throwing aside all pretence of regularity and order, and marking down events just as they occurred to recollection. I will try this plan; and behold I have a handsome locked volume, such as might serve for a lady's album.

one. Then I write or study again till one. At that hour to-day I drove to Huntly Burn, and walked home by one of the hundred and one pleasing paths which I have made through the 5 woods I have planted-now chatting with Tom Purdie, who carries my plaid, and speaks when he pleases, telling long stories of hits and misses in shooting twenty years back-sometimes chewing the cud of sweet and bitter

mours of two curious little terriers of the Dandie Dinmont breed, together with a noble wolf-hound puppy which Glengarry had given me to replace Maida. This brings me down

December 18. An odd thought strikes me; when I die will the Journal of these days be taken out of the ebony cabinet at Abbotsford, and read as the transient pout of a man worth £60,000, with wonder that the well-seeming 10 fancy-and sometimes attending to the huBaronet should ever have experienced such a hitch? Or will it be found in some obscure lodging-house, where the decayed son of chivalry has hung up his scutcheon for some 20s. a week, and where one or two old friends 15 to the very moment I do tell-the rest is will look grave and whisper to each other, "Poor gentleman," "A well-meaning man," "Nobody's enemy but his own," "Thought his parts could never wear out," "Family poorly left," "Pity he took that foolish title"? 20 Who can answer this question?

prophetic. I will feel sleepy when this book is locked, and perhaps sleep until Dalgleish brings the dinner summons. Then I will have a chat with Lady S. and Anne; some broth or soup, a slice of plain meat-a man's chief business, in Dr. Johnson's estimation, is briefly despatched. Half an hour with my family, and half an hour's coquetting with a cigar, a tumbler of weak whisky and water, and a novel

consumes another half hour of chat; then write or read in my own room till ten o'clock at night; a little bread and then a glass of porter, and to bed.

What a life mine has been!-half educated, almost wholly neglected or left to myself, stuffing my head with most nonsensical trash, and undervalued in society for a time by most 25 perhaps, lead on to tea, which sometimes of my companions, getting forward and held a bold and clever fellow, contrary to the opinion of all who thought me a mere dreamer, broken-hearted for two years, my heart handsomely pieced again, but the crack will remain 30 to my dying day. Rich and poor four or five times, once on the verge of ruin, yet opened new sources of wealth almost overflowing. Now taken in my pitch of pride, and nearly winged (unless the good news hold), because London 35 chooses to be in an uproar, and in a tumult of bulls and bears, a poor inoffensive lion like myself is pushed to the wall. And what is to be the end of it? God knows. And so ends the catechism.

August 15. I write on, though a little afflicted with the oppression on my chest. Sometimes I think it is something dangerous, but as it always goes away on change of posture, it cannot be speedily so. I want to finish my task, and then good-night. I will never relax my labour in these affairs, either for fear of pain or for love of life. I will die a free man if working will do it. Accordingly, to-day I cleared the ninth leaf, which is the tenth part 40 of a volume, in two days-four and a half leaves a day.

March 14, 1826. Read again, and for the third time at least, Miss Austen's very finely written novel of Pride and Prejudice. That young lady had a talent for describing the involvements and feelings and characters of 45 ordinary life, which is to me the most wonderful I ever met with. The Big Bow-wow strain I can do myself like any now going; but the exquisite touch, which renders ordinary commonplace things and characters interesting, from 50 the truth of the description and the sentiment, is denied to me. What a pity such a gifted creature died so early!

April 1.-Ex uno die disce omnes.1 Rose at seven or sooner, studied, and wrote till break- 55 fast with Anne,2 about a quarter before ten. Lady Scott seldom able to rise till twelve or

1 From one day learn all. Cf. Vergil, Æn. II. 65. 2 Scott's daughter.

March 21, 1827. Wrote till twelve, then out upon the heights though the day was stormy, and faced the gale bravely. Tom Purdie was not with me. He would have obliged me to keep the sheltered ground. But, I don't know—

"Even in our ashes live our wonted fires." There is a touch of the old spirit in me yet that bids me brave the tempest,-the spirit that, in spite of manifold infirmities, made me a roaring boy in my youth, a desperate climber, a bold rider, a deep drinker, and a stout player at single-stick, of all which valuable qualities there are now but slender remains. I worked hard when I came in, and finished five pages.

