shoulders
scored
Meek beast!
Meek beast!
William Wordsworth
1836.
]
[Variant 69:
1836.
Whom he hath sought . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 70:
1820.
. . . doth rightly spell; 1819. ]
[Variant 71:
1836.
. . . noise . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 72:
1820.
. . . to gain his end 1819. ]
[Variant 73:
1845.
. . . footstep . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 74:
1836.
. . . along a . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 75: In the editions of 1819 and 1820 the following stanza
occurs:
The verdant pathway, in and out,
Winds upwards like a straggling chain;
And, when two toilsome miles are past,
Up through the rocks it leads at last
Into a high and open plain. ]
[Variant 76:
1827.
The . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 77:
1836.
How blank! --but whence this rustling sound
Which, all too long, the pair hath chased!
--A dancing leaf is close behind, 1819.
But whence that faintly-rustling sound 1820.
But whence this faintly rustling sound
By which the pair have long been chased? c. ]
[Variant 78:
1836.
When Peter spies the withered leaf,
It yields no cure to his distress--1819. ]
[Variant 79:
1836.
Ha! why this comfortless despair? 1819. ]
[Variant 80:
1819.
. . . the Creature's head; 1827.
The text of 1845 returns to that of 1819. ]
[Variant 81:
1836.
. . . those darting pains,
As meteors shoot through heaven's wide plains,
Pass through his bosom--and repass! 1819. ]
[Variant 82:
1827.
Reading, as you or I might read
At night in any pious book, 1819. ]
[Variant 83:
1836.
. . . the good man's taper, 1819. ]
[Variant 84:
1836.
The ghostly word, which thus was fram'd, 1819.
. . . full plainly seen, 1827. ]
[Variant 85:
1836.
. . . to torment the good 1819. ]
[Variant 86:
1836.
I know you, potent Spirits! well,
How with the feeling and the sense
Playing, ye govern foes or friends.
Yok'd to your will, for fearful ends--1819. ]
[Variant 87:
1836.
. . . I have often . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 88:
1836.
And well I know . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 89:
1836.
. . . and danc'd . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 90:
1836.
. . . clearly . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 91:
1836.
. . . hath . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 92:
1836.
. . . to confound . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 93:
1836.
But now the pair have reach'd a spot
Where, shelter'd by a rocky cove, 1819.
Meanwhile the pair 1820. ]
[Variant 94:
1836.
The building seems, wall, roof, and tower, 1819. ]
[Variant 95:
1836.
Deep sighing as he pass'd along,
Quoth Peter, "In the shire of Fife,
'Mid such a ruin, following still
From land to land a lawless will, 1819. ]
[Variant 96:
1827.
Making, . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 97:
1836.
As if confusing darkness came 1819.
And a confusing 1832.
While clouds of swimming darkness came
Over his eyesight with the sound. C. ]
[Variant 98: _Italics_ were first used in the edition of 1820. ]
[Variant 99:
1836.
A lonely house her dwelling was, 1819. ]
[Variant 100:
1819.
. . . her name . . . 1820.
The edition of 1827 returns to the text of 1819. ]
[Variant 101:
1820.
Distraction reigns in soul and sense,
And reason drops in impotence
From her deserted pinnacle! 1819. ]
[Variant 102:
1820.
. . . ears . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 103:
1836.
Though clamorous as a hunter's horn
Re-echoed from a naked rock,
'Tis from that tabernacle--List! 1819.
The voice, though clamorous as a horn
Re-echoed by a naked rock,
Is from . . . . 1832. ]
[Variant 104:
1819.
. . . pious . . . c. ]
[Variant 105:
1836.
'Tis said, that through prevailing grace 1819. ]
[Variant 106:
1836.
. . .
shoulders scored
Meek beast! in memory of the Lord 1819.
Faithful memorial of the Lord c. ]
[Variant 107:
1836.
In memory of that solemn day 1819. ]
[Variant 108:
1836.
Towards a gate in open view
Turns up a narrow lane; . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 109:
1836.
Had gone two hundred yards, not more;
When to a lonely house he came;
He turn'd aside towards the same
And stopp'd before the door. 1819. ]
[Variant 110:
1836.
