iption, and adopted these at the
suggestion of his friend, Principal Shairp.--ED.

VARIANTS:

[1] 1815.

About ... 1807.

[2] 1815.

By my half-kitchen my half-parlour fire, 1807.

[3] 1827.

There do I find a never-failing store
Of personal themes, and such as I love best;
Matter wherein right voluble I am:
Two will I mention, dearer than the rest; 1807.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] This is the line referred to by Wordsworth in the Fenwick note.
Compare _Midsummer Night's Dream_, act I. scene i. ll. 75-78.--ED.

[B] Compare Collins, _The Passions_, l. 60, and _An Evening Walk_, l.
237 and note (vol. i. p. 22).--ED.

[C] Compare _The Prelude_, book xii. l. 151 (vol. iii. p. 349)--

I knew a maid,
A young enthusiast, who escaped these bonds;
Her eye was not the mistress of her heart. ED.

[D] Wordsworth said on one occasion, as Professor Dowden has reminded
us, that he thought _Othello_, the close of the _Phaedo_, and Walton's
_Life of George Herbert_, the three "most pathetic" writings in the
world.--ED.

ADMONITION

Intended more particularly for the perusal of those who may have happened
to be enamoured of some beautiful place of Retreat, in the Country of
the Lakes.

Composed 1806.--Published 1807

Classed among the "Miscellaneous Sonnets."--ED.

Well may'st thou halt--and gaze with brightening eye![1]
The lovely Cottage in the guardian nook
Hath stirred thee deeply; with its own dear brook,
Its own small pasture, almost its own sky![A]
But covet not the Abode;--forbear to sigh,[2] 5
As many do, repining while they look;
Intruders--who would tear[3] from Nature's book
This precious leaf, with harsh impiety.[4]
Think what the Home must[5] be if it were thine,
Even thine, though few thy wants!--Roof, window, door, 10
The very flowers are sacred to the Poor,
The roses to the porch which they entwine:
Yea, all, that now enchants thee, from the day
On which it should be touched, would melt away.[6]

The cottage at Town-end, Grasmere--where this sonnet was composed--may
have suggested it. Some of the details, however, are scarcely applicable
to Dove Cottage; the "brook" (referred to elsewhere) is outside the
orchard ground, and there is scarcely anything in the