March 16, 1831. The affair with Mr. Cadell being settled, I have only to arrange a set of

"Three score and ten years do sum up."

regular employment for my time, without overfatiguing myself. What I at present practice seems active enough for my capacity, and even if I should reach the three score and ten, from which I am thrice three years distant, or nearer ten, the time may pass honourably, usefully, and profitably, both to myself and other people. My ordinary runs thus:Rise at a quarter before seven; at a quarter after nine breakfast, with eggs, or 10 sion, with the extent of which I am not perhaps

October. I have been very ill, and if not quite unable to write, I have been unfit to do 5 so. I have wrought however, at two Waverly things, but not well, and, what is worse, past 'mending. A total prostration of bodily strength is my chief complaint. I cannot walk half a mile. There is, besides, some mental confu

fully acquainted. I am perhaps setting. I am myself inclined to think so, and, like a day that has been admired as a fine one, the light of it sets down amid mists and storms. I neither

in the single number, at least; before breakfast private letters, etc.; after breakfast Mr. Laidlaw comes at ten, and we write together till one. I am greatly helped by this excellent man, who takes pains to write a good 15 regret nor fear the approach of death if it is

coming. I would compound for a little pain instead of this heartless muddiness of mind which renders me incapable of anything rational. The expense of my journey will be

hand, and supplies the want of my own fingers as far as another person can. We work seriously at the task of the day till one o'clock, when I sometimes walk-not often, however, having failed in strength, and suffering great pain 20 something considerable, which I can provide

against by borrowing £500 from Mr. Gibson. To Mr. Cadell I owe already, with the cancels on these apoplectic books, about £200, and must run it up to £500 more at least; yet this

even from a very short walk. Oftener I take the pony for an hour or two and ride about the doors; the exercise is humbling enough, for I require to be lifted on horseback by two servants, and one goes with me to take care 25 heavy burthen would be easily borne if I were

to be the Walter Scott I once was; but the change is great.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

1772-1834

THE WANDERINGS OF CAIN1
CANTO II

I do not fall off and break my bones, a catastrophe very like to happen. My proud promenade à pied or à cheval, as it happens, concludes by three o'clock. An hour intervenes for making up my Journal and such light work. 30 At four comes dinner,-a plate of broth or soup, much condemned by the doctors, a bit of plain meat, no liquors stronger than small beer, and so I sit quiet to six o'clock, when Mr. Laidlaw returns, and remains with me 35 till nine or three quarters past, as it happens. Then I have a bowl of porridge and milk, which I eat with the appetite of a child. I forgot to say that after dinner I am allowed half a glass of whiskey or gin made into weak grog. I 40 of fir-trees; at its entrance the trees stood never wish for any more, nor do I in my secret soul long for cigars, though once so fond of them. About six hours per day is good working, if I can keep it up.

(Written 1798)

"A little further, O my father, yet a little further, and we shall come into the open moonlight." Their road was through a forest

at distances from each other, and the path was broad, and the moonlight shadows reposed upon it, and appeared quietly to inhabit that solitude. But soon the path winded and became narrow; the sun at high noon sometimes speckled, but never illumined it, and now it was dark as a cavern.

"It is dark, O my father!" said Enos, "but the path under our feet is smooth and soft, Your wishes are 50 and we shall soon come out into the open moonlight."

May 4, 1831. My pronunciation is a good 45 deal improved. My time glides away ill employed, but I am afraid of the palsy. I should not like to be pinned to my chair. But I believe even that kind of life is more endurable than we could suppose. limited to your little circle-yet the idea is terrible to a man who has been active. My own circle in bodily matters is daily narrowing; not so in intellectual matters, but I am perhaps a bad judge. The plough is coming 55 to the end of the furrow, so it is likely I shall not reach the common goal of mortal life by a few years. I am now in my sixtieth year only, and

"Lead on, my child!" said Cain: "guide

1 Coleridge tells us that while he was living near Wordsworth, at Nether-Stowey in 1798, they agreed to write

in concert a "prose-poem" on the story of Cain and

Abel in three cantos. Wordsworth was to write the first canto, Coleridge the second, and whoever finished his part first, was to undertake the third. The second canto, The Wanderings of Cain, was the only part ever written. It is well known that Coleridge did not consider meter essential to poetry.

