1802. Suggested by what I have noticed in more than one French fugitive during the time of the French Revolution. If I am not mistaken, the lines were composed at Sockburn when I was on a visit to Mary and her brothers.

The following tale was written as an Episode, in a work from which its length may perhaps exclude it. The facts are true; no invention as to these has been exercised, as none was needed.

Town-End, 1805. Faithfully narrated, though with the omission of many pathetic circumstances, from the mouth of a French lady, who had been an eye and ear-witness of all that was done and said. Many long years after I was told that Dupligne was then a monk in the Convent of La Trappe.

Town-End, 1807. Written about the same time as 'The Brothers.' The sheepfold on which so much of the poem turns, remains, or rather the ruins of it. The character and circumstances of Luke were taken from a family to whom had belonged, many years before, the house we lived in at Town-End, along with some fields and woodlands on the eastern shore of Grasmere. The name of the Evening Star was not in fact given to this house, but to another on the same side of the valley more to the north. [On opposite page in pencil—' Greenhead Ghyll.']

Clipping is the word used in the North of England for shearing.

The facts recorded in this Poem were given me and the character of the person described by my highly esteemed friend the Rev. R. P. Graves, who has long officiated as Curate at Bowness, to the great benefit of the parish and neighbourhood. The individual was well known to him. She died before these Verses were composed. It is scarcely worth while to notice that the stanzas are written in the sonnet-form; which was adopted when I thought the matter might be included in 28 lines.

See in Percy's Reliques that fine old ballad, 'The Spanish Lady's Love'; from which Poem the form of stanza, as suitable to dialogue, is adopted.

By my Sister. Rydal Mount, 1832. It arose, I believe, out of a casual expression of one of Mr. Swinburne's children.

These Lines were designed as a farewell to Charles Lamb and his Sister, who had retired from the throngs of London to comparative solitude in the village of Enfield, Herts, [sic.]

Lines 45-6.

The words—

are part of a child's prayer still in general use through the northern counties.

Rydal Mount, 1834. Our cats having been banished the house, it was soon frequented by Red-breasts. Two or three of them, when the window was open, would come in, particularly when Mary was breakfasting alone, and hop about the table picking up the crumbs. My Sister being then confined to her room by sickness, as, dear creature, she still is, had one that, without being caged, took up its abode with her, and at night used to perch upon a nail from which a picture had hung. It used to sing and fan her face with its wings in a manner that was very touching. [In pencil—- But who was the pale-faced child?]

Alfoxden, 1798. The subject was reported to me by a lady of Bristol, who had seen the poor creature.

By persons resident in the country and attached to rural objects, many places will be found unnamed or of unknown names, where little Incidents must have occurred, or feelings been experienced, which will have given to such places a private and peculiar interest. From a wish to give some sort of record to such Incidents, and renew the gratification of such feelings, Names have been given to Places by the Author and some of his Friends, and the following Poems written in consequence.

Grasmere, 1800. This poem was suggested on the banks of the brook that runs through Easedale, which is, in some parts of its course, as wild and beautiful as brook can be. I have composed thousands of verses by the side of it.

[In pencil, with reference to the last line is this—Emma's Dell—Who was Emma?]

Grasmere, 1800. The effect of her laugh is an extravagance; though the effect of the reverberation of voices in some parts of these mountains is very striking. There is, in 'The Excursion,' an allusion to the bleat of a lamb thus re-echoed and described, without any exaggeration, as I heard it on the side of Stickle Tarn, from the precipice that stretches on to Langdale Pikes.

1800. It is not accurate that the eminence here alluded to could be seen from our orchard seat. It arises above the road by the side of Grasmere Lake, towards Keswick, and its name is Stone Arthur.

1800. The character of the eastern shore of Grasmere Lake is quite changed since these verses were written, by the public road being carried along its side. The friends spoken of were Coleridge and my sister, and the fact occurred strictly as recorded.

Two years before our marriage. The pool alluded to is in Rydal Upper Park.

1805. The grove still exists; but the plantation has been walled in, and is not so accessible as when my brother John wore the path in the manner here described. The grove was a favourite haunt with us all while we lived at Town-End.

Rydal Mount, 1825. I could wish the last five stanzas of this to be read with the poem addressed to the Skylark. [No. 158.]

'A feathered task-master cries, "Work away!" And, in thy iteration, "Whip Poor Will!" Is heard the spirit of a toil-worn slave' (II. 15-17).

