[343] It was at Allan Bank that
Coleridge dictated "The Friend," and Wordsworth contributed to it two
essays, one in answer to a letter of Mathetes[344] (Professor Wilson),
and the other on Epitaphs, republished in the Notes to "The Excursion."
Here also he wrote his "Description of the Scenery of the Lakes." Perhaps
a truer explanation of the comparative silence of Wordsworth's Muse
during these years is to be found in the intense interest which he took
in current events, whose variety, picturesqueness, and historical
significance were enough to absorb all the energies of his imagination.
In the spring of 1811 Wordsworth removed to the Parsonage at Grasmere.
Here he remained two years, and here he had his second intimate
experience of sorrow in the loss of two of his children, Catharine and
Thomas, one of whom died 4th June, and the other 1st December, 1812.[345]
Early in 1813 he bought Rydal Mount, and, having removed thither, changed
his abode no more during the rest of his life. In March of this year he
was appointed Distributor of Stamps for the county of Westmoreland, an
office whose receipts rendered him independent, and whose business he was
able to do by deputy, thus leaving him ample leisure for nobler duties.
De Quincey speaks of this appointment as an instance of the remarkable
good luck which waited upon Wordsworth through his whole life.
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