me, little child!" And the innocent little child clasped a finger of the hand which had murdered the righteous Abel, and he guided his father. "The fir branches drip upon thee, my son." "Yea, pleasantly, father, for I ran fast and eagerly to bring thee the pitcher and the cake, and my body is not yet cool. How happy the squirrels are that feed on these firtrees! they leap from bough to bough, and the old squirrels play round their young ones in 10 the black abundant locks on either side, a

denly; the thick black trees formed a low arch, and the moonlight appeared for a moment like a dazzling portal. Enos ran before and stood in the open air; and when Cain, his 5 father, emerged from the darkness, the child was affrighted. For the mighty limbs of Cain were wasted as by fire; his hair was as the matted curls on the bison's forehead, and so glared his fierce and sullen eye beneath; and

rank and tangled mass, were stained and scorched, as though the grasp of a burning iron hand had striven to rend them; and his countenance told in a strange and terrible language of agonies that had been, and were, and were still to continue to be.

the nest. I clomb a tree yesterday at noon, O my father, that I might play with them, but they leaped away from the branches, even to the slender twigs did they leap, and in a moment I beheld them on another tree. Why, 15 O my father, would they not play with me? I would be good to them as thou art good to me; and I groaned to them even as thou groanest when thou givest me to eat, and when thou coverest me at evening, and as often as I stand 20 terval of thin white sand. You might wander at thy knee and thine eyes look at me?" Then Cain stopped, and stifling his groans he sank to the earth, and the child Enos stood in the darkness beside him.

The scene around was desolate; as far as the eye could reach it was desolate: the bare rocks faced each other, and left a long and wide in

on and look round and round, and peep into the crevices of the rocks and discover nothing that acknowledged the influence of the seasons. There was no spring, no summer, no autumn: and the winter's snow, that would have been lovely, fell not on these hot rocks and scorching sands. Never morning lark had poised himself over this desert; but the huge serpent often hissed there beneath the talons of the vulture, and the vulture screamed, his wings imprisoned within the coils of the serpent. The pointed and shattered summits of the ridges of the rocks made a rude mimicry of human concerns, and seemed to prophesy

And Cain lifted up his voice and cried bit- 25 terly, and said, "The Mighty One that persecuteth me is on this side and on that; he pursueth my soul like the wind, like the sandblast he passeth through me; he is around me even as the air! O that I might be utterly no more! 30 I desire to die-yea, the things that never had life, neither move they upon the earth-behold! they seem precious to mine eyes. O that a man might live without the breath of his nostrils. So I might abide in darkness, and black- 35 mutely of things that then were not; steeples, ness, and an empty space! Yea, I would lie down, I would not rise, neither would I stir my limbs till I became as the rock in the den of the lion, on which the young lion resteth his head whilst he sleepeth. For the torrent 40 that roareth far off hath a voice: and the clouds in heaven look terribly on me; the Mighty One who is against me speaketh in the wind of the cedar grove; and in silence am I dried up." Then Enos spake to his 45 father, "Arise, my father, arise, we are but a little way from the place where I found the cake and the pitcher." And Cain said, "How knowest thou?" And the child answered"Behold the bare rocks are a few of thy strides 50 were advancing unperceived, when they heard distant from the forest; and while even now thou wert lifting up thy voice, I heard the echo." Then the child took hold of his father, as if he would raise him: and Cain being faint and feeble rose slowly on his knees and pressed 55 himself against the trunk of a fir, and stood upright and followed the child.

The path was dark till within three strides' length of its termination, when it turned sud

and battlements, and ships with naked masts. As far from the wood as a boy might sling a pebble of the brook, there was one rock by itself at a small distance from the main ridge. It had been precipitated there perhaps by the groan which the Earth uttered when our first father fell. Before you approached, it appeared to lie flat on the ground, but its base slanted from its point, and between its points and the sands a tall man might stand upright. It was here that Enos had found the pitcher and cake, and to this place he led his father. But ere they had reached the rock they beheld a human shape: his back was towards them, and they

him smite his breast and cry aloud, "Woe is me! woe is me! I must never die again, and yet I am perishing with thirst and hunger."

