William Wordsworth

by Hunter Davies

  But in June 1812, Catherine had another convulsion while both William and Mary were away from home. William was just about to leave London, after his reconciliation walk with Coleridge in Hampstead, and join Mary in Wales, where she was having a short holiday with her brother Tom. While they’d been away, Dorothy and Sarah, who had now returned to the household, were in charge of the five children. Dorothy wrote:

  On the Sunday afternoon and the Monday I had been for several hours with Willy and her [Catherine] in the Churchyard and they had run races. I then particularly noticed how little was to be seen of her lameness and several persons who came up to speak to us observed how trifling the lameness was. That very night on which she was seized she ran up to bed in such glee striving to get before Willy, and proud that she was going to sleep in her Mother’s bed, an unusual treat. We returned from our walk at a little after nine and John called me to her about a quarter to ten. He was going to bed, found that she had been sick. She was lying with her eyes fixed—and I knew what was going to happen and in a fright called Sarah. She would have persuaded me that the child was only overpowered with sickness but I had seen her before and knew only too well. We lost no time in sending for Mr Scrambler [the doctor] and the meantime applied the remedies used before. Mr Scrambler gave us no hope.…

  She died on Wednesday the 4th and was buried on the 8th. We all three, Sarah, John and I followed to her grave. She lies at the South West corner of the church yard, under a tall and beautiful hawthorn which stands in the wall.

  Dorothy immediately wrote to William in London, the letter just catching him as he left, asking him to tell Mary the dreadful news when he reached her in Wales; but she also wrote a little note to Tom, Mary’s brother, warning him that William would be arriving with bad news. Tom unwittingly read the letter in Mary’s presence, and when she saw his face, she realized something must have happened and he was forced to tell her. She was distraught and was still ill when William arrived—hardly able to move or speak, except to say that she feared that another child would soon die.

  Dorothy also wrote at once to De Quincey, knowing that Catherine had always been his special favourite. ‘It is a great addition to our affliction that her Father and Mother were not here to witness her last struggles and to see her in the last happy weeks of her short life—she never forgot Quincey. Dear innocent. She now lies upon her Mother’s bed, a perfect image of peace.’

  De Quincey was more than distraught. For a while, he became mentally deranged by little Catherine’s death, stretching himself every night for two months on her grave in Grasmere churchyard, where she had run races only just before her death, convinced that he could still see her, running happily around. Coleridge, whom they thought might be equally grief-stricken, took little notice of Catherine’s death, neither coming to Grasmere to console the family (as they half expected), nor writing, which hurt them deeply.

  Mary’s awful premonition came true. Just six months later, in December 1812, Thomas died, catching pneumonia after a serious bout of measles. William and Mary were both at home. On this occasion, it was Dorothy who was away. William did the letter-writing this time, as Mary was too ill with grief. ‘Pray come to us as soon as you can,’ he wrote to De Quincey, who was in Liverpool at the time. ‘My sister is not at home. Mrs W bears her loss with striking fortitude, and Miss Hutchinson is as well as can be expected.’

  William also wrote to Southey, letting them all know at Greta Hall,

  I dare not say in what state I am. I loved the Boy with the utmost love of which my soul is capable and he is taken from me—yet in the agony of my spirit in surrendering such a treasure I feel a thousand times richer than if I had never possessed it. God comfort and save you and all our friends and us all from a repetition of such trials. O Southey feel for me. You will impart this sad news to your wife, Mrs Coleridge and Mrs Lovel and Mrs Wilson. Poor woman. She was good to him. Heaven reward her.

  Catherine was not quite four and Thomas six and a half. Their deaths clouded the family for many years, much in the same way as the death of John had done seven years previously. William’s grief-stricken sonnet, ‘Surprised by joy—impatient as the wind’, was written in memory of little Catherine. Coleridge at last wrote in sympathy at this second death, when he heard about Thomas, expressing his pain and saying he would come when he’d finished work on a play; but he never did.

