[DP] "At the commencement of the French Revolution, in the remotest villages every tongue was employed in echoing and enforcing the almost geometrical abstractions of the physiocratic politicians and economists. The public roads were crowded with armed enthusiasts disputing on the inalienable sovereignty of the people, the imprescriptible laws of the pure reason, and the universal constitution, which, as rising out of the nature and rights of man as man, all nations alike were under the obligation of adopting."-S.T. Coleridge, The Statesman's Manual, a Lay Sermon (1816), p. 19.—ED.
[DQ] The Hudson river, some of the sources of which rise in the Adirondack wilderness.—ED.
[DR] New York.—ED.
[DT] The St. Lawrence.—ED.
[DU] "The Mocking Bird (Turdus polyglottus, Linn.), the American nightingale. He has a voice full, strong, and musical, and capable of almost every modulation, from the clear mellow tones of the Wood Thrush, to the savage scream of the Bald Eagle. In measure and accent he faithfully follows his originals. In force and sweetness of expression he greatly improves upon them. In his native groves, his song rises pre-eminent over every competitor. Neither is his strain altogether imitative. His notes are bold and full, and varied seemingly beyond all limits. They consist of short expressions of two, three, or, at the most, five or six syllables; generally interspersed with imitations, and all of them uttered with great emphasis and rapidity, and continued with undiminished ardour for half an hour, or an hour at a time."—American Ornithology, by Wilson, Bonaparte, and Jardine, vol. i. p. 164, etc.—ED.
[DV] I was indebted to Mr. Edward B. Tylor, and also to the Rev. Charles M. Addison, of Arlington, Mass., for identifying the "melancholy Muccawiss" as the Whip-poor-will (Caprimulgus vociferus, or Antrostomus vociferus). "Their melancholy night song has led some Indians to consider them the souls of ancestors killed in battle."—Mr. Tylor. For letters in reference to the Muccawiss, see Note C in the Appendix to this volume, p. 393; and compare Charles Waterton's Wanderings in South America, etc. etc. (1828), and Wordsworth's poem, A Morning Exercise, written in 1828.
Since Messrs. Tylor, Addison, and Col. Trumbull identified the Muccawiss with the Whip-poor-will, I have had access to the original MSS. of The Excursion; and have found that the point which is discussed—in the above note and in Note C in the Appendix—is set conclusively at rest, by one of the earlier (discarded) readings of the text in Wordsworth's own handwriting.
Another version of the last line is also given,
I entertain no doubt that Wordsworth first of all met with the name of this bird, whip-pow-will, in Waterton's Wanderings (a copy of which he possessed), and that he afterwards exchanged it—before sending his Excursion to press, in 1814—for the more musical Indian name, Muccawiss.
It is also worthy of note that Southey had transferred to his Commonplace Book (see vol. ii. p. 567), Carver's account of the Whipper-will, or as it is termed by the Indians, Muckawiss. "As soon as night comes on these birds will place themselves on the fences, stumps, or stones that lie near some house, and repeat their melancholy note without any variation till midnight." (Travels, by Jonathan Carver, p. 467.)—ED.
DESPONDENCY CORRECTED
ARGUMENT
State of feeling produced by the foregoing Narrative—A belief in a superintending Providence the only adequate support under affliction—Wanderer's ejaculation[284]—Acknowledges the difficulty of a lively faith—Hence immoderate sorrow[285]—Exhortations—How received—Wanderer applies[286] his discourse to that other cause of dejection in the Solitary's mind—Disappointment from[287] the French Revolution—States grounds[288] of hope, and insists[289] on the necessity of patience and fortitude with respect to the course of great revolutions[290]—Knowledge the source of tranquillity—Rural Solitude favourable to[291] knowledge of the inferior Creatures; Study of their habits and ways recommended;[292] exhortation to bodily exertion and communion[293] with Nature—Morbid Solitude pitiable[294]—Superstition better than apathy—Apathy and destitution unknown in the infancy of society—The various modes of Religion prevented it—Illustrated[295] in the Jewish, Persian, Babylonian, Chaldean, and Grecian modes of belief—Solitary interposes—Wanderer[296] points out the influence of religious and imaginative feeling in the humble ranks of society, illustrated[297] from present and past times—These principles[298] tend to recal exploded superstitions and popery—Wanderer rebuts this charge, and contrasts the dignities of the Imagination with the presumptuous[299] littleness of certain modern Philosophers—Recommends[300] other lights and guides—Asserts the power of the Soul to regenerate herself; Solitary asks how[301]—Reply—Personal appeal[302]— Exhortation to activity of body renewed—How to commune with Nature—Wanderer concludes with a[303] legitimate union of the imagination, affections, understanding, and reason[304]—Effect of his discourse[305]—Evening; return to the Cottage.