WORDSWORTH AND THE STANZA "SMALL SERVICE IS TRUE SERVICE."
[To Tan EDITOR Or THE " SPECTATOR."
SIE,—The quatrain on the daisy and its shadow protecting the lingering dewdrop from the sun—referred to by Mx. Lionel Tollemache in his letter in last week's Spectator—was, as Wordsworth told Miss Fenwick, composed "extempore on observing the image as I had often done on the lawn at. Rydal Mount. It was first written down in the album of my god- daughter, Rotha Quillinan." It was composed in 1834. Ten
years later—during a walk to Loughrigg Tarn with Archer Butler, Julius Charles Hare, and Rowan Hamilton—he wrote :—
"So fair, so sweet, withal so sensitive, Would that the little flowers were born to live, Conscious of half the pleasure which they give;
That to this mountain-daisy's self were blown The beauty of its star-shaped shadow, thrown On the smooth surface of this naked stone."
There is no doubt that the quatrain beginning "Small service is true service while it lasts"
was composed "on the lawn at Rydal Mount." I may add that Miss Rotha Quillinan once showed me them written in her album by the poet in the year 1834.-1 am, Sir, &c.,
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