at Coleorton, during Sir George and Lady Beaumont's absence in 1807,
exists very much as it was at the beginning of the century. The
"perennial bowers and murmuring pines" may still be seen, little altered
since 1807. The late Sir George Beaumont (whose grandfather was
first-cousin to the artist Sir George, Wordsworth's friend), with strong
reverence for the past, and for the traditions of literary men which
have made the district famous since the days of his ancestor Beaumont
the dramatist, and especially for the memorials of Wordsworth's ten
months' residence at Coleorton,--took a pleasure in preserving these
memorials, very much as they were when he entered in possession of the
estates of his ancestors. Such a reverence for the past is not only
consistent with the "improvement" of an estate, and its belongings; it
is a part of it. Wordsworth, and his wife and sister, were adepts in the
laying out of grounds. (See the reference to the poet's joint labour
with Wilkinson at Yanwath, p. 2.) It was the Wordsworths also, I
believe, who designed the grounds of Fox How--Dr. Arnold's residence,
near Ambleside. Similar memorials of the poet survive at Hallsteads,
Ullswater. The following is an extract from the letter of Dorothy
Wordsworth to Lady Beaumont above referred to, and having the post-mark
of February 18, 1807. "For more than a week we have had the most
delightful weather. If William had but waited a few days, it would have
been no anticipation when he said to you, 'the songs of Spring were in
the grove;' for all this week the birds have chanted from morn till
evening, larks, blackbirds, thrushes, and far more than I can name, and
the busy rooks have joined their happy voices."
Wordsworth, writing to Sir George Beaumont, November 16, 1811, says, "I
remember, Mr. Bowles, the poet, objected to the word 'ravishment' at the
end of the sonnet to the winter-garden; yet it has the authority of all
the first-rate poets, for instance, Milton:
'In whose sight all things joy, _with ravishment_,
Attracted by thy beauty still to gaze'...."
ED.
VARIANTS:
[1] 1837.
... framing beds of ... 1807.
... for ... 1815.
A PROPHECY. FEBRUARY, 1807
Composed 1807.--Published 1807
Included among the "Sonnets dedicated to Liberty," re-named in 1845,
"Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty."--ED.
High deeds, O Germans, are to come from you!
Thus in your books the record shall be found,
"A watchword was pronounced, a potent sound--
ARMINIUS![A]--all the people quaked like dew
Stirred by the breeze; they rose, a Nation, true, 5
True to herself[1]--the mighty Germany,
She of the Danube and the Northern Sea,
She rose, and off at once the yoke she threw.
All power was given her in the dreadful trance;
Those new-born Kings she withered like a flame."[B] 10
--Woe to them all! but heaviest woe and shame
To that Bavarian who could[2] first advance
His banner in accursed league with France,[C]
First open traitor to the German name![3]
VARIANTS:
[1] 1820.
... itself ... 1807.
[2] 1837.
... did ... 1807.
[3] 1837.
... to her sacred name! 1807.
... to a ... 1820.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] Arminius, or Hermann, the liberator of Germany from the Roman power,
A.D. 9-17. Tacitus says of him, "He was without doubt the deliverer of
Germany; and, unlike other kings and generals, he attacked the Roman
people, not at the commencement, but in the fullness of their power: in
battles he was not always successful, but he was invincible in war. He
still lives in the songs of the barbarians."--ED.
[B] The "new-born Kings" were the lesser German potentates, united in
the Confederation of the Rhine. By a treaty signed at Paris (July 12th,
1806), by Talleyrand, and the ministers of twelve sovereign houses of
the Empire, these princes declared themselves perpetually severed from
Germany, and united together as the Confederate States of the Rhine, of
which the Emperor of the French was declared Protector.--ED.
[C] On December 11, 1806, Napoleon concluded a treaty with Frederick
Augustus, the Elector of Saxony--who had been secretly on the side of
France for some time--to whom he gave additional territories, and the
title of King, admitting him into "the Confederation of the Rhine." He
had fallen, as one of the Prussian statesmen put it, into "that lowest
of degradations, to steal at another man's bidding."--ED.
