THE wandering minstrel and his sister--that great-hearted, most
beautiful, and devoted sister, whom we cannot help loving so
devoutly,--went in the spring of 1799 to visit their friends, the
Hutchinsons, at Stockton-on-Tees, and remained there, with occasional
exceptions, until the close of the year. Here dwelt Miss Mary
Hutchinson, for whom the poet had begun to conceive such passion as he
was capable of from the time of her visit to him and his sister, at
Alfoxden. For although Dr. Wordsworth is silent also respecting this
visit, De Quincy tells us that it actually took place.--And now the
lovers--in their saturnine way--had leisure to cement their attachment,
and what is more, they took advantage of it, as their subsequent
marriage, about the commencement of the present century, sufficiently
proves.--Many other things, however, occupied the poet’s attention
beside this, and we find him, September 20, planning another tour, and
this time through the lake district, with his friends Cottle and
Coleridge. It was the first time that the latter had seen the lake
country, and he, in writing to Miss Wordsworth, thus speaks of it:--
“At Temple Sowerby we met your brother John, who accompanied us to
Hawes-water, Ambleside, and the divine sisters, Rydal and Grasmere. Here
we stayed two days. We accompanied John over the fork of Helvellyn, on a
day when light and darkness co-existed in contiguous masses, and the
earth and sky were but one. Nature lived for us in all her grandest
accidents. We quitted him by a wild turn, just as we caught a sight of
the gloomy Ullswater.
“Your brother John is one of you; a man who hath solitary usings of his
own intellect, deep in feelings, with a subtle tact, a swift instinct
of truth and beauty; he interests me much.
“You can feel what I cannot express for myself, how deeply I have been
impressed by a world of scenery, absolutely new to me. At Rydal and
Grasmere I received, I think, the deepest delight; yet Hawes-water,
through many a varying view, kept my eyes dim with tears; and the
evening approaching, Derwent-water, in diversity of harmonious features,
in the majesty of its beauties, and in the beauty of its majesty ... and
the black crags close under the snowy mountains, whose snows were
pinkish with the setting sun, and the reflections from the rich clouds
that floated over some, and rested over others!--it was to me a vision
of a fair country: why were you not with us?”
It was in this tour that Wordsworth resolved to settle at Grasmere.
First he thought of building a house by the lake side, and to enable him
to do this, his brother John offered to give him £40 to buy the land.
There was a small house to let, however, at Grasmere, which, after much
deliberation with his sister, he finally hired, and the two
inseparables entered upon it on St. Thomas’s Day, 1799.
One of the very finest of all Wordsworth’s letters--written to Coleridge
four days after the settlement at Grasmere--details, with a graphic and
truly poetic power, the wanderings of the sister and brother from
Sockburn to their new home. It is too long, however, to quote here, and
for a perusal of it the reader is referred to the Memoirs.[H]
The poet lived at Grasmere with his sister for eight years.[I] “The
cottage,” says Dr. Wordsworth, in which Wordsworth and his sister took
up their abode, and which still retains the form it wore then, stands on
the right hand, by the side of what was then the coach road, from
Ambleside to Keswick, as it enters Grasmere, or, as that part of the
village is called, “Town End.” The front of it faces the lake; behind is
a small plot of orchard and garden-ground, in which there is a spring,
and rocks; the enclosure shelves upward towards the woody sides of the
mountain above it.--Many of his poems, as the reader will remember, are
associated with this fair spot:
“This spot of orchard ground is ours;
My trees they are, my sister’s flowers.”
In the first book of the “Recluse,” still unpublished, he thus expresses
his feelings in settling in this house at Grasmere, and in looking down
from the hills which embosom the lake.
“On Nature’s invitation do I come,
By reason sanctioned. Can the choice mislead,
That made the calmest, fairest spot on earth,
With all its unappropriated good,
My own, and not mine only, for with me
Entrenched--say rather peacefully embowered--
Under yon orchard, in yon humble cot,
A younger orphan of a home extinct
The only daughter of my parents, dwells;
Aye, think on that, my heart, and cease to stir;
Pause upon that, and let the breathing frame
No longer breathe, but all be satisfied.
O, if such silence be not thanks to God
For what hath been bestowed, then where, where then,
Shall gratitude find rest? Mine eyes did ne’er
Fix on a lovely object, nor my mind
Take pleasure in the midst of happy thoughts,
But either she, whom now I have, who now
Divides with me that loved abode was there,
Or not far off. Where’er my footsteps turned,
Her voice was like a hidden bird that sung;
The thought of her was like a flash of light
Or an unseen companionship, a breath
Or fragrance independent of the wind.
In all my goings, in the new and old
Of all my meditations, and in this
Favourite of all, in this the most of all....
Embrace me then, ye hills, and close me in.
