s of age, but his appearance was that of an man. He had been a painter by profesbut on taking orders changed his name Santi to Raffaello, perhaps with an unconas reference as well to the great Sanzio d' no as to the archangel. He assured my id that he had been thirteen years in the itage and had never known melancholy or i. In the little recess for study and prayer, e was a small collection of books. "I read ," said he, "books of asceticism and mystitheology." On being asked the names of most famous mystics, he enumerated Scarai, San Giovanni della Croce, St. Dionysius Areopagite (supposing the work which bears name to be really his), and with peculiar hasis Ricardo di San Vittori. The works Saint Theresa are also in high repute among etics. These names may interest some of readers.

Ve heard that Raffaello was then living in convent; my friend sought in vain to renew acquaintance with him. It was probably a of seclusion. The reader will perceive that se sonnets were supposed to be written when was a young man. W. W.

Page 753. AT THE EREMITE OR UPPER NVENT OF CAMALDOLI.

Line 1. What aim had they, the Pair of nks. In justice to the Benedictines of Caldoli, by whom strangers are so hospitably tertained, I feel obliged to notice that I saw ong them no other figure at all resembling, in e and complexion, the two monks described this Sonnet. What was their office, or the moe which brought them to this place of mortiation, which they could not have approached thout being carried in this or some other way, feeling of delicacy prevented me from iniring. An account has before been given of e hermitage they were about to enter. It as visited by us towards the end of the month May; yet snow was lying thick under the ne-trees, within a few yards of the gate. 1. W.

Page 753. AT VALLOMBROSA.
Milton visited Italy in 1638.

The name of Milton is pleasingly connected ith Vallombrosa in many ways. The pride ith which the monk, without any previous uestion from me, pointed out his residence, I all not readily forget. It may be proper here › defend the poet from a charge which has een brought against him, in respect to the pasage in Paradise Lost,' where this place is mentioned. It is said, that he has erred in peaking of the trees there being deciduous, whereas they are, in fact, pines. The faultinders are themselves mistaken; the natural voods of the region of Vallombrosa are deciduus, and spread to a great extent; those near he convent are, indeed, mostly pines; but they re avenues of trees planted within a few steps of each other, and thus composing large tracts of wood; plots of which are periodically cut

down. The appearance of those narrow avenues, upon steep slopes open to the sky, on account of the height which the trees attain by being forced to grow upwards, is often very impressive. My guide, a boy of about fourteen years old, pointed this out to me in several places." W. W.

1838

Page 761. "BLEST STATESMAN HE."
Line 14.

"All change is perilous, and all chance unsound." W. W.

1839

This year Wordsworth received the degree of D. C. L. at Oxford.

Page 761. SONNETS UPON THE PUNISHMENT OF DEATH.

These were occasioned by the general discussion in England in 1836-7 in regard to abolishing the death penalty in all cases excepting murder and treason. Wordsworth's ideals, while conservative, in many respects were in advance of his time.

In 1841 Wordsworth wrote to Sir Henry Taylor as follows: "You and Mr. Lockhart have been very kind in taking so much trouble about the sonnets. I have altered them as well as I could to meet your wishes, and trust that you will find them improved, as I am sure they are where I have adopted your own words."

1840

Page 764. SONNETS ON A PORTRAIT OF I. F. This year is memorable from the fact that Miss Fenwick came to Rydal to live. To her interest in Wordsworth as poet and man we are indebted for the autobiographical notes prefixed to the poems of this volume. They were dictated to her by the poet and are known as the

Fenwick Notes." She once said to Sir Henry Taylor: "I would be content to be a servant in the house to hear his wisdom." It was natural that the first two sonnets of this year should be a tribute to Miss Fenwick. The lower terrace at Rydal was cut by the poet for her.

Page 765. POOR ROBIN.

The Poor Robin is the small wild geranium known by that name. W. W.

The hope expressed in the Fenwick note and the poem itself has been reverenced by those who have had the care of Rydal since Wordsworth left it; it has lost none of its beauty or charm.

Page 765. ON A PORTRAIT OF THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON UPON THE FIELD OF WATERLOO, BY HAYDON.

