1815, I infer that the larger part of the poem was written at Stockton.
In it he says that "the Poem of _The White Doe_ was composed at the
close of the year" (1807). This is an illustration of the vague manner
in which he was in the habit of assigning dates. The Fenwick note, and
the evidence of his sister's letter, is conclusive; although the fact
that _The Force of Prayer_--written in 1807--is called in the Fenwick
note "an appendage to _The White Doe_," is further confirmation of the
belief that the principal part of the latter poem was finished in 1807.
All things considered, _The White Doe of Rylstone_ may be most
conveniently placed after the poems belonging to the year 1807, and
before those known to have been written in 1808; while _The Force of
Prayer_ naturally follows it.
The poem--first published in quarto in 1815--was scarcely altered in the
editions of 1820, 1827, and 1832. In 1837, however, it was revised
throughout, and in that year the text was virtually settled; the
subsequent changes being few and insignificant, while those introduced
in 1837 were numerous and important. A glance at the foot-notes will
show that many passages were entirely rewritten in that year, and that a
good many lines of the earlier text were altogether omitted. All the
poems were subjected to minute revision in 1836-37; but few, if any,
were more thoroughly recast, and improved, in that year than _The White
Doe of Rylstone_. As a sample of the best kind of changes--where a new
thought was added to the earlier text with admirable felicity--compare
the lines in canto vii., as it stood in 1815, when the Lady Emily first
saw the White Doe at the old Hall of Rylstone, after her terrible losses
and desolation--
Lone Sufferer! will not she believe
The promise in that speaking face,
And take this gift of Heaven with grace?
with the additional thought conveyed in the version of 1837--
Lone Sufferer! will not she believe
The promise in that speaking face;
And welcome, as a gift of grace,
The saddest thought the Creature brings?
In the "Reminiscences" of Wordsworth--written by the Hon. Mr. Justice
Coleridge for the late Bishop of Lincoln's _Memoirs_ of his uncle--the
following occurs. (See vol. ii. p. 311.) "His conversation was on
critical subjects, arising out of his attempts to alter his poems. He
said he considered _The White Doe_ as, in conception, the highest work
he had ever produced. The mere physical action was all unsuccessful: but
the true action of the poem was spiritual--the subduing of the will, and
all inferior fancies, to the perfect purifying and spiritualizing of the
intellectual nature; while the Doe, by connection with Emily, is raised
as it were from its mere animal nature into something mysterious and
saint-like. He said he should devote much labour to perfecting the
execution of it in the mere business parts, in which, from anxiety 'to
get on' with the more important parts, he was sensible that
imperfections had crept in which gave the style a feebleness of
character."
From this conversation--which took place in 1836--it will be seen that
Wordsworth knew very well that there were feeble passages in the earlier
editions; and that, in the thorough revision which he gave to all his
poems in 1836-37, this one was specially singled out for "much labour."
The result is seen by a glance at the changes of the text.
The notes appended by Wordsworth to the edition of 1815 explain some of
the historical and topographical allusions in the poem. To these the
following editorial notes may be added--
I. (See pp. 106, 107.)
_... Bolton's mouldering Priory._
...
_... the tower
Is standing with a voice of power,_
...
_And in the shattered fabric's heart
Remaineth one protected part;
A Chapel, like a wild-bird's nest,
Closely embowered and trimly drest._
In 1153, the canons of the Augustinian Priory at Embsay, near Skipton,
were removed to Bolton, by William Fitz Duncan, and his wife, Cecilia de
Romille, who granted it by charter in exchange for the Manors of Skibdem
and Stretton. The establishment at Bolton consisted of a prior and about
15 canons, over 200 persons (including servants and lay brethren) being
supported at Bolton. During the Scottish raids of the fourteenth
century, the prior and canons had frequently to retreat to Skipton for
safety. In 1542 the site of the priory and demesnes were sold to Harry
Clifford, first Earl of Cumberland. From the last Earl of Cumberland it
passed to the second Earl of Cork, and then to the Devonshire family, to
which it still belongs. The following is part of the excellent account
of the Priory, given in Murray's _Yorkshire_:--
"The chief relic of the Priory is the church, the nave of which
after the Dissolution was retained as the chapel of this so-called
'Saxon-Cure.' This nave remains perfect, but the rest of the
church is in complete ruin. The lower walls of the choir are
Trans-Norman, and must have been built immediately after (if not
before) the removal from Embsay. The upper walls and windows (the
tracery of which is destroyed) are decorated. The nave is early
English, and decorated; and the original west front remains with
an elaborate Perpendicular front of excellent design, intended as
the base of a western tower, which was never finished.... The nave
(which has been restored under the direction of Crace)--the
"'One protected part
In the shattered fabric's heart,'
is Early English on the south side, and Decorated on the north....
