Green
pastures
she views [A] in the midst of the dale,
Down which she so often has tripped with her pail; 10
And a single small cottage, a nest like a dove's,
The one only [2] dwelling on earth that she loves.
Down which she so often has tripped with her pail; 10
And a single small cottage, a nest like a dove's,
The one only [2] dwelling on earth that she loves.
William Wordsworth
--
IDONEA Alas! the thought of such a cruel death
Has overwhelmed him. --I must follow.
ELDRED Lady!
You will do well; (she goes) unjust suspicion may
Cleave to this Stranger: if, upon his entering,
The dead Man heave a groan, or from his side
Uplift his hand--that would be evidence.
ELEANOR Shame! Eldred, shame!
MARMADUKE (both returning)
The dead have but one face.
(To himself. )
And such a Man--so meek and unoffending--
Helpless and harmless as a babe: a Man,
By obvious signal to the world's protection,
Solemnly dedicated--to decoy him! --
IDONEA Oh, had you seen him living! --
MARMADUKE I (so filled
With horror is this world) am unto thee
The thing most precious, that it now contains:
Therefore through me alone must be revealed
By whom thy Parent was destroyed, Idonea!
I have the proofs! --
IDONEA O miserable Father!
Thou didst command me to bless all mankind;
Nor to this moment, have I ever wished
Evil to any living thing; but hear me,
Hear me, ye Heavens! --
(kneeling) --may vengeance haunt the fiend
For this most cruel murder: let him live
And move in terror of the elements;
The thunder send him on his knees to prayer
In the open streets, and let him think he sees,
If e'er he entereth the house of God,
The roof, self-moved, unsettling o'er his head;
And let him, when he would lie down at night,
Point to his wife the blood-drops on his pillow!
MARMADUKE My voice was silent, but my heart hath joined thee.
IDONEA (leaning on MARMADUKE)
Left to the mercy of that savage Man!
How could he call upon his Child! --O Friend!
[Turns to MARMADUKE. ]
My faithful true and only Comforter.
MARMADUKE Ay, come to me and weep. (He kisses her. )
(To ELDRED. ) Yes, Varlet, look,
The devils at such sights do clap their hands.
[ELDRED retires alarmed. ]
IDONEA Thy vest is torn, thy cheek is deadly pale;
Hast thou pursued the monster?
MARMADUKE I have found him. --
Oh! would that thou hadst perished in the flames!
IDONEA Here art thou, then can I be desolate? --
MARMADUKE There was a time, when this protecting hand
Availed against the mighty; never more
Shall blessings wait upon a deed of mine.
IDONEA Wild words for me to hear, for me, an orphan,
Committed to thy guardianship by Heaven;
And, if thou hast forgiven me, let me hope,
In this deep sorrow, trust, that I am thine
For closer care;--here, is no malady.
[Taking his arm. ]
MARMADUKE There, _is_ a malady--
(Striking his heart and forehead. ) And here, and here,
A mortal malady. --I am accurst:
All nature curses me, and in my heart
_Thy_ curse is fixed; the truth must be laid bare.
It must be told, and borne. I am the man,
(Abused, betrayed, but how it matters not)
Presumptuous above all that ever breathed,
Who, casting as I thought a guilty Person
Upon Heaven's righteous judgment, did become
An instrument of Fiends. Through me, through me,
Thy Father perished.
IDONEA Perished--by what mischance?
MARMADUKE Beloved! --if I dared, so would I call thee--
Conflict must cease, and, in thy frozen heart,
The extremes of suffering meet in absolute peace.
[He gives her a letter. ]
IDONEA (reads)
"Be not surprised if you hear that some signal judgment
has befallen the man who calls himself your father; he is
now with me, as his signature will shew: abstain from
conjecture till you see me.
"HERBERT.
"MARMADUKE. "
The writing Oswald's; the signature my Father's:
(Looks steadily at the paper. )
And here is yours,--or do my eyes deceive me?
You have then seen my Father?
MARMADUKE He has leaned
Upon this arm.
IDONEA You led him towards the Convent?
MARMADUKE That Convent was Stone-Arthur Castle. Thither
We were his guides. I on that night resolved
That he should wait thy coming till the day
Of resurrection.
IDONEA Miserable Woman,
Too quickly moved, too easily giving way,
I put denial on thy suit, and hence,
With the disastrous issue of last night,
Thy perturbation, and these frantic words.
Be calm, I pray thee!
MARMADUKE Oswald--
IDONEA Name him not.
[Enter Female Beggar. ]
BEGGAR And he is dead! --that Moor--how shall I cross it?
By night, by day, never shall I be able
To travel half a mile alone. --Good Lady!
Forgive me! --Saints forgive me. Had I thought
It would have come to this! --
IDONEA What brings you hither? speak!
BEGGAR (pointing to MARMADUKE)
This innocent Gentleman. Sweet heavens! I told him
Such tales of your dead Father! --God is my judge,
I thought there was no harm: but that bad Man,
He bribed me with his gold, and looked so fierce.
Mercy! I said I know not what--oh pity me--
I said, sweet Lady, you were not his Daughter--
Pity me, I am haunted;--thrice this day
My conscience made me wish to be struck blind;
And then I would have prayed, and had no voice.
IDONEA (to MARMADUKE)
Was it my Father? --no, no, no, for he
Was meek and patient, feeble, old and blind,
Helpless, and loved me dearer than his life
--But hear me. For _one_ question, I have a heart
That will sustain me. Did you murder him?
MARMADUKE No, not by stroke of arm. But learn the process:
Proof after proof was pressed upon me; guilt
Made evident, as seemed, by blacker guilt,
Whose impious folds enwrapped even thee; and truth
And innocence, embodied in his looks,
His words and tones and gestures, did but serve
With me to aggravate his crimes, and heaped
Ruin upon the cause for which they pleaded.
Then pity crossed the path of my resolve:
Confounded, I looked up to Heaven, and cast,
Idonea! thy blind Father, on the Ordeal
Of the bleak Waste--left him--and so he died! --
[IDONEA sinks senseless; Beggar, ELEANOR, etc. , crowd round, and bear
her off. ]
Why may we speak these things, and do no more;
Why should a thrust of the arm have such a power,
And words that tell these things be heard in vain?
_She_ is not dead. Why! --if I loved this Woman,
I would take care she never woke again;
But she WILL wake, and she will weep for me,
And say, no blame was mine--and so, poor fool,
Will waste her curses on another name.
[He walks about distractedly. ]
[Enter OSWALD. ]
OSWALD (to himself)
Strong to o'erturn, strong also to build up.
[To MARMADUKE. ]
The starts and sallies of our last encounter
Were natural enough; but that, I trust,
Is all gone by. You have cast off the chains
That fettered your nobility of mind--
Delivered heart and head!
Let us to Palestine;
This is a paltry field for enterprise.
MARMADUKE Ay, what shall we encounter next? This issue--
'Twas nothing more than darkness deepening darkness,
And weakness crowned with the impotence of death! --
Your pupil is, you see, an apt proficient.
(ironically)
Start not! --Here is another face hard by;
Come, let us take a peep at both together,
And, with a voice at which the dead will quake,
Resound the praise of your morality--
Of this too much.
[Drawing OSWALD towards the Cottage--stops short at the door. ]
Men are there, millions, Oswald,
Who with bare hands would have plucked out thy heart
And flung it to the dogs: but I am raised
Above, or sunk below, all further sense
Of provocation. Leave me, with the weight
Of that old Man's forgiveness on thy heart,
Pressing as heavily as it doth on mine.
