Dorothy Wordsworth Part 8

"MY DEAR SIR,--I am very proud of the commission my brother has given me, as it affords me an opportunity of expressing the pleasure with which I think of you, and of our long journey side by side in the pleasant suns.h.i.+ne, our splendid entrance into the great city, and our rambles together in the crowded streets. I a.s.sure you I am not ungrateful for even the least of your kind attentions, and shall be happy in return to be your guide amongst these mountains, where, if you bring a mind free from care, I can promise you a rich store of n.o.ble enjoyments. My brother and sister will be exceedingly happy to see you; and, if you tell him stories from Spain of enthusiasm, patriotism, and detestation of the usurper, my brother will be a ready listener; and in presence of these grand works of nature you may feed each other's lofty hopes. We are waiting with the utmost anxiety for the issue of that battle which you arranged so nicely by Charles Lamb's fireside. My brother goes to seek the newspapers whenever it is possible to get a sight of one, and he is almost out of patience that the tidings are delayed so long.

"Pray, as you are most likely to see _Charles_ at least from time to time, tell me how they are going on. There is n.o.body in the world out of our house for whom I am more deeply interested. You will, I know, be happy that our little ones are all going on well.

The delicate little Catherine, the only one for whom we had any serious alarm, gains ground daily. Yet it will be long before she can be or have the appearance of being a stout child. There was great joy in the house at my return, which each showed in a different way. They are sweet wild creatures, and I think you would love them all. John is thoughtful with his wildness; Dora alive, active, and quick; Thomas, innocent and simple as a new-born babe. John had no feeling but of bursting joy when he saw me. Dorothy's first question was, 'Where is my doll?' We had delightful weather when I first got home; but on the first morning Dorothy roused me from my sleep with, 'It is time to get up, Aunt; it is a blasty morning--it does blast so.' And the next morning, not more encouraging, she said, 'It is a hailing morning--it hails so hard.' You must know that our house stands on a hill, exposed to all hails and blasts....

"D. WORDSWORTH."

From the above letter it will be seen, as can be well understood, that Miss Wordsworth was a great favourite with the poet's children, of whom there were then born the four mentioned. To these children, and the interests and enjoyments of their young lives, she devoted herself with the unselfish devotion and zeal which so pervaded her life and animated her conduct.

Sara Coleridge, the daughter of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, between whose family and that of Wordsworth the most cordial relations always existed, in the record of her early life has a pleasant recollection of a visit paid by her to Allan Bank when she was six years old. She writes:--"That journey to Grasmere gleams before me as the shadow of a shade. Allan Bank is a large house on the hill overlooking Easedale on one side and Grasmere on the other. Dorothy, Mr. Wordsworth's only daughter, was at the time very picturesque in her appearance, with her long thick yellow locks, which were never cut, but curled with papers, a thing which seems much out of keeping with the poetic, simple household. I remember being asked by my father and Miss Wordsworth, the poet's sister, if I did not think her very pretty. 'No,' said I, bluntly, for which I met with a rebuff, which made me feel as if I was a culprit."

Miss Coleridge also gives the following reminiscence:--"Miss Wordsworth, Mr. Wordsworth's sister, of most poetic eye and temper, took a great part with the children. She told us once a pretty story of a primrose, I think, which she espied by the wayside when she went to see me soon after my birth, though that was at Christmas, and how this same primrose was still blooming when she went back to Grasmere."

The life of Miss Wordsworth had hitherto been, on the whole, one of serene and calm enjoyment. In the social circle bound so closely in mutual affection, and so richly endowed with the faculty of making herself happy--of truly living--the only cloud during many years of brightness had been the death of her brother John. It could not, however, but have been expected that the happy circle would become still more acquainted with the common lot of mortal life.

During their residence at the parsonage at Grasmere, where they were living in 1812, the circle was broken by the loss of two of their children, then five in number. In the case of one, the interesting and delicate little Kate, then about four years old, the circ.u.mstances were peculiarly distressing. The way in which her very brief illness was caused has not been very clearly stated. De Quincey has attributed it to what he calls by the harsh name of the "criminal negligence" of one of the children of the George and Sarah Green before-mentioned, whom the Wordsworths had taken to live with them. He relates that while little Catherine was under the care of Sarah Green she was allowed to eat a number of raw carrots, in consequence of which she was very shortly, seized with strong convulsions. Although she partially recovered the immediate effect, her left side remained in a disabled condition.

