The second night,

In eagerness, and by report misled

Of those Italian clocks that speak the time

In fashion different from ours, we rose

By moonshine, doubting not that day was near,

And that, meanwhile, coasting the water's edge

As hitherto, and with as plain a track

To be our guide, we might behold the scene

In its most deep repose. We left the town

Of Gravedona with this hope, but soon

Were lost, bewildered among woods immense,

Where, having wandered for a while, we stopped

And on a rock sate down to wait for day.

An open place it was and overlooked

From high the sullen water underneath,

On which a dull red image of the moon

Lay bedded, changing oftentimes its form

Like an uneasy snake. Long time we sate,

For scarcely more than one hour of the night –

Such was our error – had been gone when we

Renewed our journey. On the rock we lay

And wished to sleep, but could not for the stings

Of insects, which with noise like that of noon

Filled all the woods. The cry of unknown birds,

The mountains – more by darkness visible

And their own size, than any outward light –

The breathless wilderness of clouds, the clock

That told with unintelligible voice

The widely parted hours, the noise of streams,

And sometimes rustling motions nigh at hand

Which did not leave us free from personal fear,

And lastly, the withdrawing moon that set

Before us while she still was high in heaven –

These were our food, and such a summer night

Did to that pair of golden days succeed,

With now and then a doze and snatch of sleep,

On Como's banks, the same delicious lake.

 

But here I must break off, and quit at once,

Though loth, the record of these wanderings,

A theme which may seduce me else beyond

All reasonable bounds. Let this alone

Be mentioned as a parting word, that not

In hollow exultation, dealing forth

Hyperboles of praise comparative;

Not rich one moment to be poor for ever;

Not prostrate, overborne – as if the mind

Itself were nothing, a mean pensioner

On outward forms – did we in presence stand

Of that magnificent region. On the front

Of this whole song is written that my heart

Must, in such temple, needs have offered up

A different worship. Finally, whate'er

I saw, or heard, or felt, was but a stream

That flowed into a kindred stream, a gale

That helped me forwards, did administer

To grandeur and to tenderness – to the one

Directly, but to tender thoughts by means

Less often instantaneous in effect –

Conducted me to these along a path

Which, in the main, was more circuitous.

 

Oh most belovèd friend, a glorious time,

A happy time that was. Triumphant looks

Were then the common language of all eyes:

As if awaked from sleep, the nations hailed

Their great expectancy; the fife of war

Was then a spirit-stirring sound indeed,

A blackbird's whistle in a vernal grove.

We left the Swiss exulting in the fate

Of their neighbours, and, when shortening fast

Our pilgrimage – nor distant far from home –

We crossed the Brabant armies on the fret

For battle in the cause of Liberty.

A stripling, scarcely of the household then

Of social life, I looked upon these things

As from a distance – heard, and saw, and felt,

Was touched but with no intimate concern –

I seemed to move among them as a bird

Moves through the air, or as a fish pursues

Its business in its proper element.

I needed not that joy, I did not need

Such help: the ever-living universe

And independent spirit of pure youth

Were with me at that season, and delight

Was in all places spread around my steps

As constant as the grass upon the fields.

 

Book Seventh

Residence in London

Five years are vanished since I first poured out,

Saluted by that animating breeze

Which met me issuing from the city's walls,

A glad preamble to this verse. I sang

Aloud in dithyrambic fervour, deep

But short-lived uproar, like a torrent sent

Out of the bowels of a bursting cloud

Down Scawfell or Blencathara's rugged sides,

A waterspout from heaven. But 'twas not long

Ere the interrupted strain broke forth once more,

And flowed awhile in strength; then stopped for years –

Not heard again until a little space

Before last primrose-time. Belovèd friend,

The assurances then given unto myself,

Which did beguile me of some heavy thoughts

At thy departure to a foreign land,

Have failed; for slowly doth this work advance.