Coward I have been; know, there lies not now
Within the compass of a mortal thought,
A deed that I would shrink from;--but to endure,
That is my destiny. May it be thine:
Thy office, thy ambition, be henceforth
To feed remorse, to welcome every sting
Of penitential anguish, yea with tears.
When seas and continents shall lie between us--
The wider space the better--we may find
In such a course fit links of sympathy,
An incommunicable rivalship
Maintained, for peaceful ends beyond our view.
[Confused voices--several of the Band enter--rush upon OSWALD and
seize him. ]
ONE OF THEM I would have dogged him to the jaws of hell--
OSWALD Ha! is it so! --That vagrant Hag! --this comes
Of having left a thing like her alive! [Aside. ]
SEVERAL VOICES
Despatch him!
OSWALD If I pass beneath a rock
And shout, and, with the echo of my voice,
Bring down a heap of rubbish, and it crush me,
I die without dishonour. Famished, starved,
A Fool and Coward blended to my wish!
[Smiles scornfully and exultingly at MARMADUKE. ]
WALLACE 'Tis done! (Stabs him. )
ANOTHER OF THE BAND
The ruthless traitor!
MARMADUKE A rash deed! --
With that reproof I do resign a station
Of which I have been proud.
WILFRED (approaching MARMADUKE)
O my poor Master!
MARMADUKE Discerning Monitor, my faithful Wilfred,
Why art thou here?
[Turning to WALLACE. ]
Wallace, upon these Borders,
Many there be whose eyes will not want cause
To weep that I am gone. Brothers in arms!
Raise on that dreary Waste a monument
That may record my story: nor let words--
Few must they be, and delicate in their touch
As light itself--be there withheld from Her
Who, through most wicked arts, was made an orphan
By One who would have died a thousand times,
To shield her from a moment's harm. To you,
Wallace and Wilfred, I commend the Lady,
By lowly nature reared, as if to make her
In all things worthier of that noble birth,
Whose long-suspended rights are now on the eve
Of restoration: with your tenderest care
Watch over her, I pray--sustain her--
SEVERAL OF THE BAND (eagerly)
Captain!
MARMADUKE No more of that; in silence hear my doom:
A hermitage has furnished fit relief
To some offenders; other penitents,
Less patient in their wretchedness, have fallen,
Like the old Roman, on their own sword's point.
They had their choice: a wanderer _must I_ go,
The Spectre of that innocent Man, my guide.
No human ear shall ever hear me speak;
No human dwelling ever give me food,
Or sleep, or rest: but, over waste and wild,
In search of nothing, that this earth can give,
But expiation, will I wander on--
A Man by pain and thought compelled to live,
Yet loathing life--till anger is appeased
In Heaven, and Mercy gives me leave to die.
* * * * *
In June 1797 Coleridge wrote to his friend Cottle:
"W. has written a tragedy himself. I speak with heart-felt sincerity,
and, I think, unblinded judgment, when I tell you that I feel myself a
little man by his side, and yet I do not think myself a less man than
I formerly thought myself. His drama is absolutely wonderful. You know
I do not commonly speak in such abrupt and unmingled phrases, and
therefore will the more readily believe me. There are in the piece
those profound touches of the human heart which I find three or four
times in the 'Robbers' of Schiller, and often in Shakspeare; but in W.
there are no inequalities. "
On August 6, 1800, Charles Lamb wrote to Coleridge:
"I would pay five-and-forty thousand carriages to read W. 's tragedy,
of which I have heard so much and seen so little. " Shortly afterwards,
August 26, he wrote to Coleridge: "I have a sort of a recollection
that somebody, I think _you_, promised me a sight of Wordsworth's
tragedy. I shall be very glad of it just now, for I have got Manning
with me, and should like to read it _with him_. But this, I confess,
is a refinement. Under any circumstances, alone, in Cold-Bath Prison,
or in the desert island, just when Prospero and his crew had set off,
with Caliban in a cage, to Milan, it would be a treat to me to read
that play. Manning has read it, so has Lloyd, and all Lloyd's family;
but I could not get him to betray his trust by giving me a sight of
it. Lloyd is sadly deficient in some of those virtuous vices. "--Ed.
* * * * *
VARIANTS ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1845.
. . . female . . . 1842. ]
[Variant 2:
1845.
Ha! . . . 1842. ]
[Variant 3:
1849.
With whom you parted? 1842. ]
[Variant 4:
1845.
. . . o'er . . . 1842. ]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: He doubtless refers to the lines (Act iii. l. 405) "Action
is transitory--a step, a blow," etc. , which followed the Dedication of
'The White Doe of Rylstone' in the edition of 1836. --Ed. ]
[Footnote B: Note prefixed to the edition of 1842. --Ed. ]
[Footnote C: Note appended to the edition of 1842. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
THE REVERIE OF POOR SUSAN
Composed 1797. --Published 1800.
[Written 1801 or 1802. This arose out of my observations of the
affecting music of these birds, hanging in this way in the London
streets during the freshness and stillness of the spring morning. --I.
F. ]
Placed by Wordsworth among his "Poems of the Imagination. "--Ed.
The preceding Fenwick note to this poem is manifestly inaccurate as to
date, since the poem is printed in the "Lyrical Ballads" of 1800. In the
edition of 1836 the date of composition is given as 1797, and this date
is followed by Mr. Carter, the editor of 1857. Miss Wordsworth's Journal
gives no date; and, as the Fenwick note is certainly incorrect--and the
poem must have been written before the edition of 1800 came out--it
seems best to trust to the date sanctioned by Wordsworth himself in
1836, and followed by his literary executor in 1857. I think it probable
that the poem was written during the short visit which Wordsworth and
his sister paid to their brother Richard in London in 1797, when he
tried to get his tragedy, 'The Borderers', brought on the stage. The
title of the poem from 1800 to 1805 was 'Poor Susan'. --Ed.
* * * * *
THE POEM
At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears,
Hangs a Thrush [1] that sings loud, it has sung for three years:
Poor Susan has passed by the spot, and has heard
In the silence of morning the song of the Bird.
'Tis a note of enchantment; what ails her? She sees 5
A mountain ascending, a vision of trees;
Bright volumes of vapour through Lothbury glide,
And a river flows on through the vale of Cheapside.
Green pastures she views [A] in the midst of the dale,
Down which she so often has tripped with her pail; 10
And a single small cottage, a nest like a dove's,
The one only [2] dwelling on earth that she loves.
She looks, and her heart is in heaven: but they fade,
The mist and the river, the hill and the shade:
The stream will not flow, and the hill will not rise, 15
And the colours have all passed away from her eyes! [3]
* * * * *
VARIANTS ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1820.
There's a Thrush . . . 1800. ]
[Variant 2:
1802.
