Now fades the last long streak of snow, Now burgeons every maze of quick About the flowering squares, and thick By ashen roots the violets blow,
Now rings the woodland loud and long, 5 The distance takes a lovelier hue, And drown'd in yonder living blue The lark becomes a sightless song.
Now dance the lights on lawn and lea, The flocks are whiter down the vale, 10 And milkier every milky sail On winding stream or distant sea;
Where now the seamew pipes, or dives In yonder greening gleam, and fly The happy birds, that change their sky 15 To build and brood, that live their lives
From land to land; and in my breast Spring wakens too; and my regret Becomes an April violet, And buds and blossoms like the rest. 20
Contemplate all this work of Time, The giant labouring in his youth; Nor dream of human love and truth, As dying Nature's earth and lime;
But trust that those we call the dead 5 Are breathers of an ampler day For ever nobler ends. They say, The solid earth whereon we tread
In tracts of fluent heat began, And grew to seeming-random forms, 10 The seeming prey of cyclic storms, Till at the last arose the man;
Who throve and branch'd from clime to clime, The herald of a higher race, And of himself in higher place, 15 If so he type this work of time
Within himself, from more to more; Or, crown'd with attributes of woe Like glories, move his course, and show That life is not as idle ore, 20
But iron dug from central gloom, And heated hot with burning fears, And dipt in baths of hissing tears, And batter'd with the shocks of doom
To shape and use. Arise and fly 25 The reeling Faun, the sensual feast; Move upward, working out the beast And let the ape and tiger die.
There rolls the deep where grew the tree. O earth, what changes hast thou seen! There where the long street roars hath been The stillness of the central sea.
The hills are shadows, and they flow 5 From form to form, and nothing stands; They melt like mist, the solid lands, Like clouds they shape themselves and go.
But in my spirit will I dwell, And dream my dream, and hold it true; 10 For tho' my lips may breathe adieu, I cannot think the thine farewell.
William Wordsworth was born at Cockermouth, Cumberland, on April 7th, 1770. His father, John Wordsworth, was the agent of Sir J. Lowther, who later became the first Earl of Lonsdale. At the age of eight the boy was sent to school at Hawkshead. The impressions of his boyhood period are related in the autobiographical poem, _The Prelude_, (written 1805, published 1850), and from this poetical record we discern how strong the influences of Nature were to shape and develop his imagination. Wordsworth's father died in 1783, leaving the family poorly provided for. The main asset was a considerable claim upon the Earl of Lonsdale, which that individual refused to pay. On his death, in 1802, the successor to the title and estates paid the amount of the claim in full with accumulated interest. In the interval, however, the Wordsworth family remained in very straitened circumstances. Enough money was provided by Wordsworth's guardians to send him to Cambridge University In 1787. He entered St. John's College, and after an undistinguished course graduated without honors in January, 1791. His vacations were spent chiefly in Hawkshead and Wales, but one memorable vacation was marked by a walking excursion with a friend through France and Switzerland, the former country then being on the verge of revolution.