It was some months after this that little Kate, having gone to bed bright and happy at the hour of a June sunset, was discovered in a speechless condition about midnight, and died in convulsions after a few hours' suffering. While, as may be imagined, the grief of her parents at the loss was great, that of De Quincey (who was not at Grasmere at the time, and was informed of the event by Miss Wordsworth) was so poignant and extravagant as to become romantic. The dear child had got so near the heart of the little dreamy opium-eater--had, in fact, found so warm a corner there--that he seemed to be almost overwhelmed. The heart was empty, and the eyes that could no longer gaze upon the living form were filled with its image. He used to imagine that he saw her. So great was his grief that we are told he often spent the night upon her grave. This may appear very extravagant, as it doubtless is; but we cannot measure a man like De Quincey by any ordinary standard. Possessing as he did a gigantic and immortal genius, he was at the same time one of the most unimaginable and eccentric, unreal and dreamy of beings that ever owned a warm human heart. The Wordsworth children were especially dear to him, and particularly so little Catherine. And they returned his affection.

Three weeks before her death he had seen her for the last time. In his letter to Miss Wordsworth he says:--"The children were speaking to me altogether, and I was saying one thing to one and another to another, and she, who could not speak loud enough to overpower the other voices, had got on a chair, and putting her hand upon my mouth, she said, with her sweet importunateness of action and voice, 'Kinsey, Kinsey, what a bring Katy from London?' I believe she said it twice; and I remember that her mother noticed the earnestness and intelligence of her manner, and looked at me and smiled. This was the last time that I heard her sweet voice distinctly, and I shall never hear one like it again."

The death of Catherine was followed six months later by that of her brother Thomas, six and a half years old. This double affliction made the Wordsworths glad to remove from the neighbourhood of the churchyard, which so constantly reminded them of their loss. It was for this reason that, in 1813, they went to reside at Rydal Mount, which was thenceforth the home of Miss Wordsworth until her death--a period of more than forty years.

CHAPTER XIII.

REMOVAL TO RYDAL MOUNT.--DORA WORDSWORTH.

Since their settlement in Grasmere, the worldly circ.u.mstances of Wordsworth, as well as those of his sister, had considerably improved.

We have seen upon what slender, combined means they began housekeeping, living in "n.o.ble poverty"--and were happy. Shortly afterwards the then Earl of Lonsdale honourably paid to the Wordsworths the large sum of money which, as has been before mentioned, had been withheld by his father. The share of each of them of this is said to have been about 1,800. In addition to this the poet's muse had begun to be more profitable to him. Though he had not then been awarded that high and foremost rank in the inspired choir which he has since attained, yet his power as a great poet was beginning to be acknowledged by more than the select number who had from the first recognised his genius.

About this time he also had conferred upon him the appointment as distributor of stamps for Westmoreland. While the emoluments of this office formed a substantial addition to the poet's income, its duties were such that they could be chiefly performed by deputy.

In obtaining for their new home the now cla.s.sic RYDAL MOUNT, the good fortune of the Wordsworths did not fail them. The "modest mansion" is well known, and many descriptions of it have been given. For the beauty of its situation, and the amenities of its surroundings, it is almost unsurpa.s.sed. It has been somewhere stated that whilst most persons, who, having chosen their own residences, think them the first, they are all ready to give the second place to Rydal Mount. I have on two occasions since the poet's death had the good fortune to obtain admittance to the grounds, and, with feelings of reverence and emotion, paced the terrace-walks, worn by the footsteps of the great departed. We are on such occasions strikingly reminded of the words of Foster: "What a tale could be told by many a room were the walls endowed with memory and speech." The house stands in an elevated position, being on a plateau on the south side of Nab Scar. Striking off from the side of the house is a walk called the Upper Terrace. From this path the views are exceedingly lovely. Immediately in front is the Rothay Valley, backed by the richly-wooded heights of Loughrigg, with Windermere in the distance to the left, "a light thrown into the picture in the winter season, and in the summer a beautiful feature, changing with every hue of the sky."

About halfway along the terrace we come to a rustic alcove, built of fir poles, and lined with cones. Here, we should think, the walk ends, for we are parallel with the boundary wall of the garden below; but opening a door, we find the road branches slightly to the right, and, opening into the far terrace, reveals a surprise view. Here we see beneath us Rydal Water, gemmed with its romantic islands, and beyond, the green heights of Loughrigg Terrace. Following the path, with its sloping banks of fern and flowers, for about fifty yards, we find it terminated by a little wicket-gate, which opens upon a field, whence the old, and now gra.s.s-green, road to Grasmere is reached. On the left side of the Upper Terrace is a dwarf wall, niched with ferns and mosses. Below this wall is another terrace--a level one--formed by the poet himself, chiefly for the sake of Miss Fenwick, who was a valued friend, and, in after years, an inmate at Rydal Mount. To her the poet dictated the MSS. notes upon his poems, referred to in the "Memoirs," and elsewhere, as the "MSS. I.

