Walker, for which see notes to the Duddon. Then that of the deaf man, whose epitaph may be seen in the churchyard at the head of Haweswater, and whose qualities of mind and heart, and their benign influence in conjunction with his privation, I had from his relatives on the spot. The blind man, next commemorated, was John Gough, of Kendal, a man known, far beyond his neighborhood, for his talents and attainments in natural history and science. Of the Infant's grave, next noticed, I will only say, it is an exact picture of what fell under my own observation; and all persons who are intimately acquainted with cottage life must often have observed like instances of the working of the domestic affections.

"A volley thrice repeated o'er the corse

Let down into the hollow of that grave." This young volunteer bore the name of Dawson, and was younger brother, if I am not mistaken, to the prodigal of whose character and fortunes an account is given towards the beginning of the preceding book. The father of the family I knew well; he was a man of literary education and of experience in society much beyond what was common among the inhabitants of the vale. He had lived a good while in the Highlands of Scotland, as a manager of iron-works at Bunaw, and had acted as clerk to one of my predecessors in the office of Distributor of Stamps, when he used to travel round the country collecting and bringing home the money due to Government, in gold, which, it may be worth while to mention for the sake of my friends, was deposited in the cell or iron closet under the west window of the long room at Rydal Mount, which still exists with the iron doors that guarded the property. This of course was before the time of Bills and Notes. The two sons of this person had no doubt been led by the knowledge of their father to take more delight in scholarship, and had been accustomed in their own minds to take a wider view of social interests than was usual among their associates. The premature death of this gallant young man was much lamented, and, as an attendant at the funeral, I myself witnessed the ceremony and the effect of it as described in the poem.

"Tradition tells
That, in Eliza's golden days, a Knight
Came on a war-horse."

"The house is gone."

The pillars of the gateway in front of the mansion remained when we first took up our abode at Grasmere. Two or three cottages still remain, which are called Knott-houses from the name of the gentleman (I have called him a knight)

concerning whom these traditions survive. He was the ancestor of the Knott family, formerly considerable proprietors in the district. What follows in the discourse of the Wanderer upon the changes he had witnessed in rural life, by the introduction of machinery, is truly described from what I myself saw during my boyhood and early youth, and from what was often told me by persons of this humble calling. Happily, most happily, for these mountains, the mischief was diverted from the banks of their beautiful streams, and transferred to open and flat countries abounding in coal, where the agency of steam was found much more effectual for carrying on those demoralizing works. Had it not been for this invention, long before the present time every torrent and river in this district would have had its factory, large and populous in proportion to the power of the water that could there have been commanded. Parliament has interfered to prevent the night-work which was once carried on in these mills as actively as during the daytime, and by necessity still more perniciously-a sad disgrace to the proprietors, and to the nation which could so long tolerate such unnatural proceedings. Reviewing at this late period, 1843, what I put into the mouths of my interlocutors a few years after the commencement of the century, I grieve that so little progress has been made in diminishing the evils deplored, or promoting the benefits of education which the Wanderer anticipates. The results of Lord Ashley's labors to defer the time when children might legally be allowed to work in factories, and his endeavors to limit still farther the hours of permitted labor, have fallen far short of his own humane wishes, and those of every benevolent and right-minded man who has carefully attended to this subject: and in the present session of Parliament (1843) Sir James Graham's attempt to establish a course of religious education among the children employed in factories has been abandoned, in consequence of what might easily have been foreseen, the vehement and turbulent opposition of the Dissenters so that, for many years to come, it may be thought expedient to leave the religious instruction of children entirely in the hands of the several denominations of Christians in the island, each body to work according to its own means and in its own way. Such is my own confidence, a confidence I share with many others of my most valued friends, in the superior advantages, both religious and social, which attend a course of instruction presided over and guided by the clergy of the Church of England, that I have no doubt that, if but once its members, lay and clerical, were duly sensible of those benefits, their church would daily gain ground, and rapidly, upon every shape and fashion of

Dissent: and in that case, a great majority in Parliament being sensible of these benefits, the Ministers of the country might be emboldened, were it necessary, to apply funds of the State to the support of education on Church principles. Before I conclude, I cannot forbear noticing the strenuous efforts made at this time in Parliament, by so many persons, to extend manufacturing and commercial industry at the expense of agricultural, though we have recently had abundant proofs that the apprehensions expressed by the Wanderer were not groundless.