Sept. 4, 1840, Haydon writes in his Journal, "I heard from dear Wordsworth with a glorious sonnet On the Duke and Copenhagen.'"

This picture used to hang on the staircase near the cuckoo clock at Rydal. See "On the Field of Waterloo."

1841

Page 766. TO A PAINTER.

Miss Margaret Gillies painted five portraits of Wordsworth on ivory. One of these was so pleasing to the family that it was reproduced with Mrs. Wordsworth at the poet's side. It is to her portrait that the two sonnets of this year refer.

Line 10. that inward eye. See "The Daffodils," note, and the other poems on Mrs. Wordsworth: She was a Phantom of delight," "O dearer far than life and light are dear," "Let other bards of angels sing," "Such age how beautiful! O Lady bright," "What heavenly smiles! O Lady mine," " In trellised shed with clustering roses gay."

"In a letter of Wordsworth to his daughter (printed in the Cornhill Magazine, March, 1893) he writes of this and the following poem: Dearest Dora, Your mother tells me she shrinks from copies being spread of these sonnets; she does not wish one, at any rate, to be given to Miss Gillies, for that, without blame to Miss G., would be like advertising them. I assure you her modesty and humble-mindedness were so much shocked, that I doubt if she had more pleasure than pain from these compositions though I never poured out anything more from the heart.'" - DowDEN.

It is interesting to note that (in June, 1841) when Wordsworth was receiving honor at home and abroad for the great fight he had fought, Carlyle wrote a letter to Browning (just published), regarding Sordello" and "Pippa Passes," in which he lays down the following distinctive doctrine for which Wordsworth had contended both in verse and prose. Unless poetic faculty means a higher power of common understanding, I know not what it means. One must first take a true intellectual representation of a thing before any poetic interest that is true will supervene."

It was against such a perversion of art th Wordsworth did battle even to the last; be sisted that art was the product of the vie nature, intellect, sensibility, and will, with a lofty spiritual imagination.

SONNET VII. Men of the Western World, These lines were written several years when reports prevailed of cruelties commit in many parts of America, by men making law of their own passions. A far more form able, as being a more deliberate mischief, a appeared among those States, which have late broken faith with the public creditor in a m ner so infamous. I cannot, however, but lat at both evils under a similar relation to inh ent good, and hope that the time is not distr when our brethren of the West will wipe f this stain from their name and nation.

ADDITIONAL NOTE

I am happy to add that this anticipation a already partly realised; and that the reproac addressed to the Pennsylvanians in the so on page 784 is no longer applicable to them. trust that those other States to which it may yet apply will soon follow the example now them by Philadelphia, and redeem their cred with the world.-1850. W. W.

Page 771. THE POET'S DREAM.

Line 28. Chapel Oak of Allonville. Am ancient Trees there are few, I believe, at leas in France, so worthy of attention as an which may be seen in the "Pays de Cax about a league from Yvetot, close to the church. and in the burial-ground of Allonville.

The height of this Tree does not answer t its girth; the trunk, from the roots to the samemit, forms a complete cone; and the inside of this cone is hollow throughout the whole of i height.

Such is the Oak of Allonville in its state of nature. The hand of Man, however, has e deavoured to impress upon it a character sta more interesting, by adding a religious feeling to the respect which its age naturally inspires

The lower part of its hollow trunk has been transformed into a Chapel of six or seven fee in diameter, carefully wainscoted and pared. and an open iron gate guards the humble San tuary.

Leading to it there is a staircase, which twists round the body of the Tree. At certa seasons of the year, divine service is performed in this Chapel.

The summit has been broken off my years, but there is a surface at the top of the trunk, of the diameter of a very large tree. and from it rises a pointed roof, covered with slates, in the form of a steeple, which is su mounted with an iron Cross, that rises in a pie turesque manner from the middle of the leaves, like an ancient hermitage above the surrounding Wood.

Over the entrance to the Chapel an Inscrip tion appears, which informs us it was erected by the Abbé du Détroit, Curate of Allonville

the year 1696; and over a door is another, licating it "To our Lady of Peace." Vide No. 14, Saturday Magazine. W. W.

Page 774. AIREY-FORCE VALLEY.