Through the whole summer have I been at rest,

Partly from voluntary holiday

And part through outward hindrance. But I heard

After the hour of sunset yester-even,

Sitting within doors betwixt light and dark,

A voice that stirred me. 'Twas a little band,

A quire of redbreasts gathered somewhere near

My threshold, minstrels from the distant woods

And dells, sent in by Winter to bespeak

For the old man a welcome, to announce

With preparation artful and benign –

Yea, the most gentle music of the year –

That their rough lord had left the surly north,

And hath begun his journey. A delight

At this unthought-of greeting unawares

Smote me, a sweetness of the coming time,

And, listening, I half whispered, »We will be,

Ye heartsome choristers, ye and I will be

Brethren, and in the hearing of bleak winds

Will chaunt together.« And, thereafter, walking

By later twilight on the hills I saw

A glow-worm, from beneath a dusky shade

Or canopy of the yet unwithered fern

Clear shining, like a hermit's taper seen

Through a thick forest. Silence touched me here

No less than sound had done before: the child

Of summer, lingering, shining by itself,

The voiceless worm on the unfrequented hills,

Seemed sent on the same errand with the quire

Of winter that had warbled at my door,

And the whole year seemed tenderness and love.

The last night's genial feeling overflowed

Upon this morning, and my favorite grove –

Now tossing its dark boughs in sun and wind –

Spreads through me a commotion like its own,

Something that fits me for the poet's task,

Which we will now resume with chearful hope,

Nor checked by aught of tamer argument

That lies before us, needful to be told.

 

Returned from that excursion, soon I bade

Farewell for ever to the private bowers

Of gownèd students – quitted these, no more

To enter them, and pitched my vagrant tent,

A casual dweller and at large, among

The unfenced regions of society.

Yet undetermined to what plan of life

I should adhere, and seeming thence to have

A little space of intermediate time

Loose and at full command, to London first

I turned, if not in calmness, nevertheless

In no disturbance of excessive hope –

At ease from all ambition personal,

Frugal as there was need, and though self-willed,

Yet temperate and reserved, and wholly free

From dangerous passions. 'Twas at least two years

Before this season when I first beheld

That mighty place, a transient visitant;

And now it pleased me my abode to fix

Single in the wide waste. To have a house,

It was enough – what matter for a home? –

That owned me, living chearfully abroad

With fancy on the stir from day to day,

And all my young affections out of doors.

 

There was a time when whatso'er is feigned

Of airy palaces and gardens built

By genii of romance, or hath in grave

Authentic history been set forth of Rome,

Alcairo, Babylon, or Persepolis,

Or given upon report by pilgrim friars

Of golden cities ten months' journey deep

Among Tartarean wilds, fell short, far short,

Of that which I in simpleness believed

And thought of London – held me by a chain

Less strong of wonder and obscure delight.

I know not that herein I shot beyond

The common mark of childhood, but I well

Remember that among our flock of boys

Was one, a cripple from the birth, whom chance

Summoned from school to London – fortunate

And envied traveller – and when he returned,

After short absence, and I first set eyes

Upon his person, verily, though strange

The thing may seem, I was not wholly free

From disappointment to behold the same

Appearance, the same body, not to find

Some change, some beams of glory brought away

From that new region. Much I questioned him,

And every word he uttered, on my ears

Fell flatter than a cagèd parrot's note,

That answers unexpectedly awry,

And mocks the prompter's listening. Marvellous things

My fancy had shaped forth of sights and shows,

Processions, equipages, lords and dukes,

The King and the King's palace, and not last

Or least, heaven bless him! the renowned Lord Mayor –

Dreams hardly less intense than those which wrought

A change of purpose in young Whittington

When he in friendlessness, a drooping boy,

Sate on a stone and heard the bells speak out

Articulate music. Above all, one thought

Baffled my understanding, how men lived

Even next-door neighbours, as we say, yet still

Strangers, and knowing not each other's names.

 

Oh wondrous power of words, how sweet they are

According to the meaning which they bring –

Vauxhall and Ranelagh, I then had heard

Of your green groves and wilderness of lamps,

Your gorgeous ladies, fairy cataracts,

And pageant fireworks. Nor must we forget

Those other wonders, different in kind

Though scarcely less illustrious in degree,

The river proudly bridged, the giddy top

And Whispering Gallery of St Paul's, the tombs

Of Westminster, the Giants of Guildhall,

Bedlam and the two figures at its gates,

Streets without end and churches numberless,

Statues with flowery gardens in vast squares,

The Monument, and Armoury of the Tower.