"I spake of mischief by the wise diffused With gladness, thinking that the more it spreads The healthier, the securer, we become Delusion which a moment may destroy!" The Chartists are well aware of this possibility, and cling to it with an ardor and perseverance which nothing but wiser and more brotherly dealing towards the many, on the part of the wealthy few, can moderate or remove. "While, from the grassy mountain's open side, We gazed, in silence hushed."

The point here fixed upon in my imagination is half-way up the northern side of Loughrigg Fell, from which the Pastor and his companions were supposed to look upwards to the sky and mountain-tops, and round the vale, with the lake lying immediately beneath them.

"But turned not without welcome promise made,
That he would share the pleasures and pursuits
Of yet another summer's day, consumed
In wandering with us.

When I reported this promise of the Solitary, and
long after, it was my wish, and I might say in-
tention, that we should resume our wanderings,
and pass the Borders into his native country,
where, as I hoped, he might witness, in the
society of the Wanderer, some religious ceremony
- a sacrament, say, in the open fields, or a preach-
ing among the mountains-which, by recalling to
his mind the days of his early childhood, when
he had been present on such occasions in com-
pany with his parents and nearest kindred, might
have dissolved his heart into tenderness, and so
have done more towards restoring the Christian
faith in which he had been educated, and, with
that, contentedness and even cheerfulness of
mind, than all that the Wanderer and Pastor, by
their several effusions and addresses, had been
able to effect.
tentions.

An issue like this was in my inBut, alas!

"Mid the wreck of is and was, Things incomplete and purposes betrayed Make sadder transits o'er thought's optic glass Than noblest objects utterly decayed!"

TO THE RIGHT HON.

WILLIAM, EARL OF LONSDALE, K.G. ETC., ETC.

OFT, through thy fair domains, illustrious Peer!
In youth I roamed, on youthful pleasures bent;
And mused in rocky cell or sylvan tent,
Beside swift-flowing Lowther's current clear

Now, by thy care befriended, I appear
Before thee, LONSDALE, and this Work present,
A token (may it prove a monument!)
Of high respect and gratitude sincere.
Gladly would I have waited till my task
Had reached its close; but Life is insecure,
And Hope full oft fallacious as a dream:
Therefore, for what is here produced, I ask
Thy favor; trusting that thou wilt not deem
The offering, though imperfect, premature.
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.
RYDAL MOUNT, WESTMORELAND,
July 29, 1814.

PREFACE TO THE EDITION OF

1814.

THE Title-page announces that this is only a portion of a poem; and the Reader must be here apprised that it belongs to the second part of a long and laborious Work, which is to consist of three parts. -The Author will candidly acknowledge that, if the first of these had been completed, and in such a manner as to satisfy his own mind, he should have preferred the natural order of publication, and have given that to the world first; but, as the second division of the Work was designed to refer more to passing events, and to an existing state of things, than the others were meant to do, more continuous exertion was naturally bestowed upon it, and greater progress made here than in the rest of the poem; and as this part does not depend upon the preceding to a degree which will materially injure its own peculiar interest, the Author, complying with the earnest entreaties of some valued Friends, presents the following pages to the Public.

