re,
If thou appear'st untouch'd by solemn thought, 1807.

Dear Child! dear happy Girl! if thou appear
Heedless--untouched with awe or serious thought, 1837.

Heedless-unawed, untouched with serious thought, 1838.

The text of 1840 returns to that of 1807.]

* * * * *

FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT

[Footnote A: I thought, for some time, that the "girl" referred to was
Dorothy Wordsworth. Her brother used to speak, and to write, of her
under many names, "Emily," "Louisa," etc.; and to call her a "child" in
1802--a "child of Nature" she was to the end of her days--or a "girl,"
seemed quite natural. However, a more probable suggestion was made by
Mr. T. Hutchinson to Professor Dowden, that it refers to the girl
Caroline mentioned in Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal.

"We arrived at Calais at four o'clock on Sunday morning, the 3rd of
July.... We found out Annette and C., chez Madame Avril dans la rue de
la Tete d'or. The weather was very hot. We walked by the shore almost
every evening with Annette and Caroline, or William and I alone.... It
was beautiful on the calm hot night to see the little boats row out of
harbour with wings of fire, and the sail-boats with the fiery track
which they cut as they went along, and which closed up after them with
a hundred thousand sparkles and streams of glowworm light. Caroline
was delighted."

I have been unable to discover who Annette and Caroline were. Dorothy
Wordsworth frequently records in her Grasmere Journal that either
William, or she, "wrote to Annette," but who she was is unknown to
either the Wordsworth or the Hutchinson family.--Ed.]

[Footnote B: Compare:

'The Child is father of the Man, etc.'

p. 292.

Also S. T. C. in 'The Friend', iii. p. 46:

'The sacred light of childhood,'

and 'The Prelude', book v. l. 507. Ed.]

* * * * *

ON THE EXTINCTION OF THE VENETIAN REPUBLIC

Composed August, 1802.--Published 1807

This and the following ten sonnets were included among the "Sonnets
dedicated to Liberty"; re-named in 1845, "Poems dedicated to National
Independence and Liberty."--Ed.

Once did She hold the gorgeous east in fee;
And was the safeguard of the west: the worth
Of Venice did not fall below her birth,
Venice, the eldest Child of Liberty.
She was a maiden City, bright and free; 5