criticism, and was generally pronouncedplain-looking, but the absence of the practical power and fascination which lie in beauty, were compensated by sweetness all but angelic, simplicity the most entire, womanly self-respect, and purity of heart, speaking through all her looks, acts, and movements. She rarely spoke; so that Mr. Slave-trade Clarkson used to say of her, that she could only sayGod bless you. Certainly her intellect was not of an active order; but in a quiescent, reposing, meditative way, she appeared always to have a social enjoyment from her own thoughts; and it would have been strange indeed, if she, who enjoyed such eminent advantages of training, from the daily society of her husband and his sister; not only hearing the best parts of English literature daily read, or quoted by short fragments, but also hearing them very often critically discussed in a style of great originality and truth, and by the light of strong poetic feeling,—strange would it have been had any person, dull as the weeds of Lethe in the native constitution of mind, failedto acquire the power of judging for herself, and putting forth some functions of activity. But undoubtedly that was not her element: to feel and to enjoy a luxurious repose of mind—there was her forte and her peculiar privilege; and how much better this was adapted to her husband’s taste, how much more suited to uphold the comfort of his daily life, than a blue-stocking loquacity, or even a legitimate talent for discussion and analytic skill may be inferred from his celebrated verses, beginning:

‘She was a phantom of delightWhen first she gleamed upon my sight;’

and ending with this matchless winding up of

‘A perfect woman, nobly plannedTo warn, to comfort, to command;And yet——’

going back to a previous thought, and resuming a leading impression of the whole character—

‘And yet a spirit too, and brightWith something of an angel light.’”

“From these verses,” continues De Quincy,“it may be inferred what were the qualities which won Wordsworth’s admiration in a wife; for these verses were written upon Mary Hutchinson, his own cousin, and his wife; and not written as Coleridge’s memorable verses upon “Sara,” for some forgotten original Sara, and consequently transferred to every other Sara who came across his path. Once for all, these exquisite lines were dedicated to Mrs. Wordsworth; were understood to describe her—to have been prompted by the feminine graces of her character; hers they are and will remain for ever.” To these, therefore, De Quincy refers the reader for an idea infinitely more powerful and vivid, he says, than any he could give, of what was most important in the partner and second self of the poet. And to this abstract of her moral portrait he adds the following remarks upon her physical appearance. “She was tall, as already stated; her figure was good—except that for my taste it was rather too slender, and so it always continued. In complexion she was fair; and there was something peculiarly pleasing even in this accident of the skin, for it was accompanied by an animated expression of health, a blessing whichin fact she possessed uninterruptedly, very pleasing in itself, and also a powerful auxiliary of that smiling benignity which constituted the greatest attraction of her person. Her eyes—the reader may already know—her eyes

‘Like stars of twilight fair;Like twilight, too, her dark brown hair;But all things else about her drawnFrom May time and the cheerful dawn.’

But strange it is to tell, that in these eyes of vesper gentleness, there was a considerable obliquity of vision; and much beyond that slight obliquity which is often supposed to be an attractivefoibleof the countenance; and yet though itoughtto have been displeasing or repulsive, in fact it was not. Indeed, all faults, had they been ten times and greater, would have been swallowed up or neutralised by that supreme expression of her features, to the intense unity of which every lineament in the fixed parts, and every undulation in the moving parts or play of her countenance, concurred, viz., a sunny benignity—a radiant perception—such as in this world De Quincy says he never saw equalled or approached.”