F."

In speaking of the nocturnal aspect of Rydal Mount, Wordsworth mentions "the beauty of the situation, its being backed and flanked by lofty fells, which bring the heavenly bodies to touch, as it were, the earth upon the mountain tops, while the prospect in front lies open to a length of level valley, the extended lake, and a terminating ridge of low hills."

A poetical description of this chosen retreat, by Miss Jewsbury, and published in the _Literary Magnet_, for 1826, may be quoted here:--

"THE POET'S HOME."

"Low and white, yet scarcely seen, Are its walls for mantling green; Not a window lets in light, But through flowers cl.u.s.tering bright; Not a glance may wander there, But it falls on something fair; Garden choice, and fairy mound, Only that no elves are found; Winding walk, and sheltered nook, For student grave and graver book: Or a bird-like bower, perchance, Fit for maiden and romance.

Then, far off, a glorious sheen Of wide and sunlit waters seen; Hills that in the distance lie, Blue and yielding as the sky; And nearer, closing round the nest, The home of all the 'living crest,'

Other rocks and mountains stand, Rugged, yet a guardian band, Like those that did, in fable old, Elysium from the world enfold.

"... ... . Companions meet Thou shalt have in thy retreat: One of long-tried love and truth; Thine in age as thine in youth; One, whose locks of partial grey, Whisper somewhat of decay; Yet whose bright and beaming eye Tells of more that cannot die.

"Then a second form beyond, Thine, too, by another bond, Sportive, tender, graceful, wild-- Scarcely woman, more than child-- One who doth thy heart entwine, Like the ever-clinging vine; One to whom thou art a stay, As the oak that, scarred and grey, Standeth on, and standeth fast, Strong and stately to the last.

"Poet's lot like this hath been; Such, perchance, may I have seen; Or in fancy's fairy land, Or in truth, and near at hand: If in fancy, then, forsooth, Fancy had the force of truth; If, again, a truth it were, Then were truth as fancy fair; But, which ever it might be, "Twas a Paradise to me.'"

Of the "companions meet" referred to above it is evident that the first-named "of long-tried love and truth" is Miss Wordsworth; the second, Mrs. Wordsworth; and the third, Miss Dora Wordsworth, the poet's daughter, to whom some further reference should now be made.

At the time of the removal to Rydal Mount, in the spring of 1813, the family, in addition to the parents and Miss Wordsworth, consisted of three children, of whom the second--Dorothy, or Dora, born in 1804--was of the interesting age of nine years. She was named after her aunt, Miss Wordsworth; for, although her father would have preferred to have called her Mary, the name Dorothy, as he stated to Lady Beaumont, had been so long devoted in his own thoughts to the first daughter he might have, he could not break his promise to himself. By way of further distinguis.h.i.+ng her from her aunt, Mr. Crabb Robinson used to call her Dorina. To this surviving daughter, as she grew up to womanhood, Wordsworth was pa.s.sionately attached. Inheriting as she did, in no slight degree, the family genius, he seemed to see reproduced in her a harmonious blending of the characteristics and mental lineaments of his wife and sister, the two beings in the world whom he had most devotedly loved.

Wordsworth's later poems contain several allusions to Dora. In this place I will quote a stanza or two only, from one, ent.i.tled "The Triad,"

written in celebration of Edith Southey, Dora Wordsworth, and Sara Coleridge:--

"Open, ye thickets! let her fly, Swift as a Thracian Nymph o'er field and height!

For She, to all but those who love her, shy, Would gladly vanish from a Stranger's sight; Though where she is beloved and loves, Light as the wheeling b.u.t.terfly she moves; Her happy spirit as a bird is free, That rifles blossoms on a tree, Turning them inside out with arch audacity.

Alas! how little can a moment show Of an eye where feeling plays In ten thousand dewy rays; A face o'er which a thousand shadows go!

--She stops--is fastened to that rivulet's side; And there (while, with sedater mien, O'er timid waters that have scarcely left Their birth-place in the rocky cleft, She bends) at leisure may be seen Features to old ideal grace allied, Amid their smiles and dimples dignified-- Fit countenance for the soul of primal truth: The bland composure of eternal youth!

"What more changeful than the sea?

But over his great tides Fidelity presides; And this light-hearted Maiden, constant is as he.

High is her aim as heaven above, And wide as ether her good-will; And, like the lowly reed, her love Can drink its nurture from the scantiest rill: Insight as keen as frosty star Is to _her_ charity no bar, Nor interrupts her frolic graces When she is, far from these wild places, Encircled by familiar faces."