Pallid, as the reflection of the sheeted lightning on the heavy-sailing night-cloud, became the face of Cain; but the child Enos took hold of the shaggy skin, his father's robe, and raised his eyes to his father, and listening, whispered, "Ere yet I could speak, I am sure, O my father,

that I heard that voice. Have not I often said that I remembered a sweet voice? O my father! this is it;" and Cain trembled exceedingly. The voice was sweet indeed, but it was thin and querulous, like that of a feeble slave in misery, who despairs altogether, yet cannot refrain himself from weeping and lamentation. And, behold! Enos glided forward, and creeping softly round the base of the rock, stood before the stranger, and looked up into his 10 not the sands. He greatly outran Cain, and face. And the Shape shrieked, and turned round, and Cain beheld him, that his limbs and his face were those of his brother Abel whom he had killed! And Cain stood like one who struggles in his sleep because of the ex- 15 and he fell upon the ground. And Cain stopped ceeding terribleness of a dream.

who didst snatch me away from his power and his dominion." Having uttered these words, he rose suddenly, and fled over the sands: and Cain said in his heart, "The curse of the Lord 5 is on me; but who is the God of the dead?" and he ran after the Shape, and the Shape fled shrieking over the sands, and the sands rose like white mists behind the steps of Cain, but the feet of him that was like Abel disturbed

turning short, he wheeled round, and came again to the rock where they had been sitting, and where Enos still stood; and the child caught hold of his garment as he passed by,

and beholding him not, said, "he has passed into the dark woods," and he walked slowly back to the rock; and when he reached it the child told him that he had caught hold of his garment as he passed by, and that the man had fallen upon the ground; and Cain once more sate beside him, and said, "Abel, my brother, I would lament for thee, but that the spirit within me is withered, and burnt up with extreme agony. Now, I pray thee, by thy flocks, and by thy pastures, and by the quiet rivers which thou lovedst, that thou tell me all that thou knowest. Who is the God of the dead? where doth he make his dwelling? what sacrifices are acceptable unto him? for I have offered, but have not been received; I have prayed, and have not been heard; and how can I be afflicted more than I already am?" The Shape arose and answered, "O that thou

thee. Follow me, Son of Adam! and bring thy child with thee!"

Thus as he stood in silence and darkness of soul, the Shape fell at his feet, and embraced his knees, and cried out with a bitter outcry, "Thou eldest born of Adam, whom Eve my 20 mother, brought forth, cease to torment me! I was feeding my flocks in green pastures by the side of quiet rivers, and thou killedst me; and now I am in misery." Then Cain closed his eyes, and hid them with his hands; and 25 again he opened his eyes, and looked around him, and said to Enos, "What beholdest thou? Didst thou hear a voice, my son?" "Yes, my father, I beheld a man in unclean garments, and he uttered a sweet voice, full of lamenta- 30 tion." Then Cain raised up the Shape that was like Abel, and said: "The Creator of our father, who had respect unto thee and unto thy offering, wherefore hath he forsaken thee?" Then the Shape shrieked a second time, and 35 hadst had pity on me as I will have pity on rent his garment, and his naked skin was like the white sands beneath their feet; and he shrieked yet a third time, and threw himself on his face upon the sand that was black with the shadow of the rock, and Cain and 40 Enos sat beside him; the child by his right hand, and Cain by his left. They were all three under the rock, and within the shadow. The Shape that was like Abel raised himself up, and spake to the child: "I know where the 45 cold waters are, but I may not drink, wherefore didst thou then take away my pitcher?" But Cain said, "Didst thou not find favour in the sight of the Lord thy God?" The Shape answered, "The Lord is God of the living only, 50 the dead have another God." Then the child Enos lifted up his eyes and prayed; but Cain rejoiced secretly in his heart. "Wretched shall they be all the days of their mortal life," exclaimed the Shape, "who sacrifice worthy 55 and acceptable sacrifices to the God of the dead; but after death their toil ceaseth. Woe is me, for I was well beloved by the God of the living, and cruel wert thou, O my brother,

And they three passed over the white sands between the rocks, silent as the shadows.

