“In the two poems, ‘The Brothers’ and ‘Michael’, I have attempted to draw a picture of the domestic affections, as I know they exist amongst a class of men who are now almost confined to the north of England.  They are small independent ‘proprietors’ of land, here called ‘statesmen,’ men of respectable education, who daily labour on their own little properties.  The domestic affections will always be strong amongst men who live in a country not crowded with population; if these men are placed above poverty.  But, if they are proprietors of small estates which have descended to them from their ancestors, the power which these affections will acquire amongst such men, is inconceivable by those who have only had an opportunity of observing hired labourers, farmers, and the manufacturing poor.  Their little tract of land serves as a kind of permanent rallying point for their domestic feelings, as a tablet on which they are written, which makes them objects of memory in a thousand instances, when they would otherwise be forgotten.  It is a fountain fitted to the nature of social man, from which supplies of affection as pure as his heart was intended for, are daily drawn.  This class of men is rapidly disappearing....  The two poems that I have mentioned were written with a view to show that men who do not wear fine clothes can feel deeply.  ’Pectus enim est quod disertos facit, et vis mentis.  Ideoque imperitis quoque, si modo sint aliquo affectu concitati, verba non desunt.’  The poems are faithful copies from nature; and I hope whatever effect they may have upon you, you will at least be able to perceive that they may excite profitable sympathies in many kind and good hearts; and may in some small degree enlarge our feelings of reverence for our species, and our knowledge of human nature, by showing that our best qualities are possessed by men whom we are too apt to consider, not with reference to the points in which they resemble us, but to those in which they manifestly differ from us.” (See ’Correspondence of Sir Thomas Hanmer’, by Sir Henry Burnbury, p. 436.)

A number of fragments, originally meant to be parts of ’Michael’,—­or at least written with such a possibility in view,—­will be found in the Appendix to the eighth volume of this edition.—­Ed.

* * * * *

1801

‘The Sparrow’s Nest’, and the sonnet on Skiddaw, along with some translations from Chaucer, belong to the year 1801.  During this year, however, ‘The Excursion’ was in progress.  In its earlier stages, and before the plan of ‘The Recluse’ was matured, the introductory part was familiarly known, and talked of in the Wordsworth household, by the name of “The Pedlar.”  The following extracts from Dorothy Wordsworth’s Journal of 1801 will show the progress that was being made with it: 

“Dec. 21.—­Wm. sate beside me, and wrote ‘The Pedlar.’ 22nd.—­W. composed a few lines of ‘The Pedlar.’ 23rd.—­William worked at ’The Ruined Cottage’” (this was the name of the first part of ’The Excursion’, in which ‘The Pedlar’ was included), “and made himself very ill,” etc.

Ed.