The Journals written by Dorothy Wordsworth, and her reminiscences of
Tours made with her brother, are more interesting to posterity than her
letters.
A few fragments from her Grasmere Journal were included by the late
Bishop of Lincoln in the _Memoirs_ of his uncle, published in 1850. The
_Recollections of a Tour made in Scotland_ in 1803, were edited in full
by the late Principal Shairp in the year 1874 (third edition 1894). In
1889, I included in my _Life of William Wordsworth_ most of the Journal
written at Alfoxden, much of that referring to Hamburg, and the greater
part of the longer Grasmere Journal. Some extracts from the Journal of a
Tour on the Continent made in 1820 (and of a similar one written by Mrs.
Wordsworth), as well as short records of subsequent visits to Scotland
and to the Isle of Man, were printed in the same volume. None of these,
however, were given in their entirety; nor is it desirable now to print
them _in extenso_, except in the case of the _Recollections of a Tour
made in Scotland_ in 1803. All the Journals contain numerous trivial
details, which bear ample witness to the "plain living and high
thinking" of the Wordsworth household--and, in this edition, samples of
these details are given--but there is no need to record all the cases in
which the sister wrote, "To-day I mended William's shirts," or "William
gathered sticks," or "I went in search of eggs," etc. etc. In all cases,
however, in which a sentence or paragraph, or several sentences and
paragraphs, in the Journals are left out, the omission is indicated by
means of asterisks. Nothing is omitted of any literary or biographical
value. Some persons may think that too much has been recorded, others
that everything should have been printed. As to this, posterity must
judge. I think that many, in future years, will value these Journals,
not only as a record of the relations existing between Wordsworth and
his sister, his wife, her family and his friends, but also as an
illustration of the remarkable literary brotherhood and sisterhood of
the period.
Coming now to details.
I
I do not know of any Journal written at Racedown, and I do not think
that Dorothy kept one while she and her brother lived in Dorsetshire. In
July 1797 they took up their residence at Alfoxden; but, so far as is
known, it was not till the 20th of January 1798 that Dorothy began to
write a Journal of her own and her brother's life at that place. It was
continued uninterruptedly till Thursday, 22nd May 1798. It gives
numerous details as to the visits of Coleridge to Alfoxden, and the
Wordsworths' visits to him at Nether-Stowey, as well as of the
circumstances under which several of their poems were composed. Many
sentences in the Journal present a curious resemblance to words and
phrases which occur in the poems; and there is no doubt that, as brother
and sister made use of the same note-book--some of Wordsworth's own
verses having been written by him in his sister's journal--the
copartnery may have extended to more than the common use of the same MS.
The archaic spellings which occur in this Journal are retained; but
inaccuracies--such as Bartelmy for Bartholemew, Crewkshank for
Cruikshank--are corrected. In the edition of 1889 the words were printed
as written in MS.; but it is one thing to reproduce the _bona fide_ text
of a journal, or the _ipsissima verba_ of a poet, and quite another to
reproduce the incorrect spellings of his sister.