[Footnote JR: "What follows in the discourse of the Wanderer, upon the
changes he had witnessed in rural life by the introduction of machinery,
is truly described from what I myself saw during my boyhood and early
youth, and from what was often told me by persons of this humble calling.
Happily, most happily, for these mountains, the mischief was diverted
from the banks of their beautiful streams, and transferred to open and
flat counties abounding in coal, where the agency of steam was found
much more effectual for carrying on those demoralising works. Had it not
been for this invention, long before the present time, every torrent and
river in this district would have had its factory, large and populous
in proportion to the power of the water that could there be commanded.
Parliament has interfered to prevent the night-work which was carried
on in these mills as actively as during the day-time, and by necessity,
still more perniciously; a sad disgrace to the proprietors and to the
nation which could so long tolerate such unnatural proceedings."--I. F.]
[Footnote JS: In 1788, and again in 1794, Wordsworth visited Westmoreland
and Cumberland as a pedestrian. Compare the sixth book of _The Prelude_,
entitled "Cambridge and the Alps" (vol. iii. p. 228).--ED.]
[Footnote JV: See Wordsworth's note, p. 390.--ED.]
[Footnote JT: Thorpe; Anglo-Saxon _Thorp_, a homestead, or hamlet; allied
to _turba_, a crowd (as of houses). Vill; a little village or farm. Lat.
_villa_, dimin. of _vicus_.--ED.]
[Footnote JU: Evidently a reminiscence of Penrith, a "straggling burgh,
of ancient charter proud," with its castle on "the brow of a green hill,"
and with Brougham Castle close at hand, on "bank of rugged stream." See
_The Prelude_ (vol. iii. p. 229), and compare Gray's Journal.--ED.]
[Footnote JW: Mr. Rawnsley has suggested that this may refer to the
introduction of canal boats into England. It is more likely, I think,
that Wordsworth had in his mind's eye
That animating spectacle of sails
That, through her inland regions, to and fro
Pass with the respirations of the tide,
Perpetual, multitudinous!
referred to in pp. 332-33, a reminiscence perhaps of what he had often
seen in the Bristol Channel.--ED.]
[Footnote JX: See last note. The phrase "_on_ the lofty side of some
bare hill," occasions some difficulty; and, taken in connection with
the previous clause, "air has lent her breezes," suggests the idea of a
windmill, seen in its slow movement, far off on a bare hill-side. But I
rather think it is the progress of the "sails of traffic" on the waters
of an inland tidal channel that is still referred to; the masts and sails
of the vessels being seen moving onwards, while the water itself is
hidden, and the spectacle is therefore by the rustic eye, "with wonder
kenned from far." I would be disposed to think that there was a misprint
here, and that we should read "_from_ the lofty side" instead of "on,"
did the latter reading not occur in the edition of 1814, as well as in
1836, and all the subsequent editions.--ED.]
[Footnote JY: Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield.--ED.]
[Footnote JZ: See the Fenwick note, p. 330.--ED.]
[Footnote KA: The curfew-bell, introduced into England by William of
Normandy, in 1068.--ED.]
[Footnote KB: Compare Mrs. Browning's _Cry of the Children_, stanza
vii.--ED.]
[Footnote KC: The foundation of Thebes was ascribed to the mythical
Manes. The ground on which it stood was large enough to contain a city
equal in extent with ancient Rome, or modern Paris; ... an immense area
was covered with Temples, and their avenues of Sphinxes. (Cf. Diodorus,
i. 40, 50. Strabo, xvii. pp. 805, 815 fol., and Smith's _Dictionary of
Ancient Geography_.) _Tyre_, in Phœnicia, was built partly on an island
and partly on the mainland. The island city "must have arisen in the
period between Nebuchadnezzar and Alexander the Great."... "The western
side of the island is now submerged, to the extent of more than a mile;
and that this was once occupied by the city is shewn by the bases of
columns which may still be discerned. Benjamin of Tudela mentions that,
in the end of the twelfth century, towns, markets, streets, and halls
might be observed at the bottom of the sea." (Smith's _Dict. of Ancient
Geography._) Palmyra, or Tadmor,--the city of palms,--was enlarged, if
not built, by Solomon in the tenth century B.C. It is situated in a
well-watered oasis, in the great Syrian desert. It was an independent
city under the first Roman Emperors, and is called a _colonia_ on the
coins of Caracalla. In 273 A.D. it had dwindled into an insignificant
town. The ruins are inferior to those of Baalbec, but have a grandeur of
their own. They are chiefly of the Corinthian order; although the most
magnificent of them--_the Temple of the Sun_--is Ionic.--ED.]
