VARIANTS ON THE TEXT

[Variant 1:

... pleasure ... MS.]

[Variant 2:

... will be proud, and that same spot
Be dear unto the Muses evermore. MS.]

* * * * *

FOOTNOTE ON THE TEXT

[Footnote A: In the edition of 1842 the following footnote is given by
Wordsworth,

"This biographical Sonnet, if so it may be called, together with the
Epistle that follows, have been long suppressed from feelings of
personal delicacy."

The "Epistle" was that addressed to Sir George Beaumont in 1811.--Ed.]

This little property at Applethwaite now belongs to Mr. Gordon
Wordsworth, the grandson of the poet. It is a "sunny dell" only in its
upper reaches, above the spot where the cottage--which still bears
Wordsworth's name--is built. This sonnet, and Sir George Beaumont's wish
that Wordsworth and Coleridge should live so near each other, as to be
able to carry on joint literary labour, recall the somewhat similar wish
and proposal on the part of W. Calvert, unfolded in a letter from
Coleridge to Sir Humphry Davy.--Ed.

* * * * *

VAUDRACOUR AND JULIA

Composed 1804.--Published 1820

The following Tale was written as an Episode, in a work from which its
length may perhaps exclude it. [A] The facts are true; no invention as
to these has been exercised, as none was needed.--W. W. 1820.

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. Faithfully narrated, though with the
omission of many pathetic circumstances, from the mouth of a French
lady, [B] who had been an eye-and-ear witness of all that was done and
said. Many long years after, I was told that Dupligne was then a monk in
the Convent of La Trappe.--I. F.]

This was included among the "Poems founded on the Affections."--Ed.

O happy time of youthful lovers (thus
My story may begin) O balmy time,
In which a love-knot on a lady's brow
Is fairer than the fairest star in heaven!
To such inheritance of blessed fancy 5
(Fancy that sports more desperately with minds
Than ever fortune hath been known to do)
The high-born Vaudracour was brought, by years
Whose progress had a little overstepped
His stripling prime. A town of small repute, 10
Among the vine-clad mountains of Auvergne,
Was the Youth's birth-place. There he wooed a Maid
Who heard the heart-felt music of his suit
With answering vow