The only one . . . 1800. ]
[Variant 3: The following stanza, in the edition of 1800, was omitted in
subsequent ones:
Poor Outcast! return--to receive thee once more
The house of thy Father will open its door,
And thou once again, in thy plain russet gown,
May'st hear the thrush sing from a tree of its own. [i]]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTE ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: Wordsworth originally wrote "sees. " S. T. C. suggested
"views. "--Ed. ]
* * * * *
SUB-FOOTNOTE ON VARIANT 3
[Sub-Footnote i:
"Susan stood for the representative of poor '_Rus in urbe_. ' There was
quite enough to stamp the moral of the thing never to be forgotten;
'bright volumes of vapour,' etc. The last verse of Susan was to be got
rid of, at all events. It threw a kind of dubiety upon Susan's moral
conduct. Susan is a servant maid. I see her trundling her mop, and
contemplating the whirling phenomenon through blurred optics; but to
term her 'a poor outcast' seems as much as to say that poor Susan was
no better than she should be, which I trust was not what you meant to
express. "
Charles Lamb to Wordsworth. See 'The Letters of Charles Lamb', edited by
Alfred Ainger, vol. i. , p. 287. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
1798
A NIGHT PIECE
Composed 1798. --Published 1815.
[Composed on the road between Nether Stowey and Alfoxden, extempore. I
distinctly recollect the very moment when I was struck, as
described,--'He looks up, the clouds are split,' etc. --I. F. ]
Classed by Wordsworth among his "Poems of the Imagination. "--Ed.
* * * * *
--The sky is overcast
With a continuous cloud of texture close,
Heavy and wan, all whitened by the Moon,
Which through that veil is indistinctly seen,
A dull, contracted circle, yielding light 5
So feebly spread, that not a shadow falls,
Chequering the ground--from rock, plant, tree, or tower.
At length a pleasant instantaneous gleam
Startles the pensive traveller while [1] he treads
His lonesome path, with unobserving eye 10
Bent earthwards; he looks up--the clouds are split
Asunder,--and above his head he sees
The clear Moon, and the glory of the heavens.
There, in a black-blue vault she sails along,
Followed by multitudes of stars, that, small 15
And sharp, and bright, [A] along the dark abyss
Drive as she drives: how fast they wheel away,
Yet vanish not! --the wind is in the tree,
But they are silent;--still they roll along
Immeasurably distant; and the vault, 20
Built round by those white clouds, enormous clouds,
Still deepens its unfathomable depth.
At length the Vision closes; and the mind,
Not undisturbed by the delight it feels,
Which slowly settles into peaceful calm, 25
Is left to muse upon the solemn scene.
* * * * *
VARIANT ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1827
. . . as . . . 1815. ]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTE ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: The indebtedness of the Poet to his Sister is nowhere more
conspicuous than in this Poem. In Dorothy Wordsworth's Alfoxden Journal
the following occurs, under date 25th January 1798:
"Went to Poole's after tea. The sky spread over with one continuous
cloud, whitened by the light of the moon, which, though her dim shape
was seen, did not throw forth so strong a light as to chequer the
earth with shadows. At once the clouds seemed to cleave asunder, and
lift her in the centre of a black-blue vault. She sailed along,
followed by multitudes of stars, small, and bright, and sharp; their
brightness seemed concentrated. "
Ed. ]
* * * * *
WE ARE SEVEN
Composed 1798. --Published 1798.
[Written at Alfoxden in the spring of 1798, under circumstances
somewhat remarkable. The little girl who is the heroine, I met within
the area of Goodrich Castle in the year 1793. Having left the Isle of
Wight, and crost Salisbury Plain, as mentioned in the preface to
'Guilt and Sorrow', I proceeded by Bristol up the Wye, and so on to N.
Wales to the Vale of Clwydd, where I spent my summer under the roof of
the father of my friend, Robert Jones.
In reference to this poem, I will here mention one of the most
remarkable facts in my own poetic history, and that of Mr. Coleridge.
In the spring of the year 1798, he, my sister, and myself, started
from Alfoxden pretty late in the afternoon, with a view to visit
Linton and the Valley of Stones near it; and as our united funds were
very small, we agreed to defray the expense of the tour by writing a
poem, to be sent to the 'New Monthly Magazine', set up by Philips, the
bookseller, and edited by Dr. Aikin. Accordingly we set off, and
proceeded along the Quantock Hills, towards Watchet; and in the course
of this walk was planned the poem of 'The Ancient Mariner', founded on
a dream, as Mr. Coleridge said, of his friend Mr. Cruikshank. Much the
greatest part of the story was Mr. Coleridge's invention; but certain
parts I myself suggested: for example, some crime was to be committed
which should bring upon the Old Navigator, as Coleridge afterwards
delighted to call him, the spectral persecution, as a consequence of
that crime, and his own wanderings. I had been reading in Shelvocke's
'Voyages', a day or two before, that, while doubling Cape Horn, they
frequently saw albatrosses in that latitude, the largest sort of
sea-fowl, some extending their wings twelve or thirteen feet.
'Suppose,' said I, 'you represent him as having killed one of these
birds on entering the South Sea, and that the tutelary spirits of
these regions take upon them to avenge the crime. ' The incident was
thought fit for the purpose, and adopted accordingly. I also suggested
the navigation of the ship by the dead men, but do not recollect that
I had anything more to do with the scheme of the poem. The gloss with
which it was subsequently accompanied was not thought of by either of
us at the time; at least not a hint of it was given to me, and I have
no doubt it was a gratuitous after-thought. We began the composition
together, on that to me memorable evening: I furnished two or three
lines at the beginning of the poem, in particular--
And listen'd like a three years' child;
The Mariner had his will.
These trifling contributions, all but one (which Mr. C. has with
unnecessary scrupulosity recorded), slipt out of his mind, as well
they might. As we endeavoured to proceed conjointly (I speak of the
same evening), our respective manners proved so widely different, that
it would have been quite presumptuous in me to do anything but
separate from an undertaking upon which I could only have been a clog.
We returned after a few days from a delightful tour, of which I have
many pleasant, and some of them droll enough, recollections. We
returned by Dulverton to Alfoxden. 'The Ancient Mariner' grew and grew
till it became too important for our first object, which was limited
to our expectation of five pounds; and we began to talk of a volume
which was to consist, as Mr. Coleridge has told the world, of Poems
chiefly on natural subjects taken from common life, but looked at, as
much as might be, through an imaginative medium. Accordingly I wrote
'The Idiot Boy', 'Her eyes are wild', etc. , 'We are Seven', 'The
Thorn', and some others. To return to 'We are Seven', the piece that
called forth this note, I composed it while walking in the grove at
Alfoxden. My friends will not deem it too trifling to relate, that
while walking to and fro I composed the last stanza first, having
begun with the last line. When it was all but finished, I came in and
recited it to Mr. Coleridge and my sister, and said, "A prefatory
stanza must be added, and I should sit down to our little tea-meal
with greater pleasure if my task was finished. " I mentioned in
substance what I wished to be expressed, and Coleridge immediately
threw off the stanza, thus;
A little child, dear brother Jem,
I objected to the rhyme, 'dear brother Jem,' as being ludicrous; but
we all enjoyed the joke of hitching in our friend James Tobin's name,
who was familiarly called Jem. He was the brother of the dramatist;
and this reminds me of an anecdote which it may be worth while here to
notice. The said Jem got a sight of the "Lyrical Ballads" as it was
going through the press at Bristol, during which time I was residing
in that city. One evening he came to me with a grave face, and said,
"Wordsworth, I have seen the volume that Coleridge and you are about
to publish. There is one poem in it which I earnestly entreat you will
cancel, for, if published, it will make you everlastingly ridiculous. "
I answered, that I felt much obliged by the interest he took in my
good name as a writer, and begged to know what was the unfortunate
piece he alluded to. He said, 'It is called 'We are Seven'. ' 'Nay,'
said I, 'that shall take its chance, however'; and he left me in
despair. I have only to add, that in the spring [A] of 1841, I
revisited Goodrich Castle, not having seen that part of the Wye since
I met the little girl there in 1793. It would have given me greater
pleasure to have found in the neighbouring hamlet traces of one who
had interested me so much, but that was impossible, as unfortunately I
did not even know her name. The ruin, from its position and features,
is a most impressive object. I could not but deeply regret that its
solemnity was impaired by a fantastic new Castle set up on a
projection of the same ridge, as if to show how far modern art can go
in surpassing all that could be done by antiquity and nature with
their united graces, remembrances, and associations. I could have
almost wished for power, so much the contrast vexed me, to blow away
Sir----Meyrick's impertinent structure and all the fopperies it
contains. --I. F. ]
* * * * *
The "structure" referred to is Goodrich Court, built in 1828 by Sir
Samuel Rush Meyrick--a collector of ancient armour, and a great
authority on the subject--mainly to receive his extensive private
collection. The armour has been removed from Goodrich to the South
Kensington Museum. 'We are Seven' was placed by Wordsworth among his
"Poems referring to the Period of Childhood. "--Ed.