Writing of Dora Wordsworth, Miss Coleridge says:--"There is truth in the sketch of Dora--poetic truth, though such as none but a poetic father would have seen. She was unique in her sweetness and goodness. I mean that her character was most peculiar--a compound of vehemence of feeling and gentleness, sharpness and lovingness, which is not often seen."

CHAPTER XIV.

FRIENDS.--TOUR ON CONTINENT.

Some reference more special than hitherto should be made to the more outer influences which entered into the life of Miss Wordsworth.

Although so bound up in her brother, her life presented many sides, and her sympathies, as will have been seen, were by no means limited in their operation to the household circle. Her brother's friends were hers. Probably few have been more independent of outside friends.h.i.+ps, and of society, than the family at Rydal; and at the same time few have been blessed with such genial and cultured a.s.sociates.

We have seen how close had, for many years, been the companions.h.i.+p with Coleridge, whom Lamb has called "an archangel a little damaged"--Coleridge, the incomprehensible, versatile genius, poet, philosopher, theologian, metaphysician, and critic--of whom it has recently been said that "even in the dilapidation of his powers, due chiefly, if you will, to his own unthrifty management of them, we might, making proper deductions, apply to him what Mark Antony says of the dead Caesar:--

'He was the ruins of the n.o.blest man That ever lived in the tide of time.'"

Then we have the sedate and scholarly Southey, the brother-in-law of Coleridge, and both of whom, up to 1810, when Coleridge left the district, resided at Greta Hall, near Keswick. Charles and Mary Lamb, also, although they could seldom be lured from their beloved London, were, as we have seen, among the earliest friends of the Wordsworths, and their home generally the abode of Miss Wordsworth during her occasional visits to the metropolis. Charles Lloyd, of Brathay--the dreamy Quaker, and bosom friend of Lamb--also became a neighbour, and an esteemed friend. Later, we have seen De Quincey, the intellectual opium eater, whose growth seems to have been almost entirely in the direction of brain (and of whom Southey said he wished he was not so very little, and did not always forget his great coat!) received into the charmed circle; Crabb Robinson, also, who, though not a writer himself, counted amongst his friends some of the most eminent literary men of the day.

Professor Wilson, of Elleray, the physical and mental giant, who resided within, what was to the Wordsworths and himself, fair walking distance; afterwards Hartley Coleridge, loving and lovable, who inherited no small portion of the poetic genius of his more ill.u.s.trious father; and Dr.

Arnold, of Rugby fame, who settled almost within a stone's-throw of Rydal Mount, added to the _coterie_ of men of genius, among whom, Wordsworth, from time to time, if not at the same time, moved as a revered master, added to the interest of this warm centre of intellectual activity.

Among many other sons of genius who should be ranked as friends of Wordsworth was Haydon, the painter. He painted Wordsworth on several occasions, and introduced him into his famous picture of "Christ's Entry into Jerusalem." Of this Hazlitt said it was the "most like his drooping weight of thought and expression." Of this picture Haydon, in his autobiography, says: "During the progress of the picture of Jerusalem, I resolved to put into it (1816), in a side group, Voltaire, as a sneerer, and Newton, as a believer. I now (1817) put Hazlitt's head into my picture, looking at Christ as an investigator. It had a good effect. I then put in Keats into the background, and resolved to introduce Wordsworth, bowing with reverence and awe.... The Centurion, the Samaritan Woman, Jairus and his daughter, St. Peter, St. John, Newton, Voltaire, the anxious mother of the penitent girl, and the girl blus.h.i.+ng and hiding her face, many heads behind; in fact the leading groups were accomplished, when down came my health again, eyes and all." This painting, so enthusiastically received in England, was, unfortunately, sent to America, whence it has never returned. Haydon writes, under date September 23, 1831: "My 'Jerusalem' is purchased, and is going to America. Went to see it before it was embarked. It was melancholy to look, for the last time, at a work which had excited so great a sensation in England and Scotland. It was now leaving my native country for ever."

In speaking of the friends of the Wordsworths, some allusion should be made to others, who, if they were less widely known, were not less warmly appreciative of their worth, or less closely identified with them. Sir George Beaumont, of Coleorton Hall, Leicesters.h.i.+re, was for many years a close friend and admirer; and from time to time we find Miss Wordsworth visiting there.

Among the ladies who, in after years, became closely intimate with the inmates of Rydal Mount were Mrs. Fletcher, herself a lady of some literary distinction, and her daughter Mary, afterwards Lady Richardson.