THE POETICAL WORKS OF WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, VOL. 8 (Completed)

WRITTEN IN A GROTTO

Published in The Morning Post, March 9, 1802

I cannot affirm, with any certainty, that these lines were written by Wordsworth; but I agree with Mr. Ernest Coleridge in thinking that they were. He showed them to his relative--the late Chief Justice--who said that he did not know who else could have written them, at that time. Lord Coleridge said the same to myself.--ED.

O moon! if e'er I joyed when thy soft light

Danc'd to the murmuring rill on Lomond's wave,

Or sighed for thy sweet presence some dark night

When thou wert hidden in thy monthly grave,[357]

If e'er on wings which active fancy gave

I sought thy golden vale with dancing flight

Then stretcht at ease in some sequestered cave

Gaz'd on thy lovely Nymphs with fond delight,

Thy Nymphs with more than earthly beauty bright,

If e'er thy beam, as Smyrna's shepherds tell,

Soft as the gentle kiss of amorous maid

On the closed eye of young Endymion fell[358]

That he might wake to clasp thee in the shade,

Each night while I recline within this cell Guide hither,

O sweet Moon, the maid I love so well.

The shepherds of Smyrna show a cave, where, as they say, Luna descended to Endymion, laid on a bed under a large oak which was the scene of their loves. See Chandler's Travels in Asia Minor.

[357] Compare To the Moon, vol. viii. p. 15, l. 64.--ED.

[358] Compare, in the "Evening Voluntaries," To Lucca Giordano(1846), p. 183.--ED.