Then comes the end.... "Thursday, 8th July.... In the afternoon, after we had talked a little, William fell asleep. I read _The Winter's Tale_; then I went to bed, but did not sleep. The swallows stole in and out of their nest, and sat there, _whiles_ quite still, _whiles_ they sung low for two minutes or more at a time, just like a muffled robin. William was looking at _The Pedlar_ when I got up. He arranged it, and after tea I wrote it out--280 lines.... The moon was behind.... We walked first to the top of the hill to see Rydale. It was dark and dull, but our own vale was very solemn--the shape of Helm Crag was quite distinct, though black. We walked backwards and forwards on the White Moss path; there was a sky like white brightness on the lake.... O beautiful place! Dear Mary, William. The hour is come.... I must prepare to go. The swallows, I must leave them, the wall, the garden, the roses, all. Dear creatures, they sang last night after I was in bed; seemed to be singing to one another, just before they settled to rest for the night. Well, I must go. Farewell." Next day she set out with William to meet her secret dread, knowing that life in Rydale could never be the same again. Wordsworth married Mary Hutchinson on the 4th October, 1802. The secret is no secret now, for Dorothy was a crystal vase. BEN JONSON[7] [7] _Ben Jonson. By G. Gregory Smith. (English Men of Letters Series.) Macmillan, 1919. 3s. net._ By ALDOUS HUXLEY It comes as something of a surprise to find that the niche reserved for Ben Jonson in the "English Men of Letters" series has only now been filled. One expected somehow that he would have been among the first of the great ones to be enshrined; but no, he has had a long time to wait; and Adam Smith, and Sydney Smith, and Hazlitt, and Fanny Burney have gone before him into the temple of fame. Now, however, his monument has at last been made, with Professor Gregory Smith's qualified version of "O rare Ben Jonson!" duly and definitively carved upon it. What is it that makes us, almost as a matter of course, number Ben Jonson among the great? Why should we expect him to be an early candidate for immortality, or why, indeed, should he be admitted to the "English Men of Letters" series at all? These are difficult questions to answer; for when we come to consider the matter we find ourselves unable to give any very glowing account of Ben or his greatness. It is hard to say that one likes his work; one cannot honestly call him a good poet or a supreme dramatist. And yet, unsympathetic as he is, uninteresting as he often can be, we still go on respecting and admiring him, because, in spite of everything, we are conscious, obscurely but certainly, that he was a great man.