“As it befel, One summer morning we had walked abroad At break of day, Joanna and myself. —’Twas that delightful season when the broom, Full-flowered, and visible on every steep, Along the copses runs in veins of gold. Our pathway led us on to Rotha’s banks, And when we came in front of that tall rock That eastward looks, I there stopped short and stood Tracing the lofty barrier with my eye From base to summit; such delight I found To note in shrub and tree, in stone and flower That intermixture of delicious hues, Along so vast a surface, all at once, In one impression, by connecting force Of their own beauty, imaged in the heart. —When I had gazed perhaps two minutes’ space, Joanna, looking in my eyes, beheld That ravishment of mine, and laughed aloud; The Rock, like something starting from a sleep, Took up the Lady’s voice and laughed again; That ancient woman seated on Helm Crag Was ready with her cavern; Hammarscar, And the tall Steep of Silverhaw, sent forth A noise of laughter; southern Loughrigg heard, And Fairfield answered with a mountain tone; Helvellyn far into the clear blue sky Carried the Lady’s voice,—old Skiddaw blew His speaking-trumpet;—back out of the clouds Of Glaramara southward came the voice; And Kirkstone tossed it from his misty head.’ In his comments made on his Poems late in life, Wordsworth said of this one:—‘The effect of her laugh is an extravagance; though the effect of the reverberation of voices in some parts of the mountains is very striking. There is, in the “Excursion,” an allusion to the bleat of a lamb thus re-echoed, and described without any exaggeration, as I heard it, on the side of Stickle Tarn, from the precipice that stretches on to Langdale Pikes.’ {68} NOTE 7.—‘_With two bells hanging in the open air_.’—PAGE 68. ‘When I wrote this account of the village of Luss, I fully believed I had a perfect recollection of the two bells, as I have described them; but I am half tempted to think they have been a creation of my own fancy, though no image that I know I have actually seen is at this day more vividly impressed upon my mind.’—_MS. note_, _Author_, 1806. {70} NOTE 8.—‘_Her countenance corresponded with the unkindness of denying us a fire in a cold night_.’—PAGE 70.