In hope . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 111:
1827.
Close at . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 112:
1832.
What could he do? --The Woman lay 1819. ]
[Variant 113:
1836.
. . . the sufferer . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 114:
1819.
. . . stair . . . 1820.
The edition of 1827 returns to the text of 1819. ]
[Variant 115:
1836.
And to the pillow gives . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 116:
1827.
And resting on . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 117:
1827.
He turns . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 118:
1836.
. . . his inward grief and fear--1819.
. . . his sorrow and his fear--C. ]
[Variant 119:
1827.
. . . had . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 120:
1836.
Towards . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 121:
1832.
. . . repressed . . . 1819. ]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: The title in the two editions of 1819 was 'Peter Bell: A
Tale in Verse. '--Ed. ]
[Footnote B: In Dorothy Wordsworth's Alfoxden Journal the following
occurs, under date April 20, 1798: "The moon crescent. 'Peter Bell'
begun. "--Ed. ]
[Footnote C: 'Romeo and Juliet', act II. scene ii. l. 44. This motto
first appeared on the half-title of 'Peter Bell', second edition, 1819,
under the advertisement of 'Benjamin the Waggoner', its first line being
"What's a Name? " When 'The Waggoner' appeared, a few days afterwards,
the motto stood on its title-page. In the collective edition of the
Poems (1820), it disappeared; but reappeared, in its final position, in
the edition of 1827. --Ed. ]
[Footnote D: 'Julius Caesar', act I. scene ii. l. 147. --Ed. ]
[Footnote E: Compare 'The Prelude', book iv. l. 47:
'the sunny seat
Round the stone table under the dark pine. '
Ed. ]
[Footnote F: In the dialect of the North, a hawker of earthen-ware is
thus designated. --W. W. 1819 (second edition). ]
[Footnote G: Compare 'The Prelude', book v. l. 448:
'At last, the dead man, 'mid that beauteous scene
Of trees and hills and water, bolt upright
Rose, with his ghastly face, a spectre shape
Of terror. '
Ed. ]
[Footnote H: This and the next stanza were omitted from the edition of
1827, but restored in 1832. --Ed. ]
[Footnote I: The notion is very general, that the Cross on the back and
shoulders of this Animal has the origin here alluded to. --W. W. 1819. ]
[Footnote J: I cannot suffer this line to pass, without noticing that it
was suggested by Mr. Haydon's noble Picture of Christ's Entry into
Jerusalem. --W. W. 1820. Into the same picture Haydon "introduced
Wordsworth bowing in reverence and awe. " See the essay on "The Portraits
of Wordsworth" in a later volume, and the portrait itself, which will be
reproduced in the volume containing the 'Life' of the poet. --Ed. ]
[Footnote K: The first and second editions of 'Peter Bell' (1819)
contained, as frontispiece, an engraving by J. C. Bromley, after a
picture by Sir George Beaumont. In 1807, Wordsworth wrote to Sir George:
"I am quite delighted to hear of your picture for 'Peter Bell' . . . .
But remember that no poem of mine will ever be popular, and I am
afraid that the sale of 'Peter' would not carry the expense of
engraving . . . . The people would love the poem of 'Peter Bell', but the
_public_ (a very different thing) will never love it. "
Some days before Wordsworth's 'Peter Bell' was issued in 1819, another
'Peter Bell' was published by Messrs. Taylor and Hessey. It was a parody
written by J. Hamilton Reynolds, and issued as 'Peter Bell, a Lyrical
Ballad', with the sentence on its title page, "I do affirm that I am the
_real_ Simon Pure. " The preface, which follows, is too paltry to quote;
and the stanzas which make up the poem contain allusions to the more
trivial of the early "Lyrical Ballads" (Betty Foy, Harry Gill, etc. ).
Wordsworth's 'Peter Bell' was published about a week later; and Shelley
afterwards published his 'Peter Bell the Third'. Charles Lamb wrote to
Wordsworth, in May 1819:
"Dear Wordsworth--I received a copy of 'Peter Bell' a week ago, and I
hope the author will not be offended if I say I do not much relish it.
