Proofs thickening round her that on public ends Domestic virtue vitally depends,

That civic strife can turn the happiest hearth Into a grievous sore of self-tormenting earth."

But we must return to our narrative.

1 The Warning, vol. iv. p. 239.

CHAPTER X.

RACEDOWN.

In the autumn of 1795, William Wordsworth and his sister were settled at Racedown Lodge, near Crewkerne, in Dorsetshire. The house in which they lived belonged to Mr. Pinney, of Bristol, a friend of Mr. Basil Montagu. "The country," says his sister, in one of her letters, "is delightful; we have charming walks, a good garden, a pleasant house," which was pretty well stocked with books. Here they employed themselves industriously in reading, — “if reading can ever deserve the name of industry," says Wordsworth in a letter to his friend Mathews1, writing, and gardening. "My brother," she says, "handles the spade with great dexterity." "She herself," he says, "had gone through half of Davila, and yesterday we began Ariosto." The place was very retired, with little or no society, and a post only once a week. Writing afterwards to a friend in 1799, she says, "I think Racedown is the place dearest to my recollections upon the whole surface of the island; it was the first home I had." She speaks with raptures of the "lovely meadows above the tops of the combs, and the scenery on Pilsden, Lewisden, and Blackdown-hill, and the view of the sea from Lambert's Castle."

1

1 Dated Racedown, March 21. [1796.]

In a letter to his friend Wrangham, on the 20th November of this year, he sends him certain poetical Imitations of JUVENAL, in which he was then occupied ; and it appears that he and his correspondent had undertaken to compose and publish conjointly a volume of such imitations. These specimens exhibit poetical vigour, combined with no little asperity and rancour against the abuses of the time, and the vices of the ruling powers, and the fashionable corruptions of aristocratical society. He appears to have been engaged in this paraphrase of the Roman satirist till the following spring. But his labours were not brought to a close; and, ere many years had passed, he regretted the time spent upon the work. Application being then made to him for permission to publish what he had written of these imitations, he replied as follows:

"Nov. 7. 1806.

"I have long since come to a fixed resolution to steer clear of personal satire; in fact, I never will have any thing to do with it as far as concerns the private vices of individuals on any account. With respect to public delinquents or offenders, I will not say the same; though I should be slow to meddle even with these. This is a rule which I have laid down for myself, and shall rigidly adhere to; though I do not in all cases blame those who think and act differently.

"It will therefore follow, that I cannot lend any assistance to your proposed publication. The verses which you have of mine, I should wish to be destroyed; I have no copy of them myself, at least none that I can find. I would most willingly give them

up to you, fame, profit, and everything, if I thought either true fame or profit could arise out of them."

His next poetical employment was of a very dif ferent nature. He had completed his "Salisbury Plain," or "Guilt and Sorrow," and on October 24th, 1796, his sister describes him as "now ardent in the composition of a tragedy," the "BORDERERS." The subject of this play had been probably suggested to him in his residence at Penrith and on the Scottish border, where are so many castles and other monuments connected with the age to which this drama belongs-the time of Henry III.

Though written in 1795-6, it did not see the light till near fifty years afterwards. It was first published in 1842. In the year 1843, he made the following observations in speaking with respect to it':

"The Borderers; a Tragedy.—Of this dramatic work I have little to say in addition to the short printed note which will be found attached to it. It was composed at Racedown in Dorsetshire, during the latter part of the year 1795, and in the course of the following year. Had it been the work of a later period of life, it would have been different in some respects from what it is now. The plot would have been something more complete, and a greater variety of characters introduced, to relieve the mind from the pressure of incidents so mournful; the manners also would have been more attended to. My care was almost exclusively given to the passions and the characters, and the positions in which the persons in the

1 From MSS. I. F.

drama stood relatively to each other, that the reader
(for I never thought of the stage at the time it was
written) might be moved, and to a degree instructed,
by lights penetrating somewhat into the depths of our
nature. In this endeavour, I cannot think, upon a
very late review, that I have failed. As to the scene
and period of action, little more was required for
my purpose than the absence of established law and
government, so that the agents might be at liberty to
act on their own impulses. Nevertheless, I do re-
member, that having a wish to colour the manners in
some degree from local history more than
my know-
ledge enabled me to do, I read Redpath's History of
the Borders,' but found there nothing to my purpose.
I once made an observation to Sir W. Scott, in which
he concurred, that it was difficult to conceive how
so dull a book could be written on such a subject.
Much about the same time, but a little after, Coleridge
was employed in writing his tragedy of 'Remorse;' and
it happened soon after that, through one of the Mr.
Pooles, Mr. Knight, the actor, heard that we had been
engaged in writing plays, and, upon his suggestion,
mine was curtailed, and (I believe, with Coleridge's)
was offered to Mr. Harris, manager of Covent Garden.
For myself, I had no hope, nor even a wish (though a
successful play would in the then state of my finances
have been a most welcome piece of good fortune), that
he should accept my performance; so that I incurred
no disappointment when the piece was judiciously
returned as not calculated for the stage. In this
judgment I entirely concurred; and had it been other-
wise, it was so natural for me to shrink from public
notice, that any hope I might have had of success
would not have reconciled me altogether to such an

not five!