Such, then, is the portrait of Mrs. Wordsworth; and now for that of sweet, musical, romantic, true and generous Dorothy. She was much shorter, much slighter, and perhaps in other respects as different from Mrs. Wordsworth in personal characteristics as could have been wished for the most effective contrast. “Her face was of Egyptian brown: rarely in a woman of English birth had a more determined gipsy tan been seen. Her eyes were not soft, as Mrs. Wordsworth’s, nor were they fierce or bold; but they were wild and startling, and hurried in their motion. Her manner was warm, and even ardent; her sensibility seemed constitutionally deep; and some subtle fire of impassioned intellect apparently burned within her, which, being alternately pushed forward into a conspicuous expression by the irrepressible instinct of her temperament, and then immediately checked in obedience to the decorum of her sex and age, and her maidenly condition (for she had rejected all offers of marriage, out of pure sisterly regard to her brother, and subsequently to her sister’s children) gave to her whole demeanour and to her conversation, an air of embarrassment andeven of self conflict, that was sometimes distressing to witness. Even her very utterance, and enunciation often, or rather generally, suffered in point of clearness and steadiness, from the agitation of her excessive organic sensibility, and perhaps from some morbid irritability of the nerves. At times the self-contracting and self-baffling of her feelings, caused her even to stammer, and so determinedly to stammer, that a stranger who should have seen her, and quitted her in that state of feeling, would have certainly set her down for one plagued with that infirmity of speech, as distressingly as Charles Lamb himself.... The greatest deductions from Miss Wordsworth’s attractions, and from the exceeding interest which surrounded her in right of her character, her history, and the relation which she fulfilled towards her brother, was the glancing quickness of her motions, and other circumstances in her deportment—such as her stooping attitude when walking, which gave an ungraceful, and even an unsexual character to her appearance when out of doors. She did not cultivate the graces which preside over the person and its carriage. But on the other hand she was aperson of very remarkable endowments intellectually; and in addition to the other great services which she rendered to her brother, this may be mentioned as greater than all the rest, and it was one which equally operated to the benefit of every casual companion in a walk—viz., the extending sympathy, always ready, and always profound, by which she made all that one could tell her, all that one could describe, all that one could quote from a foreign author, reverberate as it werea plusieurs reprisesto one’s own feelings, by the manifest pleasure it made upon her.... Her knowledge of literature was irregular, and not systematically built up. She was content to be ignorant of many things; but what she knew and had really mastered, lay where it could not be disturbed—in the temple of her own most fervid heart.”... At the time this sketch was written, both the ladies were about twenty-eight years old. “Miss Wordsworth,” continues De Quincy, “had seen most of life, and even of good company; for she had lived, when quite a girl, under the protection of a near relation at Windsor, who was a personal favourite of the royal family, and consequently of George the Third.” Nevertheless, De Quincy thinks that “Mrs. Wordsworth was the more ladylike person of the two.”

The last figure, and the greatest, in this little group of portraits, is Wordsworth’s, and it is certainly hit off, like the others, with a free and discriminating hand.

“Wordsworth was, upon the whole, not a well-made man. His legs were positively condemned by all the female connoisseurs in legs that De Quincy ever heard lecture on that topic; not that they were bad in any way that would force itself upon your notice—there was no absolute deformity about them; and undoubtedly they had been serviceable legs, beyond the average standard of human requisition; for with these identical legs Wordsworth must have travelled a distance of one hundred and seventy-five to one hundred and eighty thousand English miles,—a mode of exertion which to him stood in the stead of wine, spirits, and all other stimulants whatever to the animal spirits; to which he has been indebted for a life of unclouded happiness, and even for much of what is most excellent in his writings. But useful as they have proved themselves, the Wordsworthian legs were certainly not ornamental; it wasreally a pity that he had not another pair for evening dress parties, when no boots lend their friendly aid to mask our imperfections from the eyes of female rigourists—theelegantes formarum spectatrices.... But the worst part of Wordsworth’s person was the bust; there was a narrowness and a stoop about the shoulders, which became striking, and had an effect of meanness, when brought into close juxtaposition with a figure of a most statuesque “order.” ... Further on, De Quincy relates how he was walking out with Miss Wordsworth, the poet being before them, deeply engaged in conversation with a person of fine proportions, and towering figure,—when the contrast was so marked, and even painful to the poet’s sister, that she could not help exclaiming: “Is it possible? Can that be William? How very mean he looks!” “And yet,” continues De Quincy, “Wordsworth was of a good height, just five feet ten, and not a slender man; on the contrary, by the side of Southey, his limbs looked thick, almost in a disproportionate degree. But the total effect of Wordsworth’s person was always worst in a state of motion; for, according to the remark I have heard fromthe county people, ‘he walked like a cade;’ a cade being a kind of insect which advances by an oblique motion. This was not always perceptible, and in part depended (I believe) upon the position of his arms; when either of these happened (as was very customary) to be inserted into the unbuttoned waistcoat, his walk had a wry or twisted appearance; and not appearance only,—for I have known it by slow degrees gradually to edge off his companion, from the middle to the side of the high road.’ Meantime his face—that was one which would have made amends for greater defects of figure; it was certainly the noblest for intellectual effect, that, De Quincy says, he ever saw. Haydon, the eminent painter, in his great picture ofChrist’s Entry into Jerusalem, has introduced Wordsworth in the character of a disciple attending his Divine Master.... “Wordsworth’s face was of the long order, often classed as oval, ... and if not absolutely the indigenous face of the lake district, at any rate a variety of that face,—a modification of the original type. The head was well filled out.... The forehead was not remarkably lofty ... but it was, perhaps, remarkable for its breadthand expansive development. Neither were the eyes large, ... on the contrary, they were rather small; but that did not interfere with their effect, which at times was fine, and suitable to his intellectual character.... The mouth and the region of the mouth—the whole circumference of the mouth, were about the strongest feature in Wordsworth’s face. There was nothing especially to be noticed in the mere outline of the lips, but the swell and protrusion of the parts above and around the mouth are noticeable.” And then De Quincy tells us why. He had read that Milton’s surviving daughter, when she saw the crayon drawing representing the likeness of her father, in Richardson the painter’s thick octavo volume of Milton, burst out in a rapture of passionate admiration, exclaiming—“This is my father! this is my dear father!” And when De Quincy had procured this book, he saw in this likeness of Milton a perfect portrait of Wordsworth. All the peculiarities, he says, were retained—“A drooping appearance about the eyelids—that remarkable swell that I have noticed about the mouth,—the way in which the hair lay upon the forehead. In two points only there was adeviation from the rigorous truth of Wordsworth’s features—the face was a little too short and too broad, and the eyes were too large.—There was also a wreath of laurel about the head, which, (as Wordsworth remarked,) disturbed the natural expression of the whole picture; else, and with these few allowances, he also admitted that the resemblance was,for that period of his life(but let not that restriction be forgotten;) perfect, or, as nearly so as art could accomplish. This period was about the year 1807.

