It would have given me greater pleasure to have found in the neighbouring hamlet traces of one who had interested me so much but it was impossible, as unfortunately I did not even know her name. I have only to add that in the spring of 1841 I revisited Goodrich Castle, not having seen that part of the Wye since I met the little Girl there in 1793. Although there is no documentation on what the little girl actually told him during their conversation, she interested Wordsworth to such an extent that he wrote: Immersed in these feelings, Wordsworth came to Goodrich Castle and met a little girl who would serve as the model for the little girl in We are Seven. This solitude with nature he claimed encouraged him to reach a deeper understanding where the experience was no longer just for pleasure, as it was in his earlier days, but also hinted at a darker side. Wordsworth claimed that the idea for We are Seven came to him while travelling alone across England in October 1793 after becoming separated from his friend, William Calvert. The poem turns on the question of whether to account two dead siblings as part of the family. It describes a discussion between an adult poetic speaker and a 'little cottage girl' about the number of brothers and sisters who dwell with her.

' We are Seven' is a poem written by William Wordsworth and published in his Lyrical Ballads. For the Welsh television series, see We Are Seven (TV series).

Lyrical Ballads by William Wordsworth