These fond imaginations, of themselves,

Had long before given way in season due,

Leaving a throng of others in their stead;

And now I looked upon the real scene,

Familiarly perused it day by day,

With keen and lively pleasure even there

Where disappointment was the strongest, pleased

Through courteous self-submission, as a tax

Paid to the object by prescriptive right,

A thing that ought to be. Shall I give way,

Copying the impression of the memory –

Though things remembered idly do half seem

The work of fancy – shall I, as the mood

Inclines me, here describe for pastime's sake,

Some portion of that motley imagery,

A vivid pleasure of my youth, and now,

Among the lonely places that I love,

A frequent daydream for my riper mind?

And first, the look and aspect of the place –

The broad highway appearance, as it strikes

On strangers of all ages, the quick dance

Of colours, lights and forms, the Babel din,

The endless stream of men and moving things,

From hour to hour the illimitable walk

Still among streets, with clouds and sky above,

The wealth, the bustle and the eagerness,

The glittering chariots with their pampered steeds,

Stalls, barrows, porters, midway in the street

The scavenger that begs with hat in hand,

The labouring hackney-coaches, the rash speed

Of coaches travelling far, whirled on with horn

Loud blowing, and the sturdy drayman's team

Ascending from some alley of the Thames

And striking right across the crowded Strand

Till the fore-horse veer round with punctual skill:

Here, there, and everywhere, a weary throng,

The comers and the goers face to face –

Face after face – the string of dazzling wares,

Shop after shop, with symbols, blazoned names,

And all the tradesman's honours overhead:

Here, fronts of houses, like a title-page

With letters huge inscribed from top to toe;

Stationed above the door like guardian saints,

There, allegoric shapes, female or male,

Or physiognomies of real men,

Land-warriors, kings, or admirals of the sea,

Boyle, Shakespear, Newton, or the attractive head

Of some quack-doctor, famous in his day.

 

Meanwhile the roar continues, till at length,

Escaped as from an enemy, we turn

Abruptly into some sequestered nook,

Still as a sheltered place when winds blow loud.

At leisure thence, through tracts of thin resort,

 

And sights and sounds that come at intervals,

We take our way – a raree-show is here

With children gathered round, another street

Presents a company of dancing dogs,

Or dromedary with an antic pair

Of monkies on his back, a minstrel-band

Of Savoyards, single and alone,

An English ballad-singer. Private courts,

Gloomy as coffins, and unsightly lanes

Thrilled by some female vendor's scream – belike

The very shrillest of all London cries –

May then entangle us awhile,

Conducted through those labyrinths unawares

To privileged regions and inviolate,

Where from their aery lodges studious lawyers

Look out on waters, walks, and gardens green.

 

Thence back into the throng, until we reach –

Following the tide that slackens by degrees –

Some half-frequented scene where wider streets

Bring straggling breezes of suburban air.

Here files of ballads dangle from dead walls;

Advertisements of giant size, from high

Press forward in all colours on the sight –

These, bold in conscious merit – lower down,

That, fronted with a most imposing word,

Is peradventure one in masquerade.

As on the broadening causeway we advance,

Behold a face turned up towards us, strong

In lineaments, and red with over-toil:

'Tis one perhaps already met elsewhere,

A travelling cripple, by the trunk cut short,

And stumping with his arms. In sailor's garb

Another lies at length beside a range

Of written characters, with chalk inscribed

Upon the smooth flat stones. The nurse is here,

The bachelor that loves to sun himself,

The military idler, and the dame

That field-ward takes her walk in decency.

 

Now homeward through the thickening hubbub, where

See – among less distinguishable shapes –

The Italian, with his frame of images

Upon his head; with basket at his waist,

The Jew; the stately and slow-moving Turk,

With freight of slippers piled beneath his arm.

Briefly, we find (if tired of random sights,

And haply to that search our thoughts should turn)

Among the crowd, conspicuous less or more

As we proceed, all specimens of man

Through all the colours which the sun bestows,

And every character of form and face:

The Swede, the Russian; from the genial south,

The Frenchman and the Spaniard; from remote

America, the hunter Indian; Moors,

Malays, Lascars, the Tartar and Chinese,

And Negro ladies in white muslin gowns.