At the end of the nave aisle, enclosed by a Perpendicular screen,
is a chantry, founded by the Mauleverers; and below it is the
vault, in which, according to tradition, the Claphams of Beamsley
and their ancestors the Mauleverers were interred upright--
"'Pass, pass who will, yon chantry door;
And, through the chink in the fractured floor
Look down, and see a griesly sight;
A vault where the bodies are buried upright!
There, face by face, and hand by hand,
The Claphams and Mauleverers stand.'
"Whitaker, however, could never see this 'griesly sight' through
the chink in the floor; and it is perhaps altogether traditional.
The ruined portion of the church is entirely Decorated, with the
exception of the lower walls of the choir. The transepts had
eastern aisles. The north transept is nearly perfect: the south
retains only its western wall, in which are two decorated windows.
The piers of a central tower remain; but at what period it was
destroyed, or if it was ever completed, is uncertain. The choir is
long and aisleless. Some fragments of tracery remain in the south
window, which was a very fine one. Below the window runs a
Transitional Norman arcade. Some portions of tomb-slabs remain in
the choir.... The church-yard lies on the north side of the ruins.
This has been made classic ground by Wordsworth's poem."
II. (See p. 118.)
_... the shy recess
Of Barden's lowly quietness._
Compare the poem _The Force of Prayer, or the Founding of Bolton
Priory_, p. 204. Whitaker writes thus of the district of Upper
Wharfedale at Barden. "Grey tower-like projections of rock, stained with
the various hues of lichens, and hung with loose and streaming canopies
of ling, start out at intervals." Before the restoration of Henry
Clifford, the Shepherd-lord, to the estates of his ancestors--on the
accession of Henry VII.--there was only a keeper's lodge or tower at
Barden, "one of six which existed in different parts of Barden Forest.
The Shepherd-lord, whose early life among the Cumberland Fells led him
to seek quiet and retirement after his restoration, preferred Barden to
his greater castles, and enlarged (or rather rebuilt) it so as to
provide accommodation for a moderate train of attendants."
III. (See p. 121.)
_It was the time when England's Queen
Twelve years had reigned, a Sovereign dread;_
...
_But now the inly-working North
Was ripe to send its thousands forth,
A potent vassalage, to fight
In Percy's and in Neville's right_, etc.
The circumstances which led to the Rising in the North, and the chief
incidents of that unfortunate episode in English history, are traced in
detail by Mr. Froude, in the fifty-third chapter of his _History of
England_. They are also summarized, in a lecture on _The White Doe of
Rylstone_, by the late Principal Shairp, in his _Aspects of Poetry_,
from which the following passage is an extract (pp. 346-48).
"The incidents on which the _White Doe_ is founded belong to the
year 1569, the twelfth of Queen Elizabeth.
"It is well known that as soon as Queen Mary of Scotland was
imprisoned in England, she became the centre around which gathered
all the intrigues which were then on foot, not only in England but
throughout Catholic Europe, to dethrone the Protestant Queen
Elizabeth. Abroad, the Catholic world was collecting all its
strength to crush the heretical island. The bigot Pope, Pius V.,
with the dark intriguer, Philip II. of Spain, and the savage Duke
of Alva, were ready to pour their forces on the shores of England.
"At home, a secret negotiation for a marriage between Queen Mary
and the Duke of Norfolk had received the approval of many of the
chief English nobles. The Queen discovered the plot, threw Norfolk
and some of his friends into the Tower, and summoned Percy, Earl
of Northumberland, and Neville, Earl of Westmoreland, immediately
to appear at court. These two earls were known to be holding
secret communications with Mary, and longing to see the old faith
restored.
"On receiving the summons, Northumberland at once withdrew to
Brancepeth Castle, a stronghold of the Earl of Westmoreland.