  The final days at Grasmere ended, therefore, in great sorrow. They were desperate to get out of the Parsonage, the scene of each death, and shake off all the bad memories which Grasmere now had for them, both at Allan Bank (with the Coleridge troubles) and the Parsonage. The next year, 1813, they finally moved out of Grasmere and into a new house and a new life: a change of scene which coincided with a change in their fortunes.

  SURPRISED BY JOY

  ‘This was suggested by my daughter Catherine long after her death,’ so Wordsworth said. Catherine died in June 1812, aged three years and nine months.

  SURPRISED by joy—impatient as the Wind

  I turned to share the transport—Oh! with whom

  But Thee, deep buried in the silent tomb,

  That spot which no vicissitude can find?

  Love, faithful love, recalled thee to my mind –

  But how could I forget thee? Through what power,

  Even for the least division of an hour,

  Have I been so beguiled as to be blind

  To my most grievous loss!—That thought’s return

  Was the worst pang that sorrow ever bore,

  Save one, one only, when I stood forlorn,

  Knowing my heart’s best treasure was no more;

  That neither present time nor years unborn

  Could to my sight that heavenly face restore.

  14

  Fine Folks

  1813–1817

  THE Wordsworths moved into Rydal Mount on May day, 1813, without ever having been inside before. The previous owners, a family called North from Liverpool, had left the house empty for several weeks, but refused to let the Wordsworths go inside until they had removed their wine from the cellar. The Wordsworths already knew, just from the outside, that they would be happy there. It’s still a fine, handsome house today, up a steep lane from the roadside, with tremendous south-facing views across to Rydal Water and the northern edges of Lake Windermere. It was high and dry and nicely secluded, compared with the damp and exposed Parsonage in Grasmere, and was very much a house of style and taste—far smarter than anything they’d ever had before—with over four acres of gardens and a splendid drawing-room.

  They never owned Rydal Mount, nor any other house they ever lived in, though they owned property they didn’t inhabit. Their landlady, called Lady Fleming, was their nearest neighbour; she lived at Rydal Hall with her mother, Diana, also a Lady Fleming. The elder Lady Fleming was very fond of William and his poetry and encouraged him and his family to call. ‘Lady D. has bought a little present for Willy,’ wrote Wordsworth, ‘what it is she has not told us, but he is very anxious to call there, expecting gratification from her little Dogs, her Peacocks or perhaps from the sight of her perenially blooming and brilliant cheeks!’ They were never as friendly with the younger Lady Fleming and when Lady Diana died in 1816, relations were occasionally strained.

  Rydal was only two miles away from Grasmere, along the road to Ambleside, but it was in many ways part of a different world. Grasmere was very much a working village (though one or two merchants from Lancashire were already buying up plots and building their holiday homes), but Ambleside had always had definite pretensions, with a sprinkling of old county families, ladies and gentlemen of quality who led an active social life. At Rydal Mount, the Wordsworths were now well within calling distance for the Ambleside gentry.

  ‘The place is a paradise,’ wrote Dorothy, ‘but my inner thoughts will go back to Grasmere. I was the last person who left the House yesterday morning. It seemed as quiet as the grave … the house only reminded me of desolation, gloom and e
mptiness and cheerless silence—but why do I now turn to these thoughts? The morning is bright and I am more cheerful today.’

  They all settled down to furnish and equip the new house, knowing that, with the weather improving, they would soon have lots of visitors, coming to see their fine house as much as the fine new occupants. Even William went to the sales with the whole family to buy tables and chairs and ornaments, returning home with goods by the cart-load. These Lakeland country sales, to this day, are great social occasions, with the whole neighbourhood congregating in the house whose goods are for sale, bringing their children and sandwiches and making a day of it. ‘We stayed the sale out to the very last and the beds were sold by candle light,’ wrote Dorothy. ‘All walked home in the bright moonshine, I with a water decanter and glass in my hand and William and Mary with a large looking glass, oval with a gilt mirror, to be hung in the best lodging room, very cheap, £1 13s.’ Dorothy was writing this letter to Sarah and she described how all the time William had wished Sarah had been there, knowing how much she enjoyed a good sale: ‘William bitterly regretted you were not here to talk over the humours of the Sales.’