Now in the clear and open day I feel
Your guardianship; I take it to my heart;
’Tis like the solemn shelter of the night,
But I would call thee beautiful; for mild,
And soft, and gay, and beautiful thou art,
Dear valley, having in thy face a smile,
Though peaceful, full of gladness. Thou art pleased,
Pleased with thy crags, and woody steeps, thy lake
Its one green island, and its winding shores,
The multitude of little rocky hills,
Thy church, and cottages of mountain stone
Clustered like stars, some few, but single most,
And lurking dimly in their shy retreats,
Or glancing at each other cheerful looks,
Like separated stars with clouds between.”
All this is a burst of quiet, yet beautiful, and almost ecstatic,
enthusiasm--the like of which is not to be met with elsewhere, I think,
in poetry. Surely, Wordsworth was worthy of his sweet cottage, and
sweeter and dearer sister, and his glorious lake, with its one green
island,--his mountains, and woods, and dales,--his church, and the
cottages, “clustered like stars,” around it; for he had the great heart,
and large brain, which Nature makes the condition for all those who
would share her communion. And, then, his tastes were so simple,
natural, and unaffected; he lived so close to Nature, and knew so many
of her secrets, and loved her too, with the passion of a first and only
love. Yes, surely, he was worthy of all he enjoyed.
During the three years which elapsed, between the poet’s entering upon
the cottage at Grasmere, and his marriage, he was very industriously,
and even laboriously, employed in cultivating his art; for he had
resolved that poetry should be the business and not the pastime of his
life. We find Coleridge urging him to continue the “Recluse,”--by which
he meant, as Dr. Wordsworth informs us, the “Prelude;”--in the summer of
1799, and again in October of the same year, he says he will hear of
nothing else but the “Recluse;” for in the mood he was in at that time,
he was wholly against the publication of any small poems. He desired
that his friend should build, what my friend J. H. Stirling calls an
“Opus;” but Wordsworth, though still at work upon the foundations of his
_opus_, cannot rest without making little oratories--holy cells--in the
pauses of his labour. Hence a new volume of poems was soon ready for
publication; and as the 12mo. edition of the “Lyrical Ballads,” was by
this time exhausted, Wordsworth determined to reprint them, and add this
new volume to the work, calling the two conjointly “Lyrical Ballads, in
two Volumes.” The pieces now presented to the public, included some of
his finest lyrical effusions. Amongst others, “Lucy Gray,” “Nutting,”
“The Brothers,” “Ruth,” “Poor Susan,” “The Waterfall, and the
Eglantine.” This new edition was published, in 1800, by Messrs.
Longmans, who offered the poet £100 for two editions of the two volumes.
In 1801, Wordsworth presented a copy of the “Lyrical Ballads” to the
Right Hon. C. J. Fox, accompanied by a characteristic letter; in reply
to which, Mr. Fox expresses his high admiration of many of the poems,
particularly of “Harry Gill,” “We are Seven,” “The Mad Mother,” and “The
Idiot Boy.” Mr. Fox, however, takes exception to blank verse, as a
vehicle for subjects which are to be treated with simplicity.
Other poems of deep interest succeeded these new lyrics; and I will name
“The Leech Gatherer,” and the “Ode to Immortality,” because these poems
have always been great favourites with me; and, further, because I wish
to add here the notes which the poet has furnished respecting them. And
first of all “The Leech Gatherer:”--speaking of this poem to his friends
he says,--
“I will explain to you in prose, my feelings in writing that poem. I
describe myself as having been exalted to the highest pitch of delight
by the joyousness and beauty of Nature; and then as depressed, even in
the midst of these beautiful objects, to the lowest dejection and
despair. A young poet in the midst of the happiness of Nature is
described as overwhelmed by the thoughts of the miserable reverses which
have befallen the happiest of all men--viz., poets. I think of this till
I am so deeply impressed with it, that I consider the manner in which I
was rescued from my dejection and despair almost as an interposition of
Providence. A person reading the poem with feelings like mine, will have
been awed and controlled, expecting something spiritual or supernatural.
What is brought forward? A lonely place, ‘a pond by which an old man
_was_, far from all house and home;’ not _stood_, nor _sat_, but _was_.
The figure presented in the most naked simplicity possible. This feeling
of spirituality or supernaturalness is again referred to as being strong
in my mind in this passage. How came he here? thought I, or what can he
be doing? I then describe him, whether ill or well is not for me to
judge with perfect confidence; but this I _can_ confidently affirm, that
though I believe God has given me a strong imagination, I cannot
conceive a figure more impressive than that of an _old_ man like this,
the survivor of a wife and children, travelling alone among the
mountains, and all lonely places, carrying with him his own fortitude in
the necessities which an unjust state of society has laid upon him. You
speak of his speech as tedious. Everything is tedious when one does not
read with the feelings of the author. The ‘Thorn’ is tedious to
hundreds; and so is the ‘Idiot Boy.’ It is in the character of the old
man to tell his story, which an impatient reader must feel tedious. But,
good heavens! should he ever meet such a figure in such a place; a
pious, self-respecting, miserably infirm old man telling such a tale!”
