Before we close these chapters on the Grasmere period, several of the more conspicuous events in Wordsworth's life during his residence at Town-end ought to be mentioned, as they had a more or less direct influence on his life as a poet. These were, first, the publication of two new editions of the "Lyrical Ballads," respectively in 1802 and 1805, which shows that he was not without appreciative readers. This fact could not have failed to give him encouragement in the pursuit of his art, although the sale of his works was not large enough to yield much more than was required to defray the expense of publication. Another event worthy of note was the death of the Earl of Lonsdale, in 1802. The Earl, as we have seen before, refused to pay a debt of £5000, due the Wordsworths. After his death his successor not only paid the original amount, but also accrued interest of £3500. Wordsworth's share of this amount was about £1800. This, of course, placed him in a more independent position in a pecuniary way, and enabled him to pursue his work with less anxiety concerning the future. Still another event of importance was his marriage with Mary Hutchinson, his cousin, for many years an intimate friend of the Wordsworths. They were married October 4, 1802. Mrs. Wordsworth proved to be a quiet force in the Poet's life. This is evident from his references to her in "The Prelude "; also in the two sonnets "To a Painter," in the Dedication to "The White Doe of Rylstone," and in the poem entitled "She was a Phantom of delight." Here she is represented as A Being breathing thoughtful breath, 1 She was a Phantom of delight, 23-30. Five children were born of this marriage: John, June 18, 1803; Dora, August 16, 1804; Thomas, June 16, 1806; Catherine, September 6, 1808; and William, May 12, 1810. Three of these died during the Poet's lifetime. During this period, as we have seen, another visit was made to France, in which he became keenly alive to the trend of political events, which, in turn, kindled his poetic fire and drew from him many of the noble sonnets "Dedicated to National Independence and Liberty." The tour to Scotland with Dorothy and Coleridge must also be noted. It appealed to Wordsworth's poetic nature, and we have, as a result, a number of beautiful lyrical poems—“Ellen Irwin, or, the Braes of Kirtle," "To a Highland Girl," "Stepping Westward," ," "The Solitary Reaper," "Rob Roy's Grave," etc. Nature and the Poet were intimate friends on this tour. This is evident from the poems already considered, and also from Dorothy's Journal. The journey was undertaken because of their love for Nature, and resulted in furnishing suggestions and materials for many poems, some of which are regarded as among his most beautiful productions. It was further signalized by a visit to Walter Scott. The death of his brother, Captain John Wordsworth, occurred during this period. This bereavement naturally impelled Wordsworth to serious reflection on death and the future life. He came to the conclusion that the destruction of "the thinking principle in man by death would involve a greater love in man than in God. Such a conclusion seemed to him inevitable "except upon the supposition of another and a better world." The death of his brother inspired "Elegiac Verses." It did much more than this however. It brought him into closer sympathy with his fellows, and fitted him all the more to be a poet of Man. Does he not say, and is there not evidence of it in his work, A deep distress hath humanised my Soul? 1 Myers, Wordsworth, 71. Finally, an event worthy of note, was the visit of Walter Scott and his wife to Dove Cottage. At this time Wordsworth, in company with Scott and Sir Humphry Davy, all of them lovers of Nature, made an ascent of Helvellyn. This memorable excursion was referred to by Wordsworth, more than thirty years later, in Musings near Aquapendente": ་་ His spirit Had flown with mine to old Helvellyn's brow, From sorrow, like the sky above our heads.1 In nearly all of these events we can perceive the direct influence of either the natural or the human environment on the unfolding of Wordsworth's genius. They stir his poetic imagination to activity, and furnish suggestions and material for his work. They were events that broke the more or less peaceful tenor of the Poet's meditation during these long and happy years at Town-end, in the beautiful Grasmere Vale. Thus, in the tranquil life of Dove Cottage, and in the rambles among its surroundings, in fields and woods, over hills and mountains, and around the silver lake, Nature vouchsafed to Wordsworth beautiful visions, and spoke to him in a language full of inspiration and meaning, and burdened with a wholesome message, which he embodied in poetry of enduring worth. Here Nature is apprehended as in the Alfoxden days, and the Poet's communion and inspirations merely confirm and intensify his former beliefs. Man, too, as he met him in these quiet haunts, occupying lowly stations, ministered to his spirit, and, as of old, he was led to exalt and idealize that which is fundamental in us. And ever and anon he lifted his eyes, and looked beyond the confines of the peaceful vale, to Man in higher stations, and in the great and stirring social and political movements of the time, sounding a note of warning, or a trumpet call in defense of his essential rights, 1 Musings near Aquapendente, 61–65. and for the maintenance of those liberties which civilization had won through long years of struggle, and which, in the Poet's judgment, were to be preserved at all hazards. For this sacred cause he contended in verse, not merely as a lover of his own country, but as "a patriot of the world," and the sonnets inspired by these important events constitute one of the chief glories of Wordsworth's poetry. It was verse like this that led a fellow poet to say: "He was the heroic poet of his age: so long as there lives one man of English blood who has any sense of noble poetry, that blood will thrill and tingle in his veins at the very thought of the trumpet-notes of Wordsworth. . . . Those other poets of his day who dealt more immediately than he with martial matter had in them less of heroic thought and intelligence than the seemingly self-centered student of uninvaded solitudes. Scott could make men breathe the breath of battle. Byron could only make men smell the reek of carnage; but Wordsworth alone could put into his verse the whole soul of a nation armed or arming for selfdevoted self-defence; could fill his meditation with the spirit of a whole people, that in the act of giving it a voice and an expression he might inform and renovate that spirit with the purity and sublimity of his own. Therefore, and on this account above all others, may his immortal words of sympathy find immortal application to himself there is not a breathing of the common wind which blows over England that ever shall forget him; his memory has great allies he too has friends in the exultations and the agonies of his fellowmen, in their love of country, in the unconquerable mind of his race." 1 1 Swinburne, Miscellanies, Essay on Wordsworth and Byron, London, 1886. CHAPTER XIV COLEORTON. STOCKTON-ON-TEES. ALLAN BANK After six years' residence at Town-end, Wordsworth moved to Coleorton. With a gradually increasing family the Poet and his household began to feel the accommodations of Dove Cottage to be inadequate. Sir George and Lady Beaumont were friends of the Wordsworths, and from time to time, between the years 1803 and 1806, visited the modest home in Grasmere. In 1806 the Beaumonts temporarily withdrew from their farmhouse adjoining Coleorton Hall, and offered it to their Grasmere friends, who occupied it during the winter of 1806-1807. As in previous places of abode, so here Nature called forth the poetic activity of this unique man who was so peculiarly sensitive to her subtle power. Wordsworth found himself in a region remarkable for beauty and sublimity, and we have his own statement testifying to the fact that his genius was stimulated, and its productions colored, by his local surroundings. In the Epistle Dedicatory, inscribing to Sir George the first collected edition of his poems, published in 1815, Wordsworth writes: "My dear Sir George, - Accept my thanks for the permission given me to dedicate these Poems to you. In addition to a lively pleasure derived from general considerations, I feel a particular satisfaction; for, by inscribing them with your name, I seem to myself in some degree to repay, by an appropriate honour, the great obligation which I owe to one part of the Collection—as having been the means of first making us personally known to each other. Upon much of the remainder, also, you have a peculiar claim, — for some of the best pieces were composed under the shade of your own groves, upon the classic ground of Coleorton; where I was - |