No More Learning

]


[Variant 3:

1815.

the soul . . . 1807. ]


[Variant 4:

1832.

Up with me, up with me, high and high, . . . 1807. ]


[Variant 5: This and the previous stanza were omitted in the edition of
1827, but restored in that of 1832. ]


[Variant 6:

1827.

Joy and jollity be with us both!
Hearing thee, or else some other,
As merry a Brother,
I on the earth will go plodding on,
By myself, chearfully, till the day is done. 1807.
What though my course be rugged and uneven,
To prickly moors and dusty ways confined,
Yet, hearing thee, or others of thy kind,
As full of gladness and as free of heaven,
I on the earth will go plodding on,
By myself, cheerfully, till the day is done. 1820. ]



* * * * *


FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT

[Footnote A: So it is printed in the 'Prose Works of Wordsworth' (1876);
but the date was 1805. --Ed. ]


[Footnote B: In a MS. copy this series is called "Poems composed 'for
amusement' during a Tour, chiefly on foot. "--Ed. ]



Compare this poem with Shelley's 'Skylark', and with Wordsworth's poem,
on the same subject, written in the year 1825, and the last five stanzas
of his 'Morning Exercise' written in 1827; also with William Watson's
'First Skylark of Spring', 1895. --Ed.





* * * * *





FIDELITY


Composed 1805. --Published 1807


[The young man whose death gave occasion to this poem was named Charles
Gough, and had come early in the spring to Patterdale for the sake of
angling. While attempting to cross over Helvellyn to Grasmere he slipped
from a steep part of the rock where the ice was not thawed, and
perished. His body was discovered as described in this poem. Walter
Scott heard of the accident, and both he and I, without either of us
knowing that the other had taken up the subject, each wrote a poem in
admiration of the dog's fidelity. His contains a most beautiful stanza:

"How long did'st thou think that his silence was slumber!
When the wind waved his garment how oft did'st thou start!