See Waterton's Wanderings in South America.

Planned by my friend Lady Beaumont in connexion with the garden at Coleorton.

Observed in the holly grove at Alfoxden, where these verses were written in the spring of 1799. I had the pleasure of again seeing, with dear friends, this Grove in unimpaired beauty forty-one years after. [The 'dear friends' were Mrs. Wordsworth, Miss Fenwick, Mr. and Mrs. Quillinan, and Mr. William Wordsworth, May 18, 1841. Memoirs, i. 112.]

Suggested nearer to Grasmere on the same mountain track. The eglantine remained many years afterwards, but is now gone. [In pencil on opposite page—Mr. W. shewed me the place 1848. E.Q.]

Written in Germany, 1799.

This Poem, and two others to the same flower, were written in the year 1802; which is mentioned, because in some of the ideas, though not in the manner in which those ideas are connected, and likewise even in some of the expressions, there is a resemblance to passages in a Poem (lately published) of Mr. [James] Montgomery's, entitled a 'Field Flower.' This being said, Mr. Montgomery will not think any apology due to him; but I cannot, however, help addressing him in the words of the Father of English Poets:

1807. [Foot-note.] See, in Chaucer and the older Poets, the honours formerly paid to this flower.

'To the Daisy,' 'To the same Flower,' and 'The Green Linnet'—all composed at Town-End Orchard, where the bird was often seen as here described.

The story of this Poem is from the German of Frederica Brun.

Observed as described in the then beautiful Orchard at Town-End.

1806. The belief on which this is founded I have often heard expressed by an old neighbour of Grasmere.

Bunches of fern may often be seen wheeling about in the wind, as here described. The particular bunch that suggested these verses was noticed in the Pass of Dunmail-Raise. The verses were composed in 1817, but the application is for all times and places.

This parrot belonged to Mrs. Luff while living at Fox-Ghyll. The wren was one that haunted for many years the Summer-house between the two terraces at Rydal Mount. [In pencil on opposite page—Addressed to Dora.]

Written in Germany, 1799. It was entirely a fancy; but intended as a prelude to a ballad poem never written.

I distinctly recollect the evening when these verses were suggested in 1818. It was on the road between Rydal and Grasmere, where glow-worms abound. A star was shining above the ridge of Loughrigg Fell just opposite. I remember a blockhead of a critic in some Review or other crying out against this piece. 'What so monstrous,' said he, 'as to make a star talk to a glowworm!' Poor fellow, we know well from this sage observation what the 'primrose on the river's brim was to him.'

Further—In writing to Coleridge he says: 'I parted from M—— on Monday afternoon, about six o'clock, a little on this side Rushyford. Soon after I missed my road in the midst of the storm.... Between the beginning of Lord Darlington's park at Raby, and two or three miles beyond Staindrop, I composed the poem on the opposite page ['The Pilgrim's Dream,' &c.]. I reached Barnard Castle about half-past ten. Between eight and nine evening I reached Eusemere.' [Memoirs, i. pp. 181-2.]

In Dora's Field, 1833: Rydal Mount. This nest was built as described, in a tree that grows near the pool in Dora's field next the Rydal Mount Garden.

Rydal Mount, 1832. Observed a hundred times in the grounds at Rydal Mount.

1805. Seen at Town-End, Grasmere. The elder bush has long since disappeared; it hung over the wall near the cottage, and the kitten continued to leap up, catching the leaves as here described. The infant was Dora.

MY DEAR FRIEND,

When I sent you, a few weeks ago, 'The Tale of Peter Bell,' you asked 'why "The Waggoner" was not added?'—To say the truth,—from the higher tone of imagination, and the deeper touches of passion aimed at in the former, I apprehended, this little Piece could not accompany it without disadvantage. In the year 1806, if I am not mistaken, 'The Waggoner' was read to you in manuscript, and, as you have remembered it for so long a time, I am the more encouraged to hope that, since the localities on which the Poem partly depends did not prevent its being interesting to you, it may prove acceptable to others. Being therefore in some measure the cause of its present appearance, you must allow me the gratification of inscribing it to you; in acknowledgment of the pleasure I have derived from your Writings, and of the high esteem with which I am very truly yours,
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

Rydal Mount, May 20, 1819.

Several years after the event that forms the subject of the Poem, in company with my friend, the late Mr. Coleridge, I happened to fall in with the person to whom the name of Benjamin is given. Upon our expressing regret that we had not, for a long time, seen upon the road either him or his waggon, he said:—'They could not do without me; and as to the man who was put in my place, no good could come out of him; he was a man of no ideas.'

