I fell to composition immediately, and published, in 1800, the second volume of the ‘Lyrical Ballads.’

In the year 1802 I married Mary Hutchinson, at Brompton, near Scarborough, to which part of the country the family had removed from Sockburn.  We had known each other from childhood, and had practised reading and spelling under the same old dame at Penrith, a remarkable personage, who had taught three generations, of the upper classes principally, of the town of Penrith and its neighbourhood.

After our marriage we dwelt, together with our sister, at Town-End, where three of our children were born.  In the spring of 1808, the increase of our family caused us to remove to a larger house, then just built, Allan Bank, in the same vale; where our two younger children were born, and who died at the rectory, the house we afterwards occupied for two years.  They died in 1812, and in 1813 we came to Rydal Mount, where we have since lived with no further sorrow till 1836, when my sister became a confirmed invalid, and our sister Sarah Hutchinson died.  She lived alternately with her brother and with us.[22]

2. His Schoolmistress, Mrs. Anne Birkett, Penrith.

’The old dame did not affect to make theologians, or logicians, but she taught to read, and she practised the memory, often no doubt by rote; but still the faculty was improved.  Something perhaps she explained, and left the rest to parents, to masters, and to the pastor of the parish.’[23]

3. Books and Reading.

’Do not trouble yourself with reading modern authors at present; confine your attention to ancient classical writers; make yourself master of them; and when you have done that, you will come down to us; and then you will be able to judge us according to our deserts.’[24]

[22] Memoirs, i. pp. 7-17.

[23] Letter to Rev. H.J.  Rose (1828), Memoirs, i. 33.

[24] Letter to a nephew, Memoirs, i. 48-9.

4. Tour on the Continent, 1790.

LETTER TO MISS WORDSWORTH, SEPT. 6 1790.

Sept. 6, 1790, Keswill (a small village on the
Lake of Constance).

MY DEAR SISTER,

My last letter was addressed to you from St. Valier and the Grande Chartreuse.  I have, since that period, gone over a very considerable tract of country, and I will give you a sketch of my route as far as relates to mentioning places where I have been, after I have assured you that I am in excellent health and spirits, and have had no reason to complain of the contrary during our whole tour.  My spirits have been kept in a perpetual hurry of delight, by the almost uninterrupted succession of sublime and beautiful objects which have passed before my eyes during the course of the last mouth.  I will endeavour to give you some idea of our route.  It will be utterly impossible for me to dwell upon particular scenes,