The humour, if it is meant for humour, is forced; and then the
price! --sixpence would have been dear for it. Mind, I do not mean
_your_ 'Peter Bell', but _a Peter Bell_, which preceded it about a
week, and is in every bookseller's shop window in London, the type and
paper nothing differing from the true one, the preface signed W. W. ,
and the supplementary preface quoting, as the author's words, an
extract from the supplementary preface to the 'Lyrical Ballads. ' Is
there no law against these rascals? I would have this Lambert Simnel
whipt at the cart's tail. " ('The Letters of Charles Lamb', edited by
A. Ainger, vol. ii. p. 20. )
Barron Field wrote on the title-page of his copy of the edition of
'Peter Bell', 1819,
"And his carcase was cast in the way, and the ass stood by it. "
1 Kings xiii. 24. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
SUB-FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Sub-Footnote a: This stanza, which was deleted from every edition of
'Peter Bell' after the two of 1819, was prefixed by Shelley to his poem
of 'Peter Bell the Third', and many of his contemporaries thought that
it was an invention of Shelley's. See the note which follows this poem,
p. 50. Crabb Robinson wrote in his 'Diary', June 6, 1812:
"Mrs. Basil Montagu told me she had no doubt she had suggested this
image to Wordsworth by relating to him an anecdote. A person, walking
in a friend's garden, looking in at a window, saw a company of ladies
at a table near the window, with countenances _fixed_. In an instant
he was aware of their condition, and broke the window. He saved them
from incipient suffocation. "
Wordsworth subsequently said that he had omitted the stanza only in
deference to the "unco guid. " Crabb Robinson remonstrated with him
against its exclusion. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
LINES,[A] COMPOSED A FEW MILES ABOVE TINTERN ABBEY, ON REVISITING THE
BANKS OF THE WYE DURING A TOUR, JULY 13, 1798 [B]
Composed July 1798. --Published 1798
[July 1798. No poem of mine was composed under circumstances more
pleasant for me to remember than this. I began it upon leaving Tintern,
after crossing the Wye, and concluded it just as I was entering Bristol
in the evening, after a ramble of four or five days, with my sister. Not
a line of it was altered, and not any part of it written down till I
reached Bristol. It was published almost immediately after in the little
volume of which so much has been said in these Notes, the "Lyrical
Ballads," as first published at Bristol by Cottle. --I. F. ]
Included among the "Poems of the Imagination. "--Ed.
Five years have past; five summers, with the length
Of five long winters! [C] and again I hear
These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs
With a soft [1] inland murmur. [D]--Once again
Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs, 5
That [2] on a wild secluded scene impress
Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect
The landscape with the quiet of the sky.
The day is come when I again repose
Here, under this dark sycamore, and view 10
These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts,
Which at this season, with their unripe fruits,
Are clad in one green hue, and lose themselves
'Mid groves and copses. [3] Once again I see
These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines 15
Of sportive wood run wild: these pastoral farms,
Green to the very door; and wreaths of smoke
Sent up, in silence, from among the trees! [E]
With some uncertain notice, as might seem
Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods, 20
Or of some Hermit's cave, where by his fire
The Hermit sits alone.
These beauteous forms,
Through a long absence, have not been to me [4]
As is a landscape to a blind man's eye: 25
But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din
Of towns and cities, I have owed to them,
In hours of weariness, sensations sweet,
Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart;
And passing even into my purer mind, [5] 30
With tranquil restoration:--feelings too
Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps,
As have no slight or trivial influence [6]
On that best portion of a good man's life,
His little, nameless, unremembered, acts 35
Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust,
To them I may have owed another gift,
Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood,
In which the burthen of the mystery,
In which the heavy and the weary weight 40
Of all this unintelligible world,
Is lightened:--that serene and blessed mood,
In which the affections gently lead us on,--
Until, the breath of this corporeal frame
And even the motion of our human blood 45
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul:
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,
We see into the life of things. 50
If this
Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft--
In darkness and amid the many shapes
Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir
Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, 55
Have hung upon the beatings of my heart--
How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee,
O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods, [7]
How often has my spirit turned to thee!
And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought, 60
With many recognitions dim and faint,
And somewhat of a sad perplexity,
The picture of the mind revives again:
While here I stand, not only with the sense
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts 65
That in this moment there is life and food
For future years.