THOUGHT OF A BRITON ON THE SUBJUGATION OF SWITZERLAND
Composed 1807.--Published 1807
[This was composed while pacing to and fro between the Hall of
Coleorton, then rebuilding, and the principal Farmhouse of the Estate,
in which we lived for nine or ten months. I will here mention that the
_Song on the Restoration of Lord Clifford_, as well as that on the
_Feast of Brougham Castle_, were produced on the same ground.--I. F.]
This sonnet was classed among those "dedicated to Liberty," re-named in
1845, "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty."--ED.
Two Voices are there; one is of the sea,
One of the mountains; each a mighty Voice:
In both from age to age thou didst rejoice,
They were thy chosen music, Liberty!
There came a Tyrant, and with holy glee 5
Thou fought'st against him; but hast vainly striven:
Thou from thy Alpine holds at length art driven,
Where not a torrent murmurs heard by thee.
Of one deep bliss thine ear hath been bereft:
Then cleave, O cleave to that which still is left; 10
For, high-souled Maid, what sorrow would it be
That Mountain floods should thunder as before,
And Ocean bellow from his rocky shore,
And neither awful Voice be heard by thee!
In 1807 the whole of the Continent of Europe was prostrate under the
power of Napoleon. It is impossible to say to what special incident, if
to any in particular, Wordsworth refers in the phrase, "with holy glee
thou fought'st against him;" but, as the sonnet was composed at
Coleorton in 1807--after the battles of Austerlitz and Jena, and
Napoleon's practical mastery of Europe--our knowing the particular event
or events in Swiss history to which he refers, would not add much to our
understanding of the poem.
In the Fenwick note Wordsworth incorrectly separates his _Song on the
Restoration of Lord Clifford_ from the _Feast of Brougham Castle_. They
are the same song.--ED.
TO THOMAS CLARKSON, ON THE FINAL PASSING OF THE BILL FOR THE ABOLITION
OF THE SLAVE TRADE, MARCH, 1807
Composed 1807.--Published 1807
One of the "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty."--ED.
Clarkson! it was an obstinate hill to climb:
How toilsome--nay, how dire--it was, by thee
Is known; by none, perhaps, so feelingly:
But thou, who, starting in thy fervent prime,
Didst first lead forth that enterprise[1] sublime, 5
Hast heard the constant Voice its charge repeat,
Which, out of thy young heart's oracular seat,
First roused thee.--O true yoke-fellow of Time,
Duty's intrepid liegeman, see,[2] the palm
Is won, and by all Nations shall be worn! 10
The blood-stained Writing is for ever torn;
And thou henceforth wilt have[3] a good man's calm,
A great man's happiness; thy zeal shall find
Repose at length, firm friend of human kind!
On the 25th of March 1807, the Royal assent was given to the Bill for
the Abolition of the Slave Trade. The movement for its abolition was
begun by Wilberforce, and carried on by Clarkson. Its abolition was
voted by the House of Lords on the motion of Lord Grenville, and by the
Commons on the motion of Charles James Fox, on the 10th of June 1806.
The bill was read a second time in the Lords on the 5th of February, and
became law on the 25th of March 1807.
VARIANTS:
[1] 1837.
... this pilgrimage ... 1807.
[2] 1837.
With unabating effort, see, ... 1807.
[3] 1837.
The bloody Writing is for ever torn,
And Thou henceforth shalt have ... 1807.
THE MOTHER'S RETURN
BY MY SISTER
Composed 1807.--Published 1815
[Written at Town-end, Grasmere.--I. F.]
One of the "Poems referring to the Period of Childhood."--ED.
A month, sweet Little-ones, is past
Since your dear Mother went away,--
And she to-morrow will return;
To-morrow is the happy day.
O blessed tidings! thought of joy! 5
The eldest heard with steady glee;
Silent he stood; then laughed amain,--
And shouted, "Mother, come to me!"
Louder and louder did he shout,
With witless hope to bring her near; 10
"Nay, patience! patience, little boy!
Your tender mother cannot hear."