  Almost all their furniture was second-hand. But, though at first they thought they would buy cheap Scottish-made carpets, they then decided that only the best would do for the Wordsworths of Rydal Mount and bought the finest new carpets.

  Now I must tell you of our grandure [wrote Dorothy]. We are going to have a Turkey!!! carpet—in the dining room and a Brussels in William’s study. You stare, and the simplicity of the dear Town End cottage comes before your eyes and you are tempted to say ‘are they changed, are they setting up for fine folks? for making parties, giving dinners, etc? No, no, you do not make such a guess, but you want an explanation and I must give it to you. The Turkey carpet (it is a large room) will cost 22 guineas and a Scotch carpet would cost 9 or ten. The Turkey will last four Scotch therefore will be the cheapest, and will never be shabby, and from this consideration we were all of one mind that the dining room carpet should be a Turkey one.

  Mary and I were rather ashamed of the thought of a Brussels (for William’s room) and inclined to the Scotch as looking less ambitious and less like setting up ourselves upon the model of our neighbours—the Ambleside gentry, who all intend calling upon us, though happily most of them considered it would be inconvenient at present, and I assure you we take their apologies very quietly and say as few civil things in return as possible. Our Master was all for the Brussels and to him we yielded. A humour took him to make his Room smart and we did not oppose him.

  William was equally anxious to smarten up their life style, personally hanging up some water-colours that had been painted by his landed friend, Sir George Beaumont, and working out plans for landscaping the large gardens. But then he wasn’t just the new occupant of a desirable residence. He had a new position in society, one of some responsibility and standing, one which needed some dignity and the keeping-up of appearance. Just as he moved into Rydal Mount, he got himself a job, the first one in his whole life.

  During the whole of the previous year William had been very worried about his financial situation. He had three children to educate, a large household to support and very little money coming in. The Lowther debts had been paid long before, and Montagu at last paid his in 1813; most of these monies had been carefully invested by Richard, who still looked after the family’s financial affairs, but William’s total investment income was relatively slight, possibly not much more than £200 a year. He had long since realized that he could never count on his poems bringing him in much money. He reckoned in 1812 that his total returns so far from his poetry—and by now almost twenty years had elapsed since his first book was published—came to only seven score pounds. Not even Wordsworth, who always travelled on the outside of coaches, rarely ate meat, often wore second-hand clothes, never took strong drink and never wasted candles, could exist on an average income from his writing of £7 a year. If he was going to be a best-selling poet, like Scott, it would have happened by now. A future as a poet who could support his family appeared impossible.

  He wrote to Lord Lonsdale in early 1812, asking him if he had any situations available for which he could recommend him. It was an ever-so-humble, bending-over-backwards-to-please sort of letter, and it is hard to tell if any of the sentiments expressed were in the slightest way cynical—if perhaps he was half revolted by having to beg—or whether he was totally unaware of any humiliation.

  In the letter he said that literature had been the pursuit of his life, but for many reasons it had turned out unprofitable: his writings didn’t suit the taste of the times and he was unwilling to associate with the more fashionable literary men of the day. He felt emboldened to beg a favour because of his family connection with Lord Lonsdale. ‘My father and grandfather did conscientously, I believe, discharge such trusts as were reposed to them through that connection. But my situation is a peculiar one and I have been chiefly encouraged by a knowledge of your Lordship’s attachment to Literature and by particular marks of kindness with which you have distinguished me.’

