The words printed in italics, it is but fair to say, were Coleridge's; but as Wordsworth adopted them, he cannot disclaim his responsibility. One of our foremost living writers and critics, however, assures us that he does not consider them in the least out of harmony with the general tenor of the beautiful poem, 'We are Seven,' in which they originally appeared. He sees no good reason for their omission. For ourselves, we prefer the stanza as it is now printed in the various editions of the poems. Again, after a description of a pond of water, we are gravely informed:

'I've measured it from side to side,

'Tis three feet long, and two feet wide.'

These

This is decidedly trivial, if not puerile. are some instances of which, alas! there are too many-in which the poet has greatly over-ridden his hobby, and which go to prove that a theory good in itself may be overdone. Poetry, or we are much mistaken, cannot be reduced to a system or fixed rules. Unlike prose, it cannot be ordered ad libitum; it is something like the wind-we cannot tell whence it cometh.'

Of the twenty-three poems contained in the 'Lyrical Ballads,' all were Wordsworth's with the exception of four; The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere,' The Nightingale,' 'The Foster Mother's Tale,' and 'The Dungeon.' It is hard to imagine that a reception so unfavourable should have been

accorded to a volume which, in addition to Coleridge's exquisite contributions, gave birth to such. beautiful conceptions as the 'Lines left upon a Seat in a Yew-tree,' 'We are Seven,' 'Lines written in early Spring,' 'The Thorn,' 'The Mad Mother,' 'The Complaint of a Forsaken Indian Woman,' and 'Tintern Abbey '--all indeed pearls of great priceunless the reason is to be found in the fact that the selection proclaimed with no uncertain sound that a revolution in poetry was imminent. But

"The world is often sadly wrong;

It censures him who most aspires,
And often most the one admires
Who is a very child in song.

'But Time, that sets all things aright,

Proves what will live and what will die;
In silence passes numbers by,

And brings neglected worth to light.'

It remains to be added, on the authority of his sister, that Wordsworth received thirty guineas as his share of the copyright, which, soon after publication, the publisher having given up business, and transferred all his copyrights to Messrs. Longman and Co., of London, was valued at nil. It was, therefore, returned at Cottle's request, and by him very kindly presented to the authors. It is worthy of note, also, that a considerable number of copies of the work was sold to sailors, who regarded it as a seabook, so many of its pages being devoted to 'The Ancient Mariner.'

And now, having a small surplus of cash, Words

worth and his sister, accompanied by Coleridge, in September, 1798, set out for Germany, their main object being the study of the language. They landed at Hamburg on the 18th of the month, and about a week later made the acquaintance of Klopstock, the celebrated author of the Messiah,' whom Coleridge humorously nicknamed 'Klubstick.' The conversations between Wordsworth and Klopstock, which were of a most interesting character, are to be found in 'Satyrane's Letters,' published by Coleridge in his 'Biographia Literaria,' and are well worthy of perusal.

At Hamburg, Coleridge parted from the Wordsworths, and proceeded to Ratzeburg, a distance of some thirty-five miles, whilst Wordsworth and his sister went on to Goslar, in Hanover, where they arrived on the 6th of October, at eight o'clock in the evening. Here they passed the winter of 1798-9, which was bitterly cold, and said to be the severest of the eighteenth century.

They had hoped, in addition to prosecuting their studies in German, to mix a little in the society of the place; but they were disappointed in this respect. Their acceptance of local invitations would, to some extent, have necessitated hospitality on their part, and as their means were humble, they prudently spent their time in comparative retirement. Perhaps it is fortunate for us that they did so, as the poetical genius of Wordsworth was now in its very flower.

He does not appear to have drank deeply of the springs of German metaphysics and philosophy, which so much infected Coleridge, and so largely coloured the current of his thoughts afterwards. Wordsworth's heart, though in a strange land, yearned for the scenes he had left behind him; and in imagination he wandered along the banks of the limpid rivers, and through the deep woods, of his native country. He writes:

'I travelled among unknown men,
In lands beyond the sea;

Nor, England! did I know till then
What love I bore to thee.

'Tis past, that melancholy dream!
Nor will I quit thy shore

A second time; for still I seem
To love thee more and more."

Here it was that he conceived many of his best known poems. Amongst others he composed 'Lucy Gray,' 'Nutting,' Wisdom and Spirit of the Universe,' 'Three years she grew in sun and shower,' 'Strange fits of passion have I known,' 'She dwelt among the untrodden ways,' 'There was a boy; ye knew him well, ye cliffs,' and 'A Poet's Epitaph'-sufficient in themselves to have earned a richly-merited immortality. He sent the lines beginning 'There was a boy, etc.,' in manuscript to Coleridge, who writes in reply: 'They are very beautiful, and leave an affecting impression. That

""Uncertain heaven received Into the bosom of the steady lake,"

I should have recognised anywhere; and had I met these lines running wild in the deserts of Arabia, I should have instantly screamed out "Wordsworth!" While at Ratzeburg, Coleridge produced some striking hexameters, which he forwarded to Wordsworth, and which conclude in strains which prove the strong bond of affection that existed between them:

'William, my head and my heart! dear William and dear Dorothea!

You have all in each other; but I am lonely, and want you !'

On quitting Goslar, on the 10th of February, 1799, Wordsworth commenced 'The Prelude,' breaking forth into impassioned, unpremeditated verse as he and his sister left their winter quarters behind them.

They returned to England in the same month, and, instead of again taking up their abode at Alfoxden, passed several months with their friends, the Hutchinsons, at Sockburn-on-Tees. About this time, Wordsworth, writing to Cottle, says: "We are now in the county of Durham, just upon the borders of Yorkshire. We left Coleridge well at Göttingen a month ago. We have spent our time pleasantly enough in Germany, but we are right glad to find ourselves in England-for we have learnt to know its value.'

The circumstances under which they left Alfoxden are specially remarkable. Political feeling in