* * * * *
THE POEM
--A simple Child, [1]
That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death? [B]
I met a little cottage Girl: 5
She was eight years old, she said;
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered round her head.
She had a rustic, woodland air,
And she was wildly clad: 10
Her eyes were fair, and very fair;
--Her beauty made me glad.
"Sisters and brothers, little Maid,
How many may you be? "
"How many? Seven in all," she said, 15
And wondering looked at me.
"And where are they? I pray you tell. "
She answered, "Seven are we;
And two of us at Conway dwell,
And two are gone to sea. 20
"Two of us in the church-yard lie,
My sister and my brother;
And, in the church-yard cottage, I
Dwell near them with my mother. "
"You say that two at Conway dwell, 25
And two are gone to sea,
Yet ye [2] are seven! I pray you tell,
Sweet Maid, how this may be. "
Then did the little Maid reply,
"Seven boys and girls are we; 30
Two of us in the church-yard lie,
Beneath the church-yard tree. "
"You run about, my little Maid,
Your limbs they are alive;
If two are in the church-yard laid, 35
Then ye are only five. "
"Their graves are green, they may be seen,"
The little Maid replied,
"Twelve steps or more from my mother's door,
And they are side by side. 40
"My stockings there I often knit,
My kerchief there I hem;
And there upon the ground I sit,
And sing a song to them. [3]
"And often after sun-set, Sir, 45
When it is light and fair,
I take my little porringer,
And eat my supper there.
"The first that died was sister Jane; [4]
In bed she moaning lay, 50
Till God released her of her pain;
And then she went away.
"So in the church-yard she was laid;
And, when the grass was dry, [5]
Together round her grave we played, 55
My brother John and I.
"And when the ground was white with snow,
And I could run and slide,
My brother John was forced to go,
And he lies by her side. " 60
"How many are you, then," said I,
"If they two are in heaven? "
Quick was the little Maid's reply, [6]
"O Master! we are seven. "
"But they are dead; those two are dead! 65
Their spirits are in heaven! "
'Twas throwing words away; for still
The little Maid would have her will,
And said, "Nay, we are seven! "
* * * * *
VARIANTS ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1815.
A simple child, dear brother Jim, 1798. ]
[Variant 2:
1815.
. . . you . . . 1798. ]
[Variant 3:
1836.
I sit and sing to them. 1798. ]
[Variant 4:
1836.
. . . little Jane; 1798. ]
[Variant 5:
1827.
And all the summer dry, 1798. ]
[Variant 6:
1836.
The little Maiden did reply, 1798. ]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: It was in June, after leaving Alfoxden finally. --Ed. ]
[Footnote B: The whole of this stanza was written by Coleridge. In a MS.
copy of the poem, transcribed by him, after 1806, Wordsworth gave it the
title 'We are Seven, or Death', but afterwards restored the original
title. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
ANECDOTE FOR FATHERS
Composed 1798. --Published 1798.
'Retine vim istam, falsa enim dicam, si coges. '
EUSEBIUS. [A]
* * * * *
[This was suggested in front of Alfoxden. The boy was a son of my
friend, Basil Montagu, who had been two or three years under our care.
The name of Kilve is from a village on the Bristol Channel, about a
mile from Alfoxden; and the name of Liswyn Farm was taken from a
beautiful spot on the Wye, where Mr. Coleridge, my sister, and I had
been visiting the famous John Thelwall, who had taken refuge from
politics, after a trial for high treason, with a view to bring up his
family by the profits of agriculture, which proved as unfortunate a
speculation as that he had fled from. Coleridge and he had both been
public lecturers; Coleridge mingling, with his politics, Theology,
from which the other elocutionist abstained, unless it was for the
sake of a sneer. This quondam community of public employment induced
Thelwall to visit Coleridge at Nether Stowey, where he fell in my way.
He really was a man of extraordinary talent, an affectionate husband,
and a good father. Though brought up in the city, on a tailor's board,
he was truly sensible of the beauty of natural objects. I remember
once, when Coleridge, he, and I were seated together upon the turf, on
the brink of a stream in the most beautiful part of the most beautiful
glen of Alfoxden, Coleridge exclaimed, 'This is a place to reconcile
one to all the jarrings and conflicts of the wide world. ' 'Nay,' said
Thelwall, 'to make one forget them altogether. ' The visit of this man
to Coleridge was, as I believe Coleridge has related, the occasion of
a spy being sent by Government to watch our proceedings; which were, I
can say with truth, such as the world at large would have thought
ludicrously harmless. --I. F. ]
* * * * *
In the editions 1798 to 1843 the title of this poem is 'Anecdote for
Fathers, showing how the practice [1] of lying may be taught'. It was
placed among the "Poems referring to the Period of Childhood. "--Ed.
* * * * *
THE POEM
I have a boy of five years old;
His face is fair and fresh to see;
His limbs are cast in beauty's mould,
And dearly he loves me.
One morn we strolled on our dry walk, 5
Our quiet home [2] all full in view,
And held such intermitted talk
As we are wont to do.
My thoughts on former pleasures ran;
I thought of Kilve's delightful shore, 10
Our [3] pleasant home when spring began,
A long, long year before.
A day it was when I could bear
Some fond regrets to entertain; [4]
With so much happiness to spare, 15
I could not feel a pain.
The green earth echoed to the feet
Of lambs that bounded through the glade,
From shade to sunshine, and as fleet
From sunshine back to shade. [5] 20
Birds warbled round me--and each trace
Of inward sadness had its charm;
Kilve, thought I, was a favoured place,[6]
And so is Liswyn farm.
My boy beside me tripped, so slim 25
And graceful in his rustic dress!
And, as we talked, I questioned him, [7]
In very idleness.
"Now tell me, had you rather be,"
I said, and took him by the arm, 30
"On Kilve's smooth shore, by the green sea,
Or here at Liswyn farm? " [8]
In careless mood he looked at me,
While still I held him by the arm,
And said, "At Kilve I'd rather be 35
Than here at Liswyn farm. "
"Now, little Edward, say why so:
My little Edward, tell me why. "--
"I cannot tell, I do not know. "--
"Why, this is strange," said I; 40
"For, here are woods, hills smooth and warm: [9]
There surely must some reason be
Why you would change sweet Liswyn farm
For Kilve by the green sea. "
At this, my boy hung down his head, 45
He blushed with shame, nor made reply; [10]
And three times to the child I said, [11]
"Why, Edward, tell me why? "
His head he raised--there was in sight,
It caught his eye, he saw it plain-- 50
Upon the house-top, glittering bright,
A broad and gilded vane.