  One might have thought that William would have wanted to keep out of the grips of the Lowther family, of all people, having suffered so much from them in the past, but presumably it appeared to him to offer his only hope. He was indeed a genuine admirer of the new Earl of Lonsdale, who was a civilized man, and their families had had long connections. It was the custom of the times for the landed gentry, especially the truly wealthy and landed such as the Lowthers, to spread around their largesse, though there were not many like Sir George Beaumont, who had a real interest in all the creative arts. Young artists, of all sorts, depended on such patronage. You might get a government pension, if you were old enough or had distinguished yourself in some way which usually meant having made friends with some important politicians or lords. But the best solution of all was to find a patron.

  Twenty years before William had hated the very idea of the Lowthers and all their inherited wealth. He wanted the aristocracy destroyed. Now he neither hated them nor even felt disapproving of their money. It seemed to him the natural and ideal scheme of things, that there should be vast landowners; as long as they treated their subjects with wisdom and kindness, he approved of their power. Lord Lonsdale was touched, and said he would look out for an opening, but there was nothing at the moment.

  By October 1812, William was becoming rather desperate and wrote to Daniel Stuart, his London friend, editor of the Courier, saying that his ‘powerful neighbour Lord Lonsdale’ had promised to help, but that some time might elapse before anything might happen.

  Now you know I live chiefly in a retired corner of the world and therefore there is no chance that I should hear of anything suitable likely to be vacant. Will you then be so kind as point out to me anything which is likely to answer my purpose that may come to your knowledge. Of course this is between ourselves. I have no objection, I must add, to quit this part of the country, provided the salary be adequate, and the duty what I am equal to, without being under the necessity of withdrawing myself wholly from Literature.

  It’s interesting to note that William was still prepared, at this late stage, to leave the Lakes.

  Lord Lonsdale eventually approached the Prime Minister, Lord Liverpool, hoping to get William a pension, but though the Prime Minister was favourable, so William was told, the pension fund was limited. Instead, Lord Lonsdale personally offered William a pension of £100 a year from his own pocket, till such time as a situation presented itself. This put William in a difficult position, since he did not want to accept such blatant charity, despite his blatant begging (in another letter to Lonsdale he’d mentioned the tragic deaths of his two children in half a year, and how the remaining three were all down with measles), but, at the same time, he needed the money. Sir George Beaumont, asked for his advice, urged William to accept, otherwise the good Lord might be upset, but William decided to wait a while.

  In early 1813, there was at
last a job in the offing, and Lord Lonsdale offered William £100 in advance—which William readily took—till the appointment was confirmed. In March 1813, the new job became official, and William was unveiled as the new Distributor of Stamps for Westmorland.

  It was a government job, and so, technically, William had become a civil servant, occupying one of the many provincial positions which a local feudal lord usually managed to control, putting forward the nomination in the right quarters when the position became vacant. It was by no means a sinecure, involving much more work than William expected, and less money than he’d been led to believe. He’d hoped to earn himself £400 a year, not realizing that the retiring Distributor had to be paid a pension of £100 from William’s earnings and that he also needed to take on a clerk, John Carter (who doubled as gardener), to help with the paper work. But it was a secure income of about £200 a year. In the first year or so, while he was settling in to the post, it was taking up two-thirds of his time, so Dorothy said.

  In those days, all legal documents, wills, insurance policies, pamphlets and books required government stamps, which could be bought from sub-distributors, usually local tradesmen or shopkeepers. The Distributor appointed his sub-distributors, handed out the stamps and collected the money, and so the job involved a lot of travelling round his area, a lot of paperwork, and a certain amount of worry—the ladies, in particular, worried when William was away from home and they were in charge of the stamps. Some skill was also needed to choose the right sub-distributors. One, in Kirkby Lonsdale, went bankrupt, owing £300 in stamp money. William, fearing that he would personally be held responsible for the debt, rushed across to Kirkby Lonsdale, took legal proceedings and was able to sell off the poor man’s belongings and effects, managing in the end to recoup the losses.