the cold, lonely winter of 1799, Wordsworth complained Coleridge, acquired more french in two months, than I should acquire German in five years living as we have lived. Wordsworth continued. In short[,] sorry am I say it I do consider myself as knowing any thing of the German (EY 255). He believes that conversation with native-speakers would help: should be perfectly contented if we could find a house where there were several young people some of whom might perhaps be always at leisure converse with us. We do wish read much but should both be highly delighted be and chatter'd to, through the whole day (EY 254). But the inhabitants at Goslar are inhospitable, petty tradespeople; in general a low and selfish race; intent upon gain, according Dorothy. They cannot find in their hearts ask of a stranger a fair price for their goods, she continued (EY 245). Similarly, William dismissed the inhabitants of Goslar as grocers and linen-drapers,...a wr etched race; the flesh, blood, and bone of their minds being nothing but knavery and low falsehood (EY 249). And, as Dorothy explained Christopher, their lack of funds prevented their entry into the better society of the place. Their best conversant, according William, was dear kind creature whose deafness and poor teeth made their conversations a jolly lesson in talking at utter cross-purposes. With bad German, bad English, bad French, bad hearing, and bad utterance you will imagine we have had very pretty dialogues (EY 249). Learning a language, Wordsworth observes, is not merely the knowing that 'Liebe' is German for 'love', and 'darum' for 'therefore' c words are a mere dead letter in the mind (EY 249-50). Literary emolument is even dust in the balance. If I had had the opportunities of conversing I should have cared much if I had read a line, he wrote Coleridge (EY 254-55). 1791, however, within two months of his arrival at Dieppe, passing through Paris settle in Orleans, Wordsworth found himself chattering and being chatter'd to in French through both days and nights. Virtually no English speakers lived in Orleans in 1791, Kenneth Johnston notes, and Wordsworth entered into the lives and language of a diverse group of French speakers. Indeed, as early as December 19, less than a month after his arrival, Wordsworth told his brother, Richard, that he thought economize engaging a French master, for he could do nearly as well without one (EY 70). Looking back on his stay in France, Wordsworth describes the experience of stepping out of English ways and leaving English words behind as a growth and expansion into a new, vital world. His attention was engrossed by novelties in speech,/Domestic manners, customs, gestures, looks,/And all the attire of ordinary life. His rapt interest in the strange life around him kept him tranquil almost, and careless as a flower/Glassed in a green-house, or a parlour shrub/That spreads its leaves in unmolested peace,/While every bush and tree, the country through,/Is shaking the roots (Pr 1805 9:82-4, 87-91). The Royalist officers at Orleans kindly indulged his half-learned speech (Pr 1805 9:195). I--who had been else/Shunned and tolerated--freely lived/With these defenders of the crown, and talked,/And heard their notions, Wordsworth writes (Pr 1805 9:196-199). Wordsworth also met Michel Beaupuis, whom Johnston calls a military version of the 'man speaking men' of Wordsworth's ideal Poet (304). Words worth remembers tromping through the countryside with Beaupuis discussing government, chartered rights/Allegiance, faith, and laws time matured/Custom and habit, novelty and change (Pr 1805 9:331-333). …