And he hath his reward. It needs not to bid
"Renowned Chaucer lie a thought more nigh
To rare Beaumond, and learned Beaumond lie
A little nearer Spenser";
for there is no fear of crowding in that little society with whom he is
now enrolled as fifth in the succession of the great English Poets.
Footnotes:
[323] "I pay many little visits to the family in the churchyard at
Grasmere," writes James Dixon (an old servant of Wordsworth) to Crabb
Robinson, with a simple, one might almost say canine pathos, thirteen
years after his master's death. Wordsworth was always considerate and
kind with his servants, Robinson tells us.
[324] In the Prelude he attributes this consecreation to a sunrise
seen (during a college vacation) as he walked homeward from some
village festival where he had danced all night--
"My heart was full; I made no vows, but vows
Were then made for me; bond unknown to me
Was given that I should be, else sinning greatly,
A dedicated spirit."--B. IV.
[325] Prelude, Book II.
[326]
"I to the muses have been bound,
These fourteen years, by strong indentures."
_Idiot Boy_ (1798).
[327] I think this more than doubtful, for I find no traces of the
influence of any of these poets in his earlier writings.
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