IDONEA Alas! the thought of such a cruel death
Has overwhelmed him. --I must follow.
ELDRED Lady!
You will do well; (she goes) unjust suspicion may
Cleave to this Stranger: if, upon his entering,
The dead Man heave a groan, or from his side
Uplift his hand--that would be evidence.
ELEANOR Shame! Eldred, shame!
MARMADUKE (both returning)
The dead have but one face.
(To himself. )
And such a Man--so meek and unoffending--
Helpless and harmless as a babe: a Man,
By obvious signal to the world's protection,
Solemnly dedicated--to decoy him! --
IDONEA Oh, had you seen him living! --
MARMADUKE I (so filled
With horror is this world) am unto thee
The thing most precious, that it now contains:
Therefore through me alone must be revealed
By whom thy Parent was destroyed, Idonea!
I have the proofs! --
IDONEA O miserable Father!
Thou didst command me to bless all mankind;
Nor to this moment, have I ever wished
Evil to any living thing; but hear me,
Hear me, ye Heavens! --
(kneeling) --may vengeance haunt the fiend
For this most cruel murder: let him live
And move in terror of the elements;
The thunder send him on his knees to prayer
In the open streets, and let him think he sees,
If e'er he entereth the house of God,
The roof, self-moved, unsettling o'er his head;
And let him, when he would lie down at night,
Point to his wife the blood-drops on his pillow!
MARMADUKE My voice was silent, but my heart hath joined thee.
IDONEA (leaning on MARMADUKE)
Left to the mercy of that savage Man!
How could he call upon his Child! --O Friend!
[Turns to MARMADUKE. ]
My faithful true and only Comforter.
MARMADUKE Ay, come to me and weep. (He kisses her. )
(To ELDRED. ) Yes, Varlet, look,
The devils at such sights do clap their hands.
[ELDRED retires alarmed. ]
IDONEA Thy vest is torn, thy cheek is deadly pale;
Hast thou pursued the monster?
MARMADUKE I have found him. --
Oh! would that thou hadst perished in the flames!
IDONEA Here art thou, then can I be desolate? --
MARMADUKE There was a time, when this protecting hand
Availed against the mighty; never more
Shall blessings wait upon a deed of mine.
IDONEA Wild words for me to hear, for me, an orphan,
Committed to thy guardianship by Heaven;
And, if thou hast forgiven me, let me hope,
In this deep sorrow, trust, that I am thine
For closer care;--here, is no malady.
[Taking his arm. ]
MARMADUKE There, _is_ a malady--
(Striking his heart and forehead. ) And here, and here,
A mortal malady. --I am accurst:
All nature curses me, and in my heart
_Thy_ curse is fixed; the truth must be laid bare.
It must be told, and borne. I am the man,
(Abused, betrayed, but how it matters not)
Presumptuous above all that ever breathed,
Who, casting as I thought a guilty Person
Upon Heaven's righteous judgment, did become
An instrument of Fiends. Through me, through me,
Thy Father perished.
IDONEA Perished--by what mischance?
MARMADUKE Beloved! --if I dared, so would I call thee--
Conflict must cease, and, in thy frozen heart,
The extremes of suffering meet in absolute peace.
[He gives her a letter. ]
IDONEA (reads)
"Be not surprised if you hear that some signal judgment
has befallen the man who calls himself your father; he is
now with me, as his signature will shew: abstain from
conjecture till you see me.
"HERBERT.
"MARMADUKE. "
The writing Oswald's; the signature my Father's:
(Looks steadily at the paper. )
And here is yours,--or do my eyes deceive me?
You have then seen my Father?
MARMADUKE He has leaned
Upon this arm.
IDONEA You led him towards the Convent?
MARMADUKE That Convent was Stone-Arthur Castle. Thither
We were his guides. I on that night resolved
That he should wait thy coming till the day
Of resurrection.
IDONEA Miserable Woman,
Too quickly moved, too easily giving way,
I put denial on thy suit, and hence,
With the disastrous issue of last night,
Thy perturbation, and these frantic words.
Be calm, I pray thee!
MARMADUKE Oswald--
IDONEA Name him not.
[Enter Female Beggar. ]
BEGGAR And he is dead! --that Moor--how shall I cross it?
By night, by day, never shall I be able
To travel half a mile alone. --Good Lady!
Forgive me! --Saints forgive me. Had I thought
It would have come to this! --
IDONEA What brings you hither? speak!
BEGGAR (pointing to MARMADUKE)
This innocent Gentleman. Sweet heavens! I told him
Such tales of your dead Father! --God is my judge,
I thought there was no harm: but that bad Man,
He bribed me with his gold, and looked so fierce.
Mercy! I said I know not what--oh pity me--
I said, sweet Lady, you were not his Daughter--
Pity me, I am haunted;--thrice this day
My conscience made me wish to be struck blind;
And then I would have prayed, and had no voice.
IDONEA (to MARMADUKE)
Was it my Father? --no, no, no, for he
Was meek and patient, feeble, old and blind,
Helpless, and loved me dearer than his life
--But hear me. For _one_ question, I have a heart
That will sustain me. Did you murder him?
MARMADUKE No, not by stroke of arm. But learn the process:
Proof after proof was pressed upon me; guilt
Made evident, as seemed, by blacker guilt,
Whose impious folds enwrapped even thee; and truth
And innocence, embodied in his looks,
His words and tones and gestures, did but serve
With me to aggravate his crimes, and heaped
Ruin upon the cause for which they pleaded.
Then pity crossed the path of my resolve:
Confounded, I looked up to Heaven, and cast,
Idonea! thy blind Father, on the Ordeal
Of the bleak Waste--left him--and so he died! --
[IDONEA sinks senseless; Beggar, ELEANOR, etc. , crowd round, and bear
her off. ]
Why may we speak these things, and do no more;
Why should a thrust of the arm have such a power,
And words that tell these things be heard in vain?
_She_ is not dead. Why! --if I loved this Woman,
I would take care she never woke again;
But she WILL wake, and she will weep for me,
And say, no blame was mine--and so, poor fool,
Will waste her curses on another name.
[He walks about distractedly. ]
[Enter OSWALD. ]
OSWALD (to himself)
Strong to o'erturn, strong also to build up.
[To MARMADUKE. ]
The starts and sallies of our last encounter
Were natural enough; but that, I trust,
Is all gone by. You have cast off the chains
That fettered your nobility of mind--
Delivered heart and head!
Let us to Palestine;
This is a paltry field for enterprise.
MARMADUKE Ay, what shall we encounter next? This issue--
'Twas nothing more than darkness deepening darkness,
And weakness crowned with the impotence of death! --
Your pupil is, you see, an apt proficient.
(ironically)
Start not! --Here is another face hard by;
Come, let us take a peep at both together,
And, with a voice at which the dead will quake,
Resound the praise of your morality--
Of this too much.
[Drawing OSWALD towards the Cottage--stops short at the door. ]
Men are there, millions, Oswald,
Who with bare hands would have plucked out thy heart
And flung it to the dogs: but I am raised
Above, or sunk below, all further sense
Of provocation. Leave me, with the weight
Of that old Man's forgiveness on thy heart,
Pressing as heavily as it doth on mine.
