From this appropriate Court renowned Lu

CERNE

55

Calls me to pace her honoured Bridge'—that

cheers

The Patriot's heart with pictures rude and stern,
An uncouth Chronicle of glorious years.
Like portraiture, from loftier source, endears
That work of kindred frame, which spans the
lake

60

Just at the point of issue, where it fears
The form and motion of a stream to take;
Where it begins to stir, yet voiceless as a snake.

65

Volumes of sound, from the Cathedral rolled,
This long-roofed Vista penetrate-but see,
One after one, its tablets, that unfold
The whole design of Scripture history;
From the first tasting of the fatal Tree,
Till the bright Star appeared in eastern skies,
Announcing ONE was born mankind to free; 70
His acts, his wrongs, his final sacrifice;
Lessons for every heart, a Bible for all eyes.

75

Our pride misleads, our timid likings kill.
-Long may these homely Works devised of old,
These simple efforts of Helvetian skill,
Aid, with congenial influence, to uphold
The State, the Country's destiny to mould;
Turning, for them who pass, the common dust
Of servile opportunity to gold;

80

Filling the soul with sentiments august-
The beautiful, the brave, the holy, and the just!

No more;
Time halts not in his noiseless
march-

1 See Note.

Nor turns, nor winds, as doth the liquid flood;
Life slips from underneath us like that arch
Of airy workmanship whereon we stood,
Earth stretched below, heaven in our neigh-
bourhood.

85

Go forth, my little Book! pursue thy way; Go forth, and please the gentle and the good; Nor be a whisper stifled, if it say

That treasures, yet untouched, may grace some future Lay.

90

MEMORIALS OF A TOUR IN ITALY.

1837.

TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON. COMPANION! by whose buoyant Spirit cheered, In whose experience trusting, day by day Treasures I gained with zeal that neither feared The toils nor felt the crosses of the way, These records take, and happy should I be Were but the Gift a meet Return to thee For kindnesses that never ceased to flow, And prompt self-sacrifice to which I owe Far more than any heart but mine can know. W. WORDSWORTH.

RYDAL MOUNT,

Feb. 14th, 1842.

The Tour of which the following Poems are very inadequate remembrances was shortened by report, too well founded, of the prevalence of Cholera at Naples. To make some amends for what was reluctantly left unseen in the South of Italy, we visited the Tuscan Sanctuaries among the Apennines, and the principal Italian Lakes among the Alps. Neither of those lakes, nor of Venice, is there any notice in these Poems, chiefly because I have touched upon them elsewhere. See, in particular, "Descriptive Sketches,' Memorials of a Tour on the Continent in 1820," and a Sonnet upon the extinction of the Venetian Republic.

I.

MUSINGS NEAR AQUAPENDENTE.

APRIL, 1837.

YE Apennines! with all your fertile vales Deeply embosomed, and your winding shores

Of either sea, an Islander by birth,
A Mountaineer by habit, would resound
Your praise, in meet accordance with your

claims

5

Bestowed by Nature, or from man's great deeds Inherited: presumptuous thought!-it fled Like vapour, like a towering cloud, dissolved. Not, therefore, shall my mind give way to sadness;

Yon snow-white torrent-fall, plumb down it drops

IO

Yet ever hangs or seems to hang in air, Lulling the leisure of that high perched town, AQUAPENDENTE, in her lofty site

Its neighbour and its namesake-town, and flood

Forth flashing out of its own gloomy chasm 15 Bright sunbeams-the fresh verdure of this

lawn

Strewn with grey rocks, and on the horizon's

verge,

O'er intervenient waste, through glimmering haze,

Unquestionably kenned, that cone-shaped hill
With fractured summit, no indifferent sight 20
To travellers, from such comforts as are thine,
Bleak Radicofani! escaped with joy-
These are before me; and the varied scene
May well suffice, till noon-tide's sultry heat
Relax, to fix and satisfy the mind
Passive yet pleased. What! with this Broom
in flower

25

Close at my side! She bids me fly to greet
Her sisters, soon like her to be attired
With golden blossoms opening at the feet
Of my own Fairfield. The glad greeting given,
Given with a voice and by a look returned

31

Of old companionship, Time counts not minutes Ere, from accustomed paths, familiar fields, The local Genius hurries me aloft,

35

Transported over that cloud-wooing hill,
Seat Sandal, a fond suitor of the clouds,
With dream-like smoothness, to Helvellyn's top,
There to alight upon crisp moss and range,
Obtaining ampler boon, at every step,

Of visual sovereignty-hills multitudinous, 40
(Not Apennine can boast of fairer), hills
Pride of two nations, wood and lake and plains,
And prospect right below of deep coves shaped
By skeleton arms, that, from the mountain's

trunk

Extended, clasp the winds, with mutual moan Struggling for liberty, while undismayed 46 The shepherd struggles with them. Onward

thence

50

And downward by the skirt of Greenside fell,
And by Glenridding-screes, and low Glencoign,
Places forsaken now, though loving still
The Muses, as they loved them in the days
Of the old minstrels and the border bards.-
But here am I fast bound; and let it pass,
The simple rapture;-who that travels far
To feed his mind with watchful eyes could share
Or wish to share it ?-One there surely was, 56
"The Wizard of the North," with anxious hope
Brought to this genial climate, when disease
Preyed upon body and mind-yet not the less
Had his sunk eye kindled at those dear words
That spake of bards and minstrels; and his
spirit

61

Had flown with mine to old Helvellyn's brow,
Where once together, in his day of strength,
We stood rejoicing, as if earth were free
From sorrow, like the sky above our heads. 65