_Shepherd._ Wordsworth tells the world, in ane of his prefaces, that he
is a water-drinker--and its weel seen on him.--There was a sair want of
speerit through the haill o' yon lang "Excursion." If he had just made
the paragraphs about ae half shorter, and at the end of every ane taen a
caulker, like ony ither man engaged in geyan sair and heavy wark, think
na ye that his "Excursion" would hae been far less fatiguesome?--_April,
1827._
_North._ I confess that the "Excursion" is the worst poem, of any
character, in the English language. It contains about two hundred
sonorous lines, some of which appear to be fine, even in the sense, as
well as sound. The remaining seven thousand three hundred are quite
ineffectual. Then, what labour the builder of that lofty rhyme must have
undergone! It is, in its own way, a small tower of Babel, and all built
by a single man.--_Sept., 1825._