The fact of my discarded hero's getting the horses out of a difficulty with a word, as related in the poem, was told me by an eye-witness.

When the Poem was first written the note of the bird was thus described:—

but from unwillingness to startle the reader at the outset by so bold a mode of expression, the passage was altered as it now stands.

A mountain of Grasmere, the broken summit of which presents two figures, full as distinctly shaped as that of the famous Cobbler near Arroquhar in Scotland.

A term well known in the North of England, and applied to rural festivals where young persons meet in the evening for the purpose of dancing.

At the close of each strathspey, or jig, a particular note from the fiddle summons the Rustic to the agreeable duty of saluting his partner.

The crag of the ewe-lamb.

Written in Germany, 1799. This is an extract from the Poem on my own poetical education. This practice of making an instrument of their own fingers is known to most boys, though some are more skilful at it than others. William Raincock of Rayrigg, a fine spirited lad, took the lead of all my schoolfellows in this art.

Composed on the road between Nether Stowey and Alfoxden, extempore. I distinctly remember the very moment when I was struck, as described, 'He looks up at the clouds,' &c.

Written in Germany: intended as part of a poem on my own life, but struck out as not being wanted there. Like most of my schoolfellows I was an impassioned Nutter. For this pleasure the Vale of Esthwaite, abounding in coppice wood, furnished a very wide range. These verses arose out of the remembrance of feelings I had often had when a boy, and particularly in the extensive woods that still stretch from the side of Esthwaite Lake towards Graythwaite, the seat of the ancient family of Sandys.

1804. Town-End. The germ of this Poem was four lines composed as a part of the verses on the Highland Girl. Though beginning in this way, it was written from my heart, as is sufficiently obvious.

Town-End, 1806. [So, but corrected in pencil 'Written at Coleorton.']

1799. Composed in the Hartz Forest. [In pencil on opposite page—Who?]

Town-End, 1804. 'The Daffodils.' The two best lines in it are by Mary. The daffodils grew and still grow on the margin of Ulswater, and probably may be seen to this day as beautiful in the month of March nodding their golden heads beside the dancing and foaming waves. [In pencil on opposite page—Mrs. Wordsworth—but which? See the answer to this, infra.]

Grasmere, Nov. 4.

MT DEAR WRANGHAM,

Written 1801 or 1802. This arose out of my observations of the affecting music of these birds, hanging in this way in the London streets during the freshness and stillness of the Spring morning.

Taken from life, 1806.

Extempore, 1801. This little poem was a favourite with Joanna Baillie.

Town-End, 1802. Met and described by me to my sister near the Quarry at the head of Rydal Lake—a place still a chosen resort of vagrants travelling with their families.

Written in Germany, 1799. Suggested by an account I had of a wanderer in Somersetshire.

Town-End, 1807. This old man I met a few hundred yards from my cottage at Town-End, Grasmere; and the account of him is taken from his own mouth. I was in the state of feeling described in the beginning of the poem, while crossing over Barton Fell from Mr. Clarkson's at the foot of Ullswater, towards Askham. The image of the hare I then observed on the ridge of the Fell.

Alfoxden, 1798. Arose out of my observing on the ridge of Quantock Hill, on a stormy day, a thorn, which I had often past in calm and bright weather without noticing it. I said to myself, cannot I by some invention do as much to make this Thorn permanently an impressive object as the storm has made it to my eyes at this moment? I began the poem accordingly, and composed it with great rapidity. Sir George Beaumont painted a picture from it, which Wilkie thought his best. He gave it to me; though, when he saw it several times at Rydal Mount afterwards, he said, 'I could make a better, and would like to paint the same subject over again.' The sky in this picture is nobly done, but it reminds one too much of Wilson. The only fault however, of any consequence, is the female figure, which is too old and decrepit for one likely to frequent an eminence on such a call.

Hart-Leap Well is a small spring of water, about five miles from Richmond in Yorkshire, and near the side of the road that leads from Richmond to Askrigg. Its name is derived from a remarkable Chase, the memory of which is preserved by the monuments spoken of in the second Part of the following Poem, which monuments do now exist as I have there described them.

See the note attached. This poem was composed at Coleorton, while I was walking to and fro along the path that led from Sir George Beaumont's farm-house, where we resided, to the Hall, which was building at that time.