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VARIANTS ON THE TEXT

[Variant 1: 

1827.

  ... list ... 1820.]

[Variant 2: 

1845.

  ... by the Bier ... 1820.]

[Variant 3: 

1827.

  This Abbot who had been a holy man
  And was, as all Monks are, or ought to be, [a] 1820.]

[Variant 4: 

1836.

  For not long since was dealt the cruel blow, 1820.]

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FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT

[Footnote A: 

  “Friday, 4th December 1801....  William translating ‘The Prioress’
  Tale’.”

  “Saturday, 5th.  William finished ‘The Prioress’ Tale’, and after tea,
  Mary and he wrote it out”

(Dorothy Wordsworth’s Journal).—­Ed.]

[Footnote B:  See ‘Il Penseroso’, l. 110.—­Ed.]

[Footnote C:  Chaucer’s phrase is “a litel clergeon,” Wordsworth’s, “a little scholar;” but “clergeon” is a chorister, not a scholar.—­Ed.]

[Footnote D: 

  “Chaucer’s text is: 

    ’Thus hath this widow her litel child i-taught
    Our blissful lady, Criste’s moder deere,
    To worschip ay, and he forgat it nought;
    For sely child wil alway soone leere.’

  ‘For sely child wil alway soone leere,’ i.e. for a happy child will
  always learn soon.  Wordsworth renders: 

    ‘For simple infant hath a ready ear,’

  and adds: 

    ‘Sweet is the holiness of youth,’

  extending the stanza to receive this addition from seven to eight
  lines, with an altered rhyme-system.”

(Professor Edward Dowden, in the ’Transactions of the Wordsworth Society’, No.  III.)—­Ed.]

[Footnote E:  Chaucer’s text is: 

  ’This litel child his litel book lernynge
  As he sat in the schole in his primere.’

Ed.]

[Footnote F:  Chaucer’s text is: 

  ’And in a tombe of marble stoones clere
  Enclosed they this litel body swete.’

Ed.]

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SUB-FOOTNOTES ON THE TEXT

[Sub-Footnote a:  This was erased in the ‘Errata’ of 1820, but it may be reproduced here.—­Ed.]

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THE CUCKOO AND THE NIGHTINGALE

Translated 1801. [A]—­Published 1841 [B]

I The God of Love—­ah, benedicite!
How mighty and how great a Lord is he! 
For he of low hearts can make high, of high
He can make low, and unto death bring nigh;
And hard hearts he can make them kind and free. [1] 5

II Within a little time, as hath been found,
He can make sick folk whole and fresh and sound: 
Them who are whole in body and in mind,
He can make sick,—­bind can he and unbind
All that he will have bound, or have unbound. 10