But, possibly from some want
of judgment in punishments inflicted, I had become perverse and
obstinate in defying chastisement, and rather proud of it than
otherwise."
"Of my earliest days at school I have little to say, but that they
were very happy ones, chiefly because I was left at liberty then,
and in the vacations, to read whatever books I liked. For example, I
read all Fielding's works, _Don Quixote, Gil Bias_, and any part of
Swift that I liked--_Gulliver's Travels_, and the _Tale of the Tub_,
being both much to my taste. It may be, perhaps, as well to mention,
that the first verses which I wrote were a task imposed by my master;
the subject, _The Summer Vacation_; and of my own accord I added
others upon _Return to School_. There was nothing remarkable in
either poem; but I was called upon, among other scholars, to write
verses upon the completion of the second centenary from the
foundation of the school in 1585 by Archbishop Sandys. These verses
were much admired--far more than they deserved, for they were but a
tame imitation of Pope's versification, and a little in his style."
But it was not from exercises of this kind that Wordsworth's
school-days drew their inspiration.
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