Straightway all their vassals rose, and gathered round the two
great earls. The whole of the North was in arms. A proclamation
went forth that they intended to restore the ancient religion, to
settle the succession to the crown, and to prevent the destruction
of the old nobility. As they marched forward they were joined by
all the strength of the Yorkshire dales, and, among others, by a
gentleman of ancient name, Richard Norton, accompanied by eight
brave sons. He came bearing the common banner, called the Banner
of the Five Wounds, because on it was displayed the Cross with the
five wounds of our Lord. The insurgents entered Durham, tore the
Bible, caused mass to be said in the cathedral, and then set
forward as for York. Changing their purpose on the way, they
turned aside to lay siege to Barnard Castle, which was held by Sir
George Bowes for the Queen. While they lingered there for eleven
days, Sussex marched against them from York, and the earls, losing
heart, retired towards the Border, and disbanded their forces,
which were left to the vengeance of the enemy, while they
themselves sought refuge in Scotland. Northumberland, after a
confinement of several years in Loch Leven Castle, was betrayed by
the Scots to the English, and put to death. Westmoreland died an
exile in Flanders, the last of the ancient house of the Nevilles,
earls of Westmoreland. Norton, with his eight sons, fell into the
hands of Sussex, and all suffered death at York. It is the fate of
this ancient family on which Wordsworth's poem is founded."
This statement as to the fate of Norton's sons, however, is not borne
out by the historians. Mr. Froude says (_History of England_, chap. 53),
"Two sons of old Norton and two of his brothers, after long and close
cross-questioning in the Tower, were tried and convicted at Westminster.
Two of these Nortons were afterwards pardoned. Two, one of whom was
Christopher, the poor youth who had been bewildered by the fair eyes of
the Queen of Scots at Bolton, were put to death at Tyburn, with the
usual cruelties."
IV. (See p. 127.)
_For we must fall, both we and ours--
This Mansion and these pleasant bowers,
Walks, pools, and arbours, homestead, hall--
Our fate is theirs, will reach them all._
Little now remains of Rylstone Hall but the site. "Some garden flowers
still, as when Whitaker wrote, mark the site of the pleasaunce. The
house fell into decay immediately after the attainder of the Nortons;
and, with the estates here, remained in the hands of the Crown until the
second year of James I., when they were granted to the Earl of
Cumberland. Although Wordsworth makes the Nortons raise their famous
banner here, they assembled their followers in fact at Ripon (November
18, 1569), but their Rylstone tenants rose with them."
V. (See p. 137.)
_Until Lord Dacre with his power
From Naworth come; and Howard's aid
Be with them openly displayed._
Naworth Castle, at the head of the vale of Llanercort, in the Gilsland
district of Cumberland, was the seat of the Dacres from the reign of
Edward III. George, Lord Dacre, the last heir-male of that family, was
killed in 1559; and Lord William Howard (the third son of Thomas, Duke
of Norfolk), who was made Warden of the Borders by Queen Elizabeth, and
did much to introduce order and good government into the district,
married the heiress of the Dacre family, and succeeded to the castle and
estate of Naworth. The arms over the entrance of the castle are the
Howard's and Dacre's quartered.
VI. (See p. 137.)
_... mitred Thurston--what a Host
He conquered!..._
_... while to battle moved
The Standard, on the Sacred Wain
That bore it...._
The Battle of the Standard was fought in 1137.
"One gleam of national glory broke the darkness of the time. King
David of Scotland stood first among the partizans of his kinswoman
Matilda, and on the accession of Stephen his army crossed the
border to enforce her claim. The pillage and cruelties of the wild
tribes of Galloway and the Highlands roused the spirit of the
north; baron and freeman gathered at York round Archbishop
Thurstan, and marched to the field of Northallerton to await the
foe. The sacred banners of St. Cuthbert of Durham, St. Peter of
York, St. John of Beverley, and St. Wilfrid of Ripon, hung from a
pole fixed in a four-wheeled car, which stood in the centre of the
host. 'I who wear no armour,' shouted the chief of the Galwegians,
'will go as far this day as any one with breastplate of mail;' his
men charged with wild shouts of 'Albin, Albin,' and were followed
by the Norman knighthood of the Lowlands. The rout, however, was
complete; the fierce hordes dashed in vain against the close
English ranks around the Standard, and the whole army fled in
confusion to Carlisle." (J. R. Green's _Short History of the
English People_, p. 99.)
VII. (See p. 153.)
_High on a point of rugged ground
Among the wastes of Rylstone Fell
Above the loftiest ridge or mound
Where foresters or shepherds dwell,
An edifice of warlike frame
Stands single--Norton Tower its name--
It fronts all quarters, and looks round
O'er path and road, and plain and dell,
Dark moor, and gleam of pool and stream
Upon a prospect without bound._
"Some mounds near the tower are thought to have been used as butts
for archers; and there are traces of a strong wall, running from
the tower to the edge of a deep glen, whence a ditch runs to
another ravine. This was once a pond, used by the Nortons for
detaining the red deer within the township of Rylstone, which they
asserted was not within the forest of Skipton, and consequently
that the Cliffords had no right to hunt therein. The Cliffords
eventually became lords of all the Norton lands here."
