Page:Journals of Dorothy Wordsworth (Macmillan, 1897) (IA cu31924104001478).pdf/111

 his poem. We sate by the fire, and did not walk, but read The Pedlar, thinking it done; but W. could find fault with one part of it. It was uninteresting, and must be altered. Poor Wm.!

Monday Morning, 8th February 1802.—It was very windy and rained hard all the morning. William worked at his poem and I read a little in Lessing and the grammar. A chaise came past.

After dinner (i.e. we set off at about past 4) we went towards Rydale for letters. It was a "cauld clash." The rain had been so cold that it hardly melted the snow. We stopped at Park's to get some straw round Wm.'s shoes. The young mother was sitting by a bright wood fire, with her youngest child upon her lap, and the other two sate on each side of the chimney. The light of the fire made them a beautiful sight, with their innocent countenances, their rosy cheeks, and glossy curling hair. We sate and talked about poor Ellis, and our journey over the Hawes. Before we had come to the shore of the Lake, we met our patient bow-bent friend, with his little wooden box at his back. "Where are you going?" said he. "To Rydale for letters." "I have two for you in my box." We lifted up the lid, and there they lay. Poor fellow, he straddled and pushed on with all his might; but we outstripped him far away when we had turned back with our letters I could not help comparing lots with him. He goes at that slow pace every morning, and after having wrought a hard day's work returns at night, however weary he may be, takes it all quietly, and, though perhaps he neither feels thankfulness nor pleasure, when he eats his supper, and has nothing to look forward to but falling asleep in bed, yet I daresay he neither murmurs nor thinks it hard. He seems mechanised to labour. We broke the seal of Coleridge's letters, and I had light enough just to see that he was not ill. I put it in my pocket. At the top of the White Moss I took it to my bosom,—a safer place for it. The sight was wild. There