The "Descriptive Sketches" conclude with some very spirited lines, which show how ardent was the enthusiasm of the writer in favour of liberty, and how sanguine were his hopes, at that time, of a general diffusion of benevolence and happiness from the exertions of those who proclaimed themselves its advocates, and were enlisting the sympathies of France, Europe, and the world in behalf of themselves and their cause. The author dictated the following particulars concerning these two poems.1 An Evening Walk.—" The young lady to whom this was addressed was my sister. It was composed at school and during my first two college vacations. There is not an image in it which I have not observed; and, now in my seventy-third year, I recollect the time and place where most of them were noticed. I will confine myself to one instance. Waving his hat, the shepherd from the vale Directs his wandering dog the cliffs to scale; The dog loud barking mid the glittering rocks, Hunts where his master points, the intercepted flocks.' I was an eye-witness of this for the first time while crossing the pass of Dunmail Raise. Upon second thought, I will mention another image: 6 And fronting the bright west, yon oak entwines This is feebly and imperfectly expressed, but I recollect distinctly the very spot where this first struck me. It was on the way between Hawkshead and Ambleside, and gave me extreme pleasure. The moment was im 1 From MSS. I. F. See above, p. 22. note. They were dictated in 1843. portant in my poetical history; for I date from it my consciousness of the infinite variety of natural appearances which had been unnoticed by the poets of any age or country, so far as I was acquainted with them; and I made a resolution to supply in some degree the deficiency. I could not have been at that time above fourteen years of age. The description of the Swans that follows was taken from the daily opportunities I had of observing their habits, not as confined to the gentleman's park, but in a state of nature. There were two pairs of them that divided the lake of Esthwaite and its in-and-out-flowing streams between them, never trespassing a single yard upon each other's separate domain. They were of the old magnificent species, bearing in beauty and majesty about the same relation to the Thames swan which that does to a goose. It was from the remembrance of these noble creatures I took, thirty years after, the picture of the swan which I have discarded from the poem of "Dion." While I was a school-boy, the late Mr. Curwen introduced a little fleet of these birds, but of the inferior species, to the lake of Windermere. Their principal home was about his own islands; but they sailed about into remote parts of the lake, and either from real or imagined injury done to the adjoining fields, they were got rid of at the request of the farmers and proprietors, but to the great regret of all who had become attached to them from noticing their beauty and quiet habits. I will conclude my notice of this poem by observing that the plan of it has not been confined to a particular walk, or an individual place; a proof (of which I was unconscious at the time) of my unwillingness to submit the poetic spirit to the chains of fact and real circumstance. The country is idealised rather than described in any one of its local aspects." Descriptive Sketches, 1791-2.-"Much the greatest part of this poem was composed during my walks upon the banks of the Loire, in the years 1791, 1792. I will only notice that the description of the valley filled with mist, beginning 'In solemn shapes,' &c. was taken from that beautiful region, of which the principal features are Lungarn and Sarnen. Nothing that I ever saw in nature left a more delightful impression on my mind than that which I have attempted, alas how feebly! to convey to others in these lines. Those two lakes have always interested me, especially from bearing, in their size and other features, a resemblance to those of the North of England. It is much to be deplored that a district so beautiful should be so unhealthy as it is." These two poems attracted little public notice, and it was long before they passed through one edition. But one of them arrested the attention of a person who entered the University of Cambridge the same year as Wordsworth left it, and was afterwards associated with him as one of his most intimate friends, Samuel Taylor Coleridge. During the last year of my residence at Cambridge," says Coleridge 1, "I became acquainted with Mr. Wordsworth's 'Descriptive Sketches,' and seldom, if ever, was the emergence of an original poetic genius above the literary horizon more evidently announced." In January, 1791, William Wordsworth took his Bachelor of Arts degree, and quitted Cambridge. 1 Biograph. Literar. vol. i. p. 74. ed. 1847. CHAPTER VIII. RESIDENCE IN FRANCE. IN the month of May, 1791, William Wordsworth, after four months residence in London, visited his friend Robert Jones at the house of his father, Edward Jones, Esq., Plas-yn-llan, and with him made a pedestrian tour in North Wales. In a letter1 from Plas-yn-llan to his friend and fellow collegian William Mathews, he thus writes: — · Plas-yn-llan, near Ruthin, Denbighshire, June 17. 1791. "You will see by the date of this letter that I am in Wales, and whether you remember the place of Jones's residence or no, you will immediately conclude that I am with him. I quitted London about three weeks ago, where my time passed in a strange manner, sometimes whirled about by the vortex of its strenua inertia, and sometimes thrown by the eddy into a corner of the stream. Think not, however, that I had not many pleasant hours. time has been spent since I reached Wales in a very agreeable manner, and Jones and I intend to make a tour through its northern counties, on foot, as you will easily suppose." My 1 I am indebted for these letters to the courtesy of Mrs. Mathews, who, having heard the announcement of the present Memoir, very promptly and liberally placed them at my disposal, In company with Jones, he saw "the sunsets which give such splendour to the vale of Clwyd ;" with him he explored" Snowdon, the chair of Idris, the quiet village of Bethgelert, and visited Menai and the Alpine steeps of Conway, and traced the windings of the wizard stream of the Dee."1 One of the scenes which he beheld in this tour — a moonlight night on the top of Snowdon - is described with great splendour of language in the opening of the last book of "The Prelude." 2 After the completion of this tour in North Wales, Wordsworth writes again, on the 3d of August, from Plas-yn-llan to Mathews, who, it appears, was suffering from low spirits. "I regret much not to have been made acquainted with your wish to have employed your vacation in a pedestrian tour, both on your account, as it would have contributed greatly to exhilarate your spirits, and on mine, as we should have gained much from the addition of your society. Such an excursion would have served like an Aurora Borealis to gild your long Lapland night of melancholy." About this time Wordsworth was urged by some of his relatives to take holy orders. Writing from Cambridge, September 23d, to Mathews, he says, quitted Wales on a summons from Mr. Robinson, a gentleman you most likely have heard me speak of, respecting my going into orders and taking a curacy at Harwich; which curacy he considered as introductory to the living. I thought it was best to pay my respects to him in person, to inform him that I am not of age for ordination." He adds, that he I Dedication of Descriptive Sketches, vol. i. p. 16. 2 P. 353. |