I told of hills, and far-off towns,
And long, long vales to travel through;--
He listens, puzzled, sore perplexed, 15
But he submits; what can he do?
No strife disturbs his sister's breast;
She wars not with the mystery
Of time and distance, night and day;
The bonds of our humanity. 20
Her joy is like an instinct, joy
Of kitten, bird, or summer fly;
She dances, runs without an aim,
She chatters in her ecstasy.
Her brother now takes up the note, 25
And echoes back his sister's glee;
They hug the infant in my arms,
As if to force his sympathy.
Then, settling into fond discourse,
We rested in the garden bower; 30
While sweetly shone the evening sun
In his departing hour.
We told o'er all that we had done,--
Our rambles by the swift brook's side
Far as the willow-skirted pool, 35
Where two fair swans together glide.
We talked of change, of winter gone,
Of green leaves on the hawthorn spray,
Of birds that build their nests and sing,
And all "since Mother went away!" 40
To her these tales they will repeat,
To her our new-born tribes will show,
The goslings green, the ass's colt,
The lambs that in the meadow go.
--But, see, the evening star comes forth! 45
To bed the children must depart;
A moment's heaviness they feel,
A sadness at the heart:
'Tis gone--and in a merry fit
They run up stairs in gamesome race; 50
I, too, infected by their mood,
I could have joined the wanton chase.
Five minutes past--and, O the change!
Asleep upon their beds they lie;
Their busy limbs in perfect rest, 55
And closed the sparkling eye.
The Fenwick note is inaccurate. These lines were written by Dorothy
Wordsworth at Coleorton, on the eve of her brother and sister's return
from London, in the spring of 1807, whither they had gone for a
month--Dorothy remaining at Coleorton, in charge of the children.
Previous to 1845, the poem was attributed to "a female Friend of the
Author."--ED.
GIPSIES
Composed 1807.--Published 1807
[Composed at Coleorton. I had observed them, as here described, near
Castle Donnington, on my way to and from Derby.--I. F.]
One of the "Poems of the Imagination."--ED.
Yet are they here the same unbroken knot
Of human Beings, in the self-same spot!
Men, women, children, yea the frame
Of the whole spectacle the same!
Only their fire seems bolder, yielding light, 5
Now deep and red, the colouring of night;
That on their Gipsy-faces falls,
Their bed of straw and blanket-walls.
--Twelve hours, twelve bounteous hours are gone, while I
Have been a traveller under open sky, 10
Much witnessing of change and cheer,
Yet as I left I find them here!
The weary Sun betook himself to rest;--
Then issued Vesper from the fulgent west,
Outshining like a visible God 15
The glorious path in which he trod.
And now, ascending, after one dark hour
And one night's diminution of her power,
Behold the mighty Moon! this way
She looks as if at them--but they 20
Regard not her:--oh better wrong and strife
(By nature transient) than this torpid life;
Life which the very stars reprove[A]
As on their silent tasks they move![1][B]
Yet, witness all that stirs in heaven or[2] earth! 25
In scorn I speak not;--they are what their birth
And breeding suffer[3] them to be;
Wild outcasts of society![4]
See S. T. Coleridge's criticism of this poem in his _Biographia
Literaria_, vol. ii. p. 156 (edition 1847).--ED.
VARIANTS:
[1] 1836.
Regard not her:--oh better wrong and strife
Better vain deeds or evil than such life!
The silent Heavens have goings on;[C]
The stars have tasks--but these have none. 1807.
... wrong and strife,
(By nature transient) than such torpid life!
The silent Heavens have goings-on;
The stars have tasks--but these have none! 1820.
(By nature transient) than such torpid life;
Life which the very stars reprove
As on their silent tasks they move! 1827.
[2] 1827.
... and ... 1820.
[3] 1836.
... suffers ... 1820.
[4] The last four lines were added in 1820.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] Compare the _Ode to Duty_, l. 47 (vol. iii. p. 41).--ED.
[B] Compare, in the _Ode to Duty_, l. 48--
And the most ancient heavens, through Thee, are fresh and strong.--
ED.