Near Lyulph's Tower, Ullswater. See" The mnambulist," note, and "I wandered lonely a cloud." The Natural Trust for preserving ices of historic interest in England has reatly (1904) called for subscriptions that this tion" of over 700 acres with one mile of ontage to the Lake, rights of fishing, and boatz, the deer forest, the woods and the waterfall ay be obtained as a natural possession."

Page 776. WANSFELL.

Wansfell, the Fell of Woden, lies to the uthwest of Rydal above Ambleside.

1843

This year Wordsworth was appointed Poet

aureate.

Page 776. GRACE DARLING.

Grace Darling with her father, the lighthouseeeper at Longstone on the Northumbrian ast, rescued nine survivors from the wreck of e steamship Forfarshire, Sept. 7, 1838. Line 27. Cuthbert's cell. Cuthbert came from Ielrose to Lindisfarne.

Page 778. "WHILE BEAMS OF ORIENT
IGHT SHOOT WIDE AND HIGH."
Line 2. rural Town. Ambleside.

Page 778. TO THE REV. CHRISTOPHER
WORDSWORTH, D. D.
The poet's nephew.

Page 778. INSCRIPTION FOR A MONUMENT. This monument was erected in the Church of St. Kentigern, Crosthwaite, Keswick, in memry of Robert Southey. It stands on the east end of the altar tomb.

Lines 16, 17. Buthe, etc. These lines were changed by Wordsworth after they were cut on the monument. One can recognize this by running the fingers over them.

1844

Page 778. ON THE PROJECTED KENDAL AND WINDERMERE RAILWAY.

The degree and kind of attachment which many of the yeomanry feel to their small inheritances can scarcely be over-rated. Near the house of one of them stands a magnificent tree, which a neighbour of the man advised him to fell for profit's sake. "Fell it!" exclaimed the yeoman, "I had rather fall on my knees and worship it." It happens, I believe, that the intended railway would pass through this little property, and I hope that an apology for the answer will not be thought necessary by one who enters into the strength of the feeling. W. W. Wordsworth sent this sonnet to Gladstone

with a letter calling his attention to the "desecrating project."

That Wordsworth's spirit is still potent to save the Lakes for "Nature and Mankind," is evidenced by the work of the Lake District Defence Society, which has prevented the promoters from invading Borrowdale, Buttermere, and Braithwaite. In this good work it has had substantial aid from England, from across the Border, and from America. Many dalesmen may be found on the Lakes as loyal to its beauties as was that one referred to by the poet himself. So long as this feeling prevails Mr. Ruskin's prophecy that there would in time be built "A railway for Cook's excursion trains up Scaw Fell, another up Helvellyn, and a third up Skiddaw with a circular tour to connect all three branches," will not become true.

Line 9. Orrest-head. The height north of Windermere, back of Elleray, the home of Christopher North, from which there is a magnificent view of Windermere and its surroundings.

Page 779. AT FURNESS ABBEY.

The tourist visiting the Lakes from the south should enter by Furness, where he will find the sentiment of the sonnet still splendidly realized. Furness is now the property of the Duke of Devonshire.

Page 780. THE WESTMORELAND GIRL.

The scene of this poem is on the western side of Grasmere Lake, at the right of the road leading to Red Bank, where the brook descends from Silver How. The cottage known as Wyke Cottage still stands.

Page 784. "So FAIR, SO SWEET."

The circumstance which gave rise to this poem was a walk in July, 1844, from Windermere, by Rydal and Grasmere, to Loughrigg Tarn, made by Wordsworth in company with J. C. Hare, Sir William Hamilton, Prof. Butler, and others. One of the party writes of it as follows:

"When we reached the side of Loughrigg Tarn the loveliness of the scene arrested our steps

and fixed our gaze. When the Poet's eyes were satisfied with their feast on the beauties familiar to them, they sought relief in search, to them a happy vital habit, for new beauty in the flower-enamelled turf at his feet. There his attention was arrested by a fair smooth atone, of the size of an ostrich's egg, seeming to imbed at its centre, and at the same time to display a dark star-shaped fossil of most distinct outline. Upon closer inspection this proved to be the shadow of a daisy projected upon it. The Poet drew the attention of the rest of the party to the minute but beautiful phenomenon, and gave expression at the time to thoughts suggested by it, which so interested Professor Butler that he plucked the tiny flower, and, saying that it should be not only the theme but the memorial of the thought they had heard,' bestowed it somewhere for preservation." KNIGHT.

