FOOTNOTES:
[JR] "What follows in the discourse of the Wanderer, upon the changes he had witnessed in rural life by the introduction of machinery, is truly described from what I myself saw during my boyhood and early youth, and from what was often told me by persons of this humble calling. Happily, most happily, for these mountains, the mischief was diverted from the banks of their beautiful streams, and transferred to open and flat counties abounding in coal, where the agency of steam was found much more effectual for carrying on those demoralising works. Had it not been for this invention, long before the present time, every torrent and river in this district would have had its factory, large and populous in proportion to the power of the water that could there be commanded. Parliament has interfered to prevent the night-work which was carried on in these mills as actively as during the day-time, and by necessity, still more perniciously; a sad disgrace to the proprietors and to the nation which could so long tolerate such unnatural proceedings."—I. F.
[JS] In 1788, and again in 1794, Wordsworth visited Westmoreland and Cumberland as a pedestrian. Compare the sixth book of The Prelude, entitled "Cambridge and the Alps" (vol. iii. p. 228).—ED.
[JV] See Wordsworth's note, p. [390].—ED.
[JT] Thorpe; Anglo-Saxon Thorp, a homestead, or hamlet; allied to turba, a crowd (as of houses). Vill; a little village or farm. Lat. villa, dimin. of vicus.—ED.
[JU] Evidently a reminiscence of Penrith, a "straggling burgh, of ancient charter proud," with its castle on "the brow of a green hill," and with Brougham Castle close at hand, on "bank of rugged stream." See The Prelude (vol. iii. p. 229), and compare Gray's Journal.—ED.
[JW] Mr. Rawnsley has suggested that this may refer to the introduction of canal boats into England. It is more likely, I think, that Wordsworth had in his mind's eye
That animating spectacle of sails
That, through her inland regions, to and fro