My trees they are, my sister's flowers."
De Quincey speaks of the house as being immortal in his remembrance—just two bow shots from the water—"a little white cottage, gleaming in the midst of trees, with a vast and seemingly never-ending series of ascents rising above it, to the height of more than three thousand feet."
Wordsworth's satisfaction at finding himself, at length, in the companionship of his beloved sister, in this his first permanent and peaceful abode, is thus expressed in a portion of a poem which was intended to form part of the "Recluse," of which, as is well known, the Prelude and the Excursion only were completed. I am indebted for the extract to the "Memoirs of Wordsworth," by the late Bishop of Lincoln. It will be observed that the poet's ardent attachment to his sister was in no degree abated, and that he ungrudgingly bestowed upon her the generous praise so much merited:—
"On Nature's invitation do I come,
By Reason sanctioned. Can the choice mislead,
That made the calmest, fairest spot on earth,
With all its unappropriated good,
My own, and not mine only, for with me
Entrenched—say rather, peacefully embowered—
Under yon orchard, in yon humble cot,