Of present pleasure, but with pleasing And what perceive; well pleased to recog

thoughts

That in this moment there is life and food
For future years. And so I dare to hope,
Though changed, no doubt, from what I
was when first

I came among these hills; when like a roe
I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides
Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams,
Wherever nature led more like a man
Flying from something that he dreads,
[then
Who sought the thing he loved. For nature
(The coarser pleasures of my boyish days,
And their glad animal movements all
gone by)

than one

nise

In nature and the language of the sense,
The anchor of my purest thoughts, the

nurse,

[soul

The guide, the guardian of my heart, and
Of all my moral being.
Nor perchance,

If I were not thus taught, should I the

more

Suffer my genial spirits to decay :
For thou art with me, here upon the banks
Of this fair river; thou, my dearest friend,
My dear, dear friend, and in thy voice I
catch

The language of my former heart, and read
My former pleasures in the shooting lights
Of thy wild eyes. Oh! yet a little while
May I behold in thee what I was once,
My dear, dear sister! and this prayer I
make,

To me was all in all.-I cannot paint
What then I was. The sounding cataract
Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock,
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy
wood,
[to me
Their colours and their forms, were then
An appetite: a feeling and a love,
That had no need of a remoter charm,
By thought supplied, or any interest
Unborrowed from the eye.-That time is From joy to joy: for she can so inform

power

To chasten and subdue. And I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean, and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man:
A motion and a spirit, that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all
thought,
[am I still
And rolls through all things. Therefore
A lover of the meadows and the woods,
And mountains, and of all that we behold
From this green earth; of all the mighty

world

Of eye and ear, both what they half create,

This line has a close resemblance to an admirable line of Young, the exact expression of

which I cannot recollect.

Knowing that nature never did betray
The heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege,
Through all the years of this our life, to
lead

The mind that is within us, so impress
With quietness and beauty, and so feed
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil
tongues,
[men,
Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish
Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all
The dreary intercourse of daily life,
Shall e'er prevail against us, or disturb
Our cheerful faith, that all which we behold
Is full of blessings. Therefore let the moon
Shine on thee in thy solitary walk;
And let the misty mountain winds be free
To blow against thee: and, in after years,
When these wild ecstasies shall be matured
Into a sober pleasure, when thy mind
Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms,
Thy memory be as a dwelling-place
For all sweet sounds and harmonies; oh!
then,

If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief,
Should be thy portion, with what healing
thoughts

Of tender joy wilt thou remember me,
And these my exhortations! Nor, per-
chance-

If I should be where I no more can hear
Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes
these gleams

Of past existence-wilt thou then forget
That on the banks of this delightful stream
We stood together; and that I, so long
A worshipper of nature, hither came,

be admitted, that to you, as a master in that province of the art, the following tale, whether from contrast or congruity, is not an unappropriate offering. Accept it, then, as a public testimony of affectionate admiration from one with whose name yours has been often coupled (to use your own words) for evil and for good; and believe me to be, with earnest wishes that life and health may be granted you to complete the many important works in which you are engaged, and with high respect, most faithfully yours, WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. Rydal Mount, April 7, 1819.

PROLOGUE.

THERE'S Something in a flying horse,
There's something in a huge balloon;
But through the clouds I'll never float
Until I have a little boat,

Whose shape is like the crescent-moon.

MY DEAR FRIEND,-The tale of Peter
Bell, which I now introduce to your notice,
and to that of the public, has, in its manu-And now I have a little boat,
script state, nearly survived its minority; -
for it first saw the light in the summer of
1798. During this long interval, pains
have been taken at different times to make
the production less unworthy of a favour-
able reception; or, rather, to fit it for filling
permanently a station, however humble, in
the literature of my country. This has,
indeed, been the aim of all my endeavours
in poetry, which, you know, have been
sufficiently laborious to prove that I deem
the art not lightly to be approached; and
that the attainment of excellence in it may
laudably be made the principal object of
intellectual pursuit by any man, who, with
reasonable consideration of circumstances,
has faith in his own impulses.

In shape a very crescent-moon :-
Fast through the clouds my boat can sail;
But if perchance your faith should fail,
Look up-and you shall see me soon!

The woods, my friends, are round you
roaring,

The poem of Peter Bell, as the prologue will show, was composed under a belief that the imagination not only does not require for its exercise the intervention of supernatural agency, but that, though such agency be excluded, the faculty may be called forth as imperiously, and for kindred results of pleasure, by incidents, within the compass of poetic probability, in the humblest departments of daily life. Since that prologue was written, you have exhibited most splendid effects of judicious daring, in the opposite and usual course. Let this acknowledgment make my peace with the lovers of the supernatural; and I am persuaded it will

Rocking and roaring like a sea;
The noise of danger fills your ears,
And ye have all a thousand fears
Both for my little boat and me!

Meanwhile untroubled I admire
The pointed horns of my canoe :
And, did not pity touch my breast,
To see how ye are all distrest,
Till my ribs ached, I'd laugh at you!

Away we go, my boat and I-
Frail man ne'er sate in such another;
Whether among the winds we strive,
Or deep into the clouds we dive,
Each is contented with the other.

Away we go-and what care we
For treasons, tumults, and for wars?
We are as calm in our delight
As is the crescent-moon so bright
Among the scattered stars.

Up goes my boat among the stars
Through many a breathless field of light,
Through many a long blue field of ether,

Through the gray clouds-the Alps are Less quiet regions to explore,

And he had trudged through Yorkshire As ever hue-and-cry pursued,