* * * * *
In January 1816, Wordsworth wrote thus to his friend Archdeacon
Wrangham.
"Of _The White Doe_ I have little to say, but that I hope it will
be acceptable to the intelligent, for whom alone it is written. It
starts from a high point of imagination, and comes round, through
various wanderings of that faculty, to a still higher--nothing
less than the apotheosis of the animal who gives the first of the
two titles to the poem. And as the poem thus begins and ends with
pure and lofty imagination, every motive and impetus that actuates
the persons introduced is from the same source; a kindred spirit
pervades, and is intended to harmonise, the whole. Throughout
objects (the banner, for instance) derive their influence, not
from properties inherent in them, not from what they _are_
actually in themselves, but from such as are _bestowed_ upon them
by the minds of those who are conversant with, or affected by,
these objects. Thus the poetry, if there be any in the work,
proceeds, as it ought to do, from the _soul of man_, communicating
its creative energies to the images of the external world."
The following is from a letter to Southey in the same year:--"Do you
know who reviewed _The White Doe_ in the 'Quarterly'? After having
asserted that Mr. W. uses his words without any regard to their sense,
the writer says that on no other principle can he explain that Emily is
_always_ called 'the consecrated Emily.' Now, the name Emily occurs just
fifteen times in the poem; and out of these fifteen, the epithet is
attached to it _once_, and that for the express purpose of recalling the
scene in which she had been consecrated by her brother's solemn
adjuration, that she would fulfil her destiny, and become a soul,
"'By force of sorrows high
Uplifted to the purest sky
Of undisturbed mortality.'
The point upon which the whole moral interest of the piece hinges, when
that speech is closed, occurs in this line,--
"'He kissed the consecrated Maid;'
And to bring back this to the reader, I repeated the epithet."
In a letter to Wordsworth about _The Waggoner_, Charles Lamb wrote, June
7, 1819, "I re-read _The White Doe of Rylstone_; the title should be
always written at length, as Mary Sabilla Novello, a very nice woman of
our acquaintance, always signs hers at the bottom of the shortest
note.... Manning had just sent it home, and it came as fresh to me as
the immortal creature it speaks of. M. sent it home with a note, having
this passage in it: 'I cannot help writing to you while I am reading
Wordsworth's poem.... 'Tis broad, noble, poetical, with a masterly
scanning of human actions, absolutely above common readers.'" (See _The
Letters of Charles Lamb_, edited by Alfred Ainger, vol. ii. pp. 25, 26.)
Henry Crabb Robinson's judgment, as given in his _Diary_, June 1815, is
interesting. (See vol. i. p. 484.)
The following is from Principal Shairp's estimate of _The White Doe of
Rylstone_ in his Oxford Lectures, _Aspects of Poetry_ (chapter xii. pp.
373-76). "What is it that gives to it" (the poem) "its chief power and
charm? Is it not the imaginative use which the poet has made of the
White Doe? With her appearance the poem opens, with her re-appearance it
closes. And the passages in which she is introduced are radiant with the
purest light of poetry. A mere floating tradition she was, which the
historian of Craven had preserved. How much does the poet bring out of
how little! It was a high stroke of genius to seize on this slight
traditionary incident, and make it the organ of so much. What were the
objects which he had to describe and blend into one harmonious whole.
They were these:
"1. The last expiring gleam of feudal chivalry, ending in the ruin of an
ancient race, and the desolation of an ancestral home.
"2. The sole survivor, purified and exalted by the sufferings she had to
undergo.
"3. The pathos of the decaying sanctities of Bolton, after wrong and
outrage, abandoned to the healing of nature and time.
"4. Lastly, the beautiful scenery of pastoral Wharfdale, and of the
fells around Bolton, which blend so well with these affecting memories.
"All these were before him--they had melted into his imagination, and
waited to be woven into one harmonious creation. He takes the White Doe,
and makes her the exponent, the symbol, the embodiment of them all. The
one central aim--to represent the beatification of the heroine--how was
this to be attained? Had it been a drama, the poet would have made the
heroine give forth in speeches, her hidden mind and character. But this
was a romantic narrative. Was the poet to make her soliloquise, analyse
her own feelings, lay bare her heart in metaphysical monologue? This
might have been done by some modern poets, but it was not Wordsworth's
way of exhibiting character, reflective though he was. When he analyses
feelings they are generally his own, not those of his characters. To
shadow forth that which is invisible, the sanctity of Emily's chastened
soul, he lays hold of this sensible image--a creature, the purest, most
innocent, most beautiful in the whole realm of nature--and makes her the
vehicle in which he embodies the saintliness which is a thing invisible.
