This old man had been huntsman to the Squires of Alfoxden, which, at the time we occupied it, belonged to a minor.  The old man’s cottage stood upon the Common, a little way from the entrance to Alfoxden Park.  But [in 1841] it had disappeared.  Many other changes had taken place in the adjoining village, which I could not but notice with a regret more natural than well-considered.  Improvements but rarely appear such to those who after long intervals of time revisit places they have had much pleasure in.  It is unnecessary to add, the fact was as mentioned in the poem; and I have, after an interval of forty-five years, the image of the old man as fresh before my eyes as if I had seen him yesterday.  The expression when the hounds were out, ‘I dearly love their voice,’ was word for word from his own lips.

427. *_Lines written in Germany_. 1798-9. [VII.]

    ‘A plague,’ &c.

A bitter winter it was when these verses were composed by the side of my sister, in our lodgings, at a draper’s house, in the romantic imperial town of Goslar, on the edge of the Hartz Forest.  In this town the German Emperors of the Franconian line were accustomed to keep their court, and it retains vestiges of ancient splendour.  So severe was the cold of this winter, that when we passed out of the parlour warmed by the stove, our cheeks were struck by the air as by cold iron.  I slept in a room over a passage that was not ceiled.  The people of the house used to say rather unfeelingly, that they expected I should be frozen to death some night; but with the protection of a pelisse lined with fur, and a dog’s-skin bonnet, such as was worn by the peasants, I walked daily on the ramparts, or on a sort of public ground or garden, in which was a pond.  Here I had no companion but a kingfisher, a beautiful creature that used to glance by me.  I consequently became much attached to it.  During these walks I composed the poem that follows, ‘The Poet’s Epitaph.’

Foot-note.—­The Reader must be apprised, that the Stoves in North Germany generally have the impression of a gallopping horse upon them, this being part of the Brunswick Arms.

428. *_To the Daisy_. [IX.]

This and the other poems addressed to the same flower were composed at Town-End, Grasmere, during the earlier part of our residence there.  I have been censured for the last line but one, ’thy function apostolical,’ as being little less than profane.  How could it be thought so?  The word is adopted with reference to its derivation, implying something sent on a mission; and assuredly, this little flower, especially when the subject of verse, may be regarded, in its humble degree, as administering both to moral and to spiritual purposes.

429. Matthew. [X.]

In the school [of Hawkshead] is a tablet, on which are inscribed, in gilt letters, the names of the several persons who have been schoolmasters there since the foundation of the school, with the time at which they entered upon and quitted their office.  Opposite to one of those names the Author wrote the following lines:  ‘If Nature,’ &c.