The Wishing-gate was first published in The Keepsake in 1829, and next in the 1832 edition of the Poems.—Ed.
[546] Having been told, upon what I thought good authority, that this gate had been destroyed, and the opening where it hung walled up, I gave vent immediately to my feelings in these stanzas. But going to the place some time after, I found, with much delight, my old favourite unmolested.—W. W. 1832.
"The same triumphant power attributed to the Wishing-gate is fancifully attributed to an image of St. Bridget in the ruined Franciscan convent at Adare." (Mr. Aubrey de Vere.)
[547] 1832.
[548] 1836.
[549] Grasmere Church.—Ed.
Composed 1828.—Published 1842
One of the "Poems of the Imagination."—Ed.
A gate—though not the "moss-grown bar" of 1828—still stands at the old place, where Wordsworth tells us one had stood "time out of mind;" so that a "blank wall" does not now shut out the "bright landscape," at the old, and classic, spot. Long may this gate stand, defying wind and weather!—Ed.
(IN A SMALL VALLEY OPPOSITE ST. GOAR, UPON THE RHINE)
Composed 1828.—Published 1835
[Coleridge, my daughter, and I, in 1828, passed a fortnight upon the banks of the Rhine, principally under the hospitable roof of Mr. Aders of Gotesburg, but two days of the time we spent at St. Goar in rambles among the neighbouring valleys. It was at St. Goar that I saw the Jewish family here described. Though exceedingly poor, and in rags, they were not less beautiful than I have endeavoured to make them appear. We had taken a little dinner with us in a basket, and invited them to partake of it, which the mother refused to do, both for herself and children, saying it was with them a fast-day; adding, diffidently, that whether such observances were right or wrong, she felt it her duty to keep them strictly. The Jews, who are numerous on this part of the Rhine, greatly surpass the German peasantry in the beauty of their features and in the intelligence of their countenances. But the lower classes of the German peasantry have, here at least, the air of people grievously opprest. Nursing mothers, at the age of seven or eight-and-twenty, often look haggard and far more decayed and withered than women of Cumberland and Westmoreland twice their age. This comes from being under-fed and over-worked in their vineyards in a hot and glaring sun.—I. F.]
One of the "Poems of the Imagination."—Ed.
The title given to this poem by Dorothy Wordsworth, in the letter to Lady Beaumont in which the different MS. readings occur, is "A Jewish Family, met with in a Dingle near the Rhine." During the Continental Tour of 1820,—in which Wordsworth was accompanied by his wife and sister and other friends,—they went up the Rhine (see the notes to the poems recording that Tour). An extract from Mrs. Wordsworth's Journal, referring to the road from St. Goar to Bingen, may illustrate this poem, written in 1828. "From St. Goar to Bingen, castles commanding innumerable small fortified villages. Nothing could exceed the delightful variety, and at first the postilions whisked us too fast through these scenes; and afterwards, the same variety so often repeated, we became quite exhausted, at least D. and I were; and, beautiful as the road continued to be, we could scarcely keep our eyes open; but, on my being roused from one of these slumbers, no eye wide-awake ever beheld such celestial pictures as gleamed before mine, like visions belonging to dreams. The castles seemed now almost stationary, a continued succession always in sight, rarely without two or three before us at once. There they rose from the craggy cliffs, out of the centre of the stately river, from a green island, or a craggy rock, etc., etc."
In Dorothy Wordsworth's record of the same Tour, the following occurs:—"July 24.—We looked down into one of the vales tributary to the Rhine, which, in memory of the mountain recesses of Ullswater, I named Deep-dale, a green quiet place, spotted with villages and single houses, and enlivened by a sinuous brook." ... "A lovely dell runs behind one of these hills. At its opening, where it pours out its stream into the Rhine, we espied a one-arched Borrowdale bridge; and, behind the bridge, a village almost buried between the abruptly rising steeps."—Ed.
[554] Compare The Russian Fugitive, ll. 1-4.—Ed.
[555] 1835.
MS. by Dorothy Wordsworth.
Composed 1828.—Published 1835
[This occurred at Brugès in 1828. Mr. Coleridge, my daughter, and I made a tour together in Flanders, upon the Rhine, and returned by Holland. Dora and I, while taking a walk along a retired part of the town, heard the voice as here described, and were afterwards informed it was a convent in which were many English. We were both much touched, I might say affected, and Dora moved as appears in the verses.—I. F.]