It is the hardest of all tasks to make spiritual things sensuous,
without degrading them. I know not where this difficulty has been more
happily met; for we are made to feel that, before the poem closes, the
Doe has ceased to be a mere animal, or a physical creature at all, but
in the light of the poet's imagination, has been transfigured into a
heavenly apparition--a type of all that is pure, and affecting, and
saintly. And not only the chastened soul of her mistress, but the
beautiful Priory of Bolton, the whole Vale of Wharfe, and all the
surrounding scenery, are illumined by the glory which she makes; her
presence irradiates them all with a beauty and an interest more than the
eye discovers. Seen through her as an imaginative transparency, they
become spiritualized; in fact, she and they alike become the symbol and
expression of the sentiment which pervades the poem--a sentiment broad
and deep as the world. And yet, any one who visits these scenes, in a
mellow autumnal day, will feel that she is no alien or adventitious
image, imported by the caprice of the poet, but altogether native to the
place, one which gathers up and concentrates all the undefined spirit
and sentiment which lie spread around it. She both glorifies the scenery
by her presence, and herself seems to be a natural growth of the
scenery, so that it finds in her its most appropriate utterance. This
power of imagination to divine and project the very corporeal image
which suits and expresses the image of a scene, Wordsworth has many
times shown....
"And so the poem has no definite end, but passes off, as it were, into
the illimitable. It rises out of the perturbations of time and
transitory things, and, passing upward itself, takes our thoughts with
it to calm places and eternal sunshine."--ED.
VARIANTS:
[1] 1837.
... born of heavenly birth, 1815.
[2] 1837.
... which ... 1815.
[3] 1837.
... is ... 1815.
[4] 1820.
... of the crystal Wharf, 1815.
[5] 1837.
A rural Chapel, neatly drest,
In covert like a little nest; 1815.
[6] 1837.
And faith and hope are in their prime, 1815.
[7]
And right across the verdant sod
Towards the very house of God;
Inserted in the editions of 1815 to 1832.
[8] 1837.
A gift ... 1815.
[9] 1837.
Is through ... 1815.
[10] 1837.
... she no less
To the open day gives blessedness. 1815.
[11] 1837.
... hand of healing,--
The altar, whence the cross was rent,
Now rich with mossy ornament,--
The dormitory's length laid bare,
Where the wild-rose blossoms fair;
And sapling ash, whose place of birth
Is that lordly chamber's hearth? 1815.
For altar, ... 1827.
Or dormitory's length ... 1827.
[12] 1837.
Methinks she passeth by the sight, 1815.
[13] 1827.
And in this way she fares, till at last 1815.
[14] 1845.
Gently ... 1815.
[15] 1837.
Like the river in its flowing;
Can there be a softer sound? 1815.
[16] 1837.
--When now again the people rear
A voice of praise, with awful chear! 1815.
[17] 1837.
Turn, with obeisance gladly paid,
Towards the spot, where, full in view,
The lovely Doe of whitest hue, 1815.
[18]
This whisper soft repeats what he
Had known from early infancy.
In the editions of 1815 to 1832 the paragraph begins with these
lines.
[19] 1837.
... is ... 1815.
[20] 1837.
Who in his youth had often fed 1815.
... hath ... 1827.
[21] 1837.
And lately hath brought home the scars
Gathered in long and distant wars-- 1815.
[22] 1837.
... hath mounted ... 1815.
[23] 1837.
... when God's grace
At length had in her heart found place, 1815.
[24] 1837.
Well may her thoughts be harsh; for she
Numbers among her ancestry 1815.
[25] 1827.
... Cumbria's ... 1815.
[26] 1837.
... humble ... 1815.
[27] 1837.
... through strong desire
Searching the earth with chemic fire: 1815.
[28] These two lines were added in the edition of 1837.
[29] 1837.
By busy dreams, and fancies wild; 1815.
[30] 1840.
Thou hast breeze-like visitings;
For a Spirit with angel wings
Hath touched thee, ... 1815.
A Spirit, with angelic wings,
In soft and breeze-like visitings,
Has touched thee-- ... 1837.
A Spirit, with his angelic wings, C.
[31] 1827.
... --'twas She who wrought 1815.
[32] 1837.
... the ... 1815.
[33] 1837.
... one that did fulfil 1815.
[34] 1837.
... (such was the command) 1815.
[35] 1845.