to the Wordsworths, being a full acquittal, with interest, of
the original debt. The fortunes of the Wordsworth family were,
therefore, at a low ebb in 1787, and much credit is due to the
uncles who discerned the talents of William and Christopher, and
bestowed a Cambridge education on the future Poet Laureate, and the
future Master of Trinity.

In October, 1787, then, Wordsworth went up as an undergraduate to St.
John's College, Cambridge. The first court of this College, in the
south-western corner of which were Wordsworth's rooms, is divided
only by a narrow lane from the Chapel of Trinity College, and his
first memories are of the Trinity clock, telling the hours "twice
over, with a male and female voice", of the pealing organ, and of
the prospect when

From my pillow looking forth, by light
Of moon or favouring stars I could behold
The antechapel, where the statue stood
Of Newton with his prism and silent face.
The marble index of a mind for ever
Voyaging through strange seas of Thought, alone.

For the most part the recollections which Wordsworth brought away
from Cambridge are such as had already found expression more than
once in English literature; for it has been the fortune of that
ancient University to receive in her bosom most of that long line of
poets who form the peculiar glory of our English speech. Spenser,
Ben Jonson, and Marlowe; Dryden, Cowley, and Waller; Milton, George
Herbert, and Gray--to mention only the most familiar names--had owed
allegiance to that mother who received Wordsworth now, and Coleridge