And now again, white-flashing on the view,
O'er the huge craggy fragments. Ancient stream,
That murmur'st through the mountain solitudes,
The time has been when no eye mark'd thy course,
Save His who made the world! Fancy might dream
She saw thee thus bound on from age to age
Unseen of man, whilst awful Nature sat
On the rent rocks, and said, These haunts be mine.'
Now Taste has mark'd thy features; here and there
Touching with tender hand, but injuring not
Thy beauties whilst along thy woody verge
Ascends the winding pathway, and the eye
Catches at intervals thy varied falls.
But loftier scenes invite us; pass the hill,
And through the woody hanging, at whose feet
The tinkling Ellen winds, pursue thy way.
Yon bleak and weather whiten'd rock, immense,
Upshoots amidst the scene, craggy and steep,
And like some high-embattled citadel,
That awes the low plain shadowing. Half way up
The purple heath is seen, but bare its brow,
And deep-intrench'd, and all beneath it spread
With massy fragments riven from its top.
Amidst the crags, and scarce discern'd so high, Hangs here and there a sheep, by its faint bleat Discover'd, whilst the astonish'd eye looks up And marks it on the precipice's brink
Pick its scant food secure:-And fares it not
E'en so with you, poor orphans! ye who climb
The rugged path of life without a friend;
And over broken crags bear hardly on
With pale imploring looks, that seem to say,
'My mother!' she is buried, and at rest,
Laid in her grave clothes; and the heart is still,
The only heart that throughout all the world
Beat anxiously for you! Oh, yet bear on;
He who sustains the bleating lamb shall feed
And comfort you: meantime the heaven's pure beam
That breaks above the sable mountain's brow
Lighting, one after one, the sunless crags,
Awakes the blissful confidence, that here,
Or in a world where sorrow never comes,
All shall be well.
Now through the whispering wood
We steal, and mark the old and mossy oaks
Emboss the mountain slope; or the wild ash,
With rich red clusters mantling; or the birch
In lonely glens light-wavering; till behold
The rapid river shooting through the gloom
Its lucid line along; and on its side
The bordering pastures green, where the swink'd ox
Lies dreaming, heedless of the numerous flies
That, in the transitory sunshine, hum
Round his broad breast; and further up the cot,
With blue light smoke ascending: Images
Of peace and comfort! the wild rocks around
Endear your smile the more, and the full mind,
Sliding from scenes of dread magnificence,
Sinks on your charms reposing: Such repose
The sage may feel, when, fill'd and half oppress'd
With vast conceptions, smiling he returns
To life's consoling sympathies, and hears,
With heartfelt tenderness, the bells ring out,
Or pipe upon the mountains, or the low
Of herds slow winding down the cottaged vale,
Where day's last sunshine lingers: Such repose
He feels who,following where his Shakspeare leads,
As in a dream, through an enchanted land,
Here, with Macbeth, in the dread cavern hails
The weird sisters, and the dismal deed
Without a name; there sees the charmed isle,
The lone domain of Prospero, and, hark!
Wild music, such as earth scarce seems to own,
And Ariel o'er the slow-subsiding surge
Singing her smooth air quaintly: Such repose
Steals o'er her spirits, when, through storms at sea,
Fancy has follow'd some nigh-founder'd bark,
Full many a league, in ocean's solitude
Toss'd, far beyond the Cape of utmost Horne,
That stems the roaring deep; her dreary tract
Still Fancy follows, and at dead of night
Hears, with strange thunder, the huge fragments
Crashing, from mountains of high-drifting ice
That o'er her bows gleam fearful; till at last
She hails the gallant ship in some still bay
Safe moor'd, or of delightful Tinian
(Smiling, like fairy isle, amid the waste),
Or of New Zealand, where from sheltering rocks
The clear cascades gush beautiful, and high
The woodland scenery towers above the mast,
Whose long and wavy ensigns stream beneath.
Far inland, clad in snow, the mountains lift
Their spiry summits, and endear the more
The silvan scene around; the healing air
Breathes o'er green myrtles, and the Poe-bird flits,
Amid the shade of aromatic shrubs,
With silver neck and bluey-burnish'd wing.
Now cross the stream, and up the narrow track That winds along the mountain's edge, behold The peasant lass ascend: cheerful her look Beneath the umbrage of her broad black hat,
And loose her dark brown hair; the plodding pad
That bears her, panting climbs, and with sure step
Avoids the jutting fragments; she meantime
Sits unconcern'd, till lessening from the view
She gains the summit, and is seen no more.
All day, along that mountain's heathy waste,
Booted and strapp'd, and in rough coat succinct,
His shrill small whistle pendent at his breast,
With dogs and gun, untired the sportsman roams,
Nor quits his wildly devious range till eve,
Upon the woods, the rocks, and mazy rills
Descending, warns him home: then he rejoins
The social circle, just as the clear moon,
Emerging o'er the sable mountain, sails
Silent and calm and beautiful, and sheds
Its solemn grandeur on the shadowy scene.
To music then; and let some chosen strain
Of Handel gently recreate the sense,
And give the silent heart to tender joy.
Pass on to the hoar cataract*, that foams Through the dark fissures of the riven rock; Prone-rushing it descends, and with white whirl, Save where some silent shady pool receives Its dash; thence bursting with collected sweep And hollow sound, it hurries, till it falls Foaming in the wild stream that winds below. Dark trees, that to the mountain's height ascend, O'ershade with pendent boughs its mossy course, And, looking up, the eye beholds it flash
Beneath the incumbent gloom, from ledge to ledge Shooting its silvery foam, and far within Wreathing its curve fantastic.
Up to thy summit, Lewesdon, to the brow
Of yon proud rising, where the lonely thorn
Bends from the rude south-east with top cut sheer
By his keen breath, along the narrow track,
By which the scanty-pastured sheep ascend
Up to thy furze-clad summit, let me climb,--
My morning exercise, and thence look round
Upon the variegated scene, of hills
And woods and fruitful vales and villages
Half hid in tufted orchards, and the sea
Boundless, and studded thick with many a sail.
Ye dew-fed vapours, nightly balm, exhaled
From earth, young herbs and flowers, that in the
Ascend as incense to the lord of day,
[morn
I come to breathe your odours; while they float
Yet near this surface, let me walk embathed
In your invisible perfumes, to health
So friendly, nor less grateful to the mind,
Administering sweet peace and cheerfulness.
How changed is thy appearance, beauteous hill!
Thou hast put off thy wintry garb, brown heath
And russet fern, thy seemly colour'd cloak
To bide the hoary frosts and dripping rains
Of chill December, and art gaily robed
In livery of the spring: upon thy brow
A cap of flowery hawthorn, and thy neck
Mantled with new-sprung furze and spangles thick
Of golden bloom: nor lack thee tufted woods
Adown thy sides: tall oaks of lusty green,
The darker fir, light ash, and the nesh tops
Of the young hazel join to form thy skirts
In many a wavy fold of verdant wreath :-
So gorgeously hath Nature dress'd thee up
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