Here, then, thanks to De Quincy, who, for these “Lake Reminiscences” alone, is well worthy of a pension, which, had I been Prime Minister, he should have had long ago; for no living man is more deserving of this distinction for the service he has rendered to our literature:—here, I say, we have portraits of the inmates of the white cottage at Grasmere; and beautiful portraits they are. One could have wished that Dr. Wordsworth had given a little more vitality to his biography of these inmates—that he had used his pallet and brushes a little more freely (for hecanpaint, if he likes, as the description of RydalMount shows); but instead of vitality, we have dry facts—which are the mere bones of biography—and these are often strung together with very indifferent tendons. We have no picture, for example, of the poet’s wedded life at this time—we cannot getbehindthe scenes; all we know is, that a wedding had taken place, and the good doctor tells us, that the twain were afterwards very happy all the days of their life, just as fairy tales wind up. There seems to be a good deal of needless reserve about this matter; and I, for one, do not thank the greedy poet when he says, touching his private life, that “a stranger intermeddleth not with his joy.” No one wishes tomeddlewith it; but tosympathisewith it, and to know how this joy manifested itself in the little household, appear to be legitimate demands of the curious lovers of Wordsworth, and, indeed of all curious men, whether lovers of Wordsworth or not. But the doctor has nothing to say on these points; and all we can gather respecting them is to be found in the “Prelude,” and one or two other poems. Here is the extract from the “Prelude,” expressing the poet’s feelings ashe left the cottage with his sister before his marriage:—

“Fareweil! thou little nook of mountain-ground,Farewell! we leave thee to Heaven’s peaceful care,Thee, and the cottage, which thou dost surround.We go for one to whom ye will be dear;And she will prize this bower, this Indian shed,Our own contrivance—building without peer;A gentle maid....Will come to you, to you herself will wed,And love the blessed life that we lead here.”

And in this place it will be well to give De Quincy’s sketch of the cottage itself, where this blessed life was lived, and to share which the poet went to fetch his bride from her father’s house:—“A little semi-vestibule between two doors, prefaced the entrance into what might be considered the principal room of the cottage. It was an oblong square, not above eight and a half feet high, sixteen feet long, and twelve broad; very prettily wainscotted, from the floor to the ceiling, with dark polished oak, slightly embellished with carving. One window there was—a perfect and unpretending cottage window—with little diamond panes, embowered, at almost every season ofthe year, with roses; and in the summer and autumn, with jessamine and other fragrant shrubs. From the exuberant luxuriance of the vegetation around it, and from the dark hue of the wainscotting, this window, though tolerably large, did not furnish a very powerful light to one who entered from the open air.... I was ushered up a little flight of stairs—fourteen in all—to a little dingy room, or whatever the reader chooses to call it. Wordsworth himself has described the fire-place of this, his—

‘Half kitchen and half parlour fire.’

It was not fully seven feet six inches high, and in other respects of pretty nearly the same dimensions as the rustic hall below. There was however, in a small recess, a library of perhaps three hundred volumes, which seemed to consecrate the nook as the poet’s study, and composing room; and so occasionally it was.”

So far then, De Quincy; and the following poem, already alluded to, will give an idea of the poet’s feelings respecting the bride he brought with him to share the cottage blessedness of Grasmere.

