s got about, as untrue as it is disagreeable, that Dora lost
her health from her father's opposition to her marriage, and that
Wordsworth's excessive grief after her death was owing to remorse. I can
myself testify to her health having been very good for a considerable
interval between that difficulty and her last illness; and this is
enough, of itself, to dispose of the story. Her parents considered
the marriage an imprudent one; but after securing sufficient time for
consideration, they said that she must judge for herself; and there were
fine qualities in Mr. Quillinan which could not but win their affection
and substantial regard. His first wife, a friend of Dora Wordsworth's,
was carried out of the house in which she had just been confined, from
fire in the middle of the night; she died from the shock; and she died
recommending her husband and her friend to marry. Such is the understood
history of the case. After much delay they did marry, and lived near
Rydal Mount, where Dora was, as always, the light of the house, as long
as she could go to it. But, after a long and painful decline, she died
in 1847. Her husband followed soon after Wordsworth's death. He lies in
the family corner of Grasmere churchyard, between his two wives. This
appeared to be the place reserved for Mrs. Wordsworth, so that Dora
would lie between her parents. There seemed now to be no room left for
the solitary survivor, and many wondered what would be done; but all had
been thought of. Wordsworth's grave had been made deep enough for two;
and there his widow now rests.

There was much vivid life in them, however clearly the end was
approaching, when I first knew them in 1845. The day after my arrival at
a friend's house, they called on me, excited by two kinds of interest.
Wordsworth had been extremely gratified by hearing, through a book of
mine, how his works were estimated by certain classes of readers in the
United States; and he and Mrs. Wordsworth were eager to learn facts and
opinions about mesmerism, by which I had just recovered from a
long illness, and which they hoped might avail in the case of a
daughter-in-law, then in a dying state abroad. After that day, I met
them frequently, and was at their house, when I could go. On occasion of
my first visit, I was struck by an incident which explained the ridicule
we have all heard thrown on the old poet for a self-esteem which he was
merely too simple to hide. Nothing could be easier than