Note:
The spot is fixed within narrow limits by the Fenwick note. It is, beyond doubt, on the wooded part of Nab-Scar, through which the upper path from Grasmere to Rydal passes. There is one huge block of stone high above the path, which answers well to the description in the second stanza. Crabb Robinson wrote in his Diary (Sept. 11, 1816):
"The poem of The Oak and the Broom proceeded from his" (Wordsworth) "beholding a tree in just such a situation as he described the broom to be in."
Ed.
[Contents: Poems on the Naming of Places]
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