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GLEN-ALMAIN; OR, THE NARROW GLEN

Composed (possibly) in 1803.—­Published 1807

Classed in 1815 and 1820 with the “Poems of the Imagination.”—­Ed.

  In this still place, remote from men,
  Sleeps Ossian, in the NARROW GLEN;
  In this still place, where murmurs on
  But one meek streamlet, only one: 
  He sang of battles, and the breath 5
  Of stormy war, and violent death;
  And should, methinks, when all was past,
  Have rightfully been laid at last
  Where rocks were rudely heaped, and rent
  As by a spirit turbulent; 10
  Where sights were rough, and sounds were wild,
  And everything unreconciled;
  In some complaining, dim retreat,
  For fear and melancholy meet;
  But this is calm; there cannot be 15
  A more entire tranquillity.

    Does then the Bard sleep here indeed? 
  Or is it but a groundless creed? 
  What matters it?—­I blame them not
  Whose Fancy in this lonely Spot 20
  Was moved; and in such [1] way expressed
  Their notion of its perfect rest. 
  A convent, even a hermit’s cell,
  Would break the silence of this Dell:  [A]
  It is not quiet, is not ease; 25
  But something deeper far than these: 
  The separation that is here
  Is of the grave; and of austere
  Yet [2] happy feelings of the dead: 
  And, therefore, was it rightly said 30
  That Ossian, last of all his race! 
  Lies buried in this lonely place.

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VARIANTS ON THE TEXT

[Variant 1: 

1827.

  ... in this ... 1807.]

[Variant 2: 

1827.

  And ... 1807.]

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FOOTNOTE ON THE TEXT

[Footnote A:  Compare the poem ‘To the Lady Fleming’, stanza iii. ll. 28-9.—­Ed.]

The glen is Glenalmond, in Perthshire, between Crieff and Amulree, known locally as “the Sma’ Glen.”  I am not aware that it was ever called “Glen Almain,” till Wordsworth gave it that singularly un-Scottish name. [B] It must have been a warm August day, after a tract of dry weather, when he went through it, or the Almond would scarcely have been called a “small streamlet.”  In many seasons of the year the distinctive features of the Glen would be more appropriately indicated by the words, which the poet uses by way of contrast with his own experience of it, viz. a place

  ’Where sights are rough, and sounds are wild,
  And everything unreconciled.’