Coward I have been; know, there lies not now
Within the compass of a mortal thought,
A deed that I would shrink from;--but to endure,
That is my destiny. May it be thine:
Thy office, thy ambition, be henceforth
To feed remorse, to welcome every sting
Of penitential anguish, yea with tears.
When seas and continents shall lie between us--
The wider space the better--we may find
In such a course fit links of sympathy,
An incommunicable rivalship
Maintained, for peaceful ends beyond our view.
[Confused voices--several of the Band enter--rush upon OSWALD and
seize him. ]
ONE OF THEM I would have dogged him to the jaws of hell--
OSWALD Ha! is it so! --That vagrant Hag! --this comes
Of having left a thing like her alive! [Aside. ]
SEVERAL VOICES
Despatch him!
OSWALD If I pass beneath a rock
And shout, and, with the echo of my voice,
Bring down a heap of rubbish, and it crush me,
I die without dishonour. Famished, starved,
A Fool and Coward blended to my wish!
[Smiles scornfully and exultingly at MARMADUKE. ]
WALLACE 'Tis done! (Stabs him. )
ANOTHER OF THE BAND
The ruthless traitor!
MARMADUKE A rash deed! --
With that reproof I do resign a station
Of which I have been proud.
WILFRED (approaching MARMADUKE)
O my poor Master!
MARMADUKE Discerning Monitor, my faithful Wilfred,
Why art thou here?
[Turning to WALLACE. ]
Wallace, upon these Borders,
Many there be whose eyes will not want cause
To weep that I am gone. Brothers in arms!
Raise on that dreary Waste a monument
That may record my story: nor let words--
Few must they be, and delicate in their touch
As light itself--be there withheld from Her
Who, through most wicked arts, was made an orphan
By One who would have died a thousand times,
To shield her from a moment's harm. To you,
Wallace and Wilfred, I commend the Lady,
By lowly nature reared, as if to make her
In all things worthier of that noble birth,
Whose long-suspended rights are now on the eve
Of restoration: with your tenderest care
Watch over her, I pray--sustain her--
SEVERAL OF THE BAND (eagerly)
Captain!
MARMADUKE No more of that; in silence hear my doom:
A hermitage has furnished fit relief
To some offenders; other penitents,
Less patient in their wretchedness, have fallen,
Like the old Roman, on their own sword's point.
They had their choice: a wanderer _must I_ go,
The Spectre of that innocent Man, my guide.
No human ear shall ever hear me speak;
No human dwelling ever give me food,
Or sleep, or rest: but, over waste and wild,
In search of nothing, that this earth can give,
But expiation, will I wander on--
A Man by pain and thought compelled to live,
Yet loathing life--till anger is appeased
In Heaven, and Mercy gives me leave to die.
* * * * *
In June 1797 Coleridge wrote to his friend Cottle:
"W. has written a tragedy himself. I speak with heart-felt sincerity,
and, I think, unblinded judgment, when I tell you that I feel myself a
little man by his side, and yet I do not think myself a less man than
I formerly thought myself. His drama is absolutely wonderful. You know
I do not commonly speak in such abrupt and unmingled phrases, and
therefore will the more readily believe me. There are in the piece
those profound touches of the human heart which I find three or four
times in the 'Robbers' of Schiller, and often in Shakspeare; but in W.
there are no inequalities. "
On August 6, 1800, Charles Lamb wrote to Coleridge:
"I would pay five-and-forty thousand carriages to read W. 's tragedy,
of which I have heard so much and seen so little. " Shortly afterwards,
August 26, he wrote to Coleridge: "I have a sort of a recollection
that somebody, I think _you_, promised me a sight of Wordsworth's
tragedy. I shall be very glad of it just now, for I have got Manning
with me, and should like to read it _with him_. But this, I confess,
is a refinement. Under any circumstances, alone, in Cold-Bath Prison,
or in the desert island, just when Prospero and his crew had set off,
with Caliban in a cage, to Milan, it would be a treat to me to read
that play. Manning has read it, so has Lloyd, and all Lloyd's family;
but I could not get him to betray his trust by giving me a sight of
it. Lloyd is sadly deficient in some of those virtuous vices. "--Ed.
* * * * *
VARIANTS ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1845.
. . . female . . . 1842. ]
[Variant 2:
1845.
Ha! . . . 1842. ]
[Variant 3:
1849.
With whom you parted? 1842. ]
[Variant 4:
1845.
. . . o'er . . . 1842. ]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: He doubtless refers to the lines (Act iii. l. 405) "Action
is transitory--a step, a blow," etc. , which followed the Dedication of
'The White Doe of Rylstone' in the edition of 1836. --Ed. ]
[Footnote B: Note prefixed to the edition of 1842. --Ed. ]
[Footnote C: Note appended to the edition of 1842. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
THE REVERIE OF POOR SUSAN
Composed 1797. --Published 1800.
[Written 1801 or 1802. This arose out of my observations of the
affecting music of these birds, hanging in this way in the London
streets during the freshness and stillness of the spring morning. --I.
F. ]
Placed by Wordsworth among his "Poems of the Imagination. "--Ed.
The preceding Fenwick note to this poem is manifestly inaccurate as to
date, since the poem is printed in the "Lyrical Ballads" of 1800. In the
edition of 1836 the date of composition is given as 1797, and this date
is followed by Mr. Carter, the editor of 1857. Miss Wordsworth's Journal
gives no date; and, as the Fenwick note is certainly incorrect--and the
poem must have been written before the edition of 1800 came out--it
seems best to trust to the date sanctioned by Wordsworth himself in
1836, and followed by his literary executor in 1857. I think it probable
that the poem was written during the short visit which Wordsworth and
his sister paid to their brother Richard in London in 1797, when he
tried to get his tragedy, 'The Borderers', brought on the stage. The
title of the poem from 1800 to 1805 was 'Poor Susan'. --Ed.
* * * * *
THE POEM
At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears,
Hangs a Thrush [1] that sings loud, it has sung for three years:
Poor Susan has passed by the spot, and has heard
In the silence of morning the song of the Bird.
'Tis a note of enchantment; what ails her? She sees 5
A mountain ascending, a vision of trees;
Bright volumes of vapour through Lothbury glide,
And a river flows on through the vale of Cheapside.
Green pastures she views [A] in the midst of the dale,
Down which she so often has tripped with her pail; 10
And a single small cottage, a nest like a dove's,
The one only [2] dwelling on earth that she loves.
She looks, and her heart is in heaven: but they fade,
The mist and the river, the hill and the shade:
The stream will not flow, and the hill will not rise, 15
And the colours have all passed away from her eyes! [3]
* * * * *
VARIANTS ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1820.
There's a Thrush . . . 1800. ]
[Variant 2:
1802.
The only one . . . 1800. ]
[Variant 3: The following stanza, in the edition of 1800, was omitted in
subsequent ones:
Poor Outcast! return--to receive thee once more
The house of thy Father will open its door,
And thou once again, in thy plain russet gown,
May'st hear the thrush sing from a tree of its own. [i]]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTE ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: Wordsworth originally wrote "sees. " S. T. C. suggested
"views. "--Ed. ]
* * * * *
SUB-FOOTNOTE ON VARIANT 3
[Sub-Footnote i:
"Susan stood for the representative of poor '_Rus in urbe_. ' There was
quite enough to stamp the moral of the thing never to be forgotten;
'bright volumes of vapour,' etc. The last verse of Susan was to be got
rid of, at all events. It threw a kind of dubiety upon Susan's moral
conduct. Susan is a servant maid. I see her trundling her mop, and
contemplating the whirling phenomenon through blurred optics; but to
term her 'a poor outcast' seems as much as to say that poor Susan was
no better than she should be, which I trust was not what you meant to
express. "
Charles Lamb to Wordsworth. See 'The Letters of Charles Lamb', edited by
Alfred Ainger, vol. i. , p. 287. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
1798
A NIGHT PIECE
Composed 1798. --Published 1815.
