VARIANTS ON THE TEXT
[Variant 1:
1807.
Air sleeps,--from strife or stir the clouds are free; 1837.
A fairer face of evening cannot be; 1840.
The text of 1845 returns to that of 1807.]
[Variant 2:
1837.
... is on the Sea: 1807.]
[Variant 3:
1807.
But list! ... 1837.
The text of 1840 returns to that of 1807.]
[Variant 4:
1845.
Dear Child! dear Girl! that walkest with me here, If thou appear"st untouch"d by solemn thought, 1807.
Dear Child! dear happy Girl! if thou appear Heedless--untouched with awe or serious thought, 1837.
Heedless-unawed, untouched with serious thought, 1838.
The text of 1840 returns to that of 1807.]
FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT
[Footnote A: I thought, for some time, that the "girl" referred to was Dorothy Wordsworth. Her brother used to speak, and to write, of her under many names, "Emily," "Louisa," etc.; and to call her a "child" in 1802--a "child of Nature" she was to the end of her days--or a "girl,"
seemed quite natural. However, a more probable suggestion was made by Mr. T. Hutchinson to Professor Dowden, that it refers to the girl Caroline mentioned in Dorothy Wordsworth"s Journal.
"We arrived at Calais at four o"clock on Sunday morning, the 3rd of July.... We found out Annette and C., chez Madame Avril dans la rue de la Tete d"or. The weather was very hot. We walked by the sh.o.r.e almost every evening with Annette and Caroline, or William and I alone.... It was beautiful on the calm hot night to see the little boats row out of harbour with wings of fire, and the sail-boats with the fiery track which they cut as they went along, and which closed up after them with a hundred thousand sparkles and streams of glowworm light. Caroline was delighted."
I have been unable to discover who Annette and Caroline were. Dorothy Wordsworth frequently records in her Grasmere Journal that either William, or she, "wrote to Annette," but who she was is unknown to either the Wordsworth or the Hutchinson family.--Ed.]
[Footnote B: Compare:
"The Child is father of the Man, etc."
p. 292.
Also S. T. C. in "The Friend", iii. p. 46:
"The sacred light of childhood,"
and "The Prelude", book v. l. 507. Ed.]
ON THE EXTINCTION OF THE VENETIAN REPUBLIC
Composed August, 1802.--Published 1807
This and the following ten sonnets were included among the "Sonnets dedicated to Liberty"; re-named in 1845, "Poems dedicated to National Independence and Liberty."--Ed.
Once did She hold the gorgeous east in fee; And was the safeguard of the west: the worth Of Venice did not fall below her birth, Venice, the eldest Child of Liberty.
She was a maiden City, bright and free; 5 No guile seduced, no force could violate; And, when she took unto herself a Mate, She must espouse the everlasting Sea. [A]
And what if she had seen those glories fade, Those t.i.tles vanish, and that strength decay; 10 Yet shall some tribute of regret be paid When her long life hath reached its final day: Men are we, and must grieve when even the Shade Of that which once was great, is pa.s.sed away.
FOOTNOTE ON THE TEXT