[Variant 69:
1836.
Whom he hath sought . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 70:
1820.
. . . doth rightly spell; 1819. ]
[Variant 71:
1836.
. . . noise . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 72:
1820.
. . . to gain his end 1819. ]
[Variant 73:
1845.
. . . footstep . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 74:
1836.
. . . along a . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 75: In the editions of 1819 and 1820 the following stanza
occurs:
The verdant pathway, in and out,
Winds upwards like a straggling chain;
And, when two toilsome miles are past,
Up through the rocks it leads at last
Into a high and open plain. ]
[Variant 76:
1827.
The . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 77:
1836.
How blank! --but whence this rustling sound
Which, all too long, the pair hath chased!
--A dancing leaf is close behind, 1819.
But whence that faintly-rustling sound 1820.
But whence this faintly rustling sound
By which the pair have long been chased? c. ]
[Variant 78:
1836.
When Peter spies the withered leaf,
It yields no cure to his distress--1819. ]
[Variant 79:
1836.
Ha! why this comfortless despair? 1819. ]
[Variant 80:
1819.
. . . the Creature's head; 1827.
The text of 1845 returns to that of 1819. ]
[Variant 81:
1836.
. . . those darting pains,
As meteors shoot through heaven's wide plains,
Pass through his bosom--and repass! 1819. ]
[Variant 82:
1827.
Reading, as you or I might read
At night in any pious book, 1819. ]
[Variant 83:
1836.
. . . the good man's taper, 1819. ]
[Variant 84:
1836.
The ghostly word, which thus was fram'd, 1819.
. . . full plainly seen, 1827. ]
[Variant 85:
1836.
. . . to torment the good 1819. ]
[Variant 86:
1836.
I know you, potent Spirits! well,
How with the feeling and the sense
Playing, ye govern foes or friends.
Yok'd to your will, for fearful ends--1819. ]
[Variant 87:
1836.
. . . I have often . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 88:
1836.
And well I know . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 89:
1836.
. . . and danc'd . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 90:
1836.
. . . clearly . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 91:
1836.
. . . hath . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 92:
1836.
. . . to confound . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 93:
1836.
But now the pair have reach'd a spot
Where, shelter'd by a rocky cove, 1819.
Meanwhile the pair 1820. ]
[Variant 94:
1836.
The building seems, wall, roof, and tower, 1819. ]
[Variant 95:
1836.
Deep sighing as he pass'd along,
Quoth Peter, "In the shire of Fife,
'Mid such a ruin, following still
From land to land a lawless will, 1819. ]
[Variant 96:
1827.
Making, . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 97:
1836.
As if confusing darkness came 1819.
And a confusing 1832.
While clouds of swimming darkness came
Over his eyesight with the sound. C. ]
[Variant 98: _Italics_ were first used in the edition of 1820. ]
[Variant 99:
1836.
A lonely house her dwelling was, 1819. ]
[Variant 100:
1819.
. . . her name . . . 1820.
The edition of 1827 returns to the text of 1819. ]
[Variant 101:
1820.
Distraction reigns in soul and sense,
And reason drops in impotence
From her deserted pinnacle! 1819. ]
[Variant 102:
1820.
. . . ears . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 103:
1836.
Though clamorous as a hunter's horn
Re-echoed from a naked rock,
'Tis from that tabernacle--List! 1819.
The voice, though clamorous as a horn
Re-echoed by a naked rock,
Is from . . . . 1832. ]
[Variant 104:
1819.
. . . pious . . . c. ]
[Variant 105:
1836.
'Tis said, that through prevailing grace 1819. ]
[Variant 106:
1836.
. . .
shoulders scored
Meek beast! in memory of the Lord 1819.
Faithful memorial of the Lord c. ]
[Variant 107:
1836.
In memory of that solemn day 1819. ]
[Variant 108:
1836.
Towards a gate in open view
Turns up a narrow lane; . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 109:
1836.
Had gone two hundred yards, not more;
When to a lonely house he came;
He turn'd aside towards the same
And stopp'd before the door. 1819. ]
[Variant 110:
1836.
In hope . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 111:
1827.
Close at . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 112:
1832.