[C] Compare, in the Fragment, vol. viii., beginning "No doubt if you in
terms direct had asked," the phrase--
... the goings on
Of earth and sky. ED.
"O NIGHTINGALE! THOU SURELY ART"
Composed 1807 (probably).--Published 1807
[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. (Mrs. W. says, in a note,--"At
Coleorton.")--I. F.]
One of the "Poems of the Imagination."--ED.
O Nightingale! thou surely art
A creature of a "fiery heart:"--[A][1]
These notes of thine--they pierce and pierce;
Tumultuous harmony and fierce!
Thou sing'st as if the God of wine 5
Had helped thee to a Valentine;[B]
A song in mockery and despite
Of shades, and dews, and silent night;
And steady bliss, and all the loves
Now sleeping in these peaceful groves. 10
I heard a Stock-dove sing or say
His homely tale, this very day;
His voice was buried among trees,
Yet to be come-at by the breeze:
He did not cease; but cooed--and cooed; 15
And somewhat pensively he wooed:
He sang of love, with quiet blending,
Slow to begin, and never ending;
Of serious faith, and inward glee;
That was the song--the song for me! 20
Mrs. Wordsworth corrected her husband's note to Miss Fenwick, by adding
in the MS., "at Coleorton"; and at Coleorton the Wordsworths certainly
spent the winter of 1806, the Town-end Cottage at Grasmere being too
small for their increasing household. It is more likely that Wordsworth
wrote the poem at Coleorton than at Grasmere, and it looks as if it had
been an evening impromptu, after hearing both the nightingale and the
stock-dove. There are no nightingales at Grasmere,--they are not heard
further north than the Trent valley,--while they used to abound in the
"peaceful groves" of Coleorton. If the locality was--as Mrs. Wordsworth
states--Coleorton, and if the lines were written after hearing the
nightingale, the year would be 1807, and not 1806 (the poet's own date).
The nightingale is a summer visitor in this country, and could not have
been heard by Wordsworth at Coleorton in 1806, as he did not go south to
Leicestershire till November in that year. But it is quite possible that
it was "the stock-dove's voice" that alone suggested the lines, and that
they were written either in 1806, or (as I think more likely), very
early in 1807. In the month of January Wordsworth was corresponding with
Scott about the poems in this edition of 1807.--ED.
VARIANTS:
[1] 1807.
A Creature of ebullient heart:-- 1815.
The text of 1820 returns to that of 1807.[C]
FOOTNOTES:
[A] See Shakespeare's _King Henry VI._, Part III., act I. scene iv. l.
87.--ED.
[B] Compare the lines in _The Cuckoo and the Nightingale_, vol. ii. p.
255--
I heard the lusty Nightingale so sing,
That her clear voice made a loud rioting,
Echoing through all the green wood wide. ED.
[C] Henry Crabb Robinson, in his _Diary_ (May 9, 1815), anticipates this
return to the text of 1807.--ED.
"THOUGH NARROW BE THAT OLD MAN'S CARES, AND NEAR"
Composed 1807.--Published 1807
----"gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name."
[Written at Coleorton. This old man's name was Mitchell. He was, in all
his ways and conversation, a great curiosity, both individually and as a
representative of past times. His chief employment was keeping watch at
night by pacing round the house, at that time building, to keep off
depredators. He has often told me gravely of having seen the Seven
Whistlers, and the Hounds as here described. Among the groves of
Coleorton, where I became familiar with the habits and notions of old
Mitchell, there was also a labourer of whom, I regret, I had no personal
knowledge; for, more than forty years after, when he was become an old
man, I learned that while I was composing verses, which I usually did
aloud, he took much pleasure, unknown to me, in following my steps that
he might catch the words I uttered; and, what is not a little
remarkable, several lines caught in this way kept their place in his
memory. My volumes have lately been given to him by my informant, and
surely he must have been gratified to meet in print his old
acquaintances.--I. F.]
In 1815 this sonnet was one of the "Poems belonging to the Period of Old
Age"; in 1820 it was transferred to the "Miscellaneous Sonnets."--ED.
