[C] For the account of these long-lived trees, see Pliny's Natural History, lib. xvi. cap. 44; and for the features in the character of Protesilaus see the Iphigenia in Aulis of Euripides. Virgil places the Shade of Laodamia in a mournful region, among unhappy Lovers:—
His Laodamia
It comes. W. W. 1827.
To his nephew, John Wordsworth, the poet wrote in 1831, explaining the alterations he had made in the last stanza of Laodamia: "As at first written, the heroine was dismissed to happiness in Elysium. To what purpose then the mission of Protesilaus? He exhorts her to moderate her passions; the exhortation is fruitless, and no punishment follows. So it stood: at present she is placed among unhappy ghosts for disregard of the exhortation. Virgil also places her there, but compare the two passages, and give me your opinion." (William Wordsworth, by Elizabeth Wordsworth, p. 131.)
With the last two lines of the poem, compare Hart-Leap Well, part ii. stanza 4 (vol. ii. p. 133)—
The trees were grey, with neither arms nor head;
Half wasted the square mound of tawny green, etc.Ed.
[D] Compare Imaginary Conversations, third series: "Southey and Porson."—Ed.
[E] He practically admitted its force, however, in the edition of 1827.—Ed.