ORIGIN OF THE LYRICAL BALLADS

(From Biographia Literaria, 1817)

During the first year that Mr. Wordsworth and I were neighbors, our conversations turned frequently on the two cardinal points of poetry, the power of exciting the sympathy of the reader by a faithful adherence to the truth of nature; and the power of giving the interest of novelty by the modifying colors of imagination. The sudden charm which accidents of light and shade, which moonlight or sunset diffused over a known and familiar landscape, appeared to represent the practicability of combining both. These are the poetry of nature. The thought suggested itself-(to which of us I do not recollect)-that a series of poems might be composed of two sorts. In

in the language of ordinary life as to produce the pleasurable interest, which it is the peculiar business of poetry to impart. To the second edition he added a preface of considerable 5 length; in which, notwithstanding some passages of apparently a contrary import, he was understood to contend for the extension of this style to poetry of all kinds, and to reject as vicious and indefensible all phrases and

the one, the incidents and agents were to be, in part at least, supernatural; and the excellence aimed at was to consist in the interesting of the affections by the dramatic truth of such emotions, as would naturally accompany such situations, supposing them real. And real in this sense they have been to every human being who, from whatever source of delusion, has at any time believed himself under supernatural agency. For the second class, subjects 10 forms of speech that were not included in

were to be chosen from ordinary life; the characters and incidents were to be such as will be found in every village and its vicinity, where there is a meditative and feeling mind to seek

what he (unfortunately, I think, adopting an equivocal expression) called the language of real life. From this preface, prefixed to poems in which it was impossible to deny the presence

after them, or to notice them, when they pre- 15 of original genius, however mistaken its direesent themselves.

tion might be deemed, arose the whole long continued controversy. For from the conjunetion of perceived power with supposed heresy I explain the inveteracy and in some instances,

In this idea originated the plan of the Lyrical Ballads;1 in which it was agreed, that my endeavors should be directed to persons and characters supernatural, or at least romantic; 20 I grieve to say, the acrimonious passions, with

which the controversy has been conducted by the assailants.

Had Mr. Wordsworth's poems been the silly, the childish things, which they were for a long time described as being; had they been really distinguished from the compositions of other poets merely by meanness of language and inanity of thought; had they indeed contained nothing more than what is found in the

yet so as to transfer from our inward nature a human interest and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic 25 faith. Mr. Wordsworth, on the other hand, was to propose to himself as his object, to give the charm of novelty to things of every day, and to excite a feeling analogous to the supernatural, by awakening the mind's attention 30 parodies and pretended imitations of them; to the lethargy of custom, and directing it to the loveliness and the wonders of the world before us; an inexhaustible treasure, but for which, in consequence of the film of familiarity and selfish solicitude we have eyes, yet see 35 not, ears that hear not, and hearts that neither feel nor understand.

they must have sunk at once, a dead weight, into the slough of oblivion, and have dragged the preface along with them. But year after year increased the number of Mr. Wordsworth's admirers. They were found too not in the lower classes of the reading public, but chiefly among young men of strong sensibility and meditative minds; and their admiration (inflamed perhaps in some degree by opposition)

almost say, by its religious fervor.

CHARACTERISTICS OF SHAKESPEARE'S DRAMAS (Lectures Upon Shakespeare, 1818)

With this view I wrote The Ancient Mariner, and was preparing among other poems, The Dark Ladie, and the Christable, in which I 40 was distinguished by its intensity, I might should have more nearly realized my ideal than I had done in my first attempt. But Mr. Wordsworth's industry had proved so much more successful, and the number of his poems so much greater, that my compositions, 45 instead of forming a balance, appeared rather an interpolation of heterogeneous matter. Mr. Wordsworth added two or three poems written in his own character, in the impassioned, lofty, and sustained diction, which is 50 characteristic of his genius. In this form the Lyrical Ballads were published; and were presented by him, as an experiment, whether subjects, which from their nature rejected the usual ornaments and extra-colloquial style of 55 vital principle within independent of all accipoems in general, might not be so managed

1 Lyrical Ballads, published in 1798, was the epochmaking book of poems in which Wordsworth and Coleridge first appeared as important poets.

Poetry in essence is as familiar to barbarous as to civilized nations. The Laplander and the savage Indian are cheered by it as well as the inhabitants of London and Paris;-its spirit takes up and incorporates surrounding materials, as a plant clothes itself with soil and climate, whilst it exhibits the working of a

dental circumstances. And to judge with fairness of an author's works, we ought to distinguish what is inward and essential from what is outward and circumstantial. It is essential