“She was a phantom of delight,When first she gleamed upon my sight;A lovely apparition, sentTo be a moment’s ornament.Her eyes as stars of twilight fair;Like twilight too her dusky hair;But all things else about her drawnFrom May time and the cheerful dawn;A dancing shape, an image gay,To haunt, to startle, and waylay.I saw her upon nearer view,A spirit, yet a woman too!Her household motions light and free,And steps of virgin liberty;A countenance in which did meetSweet records, promises as sweet;A creature not too bright or goodFor human nature’s daily food;For transient sorrows, simple wiles,Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.And now I see with eye sereneThe very pulse of the machine;A being breathing thoughtful breath,A traveller between life and death;The reason firm, the temperate will,Endurance, foresight, strength and skill;A perfect woman, nobly planned,To warn, to comfort, to command;And yet a spirit still, and bright,With something of angelic light.”

I saw her upon nearer view,A spirit, yet a woman too!Her household motions light and free,And steps of virgin liberty;A countenance in which did meetSweet records, promises as sweet;A creature not too bright or goodFor human nature’s daily food;For transient sorrows, simple wiles,Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.

And now I see with eye sereneThe very pulse of the machine;A being breathing thoughtful breath,A traveller between life and death;The reason firm, the temperate will,Endurance, foresight, strength and skill;A perfect woman, nobly planned,To warn, to comfort, to command;And yet a spirit still, and bright,With something of angelic light.”

This beautiful poem, so full of calm affection, and intellectual homage, is a fair sample of Wordsworth’s love poems, as well as a charming tribute to his wife’s loveliness and virtue. In early life, it is thought by De Quincy and others, that the poet had experienced a tragical termination to an early love, and that the poems of which “Lucy” is the theme, were addressed to the object of this love; but Wordsworth always maintained a mysterious silence about the whole affair, and would never resolve the riddle of this attachment. The “Lucy” poems, however, beautiful as they are, are chiefly valuable as exhibiting thekindof passion whichloveshowed itself in Wordsworth. Passion, in the proper meaning of the word—viz., deep, fiery, intense, and all-embracing feeling, was certainly not Wordsworth’s. His love was calm, intellectual, and emotional—but it was not passion. All his love seems to have passed through his head before it touched his heart. And yet he loved his wife, and lived, as I said before, very happily with her.

Mrs. Wordsworth, however, was a true household woman, and had not acquired that faculty of walking which Wordsworth and his sister possessed, in so eminent a degree. In about a year, therefore, after his marriage—that is, August 14, 1803,—we find Wordsworth parting from his wife, and making a tour into Scotland, with his sister and Coleridge, taking Carlisle on the way. When they arrived at Longtown, they found a guide-post pointing out two roads,—one to Edinburgh, the other to Glasgow. They took the latter road, and entered Scotland by crossing the river Sark. Edinburgh was no favourite place with Wordsworth, and for reasons which are sufficiently obvious. The tourists then passed through Gretna Green to Annan, leaving the Solway Frith, and the Cumberland hills to their left hand. On Thursday the 18th August, they went to the churchyard where Burns is buried; a bookseller accompanied them, of whom Miss Wordsworth had bought some little books for Johnny, the poet’s first child. He showed them first the outside of Burns’ house, where he had lived the last three years of his life, and where he died. It had a mean appearance, and was in a byesituation, white-washed, and dirty about the doors, as all Scotch houses are; flowering plants in the windows. They went on to visit his grave. He lies in a corner of the churchyard, and his second son, Francis Wallace, is beside him. There was no stone to mark the spot. The greatest bard that had sung in Britain for some centuries, lay buried there like a dog. A hundred guineas, however, had been collected to build a monument over his ashes. “There,” said the bookseller to the visitors, pointing to a pompous monument, a few yards off, “there lies Mr. John Bushby, a remarkably clever man; he was an attorney, and hardly ever lost a cause he undertook. Burns made many a lampoon upon him; and there they rest as you see.” Yes, indeed, there they rested; and that was the deep, sad moral of the story. We shall all rest so at last. They then went to Burns’ house. Mrs. Burns was not at home, but had gone to the sea-shore with her children. They saw the print of “The Cotter’s Saturday Night,” which Burns mentioned in one of his letters having received as a present. In the room above the parlour Burns died, and his son after him; and of all who saw this parlour onthis 18th of August,—Wordsworth and his sister, Coleridge and the poor bookseller—who survives? “There they rest, as you see.”

The tourists travelled subsequently through the Vale of the Nith, and crossing the Frith, reached Brownhill, where they slept.

“I cannot take leave of this country,” says Miss Wordsworth, in her Journal, “without mentioning that we saw the Cumberland mountains within half a mile of Ellisland (Burns’ house) the last view we had of them. Drayton has prettily described the connection which the neighbourhood has with ours, when he makes Skiddaw say—

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