]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: It is dated thus by Wordsworth himself on three occasions,
and the year of its composition is also indicated in the title of the
poem.
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: It is dated thus by Wordsworth himself on three occasions,
and the year of its composition is also indicated in the title of the
poem.
William Wordsworth
And oh for Thee, by pitying grace
Checked oft-times in a devious race,
May He who halloweth the place 75
Where Man is laid
Receive thy Spirit in the embrace
For which it prayed!
Sighing I turned away; but ere
Night fell I heard, or seemed to hear, 80
Music that sorrow comes not near,
A ritual hymn,
Chanted in love that casts out fear
By Seraphim. [D]
* * * * *
VARIANTS ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1842.
. . . out of . . . MS. ]
[Variant 2:
But wherefore tremble? 'tis no place
Of pain and sorrow, but of grace,
Of shelter, and of silent peace,
And "friendly aid";
Grasped is he now in that embrace
For which he prayed. [a] MS. ]
[Variant 3:
1845.
Well might I mourn that He was gone
Whose light I hailed when first it shone,
When, breaking forth as nature's own,
It showed my youth 1842.
]
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: It is dated thus by Wordsworth himself on three occasions,
and the year of its composition is also indicated in the title of the
poem. --Ed. ]
[Footnote B: Compare Burns's poem 'To a Mountain Daisy', l. 15. --Ed. ]
[Footnote C: See Burns's 'A Bard's Epitaph', l. 19. --Ed. ]
[Footnote D: Compare 'The Tomb of Burns', by William Watson, 1895. --Ed. ]
* * * * *
SUB-FOOTNOTE ON THE TEXT
[Sub-Footnote a: See in his poem the 'Ode to Ruin'. --Ed. ]
The following is an extract from Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal of the
Tour in Scotland:
"Thursday, August 18th. --Went to the churchyard where Burns is
buried. A bookseller accompanied us. He showed us the outside of
Burns's house, where he had lived the last three years of his life,
and where he died.
