Tales of the Cymry: With Notes Illustrative and Explanatory

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Longmans, 1848 - English poetry - 186 pages
 

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Page 151 - Pooka seems to be to obtain a rider, and then he is in all his most malignant glory. Headlong he dashes through briar and brake, through flood and fell, over mountain, valley, moor, or river, indiscriminately; up or down precipice is alike to him, provided he gratifies the malevolence that seems to inspire him. He bounds and flies over and beyond them, gratified by the distress, and utterly reckless and ruthless of the cries, and danger, and suffering, of the luckless wight who bestrides him. As...
Page 151 - This Puck seems but a dreaming dolt, Still walking like a ragged colt, And oft out of a bush doth bolt, Of purpose to deceive us ; And, leading us, makes us to stray, Long winters nights out of the way, And when we stick in mire and clay, He doth with laughter leave us.
Page 114 - ... of them looked larger and as bright as the star Sirius; of course they look dim when seen in ground fogs, but there was not any fog on the night in question; there was however a muddy closeness in the atmosphere, and at the same time a considerable breeze from the south-west. Those Will-o'-the-wisps which shot horizontally invariably proceeded before the wind towards tho north-east.
Page 153 - That frights the maidens of the villagery, Skim milk, and sometimes labour in the quern, And bootless make the breathless housewife churn, And sometimes make the drink to bear no barm, Mislead night- wanderers, laughing at their harm ? Those that Hobgoblin call you, and sweet Puck, You do their work, and they shall have good luck.
Page 183 - Their fashion and posture is this : there is a vast unwrought stone, probably about twenty tons in weight, supported by six or seven others that are not above four feet high, and these are set in a circle, some on end, and some edgewise or sidelong, to bear the great one up. The great one is much diminished of what it has been in bulk, as having five tons, or more, by report, broken off it to make mill-stones : so that I guess the stone originally to have been between twenty-five and thirty tons...
Page 92 - Locksley Hall, that in the distance overlooks the sandy tracts, And the hollow ocean-ridges roaring into cataracts. Many a night from yonder ivied casement, ere I went to rest, Did I look on great Orion sloping slowly to the West. Many a night I saw the Pleiads, rising thro' the mellow shade, Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies tangled in a silver braid.
Page 114 - I noticed it from one of the upper windows intermittingly for about half an hour, between ten and eleven o'clock, at the distance of from one to two hundred yards off me. Sometimes it was only like a flash in the pan on the ground; at other times it rose up several feet and fell to the earth, and became extinguished; and many times it proceeded horizontally from fifty to one hundred yards with an undulating motion, like the flight of the...
Page 93 - ... they hear melancholy murmurs stealing over the waves, and behold the souls of the poor creatures who were wrecked rise upon the summits of the billows, and then in ghostly grief, pale and fugitive, melt away like froth. If one of these sad spirits happens to encounter the soul of some well-beloved friend, the air is filled with cries of despair at the first glance of recognition. Sometimes the fishermen, sitting in their huts at night, hear a strange and mysterious melange of sounds over the...
Page 156 - Or call up him that left half told The story of Cambuscan bold, Of Camball, and of Algarsife, And who had Canace to wife, That owned the virtuous ring and glass, And of the wondrous horse of brass, On which the Tartar king did ride...
Page 93 - Morts. On this occasion the winds and waters are brought into active requisition to supply materials for the spectral drama. When the wind ripples the sea into wreaths of foam, the fishermen fancy they hear melancholy murmurs stealing over the waves, and behold the souls of the poor creatures who were wrecked rise upon the summits of the billows, and then, in ghostly grief, pale and fugitive, melt away like froth. If one of these sad spirits happens to encounter the soul of some wellbeloved friend,...

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