[Composed on the road between Nether Stowey and Alfoxden, extempore. I
distinctly recollect the very moment when I was struck, as
described,--'He looks up, the clouds are split,' etc. --I. F. ]
Classed by Wordsworth among his "Poems of the Imagination. "--Ed.
* * * * *
--The sky is overcast
With a continuous cloud of texture close,
Heavy and wan, all whitened by the Moon,
Which through that veil is indistinctly seen,
A dull, contracted circle, yielding light 5
So feebly spread, that not a shadow falls,
Chequering the ground--from rock, plant, tree, or tower.
At length a pleasant instantaneous gleam
Startles the pensive traveller while [1] he treads
His lonesome path, with unobserving eye 10
Bent earthwards; he looks up--the clouds are split
Asunder,--and above his head he sees
The clear Moon, and the glory of the heavens.
There, in a black-blue vault she sails along,
Followed by multitudes of stars, that, small 15
And sharp, and bright, [A] along the dark abyss
Drive as she drives: how fast they wheel away,
Yet vanish not! --the wind is in the tree,
But they are silent;--still they roll along
Immeasurably distant; and the vault, 20
Built round by those white clouds, enormous clouds,
Still deepens its unfathomable depth.
At length the Vision closes; and the mind,
Not undisturbed by the delight it feels,
Which slowly settles into peaceful calm, 25
Is left to muse upon the solemn scene.
* * * * *
VARIANT ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1827
. . . as . . . 1815. ]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTE ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: The indebtedness of the Poet to his Sister is nowhere more
conspicuous than in this Poem. In Dorothy Wordsworth's Alfoxden Journal
the following occurs, under date 25th January 1798:
"Went to Poole's after tea. The sky spread over with one continuous
cloud, whitened by the light of the moon, which, though her dim shape
was seen, did not throw forth so strong a light as to chequer the
earth with shadows. At once the clouds seemed to cleave asunder, and
lift her in the centre of a black-blue vault. She sailed along,
followed by multitudes of stars, small, and bright, and sharp; their
brightness seemed concentrated. "
Ed. ]
* * * * *
WE ARE SEVEN
Composed 1798. --Published 1798.
[Written at Alfoxden in the spring of 1798, under circumstances
somewhat remarkable. The little girl who is the heroine, I met within
the area of Goodrich Castle in the year 1793. Having left the Isle of
Wight, and crost Salisbury Plain, as mentioned in the preface to
'Guilt and Sorrow', I proceeded by Bristol up the Wye, and so on to N.
Wales to the Vale of Clwydd, where I spent my summer under the roof of
the father of my friend, Robert Jones.
In reference to this poem, I will here mention one of the most
remarkable facts in my own poetic history, and that of Mr. Coleridge.
In the spring of the year 1798, he, my sister, and myself, started
from Alfoxden pretty late in the afternoon, with a view to visit
Linton and the Valley of Stones near it; and as our united funds were
very small, we agreed to defray the expense of the tour by writing a
poem, to be sent to the 'New Monthly Magazine', set up by Philips, the
bookseller, and edited by Dr. Aikin. Accordingly we set off, and
proceeded along the Quantock Hills, towards Watchet; and in the course
of this walk was planned the poem of 'The Ancient Mariner', founded on
a dream, as Mr. Coleridge said, of his friend Mr. Cruikshank. Much the
greatest part of the story was Mr. Coleridge's invention; but certain
parts I myself suggested: for example, some crime was to be committed
which should bring upon the Old Navigator, as Coleridge afterwards
delighted to call him, the spectral persecution, as a consequence of
that crime, and his own wanderings. I had been reading in Shelvocke's
'Voyages', a day or two before, that, while doubling Cape Horn, they
frequently saw albatrosses in that latitude, the largest sort of
sea-fowl, some extending their wings twelve or thirteen feet.
'Suppose,' said I, 'you represent him as having killed one of these
birds on entering the South Sea, and that the tutelary spirits of
these regions take upon them to avenge the crime. ' The incident was
thought fit for the purpose, and adopted accordingly. I also suggested
the navigation of the ship by the dead men, but do not recollect that
I had anything more to do with the scheme of the poem. The gloss with
which it was subsequently accompanied was not thought of by either of
us at the time; at least not a hint of it was given to me, and I have
no doubt it was a gratuitous after-thought. We began the composition
together, on that to me memorable evening: I furnished two or three
lines at the beginning of the poem, in particular--
And listen'd like a three years' child;
The Mariner had his will.
These trifling contributions, all but one (which Mr. C. has with
unnecessary scrupulosity recorded), slipt out of his mind, as well
they might. As we endeavoured to proceed conjointly (I speak of the
same evening), our respective manners proved so widely different, that
it would have been quite presumptuous in me to do anything but
separate from an undertaking upon which I could only have been a clog.
We returned after a few days from a delightful tour, of which I have
many pleasant, and some of them droll enough, recollections. We
returned by Dulverton to Alfoxden. 'The Ancient Mariner' grew and grew
till it became too important for our first object, which was limited
to our expectation of five pounds; and we began to talk of a volume
which was to consist, as Mr. Coleridge has told the world, of Poems
chiefly on natural subjects taken from common life, but looked at, as
much as might be, through an imaginative medium. Accordingly I wrote
'The Idiot Boy', 'Her eyes are wild', etc. , 'We are Seven', 'The
Thorn', and some others. To return to 'We are Seven', the piece that
called forth this note, I composed it while walking in the grove at
Alfoxden. My friends will not deem it too trifling to relate, that
while walking to and fro I composed the last stanza first, having
begun with the last line. When it was all but finished, I came in and
recited it to Mr. Coleridge and my sister, and said, "A prefatory
stanza must be added, and I should sit down to our little tea-meal
with greater pleasure if my task was finished. " I mentioned in
substance what I wished to be expressed, and Coleridge immediately
threw off the stanza, thus;
A little child, dear brother Jem,
I objected to the rhyme, 'dear brother Jem,' as being ludicrous; but
we all enjoyed the joke of hitching in our friend James Tobin's name,
who was familiarly called Jem. He was the brother of the dramatist;
and this reminds me of an anecdote which it may be worth while here to
notice. The said Jem got a sight of the "Lyrical Ballads" as it was
going through the press at Bristol, during which time I was residing
in that city. One evening he came to me with a grave face, and said,
"Wordsworth, I have seen the volume that Coleridge and you are about
to publish. There is one poem in it which I earnestly entreat you will
cancel, for, if published, it will make you everlastingly ridiculous. "
I answered, that I felt much obliged by the interest he took in my
good name as a writer, and begged to know what was the unfortunate
piece he alluded to. He said, 'It is called 'We are Seven'. ' 'Nay,'
said I, 'that shall take its chance, however'; and he left me in
despair. I have only to add, that in the spring [A] of 1841, I
revisited Goodrich Castle, not having seen that part of the Wye since
I met the little girl there in 1793. It would have given me greater
pleasure to have found in the neighbouring hamlet traces of one who
had interested me so much, but that was impossible, as unfortunately I
did not even know her name. The ruin, from its position and features,
is a most impressive object. I could not but deeply regret that its
solemnity was impaired by a fantastic new Castle set up on a
projection of the same ridge, as if to show how far modern art can go
in surpassing all that could be done by antiquity and nature with
their united graces, remembrances, and associations. I could have
almost wished for power, so much the contrast vexed me, to blow away
Sir----Meyrick's impertinent structure and all the fopperies it
contains. --I. F. ]
* * * * *
The "structure" referred to is Goodrich Court, built in 1828 by Sir
Samuel Rush Meyrick--a collector of ancient armour, and a great
authority on the subject--mainly to receive his extensive private
collection. The armour has been removed from Goodrich to the South
Kensington Museum. 'We are Seven' was placed by Wordsworth among his
"Poems referring to the Period of Childhood. "--Ed.
