63. *_Ibid._

At Alfoxden, in 1798, where I read Hearne’s Journey with great interest.  It was composed for the volume of ‘Lyrical Ballads.’

64. *_The Last of the Flock_. [XXII.]

Produced at the same time [as ‘The Complaint,’ No. 62] and for the same purpose.  The incident occurred in the village of Holford, close by Alfoxden.

65. *_Repentance_ [XXIII.]

Town-End, 1804.  Suggested by the conversation of our next neighbour,
Margaret Ashburner.

66. *_The Affliction of Margaret_ ——. [XXIV.]

Town-End, 1804.  This was taken from the case of a poor widow who lived in the town of Penrith.  Her sorrow was well known to Mary, to my sister, and I believe to the whole town.  She kept a shop, and when she saw a stranger passing by, she was in the habit of going out into the street to inquire of him after her son.

67. *_The Cottager to her Infant_. [XXV.]

By my sister.  Suggested to her while beside my sleeping children.

68. *_Maternal Grief_.

This was in part an overflow from the Solitary’s description of his own and his wife’s feelings upon the decease of their children; and I will venture to add, for private notice solely, is faithfully set forth from my wife’s feelings and habits after the loss of our two children, within half a year of each other.

69. *_The Sailor’s Mother_. [XXVII.]

Town-End, 1800.  I met this woman near the Wishing-Gate, on the high-road that then led from Grasmere to Ambleside.  Her appearance was exactly as here described, and such was her account, nearly to the letter.

70. *_The Childless Father_. [XXVIII.]

Town-End, 1800.  When I was a child at Cockermouth, no funeral took place without a basin filled with sprigs of boxwood being placed upon a table covered with a white cloth in front of the house.  The huntings (on foot) which the Old Man is suffered to join as here described were of common, almost habitual, occurrence in our vales when I was a boy; and the people took much delight in them.  They are now less frequent.

71. Funeral Basin.

     ‘Filled the funeral basin at Timothy’s door.’

In several parts of the North of England, when a funeral takes place, a basin full of sprigs of boxwood is placed at the door of the house from which the coffin is taken up, and each person who attends the funeral ordinarily takes a sprig of this boxwood, and throws it into the grave of the deceased.

72. *_The Emigrant Mother_. [XXIX.]

1802.  Suggested by what I have noticed in more than one French fugitive during the time of the French Revolution.  If I am not mistaken, the lines were composed at Sockburn when I was on a visit to Mary and her brothers.

73. Vaudracour and Julia. [XXX.]

The following tale was written as an Episode, in a work from which its length may perhaps exclude it.  The facts are true; no invention as to these has been exercised, as none was needed.