 

At leisure let us view from day to day,

As they present themselves, the spectacles

Within doors: troops of wild beasts, birds and beasts

Of every nature from all climes convened,

And, next to these, those mimic sights that ape

The absolute presence of reality,

Expressing as in mirror sea and land,

And what earth is, and what she hath to shew –

I do not here allude to subtlest craft,

By means refined attaining purest ends,

But imitations fondly made in plain

Confession of man's weakness and his loves.

Whether the painter – fashioning a work

To Nature's circumambient scenery,

And with his greedy pencil taking in

A whole horizon on all sides – with power

Like that of angels or commissioned spirits,

Plant us upon some lofty pinnacle

Or in a ship on waters, with a world

Of life and lifelike mockery to east,

To west, beneath, behind us, and before,

Or more mechanic artist represent

By scale exact, in model, wood or clay,

From shading colours also borrowing help,

Some miniature of famous spots and things,

Domestic, or the boast of foreign realms:

The Firth of Forth, and Edinburgh, throned

On crags, fit empress of that mountain land;

St Peter's Church; or, more aspiring aim,

In microscopic vision, Rome itself;

Or else, perhaps, some rural haunt, the Falls

Of Tivoli, and dim Frescati's bowers,

And high upon the steep that mouldering fane,

The Temple of the Sibyl – every tree

Through all the landscape, tuft, stone, scratch minute,

And every cottage, lurking in the rocks –

All that the traveller sees when he is there.

 

And to these exhibitions mute and still

Others of wider scope, where living men,

Music, and shifting pantomimic scenes,

Together joined their multifarious aid

To heighten the allurement. Need I fear

To mention by its name, as in degree

Lowest of these, and humblest in attempt –

Yet richly graced with honours of its own –

Half-rural Sadler's Wells? Though at that time

Intolerant, as is the way of youth

Unless itself be pleased, I more than once

Here took my seat, and, maugre frequent fits

Of irksomeness, with ample recompense

Saw singers, rope-dancers, giants and dwarfs,

Clowns, conjurors, posture-masters, harlequins,

Amid the uproar of the rabblement,

Perform their feats. Nor was it mean delight

To watch crude Nature work in untaught minds,

To note the laws and progress of belief –

Though obstinate on this way, yet on that

How willingly we travel, and how far! –

To have, for instance, brought upon the scene

The champion, Jack the Giant-killer: lo,

He dons his coat of darkness, on the stage

Walks, and atchieves his wonders, from the eye

Of living mortal safe as is the moon

›Hid in her vacant interlunar cave‹.

Delusion bold (and faith must needs be coy)

How is it wrought? – his garb is black, the word

INVISIBLE flames forth upon his chest.

 

Nor was it unamusing here to view

Those samples, as of the ancient comedy

And Thespian times, dramas of living men

And recent things yet warm with life: a sea-fight,

Shipwreck, or some domestic incident

The fame of which is scattered through the land,

Such as this daring brotherhood of late

Set forth – too holy theme for such a place,

And doubtless treated with irreverence,

Albeit with their very best of skill –

I mean, O distant friend, a story drawn

From our own ground, the Maid of Buttermere,

And how the spoiler came, ›a bold bad man‹

To God unfaithful, children, wife, and home,

And wooed the artless daughter of the hills,

And wedded her, in cruel mockery

Of love and marriage bonds. O friend, I speak

With tender recollection of that time

When first we saw the maiden, then a name

By us unheard of – in her cottage-inn

Were welcomed, and attended on by her,

Both stricken with one feeling of delight,

An admiration of her modest mien

And carriage, marked by unexampled grace.

Not unfamiliarly we since that time

Have seen her, her discretion have observed,

Her just opinions, female modesty,

Her patience, and retiredness of mind

Unsoiled by commendation and excess

Of public notice. This memorial verse

Comes from the poet's heart, and is her due;

For we were nursed – as almost might be said –

On the same mountains, children at one time,

Must haply often on the self-same day

Have from our several dwellings gone abroad

To gather daffodils on Coker's stream.

 

These last words uttered, to my argument

I was returning, when – with sundry forms

Mingled, that in the way which I must tread

Before me stand – thy image rose again,

Mary of Buttermere! She lives in peace

Upon the spot where she was born and reared;

Without contamination does she live

In quietness, without anxiety.

Beside the mountain chapel sleeps in earth

Her new-born infant, fearless as a lamb

That thither comes from some unsheltered place

To rest beneath the little rock-like pile

When storms are blowing.