* * * * *
THE POEM
--A simple Child, [1]
That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death? [B]
I met a little cottage Girl: 5
She was eight years old, she said;
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered round her head.
She had a rustic, woodland air,
And she was wildly clad: 10
Her eyes were fair, and very fair;
--Her beauty made me glad.
"Sisters and brothers, little Maid,
How many may you be? "
"How many? Seven in all," she said, 15
And wondering looked at me.
"And where are they? I pray you tell. "
She answered, "Seven are we;
And two of us at Conway dwell,
And two are gone to sea. 20
"Two of us in the church-yard lie,
My sister and my brother;
And, in the church-yard cottage, I
Dwell near them with my mother. "
"You say that two at Conway dwell, 25
And two are gone to sea,
Yet ye [2] are seven! I pray you tell,
Sweet Maid, how this may be. "
Then did the little Maid reply,
"Seven boys and girls are we; 30
Two of us in the church-yard lie,
Beneath the church-yard tree. "
"You run about, my little Maid,
Your limbs they are alive;
If two are in the church-yard laid, 35
Then ye are only five. "
"Their graves are green, they may be seen,"
The little Maid replied,
"Twelve steps or more from my mother's door,
And they are side by side. 40
"My stockings there I often knit,
My kerchief there I hem;
And there upon the ground I sit,
And sing a song to them. [3]
"And often after sun-set, Sir, 45
When it is light and fair,
I take my little porringer,
And eat my supper there.
"The first that died was sister Jane; [4]
In bed she moaning lay, 50
Till God released her of her pain;
And then she went away.
"So in the church-yard she was laid;
And, when the grass was dry, [5]
Together round her grave we played, 55
My brother John and I.
"And when the ground was white with snow,
And I could run and slide,
My brother John was forced to go,
And he lies by her side. " 60
"How many are you, then," said I,
"If they two are in heaven? "
Quick was the little Maid's reply, [6]
"O Master! we are seven. "
"But they are dead; those two are dead! 65
Their spirits are in heaven! "
'Twas throwing words away; for still
The little Maid would have her will,
And said, "Nay, we are seven! "
* * * * *
VARIANTS ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1815.
A simple child, dear brother Jim, 1798. ]
[Variant 2:
1815.
. . . you . . . 1798. ]
[Variant 3:
1836.
I sit and sing to them. 1798. ]
[Variant 4:
1836.
. . . little Jane; 1798. ]
[Variant 5:
1827.
And all the summer dry, 1798. ]
[Variant 6:
1836.
The little Maiden did reply, 1798. ]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: It was in June, after leaving Alfoxden finally. --Ed. ]
[Footnote B: The whole of this stanza was written by Coleridge. In a MS.
copy of the poem, transcribed by him, after 1806, Wordsworth gave it the
title 'We are Seven, or Death', but afterwards restored the original
title. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
ANECDOTE FOR FATHERS
Composed 1798. --Published 1798.
'Retine vim istam, falsa enim dicam, si coges. '
EUSEBIUS. [A]
* * * * *
[This was suggested in front of Alfoxden. The boy was a son of my
friend, Basil Montagu, who had been two or three years under our care.
The name of Kilve is from a village on the Bristol Channel, about a
mile from Alfoxden; and the name of Liswyn Farm was taken from a
beautiful spot on the Wye, where Mr. Coleridge, my sister, and I had
been visiting the famous John Thelwall, who had taken refuge from
politics, after a trial for high treason, with a view to bring up his
family by the profits of agriculture, which proved as unfortunate a
speculation as that he had fled from. Coleridge and he had both been
public lecturers; Coleridge mingling, with his politics, Theology,
from which the other elocutionist abstained, unless it was for the
sake of a sneer. This quondam community of public employment induced
Thelwall to visit Coleridge at Nether Stowey, where he fell in my way.
He really was a man of extraordinary talent, an affectionate husband,
and a good father. Though brought up in the city, on a tailor's board,
he was truly sensible of the beauty of natural objects. I remember
once, when Coleridge, he, and I were seated together upon the turf, on
the brink of a stream in the most beautiful part of the most beautiful
glen of Alfoxden, Coleridge exclaimed, 'This is a place to reconcile
one to all the jarrings and conflicts of the wide world. ' 'Nay,' said
Thelwall, 'to make one forget them altogether. ' The visit of this man
to Coleridge was, as I believe Coleridge has related, the occasion of
a spy being sent by Government to watch our proceedings; which were, I
can say with truth, such as the world at large would have thought
ludicrously harmless. --I. F. ]
* * * * *
In the editions 1798 to 1843 the title of this poem is 'Anecdote for
Fathers, showing how the practice [1] of lying may be taught'. It was
placed among the "Poems referring to the Period of Childhood. "--Ed.
* * * * *
THE POEM
I have a boy of five years old;
His face is fair and fresh to see;
His limbs are cast in beauty's mould,
And dearly he loves me.
One morn we strolled on our dry walk, 5
Our quiet home [2] all full in view,
And held such intermitted talk
As we are wont to do.
My thoughts on former pleasures ran;
I thought of Kilve's delightful shore, 10
Our [3] pleasant home when spring began,
A long, long year before.
A day it was when I could bear
Some fond regrets to entertain; [4]
With so much happiness to spare, 15
I could not feel a pain.
The green earth echoed to the feet
Of lambs that bounded through the glade,
From shade to sunshine, and as fleet
From sunshine back to shade. [5] 20
Birds warbled round me--and each trace
Of inward sadness had its charm;
Kilve, thought I, was a favoured place,[6]
And so is Liswyn farm.
My boy beside me tripped, so slim 25
And graceful in his rustic dress!
And, as we talked, I questioned him, [7]
In very idleness.
"Now tell me, had you rather be,"
I said, and took him by the arm, 30
"On Kilve's smooth shore, by the green sea,
Or here at Liswyn farm? " [8]
In careless mood he looked at me,
While still I held him by the arm,
And said, "At Kilve I'd rather be 35
Than here at Liswyn farm. "
"Now, little Edward, say why so:
My little Edward, tell me why. "--
"I cannot tell, I do not know. "--
"Why, this is strange," said I; 40
"For, here are woods, hills smooth and warm: [9]
There surely must some reason be
Why you would change sweet Liswyn farm
For Kilve by the green sea. "
At this, my boy hung down his head, 45
He blushed with shame, nor made reply; [10]
And three times to the child I said, [11]
"Why, Edward, tell me why? "
His head he raised--there was in sight,
It caught his eye, he saw it plain-- 50
Upon the house-top, glittering bright,
A broad and gilded vane.
