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    THE POETICAL WORKS

    OF

    WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

    VOL. V

[Illustration: _William Wordsworth_

_after Margaret Gillies_

_Printed by Wittmann Paris_]




    THE POETICAL WORKS

    OF

    WILLIAM WORDSWORTH


    EDITED BY

    WILLIAM KNIGHT


    VOL. V

[Illustration]

    London
    MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD.
    NEW YORK: MACMILLAN & CO.
    1896

_All rights reserved_




CONTENTS


                                                   PAGE
    THE EXCURSION--
        PREFACE TO THE EDITION OF 1814               20
        BOOK FIRST--THE WANDERER                     26
        BOOK SECOND--THE SOLITARY                    67
        BOOK THIRD--DESPONDENCY                     105
        BOOK FOURTH--DESPONDENCY CORRECTED          142
        BOOK FIFTH--THE PASTOR                      195
        BOOK SIXTH--THE CHURCH-YARD AMONG
            THE MOUNTAINS                           235
        BOOK SEVENTH--THE CHURCH-YARD AMONG
            THE MOUNTAINS--_Continued_              283
        BOOK EIGHTH--THE PARSONAGE                  326
        BOOK NINTH--DISCOURSE OF THE WANDERER,
            AND AN EVENING VISIT TO THE LAKE        352
        NOTES                                       383

    APPENDIX

    NOTE A                                          391
    NOTE B                                          392
    NOTE C                                          393
    NOTE D                                          396
    NOTE E                                          398




WORDSWORTH'S POETICAL WORKS




THE EXCURSION

Composed 1795-1814.--Published 1814


[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[A]) used to say that had he been born a <DW7>, 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 what is
called a liberal education, it is not unlikely that, being strong in
body, I should have taken to a way of life such as that in which my
Pedlar passed the greater part of his days. At all events, I am here
called upon freely to acknowledge that the character I have represented
in his person is chiefly an idea of what I fancied my own character might
have become in his circumstances. Nevertheless much of what he says and
does had an external existence, that fell under my own youthful and
subsequent observation.

An individual, named Patrick, by birth and education a Scotchman,
followed this humble occupation for many years, and afterwards settled
in the town of Kendal.[B] He married a kinswoman of my wife's, and her
sister Sarah was brought up from her ninth year under this good man's
roof.[C] My own imaginations I was happy to find clothed in reality,
and fresh ones suggested, by what she reported of this man's tenderness
of heart, his strong and pure imagination, and his solid attainments in
literature, chiefly religious, whether in prose or verse. At Hawkshead
also, while I was a schoolboy, there occasionally resided a Packman
(the name then generally given to persons of this calling), with whom
I had frequent conversations upon what had befallen him, and what he
had observed, during his wandering life; and, as was natural, we took
much to each other; and, upon the subject of _Pedlarism_ in general, as
_then_ followed, and its favourableness to an intimate knowledge of human
concerns, not merely among the humbler classes of society, I need say
nothing here in addition to what is to be found in _The Excursion_, and a
note attached to it.

Now for the Solitary. Of him I have much less to say. Not long after we
took up our abode at Grasmere, came to reside there, from what motive
I either never knew or have forgotten, a Scotchman, a little past the
middle of life, who had for many years been chaplain to a Highland
regiment. He was in no respect, as far as I know, an interesting
character, though in his appearance there was a good deal that attracted
attention, as if he had been shattered in fortune, and not happy in mind.
Of his quondam position I availed myself to connect with the Wanderer,
also a Scotchman, a character suitable to my purpose, the elements of
which I drew from several persons with whom I had been connected, and
who fell under my observation during frequent residences in London at
the beginning of the French Revolution. The chief of these was, one may
now say, a Mr. Fawcett, a preacher at a Dissenting meeting-house at the
Old Jewry. It happened to me several times to be one of his congregation
through my connection with Mr. Nicholson of Cateaton Street, Strand,
who, at a time when I had not many acquaintances in London, used often
to invite me to dine with him on Sundays; and I took that opportunity
(Mr. N. being a Dissenter) of going to hear Fawcett, who was an able and
eloquent man. He published a poem on War, which had a good deal of merit,
and made me think more about him than I should otherwise have done.
But his Christianity was probably never very deeply rooted; and, like
many others in those times of like shewy talents, he had not strength
of character to withstand the effects of the French Revolution, and of
the wild and lax opinions which had done so much towards producing it,
and far more in carrying it forward in its extremes. Poor Fawcett, I
have been told, became pretty much such a person as I have described,
and early disappeared from the stage, having fallen into habits of
intemperance, which I have heard (though I will not answer for the fact)
hastened his death. Of him I need say no more. There were many like him
at that time, which the world will never be without, but which were more
numerous then, for reasons too obvious to be dwelt upon.

To what is said of the Pastor in the poem, I have little to add but what
may be deemed superfluous. It has ever appeared to me highly favourable
to the beneficial influence of the Church of England upon all gradations
and classes of society, that the patronage of its benefices is in
numerous instances attached to the estates of noble families of ancient
gentry; and accordingly I am gratified by the opportunity afforded me in
_The Excursion_, to pourtray the character of a country clergyman of more
than ordinary talents, born and bred in the upper ranks of society so
as to partake of their refinements, and at the same time brought by his
pastoral office and his love of rural life into intimate connection with
the peasantry of his native district.

To illustrate the relation which in my mind this Pastor bore to the
Wanderer, and the resemblances between them, or rather the points of
community in their nature, I likened one to an oak, and the other to a
sycamore; and having here referred to this comparison, I need only add, I
had no one individual in my mind, wishing rather to embody this idea than
to break in upon the simplicity of it by traits of individual character,
or of any peculiarity of opinion.

And now for a few words upon the scene where these interviews and
conversations are supposed to occur.

The scene of the first book of the poem is, I must own, laid in a
tract of country not sufficiently near to that which soon comes into
view in the second book, to agree with the fact. All that relates to
Margaret, and the ruined cottage, etc., was taken from observations
made in the south-west of England, and certainly it would require more
than seven-league boots to stretch in one morning, from a common in
Somersetshire, or Dorsetshire, to the heights of Furness Fells, and the
deep valleys they embosom. For thus dealing with space, I need make, I
trust, no apology; but my friends may be amused by the truth.

In the poem, I suppose that the Pedlar and I ascended from a plain
country up the vale of Langdale, and struck off a good way above the
chapel to the western side of the vale. We ascended the hill, and thence
looked down upon the circular recess in which lies Blea Tarn, chosen by
the Solitary for his retreat. After we quit his cottage, passing over
a low ridge, we descend into another vale, that of Little Langdale,
towards the head of which stands embowered, or partly shaded by yews and
other trees, something between a cottage and a mansion, or gentleman's
house, such as they once were in this country. This I convert into the
parsonage, and at the same time, and as by the waving of a magic wand, I
turn the comparatively confined vale of Langdale, its tarn, and the rude
chapel which once adorned the valley, into the stately and comparatively
sp