Were by the Almighty’s sufferance prolonged,
In privately printed edition.
[418] 1845.
For the last three lines, the privately printed edition has the single one—
Pipe a glad song of triumph, ye fierce Winds.
“WHEN SEVERN’S SWEEPING FLOOD HAD OVERTHROWN”
Composed 23rd January 1842.—Published 1842
In 1842 a bazaar was held in Cardiff Castle to aid in the erection of a Church, on the site of one which had been washed away by a flood in the river Severn (and a consequent influx of waters into the estuary of the British Channel) two hundred years before. Wordsworth and James Montgomery were asked to write some verses, which might be printed and sold to assist the cause. They did so. The following was Wordsworth’s contribution.—Ed.
When Severn’s sweeping flood had overthrown