Nutting

.         —It seems a day    (I speak of one from many singled out)    One of those heavenly days that cannot die;    When, in the eagerness of boyish hope,    I left our cottage-threshold, sallying forth    With a huge wallet o'er my shoulders slung,    A nutting-crook in hand; and turned my steps    Tow'rd some far-distant wood, a Figure quaint,    Tricked out in proud disguise of cast-off weeds   Which for that service had been husbanded,   By exhortation of my frugal Dame—   Motley accoutrement, of power to smile   At thorns, and brakes, and brambles,—and, in truth,   More ragged than need was!

O'er pathless rocks,   Through beds of matted fern, and tangled thickets,   Forcing my way,

I came to one dear nook   Unvisited, where not a broken bough   Drooped with its withered leaves, ungracious sign   Of devastation; but the hazels rose   Tall and erect, with tempting clusters hung,   A virgin scene!—A little while I stood,   Breathing with such suppression of the heart   As joy delights in; and, with wise restraint   Voluptuous, fearless of a rival, eyed   The banquet;—or beneath the trees I sate   Among the flowers, and with the flowers I played;   A temper known to those, who, after long   And weary expectation, have been blest   With sudden happiness beyond all hope.   Perhaps it was a bower beneath whose leaves   The violets of five seasons re-appear   And fade, unseen by any human eye;   Where fairy water-breaks do murmur on   For ever; and I saw the sparkling foam,   And—with my cheek on one of those green stones   That, fleeced with moss, under the shady trees,   Lay round me, scattered like a flock of sheep—   I heard the murmur, and the murmuring sound,   In that sweet mood when pleasure loves to pay   Tribute to ease; and, of its joy secure,   The heart luxuriates with indifferent things,   Wasting its kindliness on stocks and stones,   And on the vacant air.

Then up I rose,   And dragged to earth both branch and bough, with crash   And merciless ravage: and the shady nook   Of hazels, and the green and mossy bower,   Deformed and sullied, patiently gave up   Their quiet being: and, unless I now   Confound my present feelings with the past;   Ere from the mutilated bower I turned   Exulting, rich beyond the wealth of kings,   I felt a sense of pain when I beheld   The silent trees, and saw the intruding sky.—   Then, dearest Maiden, move along these shades   In gentleness of heart; with gentle hand   Touch—for there is a spirit in the woods.

Form: unrhyming Composition Date:late 17981.

Composed in Germany late in 1798 and quoted by Dorothy Wordsworth in a letter of December 21 (?).

Wordsworth said that it was \