[Footnote KD: I am indebted to the Rev. H. G. Woods, President of Trinity
College, Oxford, for the following note on the tomb of Archimedes:--
"The tomb now shown at Syracuse as that of Archimedes corresponds
pretty well in point of situation with Cicero's description ('Tusculan
Disputations,' v. 23). It is a little distance to the west of the wall of
Achradina, on the left of the road which mounts the slope of Epipolæ. I
unfortunately cannot remember whether there were any traces of the sphere
and cylinder inscribed on it, which Cicero mentions as there when he
excavated it; but my impression at the time was, that its identity rested
simply on a Ciceronic tradition, and that it was hardly more genuine than
Virgil's tomb at Naples. The tomb itself resembled a number of other
tombs near--among them, the reputed tomb of Timoleon, which is close
by (Cicero speaks of the number of tombs in that spot). But, whatever
the value of the identifying tradition, there can be no doubt that
Wordsworth, in these lines, has thoroughly reproduced the local colour of
the surroundings. As one mounts the road I mentioned, past the tomb of
Archimedes, and gets the view over Achradina--once so populous, and now a
waste area covered with grey rocks and grass, save where, here and there,
it is converted by irrigation into fertile gardens and fields--one has
strongly brought before him how completely Syracuse has 'vanished.' The
modern city is entirely confined within the limits of Ortygia, and the
general impression that one gets of Achradina is that it is the graveyard
of the old city. I remember that this feeling came over me very strongly
at the time, but it was certainly not suggested by Wordsworth's lines,
which I did not remember."--ED.]
[Footnote KE: The heights between Buxton and Macclesfield, at the top of
the Valley of the Gite, near the Cat-and-Fiddle Inn.--ED.]
[Footnote KF: "The alphabet was called the Christ-cross-row, some say
because a cross was prefixed to the alphabet in the old primers; but
as probably from a superstitious custom of writing the alphabet in the
form of a cross, by way of charm." (Archdeacon Nares's _Glossary_, Art.
"Christ-cross-row.")
"The A B C horn-book, containing the alphabet and nine digits. The most
ancient of these infant-school books had the letters arranged in the form
of a Latin cross, with A at the top and Z at the bottom, but afterwards
the letters were arranged in lines, and a + was placed at the beginning
to remind the learner that 'The fear of the Lord is the beginning of
wisdom.'
Mortals ne'er shall know
More than contain'd of old the Christ-cross Row.
Tickell, _The Horn-Book_.
(See Brewer's _Dictionary of Phrase and Fable_.)
At the beginning of a poem by the Rev. J. S. Hawker, called _A
Christ-cross-Rhyme_, we find
Christ, his cross, shall be my speed,
Teach me, father John, to read.
"The true use of the cross in drawing is to define or mark a point,
especially a point to start or measure from.... But it was impossible
that it could be used long without reference being supposed to be made
to the cross of Christ, and it must soon have been regarded as invoking
Christ's blessing upon the commencement of any writing."--W. W. Skeat in
_Notes and Queries_, 3rd Series, XI. May 4, 1867.
And from the cross-row plucks the letter G.
Shakespeare, _Richard III_. act 1. scene i. l. 55. ED.
]
[Footnote KG: The "hedge of hollies dark and tall," and the "pure
cerulean gravel" on the walk between the "pastor's mansion" and the
"house of prayer," are all due to the imagination of the poet. There
is nothing now--either at Hackett or at the parsonage in Grasmere--at
all corresponding to the details given in _The Excursion_; and it is
not likely that the surroundings of either house in Wordsworth's time
resembled the description given in the poem.--ED.]
[Footnote KH: See the note on the preceding page.]
[Footnote KI: A reminiscence of St. Bees, or of days spent on the
Cumbrian coast. Compare the two sonnets (1806), _With Ships the sea was
sprinkled far and nigh_, and _Where lies the Land to which yon Ship must
go?_ (vol. iv. pp. 40, 41).--ED.]