[3] 1833. Own sweet wife. [4] This stanza was added in 1842. [5] 1833. My father’s mansion, mounted high Looked down upon the village spire. I was a long and listless boy, And son and heir unto the squire. [6] 1833. In these dear walls. [7] 1833. I often heard the cooing dove In firry woodlands mourn alone. [8] 1833. The long mosses. [9] 1842-1851. Where. [10] This stanza was added in 1842, taking the place of the following which was excised:— Sometimes I whistled in the wind, Sometimes I angled, thought and deed Torpid, as swallows left behind That winter ’neath the floating weed: At will to wander every way From brook to brook my sole delight, As lithe eels over meadows gray Oft shift their glimmering pool by night. In 1833 this stanza ran thus:— I loved from off the bridge to hear The rushing sound the water made, And see the fish that everywhere In the back-current glanced and played; Low down the tall flag-flower that sprung Beside the noisy stepping-stones, And the massed chestnut boughs that hung Thick-studded over with white cones, [11] In 1833 the following took the place of the above stanza which was added in 1842:— How dear to me in youth, my love, Was everything about the mill, The black and silent pool above, The pool beneath that ne’er stood still, The meal sacks on the whitened floor, The dark round of the dripping wheel, The very air about the door— Made misty with the floating meal! Thus in 1833:— Remember you that pleasant day When, after roving in the woods, (’Twas April then) I came and lay Beneath those gummy chestnut bud That glistened in the April blue, Upon the slope so smooth and cool, I lay and never thought of _you_, But angled in the deep mill pool. [12] Thus in 1833:— A water-rat from off the bank Plunged in the stream. With idle care, Downlooking thro’ the sedges rank, I saw your troubled image there. Upon the dark and dimpled beck It wandered like a floating light, A full fair form, a warm white neck, And two white arms—how rosy white! [13] 1872. Casement-edge. [14] Thus in 1833:— If you remember, you had set Upon the narrow casement-edge A long green box of mignonette, And you were leaning from the ledge. I raised my eyes at once: above They met two eyes so blue and bright, Such eyes! I swear to you, my love, That they have never lost their light. After this stanza the following was inserted in 1833 but excised in 1842:— That slope beneath the chestnut tall Is wooed with choicest breaths of air: Methinks that I could tell you all The cowslips and the kingcups there. Each coltsfoot down the grassy bent, Whose round leaves hold the gathered shower, Each quaintly-folded cuckoo pint, And silver-paly cuckoo flower. [15] Thus in 1833:—