One of the "Memorials of a Tour on the Continent."—Ed.
In the final arrangement of the poems, this one was published amongst the Memorials of a Tour on the Continent (1820), where it followed the two sonnets on Brugès. The poems suggested by the shorter Tour of 1828 are here published together, in their chronological order.
In an undated letter of Dorothy Wordsworth's to Lady Beaumont, before copying out this poem and A Jewish Family, she says, "The two following poems were taken from incidents recorded in Dora's journal of her tour with her father and S. T. Coleridge. As I well recollect, she has related the incidents very pleasingly, and I hope you will agree with me in thinking that the poet has made good use of them."—Ed.
[558] 1835.
MS. by Dorothy Wordsworth.
MS. by Mrs. Wordsworth.
[559] 1835.
MS. by Mrs. Wordsworth.
MS. by Dorothy Wordsworth.
[561] Compare the Sonnet—
Composed 1828.[565]—Published 1829 (in The Keepsake)
["Miserrimus." Many conjectures have been formed as to the person who lies under this stone. Nothing appears to be known for a certainty. Query—The Rev. Mr. Morris, a non-conformist, a sufferer for conscience-sake; a worthy man who, having been deprived of his benefice after the accession of William III., lived to an old age in extreme destitution, on the alms of charitable Jacobites.—I.F.]
One of the "Miscellaneous Sonnets."—Ed.
[565] This, and the following sonnet on the tradition of Oker Hill, first published in The Keepsake of 1829, appeared in the 1832 edition of the Poetical Works.—Ed.
[566] The stone is in the cloisters of Worcester Cathedral, at the north-west corner of the quadrangle, just below the doorway leading into the nave of the cathedral. It is a small stone, two feet, by one and a half. The Reverend Thomas Maurice (or Morris)—a minor canon of Worcester, and vicar of Clains—refused to take the oath of allegiance at the Revolution Settlement, and was accordingly deprived of his benefice. He lived to the age of 88, on the generosity of the richer non-jurors, and died 1748. (See Murray's Guide to Warwickshire, and Richard King's Handbook to the Cathedral of Worcester.)—Ed.
(SUGGESTED BY A PICTURE)
Composed 1828.—Published 1829
[This poem was first printed in the annual called The Keepsake. The painter's name I am not sure of, but I think it was Holmes.[567]—I.F.]
In 1832 one of the "Poems of Sentiment and Reflection." Transferred in 1845 to "Miscellaneous Poems."—Ed.
The year of the publication of this poem in The Keepsake was 1829. It then appeared under the title of The Country Girl, and it was afterwards included in the 1832 edition of the poems.—Ed.
[567] The painter was J. Holmes, and his picture was engraved by C. Heath.—Ed.
[568] 1837.
[569] 1837.
[570] 1832.
Composed December 1828.—Published 1835
[Written at Rydal Mount. I have often regretted that my tour in Ireland, chiefly performed in the short days of October in a carriage-and-four (I was with Mr. Marshall), supplied my memory with so few images that were new, and with so little motive to write. The lines however in this poem, "Thou too be heard, lone eagle!" were suggested near the Giants' Causeway, or rather at the promontory of Fairhead, where a pair of eagles wheeled above our heads and darted off as if to hide themselves in a blaze of sky made by the setting sun.—I.F.]
One of the "Poems of the Imagination."-Ed.
ARGUMENT
The Ear addressed, as occupied by a spiritual functionary, in communion with sounds, individual, or combined in studied harmony.—Sources and effects of those sounds (to the close of 6th Stanza).—The power of music, whence proceeding, exemplified in the idiot.—Origin of music, and its effect in early ages—how produced (to the middle of 10th Stanza).—The mind recalled to sounds acting casually and severally.—Wish uttered (11th Stanza) that these could be united into a scheme or system for moral interests and intellectual contemplation.—(Stanza 12th.) The Pythagorean theory of numbers and music, with their supposed power over the motions of the universe—imaginations consonant with such a theory.—Wish expressed (in 11th Stanza) realised, in some degree, by the representation of all sounds under the form of thanksgiving to the Creator.—(Last Stanza) the destruction of earth and the planetary system—the survival of audible harmony, and its support in the Divine Nature, as revealed in Holy Writ.
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II