Composed 1811.--Published 1827
[Mr. Coleridge, my sister, and myself started together from Town-end to make a tour in Scotland. Poor Coleridge was at that time in bad spirits, and somewhat too much in love with his own dejection; and he departed from us, as is recorded in my Sister's Journal, soon after we left Loch Lomond. The verses that stand foremost among these Memorials were not actually written for the occasion, but transplanted from my 'Epistle to Sir George Beaumont'.--I. F.]
The gentlest Shade that walked Elysian plains
Might sometimes covet dissoluble chains;
Even for the tenants of the zone that lies
Beyond the stars, celestial Paradise,
Methinks 't would heighten joy, to overleap
At will the crystal battlements, and peep
Into some other region, though less fair,
To see how things are made and managed there.
Change for the worse might please, incursion bold
Into the tracts of darkness and of cold;
O'er Limbo lake with aëry flight to steer,
And on the verge of Chaos hang in fear.
Such animation often do I find,
Power in my breast, wings growing in my mind,
Then, when some rock or hill is overpast,
Perchance without one look behind me cast,
Some barrier with which Nature, from the birth
Of things, has fenced this fairest spot on earth.
O pleasant transit, Grasmere! to resign
Such happy fields, abodes so calm as thine;
Not like an outcast with himself at strife;
The slave of business, time, or care for life,
But moved by choice; or, if constrained in part,
Yet still with Nature's freedom at the heart;--
To cull contentment upon wildest shores,
And luxuries extract from bleakest moors;
With prompt embrace all beauty to enfold,
And having rights in all that we behold.--
Then why these lingering steps?--A bright adieu,
For a brief absence, proves that love is true;
Ne'er can the way be irksome or forlorn
That winds into itself for sweet return.
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FOOTNOTE ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: This first poem referring to the Scottish Tour of 1803, was not actually written till 1811. It originally formed the opening paragraph of the 'Epistle to Sir George Beaumont'. Wordsworth himself dated it 1804. It is every way desirable that it should introduce the series of poems referring to the Tour of 1803.--Ed.]
The following is from Dorothy Wordsworth's 'Recollections of a Tour made in Scotland':
"William and I parted from Mary on Sunday afternoon, August 14th, 1803; and William, Coleridge, and I left Keswick on Monday morning, the 15th."
Ed.
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THE POETICAL WORKS OF WILLIAM WORDSWORTH - VOL. 2 (Completed)
ClassicsThe poetical works of William Wordsworth, edited by William Knight.