Having thus shown the feelings of the poet in writing “The Thorn,” I
will quote, secondly and lastly, the note to the celebrated “Ode.”
“This,” he says, “was composed during my residence at Town End,
Grasmere. Two years at least passed between the writing of the first
four stanzas and the remaining part. To the attentive and competent
reader the whole sufficiently explains itself; but there may be no harm
in adverting here to particular feelings or _experiences_ of my own mind
on which the structure of the poem partly rests. Nothing was more
difficult for me in childhood than to admit the notion of death as a
state applicable to my own being. I have said elsewhere--
“A simple child
That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death?”
But it was not so much from the source of animal vivacity that my
difficulties came, as from a source of the indomitableness of the spirit
within me. I used to brood over the stories of Enoch and Elijah, and
almost to persuade myself that, whatever might become of others, I
should be translated in something of the same way to heaven. With a
feeling congenial to this, I was often unable to think of external
things as having externally existence, and I communed with all that I
saw as something not apart from, but inherent in my own immaterial
nature. Many times, when going to school, have I grasped at a wall or
tree to recall myself from this abyss of idealism to the reality. At
that time I was afraid of such processes. In later periods of life I
have deplored, as we have all reason to do, a subjugation of an opposite
character, and have rejoiced over the remembrances, as is expressed in
the lines “Obstinate Questionings,” &c. To that dream-like vividness of
splendour which invests objects of sight in childhood, every one, I
believe, if he would look back, could bear testimony, and I need not
dwell upon it here; but having in the poem regarded it as presumptive
evidence of a prior state of existence, I think it right to protest
against such a conclusion which has given pain to some good and pious
persons, that I meant to inculcate such a belief. It is far too shadowy
a notion to be recommended to faith as more than an element in our
instincts of immortality. But let us bear in mind that, though the idea
is not advanced in revelation, there is nothing there to contradict it,
and the fall of man presents an analogy in its favour. Accordingly, a
pre-existent state has entered into the popular creeds of many nations,
and among all persons acquainted with classic literature is known as an
ingredient in Platonic philosophy. Archimedes said that he could move
the world if he had a point whereon to rest his machine. Who has not
felt the same aspirations as regards the world of his own mind? Having
to wield some of its elements when I was impelled to write this poem on
the ‘Immortality of the Soul,’ I took hold of the notion of
pre-existence, as having sufficient foundation in humanity for
authorising me to make for my purpose the best use of it I could as a
poet.”
Now, in this note, and in the “Ode” which it illustrates, will be found
the key to all Wordsworth’s philosophy, and to the secret of his mind as
a poet. The mystic spiritualism which imbues all his writings, is the
great distinguishing feature which marks and separates him from merely
didactic and descriptive poets; and, were this element wanting in him,
we should have a fine reporter of Nature’s doings--a fine painter of
objective effects--but no creator--no idealist, and therefore, properly
speaking, no _poet_, in the high signification of that term. Luckily,
however, for Wordsworth and for the world, he possessed the spiritual
faculty, and kept it always active; so that his eye, even in the
presence of the meanest objects, was open to the ideal things of which
the symbols they were. The _infinite_ was ever present to his mind, and
he saw all objects through that medium of light and relationship. But
the great band of critics outside the fine region in which Wordsworth
dwelt, could not of course understand this “Ode,” or the general tone of
Wordsworth’s poetry, and therefore they denounced it, as
incomprehensible, mystic, and absurd. But because they had no faculty
with which to appreciate spiritual representation, or even to believe
in spirituality as a fact belonging to the nature of man, that was no
reason in the estimation of our poet, that he should cease to sing his
wonted strains in his wonted manner. In alluding to this depreciation of
his poems, he very sorrowfully says, somewhere in his letters or notes,
that it is a fact that “nineteen out of every twenty persons are unable
to appreciate poetry;” and we are bound to confess that this hard
judgment is truth. Even the better sort of “Reviews,” in which we should
have expected at least a recognition of the genius and noble aims of the
poet, stood out dead against him; and Jeffrey’s “_This will never do_,”
in speaking of “The Excursion,” shows how blindly bigotted and
intolerant were such critics in those days. As a sample of the abuse,
and utter want of judgment which characterised Wordsworth’s critics,
take the following anecdotes, which are recorded by the writer on
“Wordsworth,” (Chamber’s Tracts) as a good joke, or I will hope, as a
picture of the folly of the time.