What could he do? --The Woman lay 1819. ]
[Variant 113:
1836.
. . . the sufferer . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 114:
1819.
. . . stair . . . 1820.
The edition of 1827 returns to the text of 1819. ]
[Variant 115:
1836.
And to the pillow gives . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 116:
1827.
And resting on . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 117:
1827.
He turns . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 118:
1836.
. . . his inward grief and fear--1819.
. . . his sorrow and his fear--C. ]
[Variant 119:
1827.
. . . had . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 120:
1836.
Towards . . . 1819. ]
[Variant 121:
1832.
. . . repressed . . . 1819. ]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: The title in the two editions of 1819 was 'Peter Bell: A
Tale in Verse. '--Ed. ]
[Footnote B: In Dorothy Wordsworth's Alfoxden Journal the following
occurs, under date April 20, 1798: "The moon crescent. 'Peter Bell'
begun. "--Ed. ]
[Footnote C: 'Romeo and Juliet', act II. scene ii. l. 44. This motto
first appeared on the half-title of 'Peter Bell', second edition, 1819,
under the advertisement of 'Benjamin the Waggoner', its first line being
"What's a Name? " When 'The Waggoner' appeared, a few days afterwards,
the motto stood on its title-page. In the collective edition of the
Poems (1820), it disappeared; but reappeared, in its final position, in
the edition of 1827. --Ed. ]
[Footnote D: 'Julius Caesar', act I. scene ii. l. 147. --Ed. ]
[Footnote E: Compare 'The Prelude', book iv. l. 47:
'the sunny seat
Round the stone table under the dark pine. '
Ed. ]
[Footnote F: In the dialect of the North, a hawker of earthen-ware is
thus designated. --W. W. 1819 (second edition). ]
[Footnote G: Compare 'The Prelude', book v. l. 448:
'At last, the dead man, 'mid that beauteous scene
Of trees and hills and water, bolt upright
Rose, with his ghastly face, a spectre shape
Of terror. '
Ed. ]
[Footnote H: This and the next stanza were omitted from the edition of
1827, but restored in 1832. --Ed. ]
[Footnote I: The notion is very general, that the Cross on the back and
shoulders of this Animal has the origin here alluded to. --W. W. 1819. ]
[Footnote J: I cannot suffer this line to pass, without noticing that it
was suggested by Mr. Haydon's noble Picture of Christ's Entry into
Jerusalem. --W. W. 1820. Into the same picture Haydon "introduced
Wordsworth bowing in reverence and awe. " See the essay on "The Portraits
of Wordsworth" in a later volume, and the portrait itself, which will be
reproduced in the volume containing the 'Life' of the poet. --Ed. ]
[Footnote K: The first and second editions of 'Peter Bell' (1819)
contained, as frontispiece, an engraving by J. C. Bromley, after a
picture by Sir George Beaumont. In 1807, Wordsworth wrote to Sir George:
"I am quite delighted to hear of your picture for 'Peter Bell' . . . .
But remember that no poem of mine will ever be popular, and I am
afraid that the sale of 'Peter' would not carry the expense of
engraving . . . . The people would love the poem of 'Peter Bell', but the
_public_ (a very different thing) will never love it. "
Some days before Wordsworth's 'Peter Bell' was issued in 1819, another
'Peter Bell' was published by Messrs. Taylor and Hessey. It was a parody
written by J. Hamilton Reynolds, and issued as 'Peter Bell, a Lyrical
Ballad', with the sentence on its title page, "I do affirm that I am the
_real_ Simon Pure. " The preface, which follows, is too paltry to quote;
and the stanzas which make up the poem contain allusions to the more
trivial of the early "Lyrical Ballads" (Betty Foy, Harry Gill, etc. ).
Wordsworth's 'Peter Bell' was published about a week later; and Shelley
afterwards published his 'Peter Bell the Third'. Charles Lamb wrote to
Wordsworth, in May 1819:
"Dear Wordsworth--I received a copy of 'Peter Bell' a week ago, and I
hope the author will not be offended if I say I do not much relish it.
