Page 547.

"Cave of Staffa."

The reader may be tempted to exclaim, "How came this and the two following sonnets to be written, after the dissatisfaction expressed in the preceding one?" In fact, at the risk of incurring the reasonable displeasure of the master of the steam-boat, the author returned to the cave, and explored it under circumstances more favourable to those imaginative impressions, which it is so wonderfully fitted to make upon the mind.

Page 547. "Sonnet 29.

"Hope smiled when your nativity was cast,.
Children of Summer!"

Upon the head of the columns which form the front of the cave, rests a body of decomposed basaltic matter, which was richly decorated with that large bright flower, the ox-eyed daisy. The author had noticed the same flower growing with profusion among the bold rocks on the western coast of the Isle of Man; making a brilliant contrast with their black and gloomy surfaces.

Page 548.
"Iona."

The four last lines of this sonnet are adopted from a well-known sonnet of Russel, as conveying the author's feeling better than any words of his own could do.

Page 549.

"The River Eden."

"Yet fetched from Paradise," &c.

It is to be feared that there is more of the poet than the sound etymologist in this derivation of the name Eden. On the western coast of Cumberland is a rivulet which enters the sea at Moresby, known also in the neighbourhood by the name of Eden. May not the latter syllable come from the word Dean, a valley? Langdale, near Ambleside, is by the inhabitants called Langden. The former syllable occurs in the name Eamont, a principal feeder of the Eden; and the stream which flows, when the tide is out, over Cartmel Sands, is called the Ea.

Page 550.
"Nunnery."

'Canal, and Viaduct, and Railway, tell!"

At Corby, a few miles below Nunnery, the Eden is crossed by a magnificent viaduct; and another of these works is thrown over a deep glen or ravine at a very short distance from the main stream.

Page 550.

"To the Earl of Lonsdale."

This sonnet was written immediately after certain trials, which took place at the Cumberland Assizes, when the Earl of Lonsdale, in consequence of repeated and long continued attacks upon his character, through the local press, had thought it right to prosecute the conductors and proprietors of three several journals. A verdict of libel was given in one case; and in the others, the prosecutions were withdrawn, upon the individuals retracting and disavowing the charges, expressing regret that they had been made, and promising to abstain from the like in future.

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APPENDIX.

DEDICATION TO THE EDITION OF 1815.

TO SIR GEORGE HOWLAND BEAUMONT, BART.

MY DEAR SIR GEORGE, -Accept my thanks for the permission given me to dedicate these poems to you. In addition to a lively pleasure derived from general considerations, I feel a particular satisfaction, for, by inscribing them with your name, I seem to myself in some degree to repay, by an appropriate honour, the great obligation which I owe to one part of the collection-as having been the means of first making us personally known to each other. Upon much of the remainder, also, you have a peculiar claim, for several of the best pieces were composed under the shade of your own groves, upon the classic ground of Coleorton, where I was animated by the recollection of those illustrious poets of your name and family, who were born in that neighbourhood; and, we may be assured, did not wander with indifference, by the dashing stream of Grace Dieu, and among the rocks that diversify the forest of Charnwood.—Nor is there any one to whom such parts of this collection as have been inspired or coloured by the beautiful country from which I now address you, could be presented with more propriety than to yourself-who have composed so many admirable pictures from the suggestions of the same scenery. Early in life, the sublimity and beauty of this region excited your admiration; and I know that you are bound to it in mind by a still-strengthening attachment.

Wishing and hoping that these poems may survive as a lasting memorial of a friendship, which I reckon among the blessings of my life,

I have the honour to be, my dear Sir George,
Yours most affectionately and faithfully,

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

RYDAL MOUNT, WESTMORELAND, February 1, 1815.

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PREFACE TO THE EDITION OF 1815.

THE observations prefixed to that portion of this work which was published many years ago, under the title of "Lyrical Ballads," have so little of a special application to the greater part of the present enlarged and diversified collection, that they could not with propriety stand as an introduction to it. Not deeming it, however, expedient to suppress that exposition, slight and imperfect as it is, of the feelings which had determined the choice of the subjects, and the principles which had regulated the composition of those pieces, I have placed it so as to form an essay supplementary to the preface, to be attended to, or not, at the pleasure of the reader.

In the preface to that part of "The Recluse," lately published under the title of "The Excursion," I have alluded to a meditated arrangement of my minor poems, which should assist the attentive reader in perceiving their connexion with each other, and also their subordination to that work. I shall here say a few words explanatory of this arrangement, as carried into effect in the present work.