“A writer in Blackwood for November, 1829, gives an amusing sketch of a
party where the ‘Intimations of Immortality,’ revered by the initiated
as _the_ ‘Revelation,’ was read aloud by a true disciple, in a kind of
unimaginable chant then peculiar to the sect. There were one or two
believers present, with a few neophytes, and one or two absolute and
wicked sceptics! No sooner had the recitation fairly commenced, than one
of the sceptics, of laughing propensities, crammed his handkerchief
half-way down his throat; the others looked keen and composed: the
disciples groaned, and the neophytes shook their heads in deep
conviction.’ The reciter proceeded with deeper unction, till on being
asked by a neophyte to give an explanation, which he was unable to give,
he got angry, and ‘roundly declared, that things so out of the common
way, so sublime, and so abstruse, could be conveyed in no language but
their own. When the reciter came to the words, ‘Callings from us,’ the
neophyte again timidly requested an explanation, and was informed by one
of the sceptics, that they meant the child’s transitory gleams of a
glorious pre-existence, that fall away and vanish almost as soon as they
appear. The obstinate neophyte only replied, in a tone of melancholy,
‘When I think of my childhood, I have only visions of traps and balls,
and whippings. I never remember being “haunted by the eternal mind.” To
be sure I did ask a great many questions, and was tolerably obstinate,
but I fear these are not the “obstinate questionings” of which Mr.
Wordsworth speaks.’ This is but a small sample of the Wordsworthian
scenes and disputations then of every-day occurrence. In 1816 a kind of
shadow of Horace Smith again took the field. It seems that Hogg intended
to publish an anthology of the living British bards, and had written to
some of them for specimens. A wag, who had heard of the project,
immediately issued an anthology, purporting to be this, but containing
merely the coinage of his own brain. As may be imagined, Wordsworth
occupied a prominent corner; and indeed some of the imitations--for most
were imitations rather than parodies--did him no discredit. ‘The Flying
Tailor,’ however, was not an infelicitous burlesque of the poet’s blank
verse:--
“Ere he was put
By his mother into breeches, Nature strung
The muscular part of his anatomy
To an unusual strength; and he could leap,
All unimpeded by his petticoats,
Over the stool on which his mother sat,
More than six inches--o’er the astonished stool!”
Enough, however, has been said about these critics, for the present, at
least. Wordsworth’s was a struggle to get for poetry, once more, a true
utterance; to annihilate the old dead, mechanical form which it had for
the most part assumed, from the time of Pope downwards to him; for
although Burns and Cowper had sounded the first trumpet in this morning
of the resurrection, it was reserved for Wordsworth to awake the dead,
and infuse into them a new and living soul.
During the residence of the poet at Grasmere, his sister kept a diary of
the proceedings of their little household, which, with Wordsworth’s
letters, are the chief biographical records of this period, respecting
the poet himself. The following extracts will give some idea of the calm
and beautiful life which they led together:--
“As we were going along, we were stopped at once, at the distance,
perhaps of fifty yards from our favourite birch-tree; it was yielding
to the gust of wind, with all its tender twigs; the sun shone upon it,
and it glanced in the wind like a flying sunshiny shower; it was a tree
in shape, with a stem and branches, but it was like a spirit of
water....
When we were in the woods before Gowbarrow Park, we saw a few
_daffodils_ close to the water-side.... As we went along there were
more, and yet more; and at last, under the boughs of the trees, we saw
there was a long belt of them along the shore. I never saw daffodils so
beautiful. They grew among the mossy stones about them; some rested
their heads on these stones, as on a pillow; the rest tossed, and
reeled, and danced, and seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind,
they looked so gay and glancing.”
The poet was frequently indebted to this beautiful sister for the
_material_ of his poems; and many of the minor pieces are a musical
transformation of her descriptions of natural scenery, and the feelings
with which she beheld it. The poem of “The Beggars” is an instance of
this; and if the reader will peruse “The Daffodils,” and compare it with
Miss Wordsworth’s description of these fair flowers, as quoted above,
he will perhaps discover how much the poet is indebted to her, in this
instance also. Here is the poem.
“I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of _golden daffodils_,
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
_Fluttering and dancing in the breeze_.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretch’d in never ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but feel gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought.
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant, or in passive mood,
_They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude_;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.”
In writing to his friends the Wranghams, November 4, 1802, Wordsworth,
after thanking them for their good opinion of this poem, alludes to
“Butler, Montague’s friend,” as having said of it (the poem,) “Aye, a
fine morsel this for the reviewers,”--and adds, “When this was told me
(for I was not present) I observed that there were _two lines_ in that
little poem, which, if thoroughly felt, would annihilate nine-tenths of
the reviews of the kingdom, as they would find no readers. The lines I
alluded to were these--
‘They flash upon that inward eye,
Which is the bliss of solitude.’”