Though narrow be that old Man's cares, and near,
The poor old Man is greater than he seems:
For he hath waking empire, wide as dreams;
An ample sovereignty of eye and ear.
Rich are his walks with supernatural cheer; 5
The region of his inner spirit teems
With vital sounds and monitory gleams
Of high astonishment and pleasing fear.
He the seven birds hath seen, that never part,
Seen the SEVEN WHISTLERS in their nightly rounds, 10
And counted them: and oftentimes will start--
For overhead are sweeping GABRIEL'S HOUNDS[A]
Doomed, with their impious Lord, the flying Hart
To chase for ever, on aerial grounds!
To bring all the poems referring to Coleorton together, so far as
possible, this and the next sonnet are transferred from their places in
the chronological list, and placed beside the Coleorton "Inscriptions."
I am indebted to Mr. William Kelly of Leicester for the following note
on the Leicestershire superstition of the Seven Whistlers.
"There is an old superstition, which it is not easy to get to the
bottom of, concerning a certain cry or sound heard in the night,
supposed to be produced by the Seven Whistlers. What or who those
whistlers are is an unsolved problem. In some districts they are
popularly believed to be witches, in others ghosts, in others
devils, while in the Midland Counties they are supposed to be
birds, either plovers or martins--some say swifts. In
Leicestershire it is deemed a bad omen to hear the Seven
Whistlers, and our old writers supply many passages illustrative
of the popular credulity. Spenser, in his _Faerie Queene_, book
II. canto xii. stanza 36, speaks of
The whistler shrill, that whoso hears doth die.
Sir Walter Scott, in _The Lady of the Lake_, names the bird with
which his character associated the cry--
And in the plover's shrilly strain
The signal whistlers heard again.
"When the colliers of Leicestershire are flush of money, we are
told, and indulge in a drinking bout, they sometimes hear the
warning voice of the Seven Whistlers, get sobered and frightened,
and will not descend the pit again till next day. Wordsworth
speaks of a countryman who
... the seven birds hath seen, that never part,
Seen the Seven Whistlers in their nightly rounds,
And counted them.
"A few years ago, during a thunderstorm which passed over
Leicestershire, and while vivid lightning was darting through the
sky, immense flocks of birds were seen flying about, uttering
doleful, affrighted cries as they passed, and keeping up for a
long time a continual whistling like that made by some kinds of
sea-birds. The number must have been immense, for the local
newspapers mentioned the same phenomenon in different parts of the
neighbouring counties of Northampton, Leicester, and Lincoln. A
gentleman, conversing with a countryman on the following day,
asked him what kind of birds he supposed them to have been. The
man answered, 'They are what we call the Seven Whistlers,' and
added that 'whenever they are heard it is considered a sign of
some great calamity, and that the last time he had heard them was
on the night before the deplorable explosion of fire damp at the
Hartley Colliery.'"
In _Notes and Queries_ there are several allusions to this local
superstition. In the Fifth Series (vol. ii. p. 264), Oct. 3, 1874, the
editor gives a summary of several notes on the subject in vol. viii. of
the Fourth Series (pp. 68, 134, 196, and 268), with additional
information. He says "record was made of their having been heard in
Leicestershire; and that the develin or martin, the swift, and the
plover were probably of the whistling fraternity that frightened men. At
p. 134 it was shown that Wordsworth had spoken of one who
... the seven birds hath seen, that never part,
Seen the Seven Whistlers in their nightly rounds,
And counted them.
On the same page, the swift is said to be the true whistler (but, as
noted at page 196, the swifts never make nightly rounds), and the
superstition is said to be common in our Midland Counties. At page 268,
Mr. Pearson put on record that in Lancashire the plovers, whistling as
they fly, are accounted heralds of ill, though sometimes of trivial
accident, and that they are there called 'Wandering Jews,' and are said
to be, or to carry with them, the ever-restless souls of those Jews who
assisted at the Crucifixion. At page 336, the whistlers are chronicled
as having been the harbingers of the great Hartley Colliery explosion. A
correspondent, VIATOR, added, that on the Bosphorus there are flocks of
birds, the size of a thrush, which fly up and down the channel, and are
never seen to rest on land or water. The men who rowed Viator's caique
told him that they were the souls of the damned, condemned to perpetual
motion. The Seven Whistlers have not furnished chroniclers with later
circumstances of their tuneful and awful progresses till a week or two
ago.... The whistlers are also heard and feared in Portugal. See _The
New Quarterly_ for July 1874, for a record of some travelling experience
in that country."