It may be proper to state whence the poem, of which "The Excursion" is a part, derives its Title of THE RECLUSE.-Several years ago, when the Author retired to his native mountains, with the hope of being enabled to construct a literary Work that might live, it was a reasonable thing that he should take a review of his own mind, and examine how far Nature and Education had

1

qualified him for such employment. As sub-
sidiary to this preparation, he undertook to
record, in verse, the origin and progress of his
own powers, as far as he was acquainted with
them. That Work,1 addressed to a dear Friend,
most distinguished for his knowledge and genius,
and to whom the Author's Intellect is deeply
indebted, has been long finished; and the result
of the investigation which gave rise to it was a
determination to compose a philosophical poem,
containing views of Man, Nature, and Society;
and to be entitled, "The Recluse; " as having for
its principal subject the sensations and opinions
of a poet living in retirement. - The preparatory
poem 1 is biographical, and conducts the history
of the Author's mind to the point when he was
emboldened to hope that his faculties were suf-
ficiently matured for entering upon the arduous
labor which he had proposed to himself; and
the two Works have the same kind of relation to
each other, if he may so express himself, as the
ante-chapel has to the body of a Gothic church.
Continuing this allusion, he may be permitted
to add, that his minor Pieces, which have been
long before the Public, when they shall be
properly arranged, will be found by the attentive
Reader to have such connection with the main
Work as may give them claim to be likened to
the little cells, oratories, and sepulchral recesses,
ordinarily included in those edifices.

The Author would not have deemed himself
justified in saying, upon this occasion, so much
of performances either unfinished or unpublished,
if he had not thought that the labor bestowed
by him upon what he has heretofore and now
laid before the Public entitled him to candid
attention for such a statement as he thinks
necessary to throw light upon his endeavors to
please and, he would hope, to benefit his country-
men. Nothing further need be added, than that
the first and third parts of "The Recluse" will
consist chiefly of meditations in the Author's own
person; and that in the intermediate part ("The
Excursion") the intervention of characters speak-
ing is employed, and something of a dramatic
form adopted.

It is not the Author's intention formally to
announce a system; it was more animating to
him to proceed in a different course; and if he
shall succeed in conveying to the mind clear
thoughts, lively images, and strong feelings, the
Reader will have no difficulty in extracting the
system for himself. And in the mean time the fol-
lowing passage, taken from the conclusion of the
first book of "The Recluse," may be acceptable
as a kind of Prospectus of the design and scope
of the whole Poem.

1 The Prelude.

passed

My school-time, an apartment he had

owned,

To which at intervals the Wanderer drew, And found a kind of home or harbor there.

He loved me; from a swarm of rosy boys Singled out me, as he in sport would say, For my grave looks, too thoughtful for

my years.

As I grew up, it was my best delight
To be his chosen comrade. Many a time,
On holidays, we rambled through the
woods:

We sate- we walked; he pleased me with report

Of things which he had seen; and often touched

Abstrusest matter, reasonings of the mind Turned inward; or at my request would sing

Old songs, the product of his native hills;
A skilful distribution of sweet sounds,
Feeding the soul, and eagerly imbibed
As cool refreshing water, by the care
Of the industrious husbandman, diffused
Through a parched meadow-ground, in
time of drought.

Still deeper welcome found his pure dis

course;

How precious, when in riper days I learned

To weigh with care his words, and to rejoice

In the plain presence of his dignity!

Oh! many are the Poets that are sown By Nature; men endowed with highest gifts,

The vision and the faculty divine;

Yet wanting the accomplishment of verse, (Which, in the docile season of their youth,

It was denied them to acquire, through

lack

Of culture and the inspiring aid of books,
Or haply by a temper too severe,
Or a nice backwardness afraid of shame)
Nor having e'er, as life advanced, been
led

By circumstance to take unto the height

A precious gift; for, as he grew in years, With these impressions would he still compare

All his remembrances, thoughts, shapes, and forms;

And, being still unsatisfied with aught
Of dimmer character, he thence attained
An active power to fasten images

Upon his brain; and on their pictured lines
Intensely brooded, even till they acquired
The liveliness of dreams. Nor did he fail,
While yet a child, with a child's eagerness
Incessantly to turn his ear and eye
On all things which the moving seasons
brought

To feed such appetite-
Appeased his yearning:

nor this alone

in the after-day

Of boyhood, many an hour in caves for

lorn,

And 'mid the hollow depths of naked crags