The humour, if it is meant for humour, is forced; and then the
price! --sixpence would have been dear for it. Mind, I do not mean
_your_ 'Peter Bell', but _a Peter Bell_, which preceded it about a
week, and is in every bookseller's shop window in London, the type and
paper nothing differing from the true one, the preface signed W. W. ,
and the supplementary preface quoting, as the author's words, an
extract from the supplementary preface to the 'Lyrical Ballads. ' Is
there no law against these rascals? I would have this Lambert Simnel
whipt at the cart's tail. " ('The Letters of Charles Lamb', edited by
A. Ainger, vol. ii. p. 20. )
Barron Field wrote on the title-page of his copy of the edition of
'Peter Bell', 1819,
"And his carcase was cast in the way, and the ass stood by it. "
1 Kings xiii. 24. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
SUB-FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Sub-Footnote a: This stanza, which was deleted from every edition of
'Peter Bell' after the two of 1819, was prefixed by Shelley to his poem
of 'Peter Bell the Third', and many of his contemporaries thought that
it was an invention of Shelley's. See the note which follows this poem,
p. 50. Crabb Robinson wrote in his 'Diary', June 6, 1812:
"Mrs. Basil Montagu told me she had no doubt she had suggested this
image to Wordsworth by relating to him an anecdote. A person, walking
in a friend's garden, looking in at a window, saw a company of ladies
at a table near the window, with countenances _fixed_. In an instant
he was aware of their condition, and broke the window. He saved them
from incipient suffocation. "
Wordsworth subsequently said that he had omitted the stanza only in
deference to the "unco guid. " Crabb Robinson remonstrated with him
against its exclusion. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
LINES,[A] COMPOSED A FEW MILES ABOVE TINTERN ABBEY, ON REVISITING THE
BANKS OF THE WYE DURING A TOUR, JULY 13, 1798 [B]
Composed July 1798. --Published 1798
[July 1798. No poem of mine was composed under circumstances more
pleasant for me to remember than this. I began it upon leaving Tintern,
after crossing the Wye, and concluded it just as I was entering Bristol
in the evening, after a ramble of four or five days, with my sister. Not
a line of it was altered, and not any part of it written down till I
reached Bristol. It was published almost immediately after in the little
volume of which so much has been said in these Notes, the "Lyrical
Ballads," as first published at Bristol by Cottle. --I. F. ]
Included among the "Poems of the Imagination. "--Ed.
Five years have past; five summers, with the length
Of five long winters! [C] and again I hear
These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs
With a soft [1] inland murmur. [D]--Once again
Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs, 5
That [2] on a wild secluded scene impress
Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect
The landscape with the quiet of the sky.
The day is come when I again repose
Here, under this dark sycamore, and view 10
These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts,
Which at this season, with their unripe fruits,
Are clad in one green hue, and lose themselves
'Mid groves and copses. [3] Once again I see
These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines 15
Of sportive wood run wild: these pastoral farms,
Green to the very door; and wreaths of smoke
Sent up, in silence, from among the trees! [E]
With some uncertain notice, as might seem
Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods, 20
Or of some Hermit's cave, where by his fire
The Hermit sits alone.
These beauteous forms,
Through a long absence, have not been to me [4]
As is a landscape to a blind man's eye: 25
But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din
Of towns and cities, I have owed to them,
In hours of weariness, sensations sweet,
Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart;
And passing even into my purer mind, [5] 30
With tranquil restoration:--feelings too
Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps,
As have no slight or trivial influence [6]
On that best portion of a good man's life,
His little, nameless, unremembered, acts 35
Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust,
To them I may have owed another gift,
Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood,
In which the burthen of the mystery,
In which the heavy and the weary weight 40
Of all this unintelligible world,
Is lightened:--that serene and blessed mood,
In which the affections gently lead us on,--
Until, the breath of this corporeal frame
And even the motion of our human blood 45
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul:
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,
We see into the life of things. 50
If this
Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft--
In darkness and amid the many shapes
Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir
Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, 55
Have hung upon the beatings of my heart--
How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee,
O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods, [7]
How often has my spirit turned to thee!
And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought, 60
With many recognitions dim and faint,
And somewhat of a sad perplexity,
The picture of the mind revives again:
While here I stand, not only with the sense
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts 65
That in this moment there is life and food
For future years.