Another extract from _Notes and Queries_ is to the following effect:--
"'Your Excellency laughs at ghosts. But there is no lie about the
Seven Whistlers. Many a man besides me has heard them.'
"'Who are the Seven Whistlers? and have you seen them yourself?'
"'Not seen, thank Heaven; but I have heard them plenty of times.
Some say they are the ghosts of children unbaptized, who are to
know no rest till the judgment day. Once last winter I was going
with donkeys and a mule to Caia. Just at the moment I stopped by
the river bank to tighten the mule's girth, I heard the accursed
whistlers coming down the wind along the river. I buried my head
under the mule, and never moved till the danger was over; but they
passed very near, for I heard the flap and rustle of their wings.'
"'What was the danger?'
"'If a man once sees them, heaven only knows what will not happen
to him--death and damnation at the very least.'
"'I have seen them many times. I shot, or tried to shoot them!'
"'Holy Mother of God! you English are an awful people! You shot
the Seven Whistlers?'
"'Yes; we call them marecos (teal or widgeon) in our country, and
shoot them whenever we can. They are better to eat than wild
ducks.'"
_Gabriel's Hounds._--"At Wednesbury in Staffordshire, the colliers going
to their pits early in the morning hear the noise of a pack of hounds in
the air, to which they give the name of Gabriel's Hounds, though the
more sober and judicious take them only to be wild geese making this
noise in their flight." Kennet MS., Lansd. 1033. (See Halliwell's
_Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words_, vol. i. p. 388.) The
peculiar cry or cackle, both of the Brent Goose and of the Bean or
Harvest Goose (_Anser Segetum_), has often been likened to that of a
pack of hounds in full cry--especially when the birds are on the wing
during night. For some account of the superstition of "Gabriel's
Hounds," see _Notes and Queries_, First Series, vol. v. pp. 534 and 596;
and vol. xii. p. 470; Second Series, vol. i. p. 80; and Fourth Series,
vol. vii. p. 299. In the last note these hounds are said to be popularly
believed to be "the souls of unbaptized children wandering in the air
till the day of judgment." They are also explained as "a thing in the
air, that is said in these parts (Sheffield) to foretell calamity,
sounding like a great pack of beagles in full cry." This quotation is
from Charles Reade's _Put yourself in his place_, which contains many
scraps of local folk-lore. The following is from the _Statistical
History of Kirkmichael_, by the Rev. John Grant. "In the autumnal
season, when the moon shines from a serene sky, often is the wayfaring
traveller arrested by the music of the hills. Often struck with a more
sober scene, he beholds the visionary hunters engaged in the chase, and
pursuing the deer of the clouds, while the hollow rocks in long
sounding echoes reverberate their cries." "There are several now living
who assert that they have seen and heard this aerial hunting." See the
_Statistical History of Scotland_, edited by Sir J. Sinclair, vol. xii.
pp. 461, 462. Compare note to _An Evening Walk_, vol. i. p. 19.--ED.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] Both these superstitions are prevalent in the midland Counties of
England: that of "Gabriel's Hounds" appears to be very general over
Europe; being the same as the one upon which the German Poet, Buerger,
has founded his Ballad of _The Wild Huntsman_.--W. W. 1807.
COMPOSED BY THE SIDE OF GRASMERE LAKE. 1807
Composed 1806.--Published 1819
This sonnet was first published along with _The Waggoner_ in 1819. In
1820 it was classed among the "Miscellaneous Sonnets," and in 1827 it
was transferred to the "Sonnets dedicated to Liberty." Previous to 1837
this sonnet had no title.--ED.