Ruskin says of the first six lines: "This is a little bit of good, downright, foreground painting and no mistake about it, daisy, and shade, and stone texture and all. Our painters must come to this before they have done their duty." Modern Painters, vol. i. part ii., section ii., chapter vii.

Prof. Dowden thinks this was composed between 1835 and 1842.

1846

Page 786. "WHY SHOULD WE WEEP?" ETC. This sonnet refers to the poet's grandson, who died in Rome, 1846.

Page 786. "WHERE LIES THE TRUTH?"

ETC.

This sonnet was occasioned by the death of the grandson alluded to in the previous sonnet; the illness of his brother Christopher, and of another grandson John, son of his brother Richard."- KNIGHT.

Page 787. TO LUCCA GIORDANO.

The picture which suggested this scnnet used

to hang on the staircase at Rydal. It ra brought from Italy by the poet's eldest son.

1847

Page 788. ODE ON THE INSTALLATION HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS.

Wordsworth's beloved daughter Dora v taken ill early in this year, and when he was anxious over her condition he was requested write the ode on the installation of the Prize Consort as Chancellor of the University Cambridge. He accepted the invitation, was not able to complete the work, and wis assisted by his nephew Christopher. Dora d in July and the poet wrote, "Our sorrow is fr life, but God's will be done!" He never ag retouched his harp.

"Wordsworth has laboured long; if for him self, yet more for men, and over all I tra for God. Will he ever be the bearer of ex thoughts to any mind? Glory is gathering round his later years on earth, and his later works especially indicate the spiritual ripe of his noble soul."-W. E. GLADSTONE. M ley's Life of Gladstone, vol. i. p. 136.

Hon. George F. Hoar, reviewing Words worth's relation to righteousness and liberty wrought out in the conduct of states, says "The influence of William Wordsworth. -1 is the greatest power for justice, and righteo ness, and liberty, that has been on the plane since Milton. The knights, the good an brave champions of freedom, as they take up their lips the vows of consecration, bathe ther selves in Wordsworth as in a pure and clear f tain. The love of liberty under law, the lofties political philosophy, snowy purity of life, sm pathy with every human sorrow, breathe from every line Wordsworth ever wrote, until at the age of eighty the mighty power passed from the earth, and,

The man from God sent forth,
Did yet again to God return.'"
International Monthly, October, 19

worth. Quam nihil ad genium, Papiniane, tuum! Fourth Edition. London: printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, & Orme, by R. Taylor and Co., 38 Shoe Lane. 1805. 8vo.

7

POEMS, in two volumes, By William Wordsworth, Author of the Lyrical Ballads. Posterius graviore sono tibi Musa loquetur Nostra: dabunt cum securos mihi tempora fructus. Vol. I. [Vol. II.] London: printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, Paternoster Row. 1807. 12mo.

8

CONCERNING THE RELATIONS OF GREAT BRITAIN, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL, TO EACH OTHER, AND TO THE COMMON ENEMY, AT THIS CRISIS; and specifically as affected by the Convention of Cintra: The whole brought to the test of those principles by which alone the Independence and Freedom of Nations can be Preserved or Recovered. Qui didicit patriæ quid debeat; - Quod sit conscripti, quod judicis officium; quæ Partes in bellum missi ducis. By William Wordsworth. London: printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, Paternoster-Row. 1809. 8vo.

POEMS BY WILLIAM WORDSWORTH: including Lyrical Ballads, and the Miscellaneous Pieces of the Author. With additional Poems, a new Preface, and a Supplementary Essay. In two volumes. Vol. I. [Vol. II.] London: printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, Paternoster Row. 1815. 8vo.

This is the first collected Edition (to date) of Wordsworth's. Poems, excluding "The Excursion." In it the poet for the first time arranges the pieces under various headings, viz. "Poems referring to the Period of Childhood," " Juvenile Pieces," "Poems founded on the Affections," etc. (T.)