The powers requisite for the production of poetry are, first, those of observation and description, .e., the ability to observe with accuracy things as they are in themselves, and with fidelity to describe them, unmodified by any passion or feeling existing in the mind of the describer; whether the things depicted be actually present to the senses, or have a place only in the memory. This power, although indispensable to a poet, is one which he employs only in submission to necessity, and never for a continuance of time as its exercise supposes all the higher qualities of the mind to be passive, and in a state of subjection to external objects, much in the same way as the translator or engraver ought to be to his original. 2ndly, Sensibility,-which, the more exquisite it is, the wider will be the range of a Poet's perceptions: and the more will he be incited to observe objects, both as they exist in themselves and as re-acted upon by his own mind. (The distinction between poetic and human sensibility has been marked in the character of the poet delineated in the original preface, before mentioned.) 3dly, Reflection, which makes the poet acquainted with the value of actions, images, thoughts, and feelings; and assists the sensibility in perceiving their connexion with each other. 4thly, Imagination and fancy,—to modify, to create, and to associate. 5thly, Invention, -by which characters are composed out of materials supplied by observation-whether of the poet's own heart and mind, or of external life and nature; and such incidents and situations produced as are most impressive to the imagination, and most fitted to do justice to the characters, sentiments, and passions, which the poet undertakes to illus trate. And lastly, Judgment,-to decide how and where, and in what degree, each of these faculties ought to be exerted; so that the less shall not be sacrificed to the greater; nor the greater, slighting the less, arrogate, to its own injury, more than its due. By judgment, also, is determined what are the laws and appropriate graces of every species of composition.

The materials of poetry, by these powers collected and produced, are cast, by means of various moulds, into divers forms. The moulds may be enumerated, and the forms specified, in the following order. Ist, the Narrative,-including the epopeia, the historic poem, the tale, the romance, the mock heroic, and, if the spirit of Homer will tolerate such neighbourhood, that dear production of our days, the metrical novel. Of this class, the distinguishing mark is, that the narrator, however liberally his speaking agents be introduced, is himself the source from which every thing primarily flows. Epi poets, in order that their mode of composition may accord with the elevation of their

subject, represent themselves as singing from the inspiration of the Muse, " Arma virumque cano; but this is a fiction, in modern times, of slight value the "Iliad" or the Paradise Lost" would gain little in our estimation by being chanted. The other poets who belong to this class are commonly content to tell their tale ;-so that of the whole it may be affirmed that they neither require nor reject the accompaniment of music.

2ndly, The Dramatic,-consisting of tragedy, historic drama, comedy, and masque, in which the poet does not appear at all in his own person, and where the whole action is carried on by speech and dialogue of the agents, music being admitted only incidentally and rarely. The opera may be placed here, inasmuch as it proceeds by dialogue, though, depending, to the degree that it does upon music, it has a strong claim to be ranked with the Lyrical. The characteristic and impassioned Epistle, of which Ovid and Pope have given examples, considered as a species of monodrama, may, without impropriety, be placed in this class.

3dly, The Lyrical,-containing the hymn, the ode. the elegy, the song, and the ballad; in all which, for the production of their full effect, an accompaniment of music is indispensable.

4thly, The Idyllium,-descriptive chiefly either of the processes and appearances of external nature, as " The Seasons" of Thomson, or of characters, manners, and sentiments, as are Shenstone's Schoolmist ress," The Cotters Saturday Night" of Burns, "The Twa Dogs" of the same author; or of these in conjunction with the appearances of nature, as most of the pieces of Theocritus, the Allegro" and "Penseroso of Milton, Beattie s "Minstrel, Goldsmith's "Deserted Village." The epitaph, the inscription, the sonnet, most of the epistles of poets writing in their own persons, and all locodescriptive poetry, belong to this class.

5thly, Didactic,-the principal object of which is direct instruction; as the poem of Lucretius, "The Georgics, of Virgil, The Fleece" of Dyer, Mason's English Garden," etc.

And, lastly, philosophical satire, like that of Horace and Juvenal: personal and occasional satire rarely compreheading sufficient of the general in the individual to be dignified with the name of poetry

Out of the three last has been constructed a composite order, of which Young's "Night Thoughts, and Cowper's "Task,' are excellent examples.

It is deducible from the above, that poems, apparently miscellaneous, may, with propriety, be arranged either with reference to the powers of mind predominant in the production of them, or to the mould in which they are cast; or, lastly, to the subjects to which they relate. From each of these considerations, the following poems have been divided into classes; which, that the work may more obviously correspond with the course of human life, and for the sake of exhibiting in it the three requisites of a legitimate whole, a beginning, a middle, and an end, have been also arranged, as far as it was possible, according to an order of time, commencing with childhood, and terminating with old age, death, and immortality My guiding wish was, that the small pieces thus discriminated might be regarded under a two-fold view; as composing an entire work within themselves, and as adjuncts to the philosophical poem, "The Recluse. This arrangement has long presented itself habitually to my own mind. Nevertheless, I should have preferred to scatter the little poems alluded to at random, if I had been persuaded that, by the plan adopted. anything material would be taken from the natural effect of the pieces. individually. on the mind of the unreflecting reader. I trust there is a sufficient variety in each class to prevent this: while, for him who reads with reflection, the arrangement will serve as a commentary unostentatiously directing his attention to my purposes, both particular and general. But, as I wish to guard against the possibility of misleading by this classification, it is proper first to remind the reader, that certain poems are placed according to the powers of mind, in the author's conception, predominant in the production of them; predominant, which implies the exertion of other faculties in less degree. Where there is more imagination than fancy in a poem, it is placed under the head of imagination, and vice versa. Both the above classes might without impropriety have been enlarged from that consisting of "Poems Founded on the Affections ;"as might this latter from those, and from the classProceeding from Sentiment and Reflection." The most striking characteristics