thicken, and the scene soon became very animated.  Neighbours, old and young, of all degrees, ascended to the Mount to keep the Poet’s seventy-fourth birthday, and every face looked friendly and happy.  Each child brought its own mug, and held it out to be filled with tea, in which ceremony all assisted.  Large baskets of currant cakes were handed round and liberally dispensed; and as each detachment of children had satisfied themselves with tea and cake, they were moved off, to play at hide and seek among the evergreens on the grassy part of the Mount.  The day was not bright, but it was soft, and not cold, and the scene, viewed from the upper windows of the house, was quite beautiful, and one I should have been very sorry not to have witnessed.  It was innocent and gay, and perfectly natural.  Miss F——­, the donor of the fete, looked very happy, and so did all the Poet’s household.  The children, who amounted altogether to above 300, gave three cheers to Mr. Wordsworth and Miss F——.  After some singing and dancing, and after the division of eggs, gingerbread, and oranges had taken place, we all began to disperse.  We spent the night at the Oaks, and set off on our journey the following morning.  The gay scene at the Mount often comes before me, as a pleasant dream.  It is perhaps the only part of the island where such a reunion of all classes could have taken place without any connection of landlord and tenant, or any clerical relation, or school direction.  Wordsworth, while looking at the gambols on the Mount, expressed his conviction that if such meetings could oftener take place between people of different condition, a much more friendly feeling would be created than now exists in this country between the rich and poor.

[248] But see Memorials of Italy, ‘Sonnets on Roman Historians.’

[249] Mrs. Fletcher.

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July 12th, 1844.—­Wordsworth spoke much during the evening of his early intercourse with Coleridge, on some one observing that it was difficult to carry away a distinct impression from Coleridge’s conversation, delightful as every one felt his outpourings to be.  Wordsworth agreed, but said he was occasionally very happy in clothing an idea in words; and he mentioned one which was recorded in his sister’s journal during a tour they all made together in Scotland.  They passed a steam engine, and Wordsworth made some observation to the effect that it was scarcely possible to divest oneself of the impression on seeing it that it had life and volition.  ‘Yes,’ replied Coleridge, ‘it is a giant with one idea.’

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He discoursed at great length on Scott’s works.  His poetry he considered of that kind which will always he in demand, and that the supply will always meet it, suited to the age.  He does not consider that it in any way goes below the surface of things; it does not reach to any intellectual or spiritual emotion; it is altogether superficial, and he felt it himself to be so.  His descriptions are not true to Nature; they are addressed to the ear, not to the mind.  He was a master of bodily movements in his battle-scenes; but very little productive power was exerted in popular creations.