Where mightiest rivers into powerless sleep
Sink, and forget their nature-now expands
Majestic Duddon, over smooth flat sands
Gliding in silence with unfettered sweep!
Beneath an ampler sky a region wide

Is opened round him :-hamlets, towers, and towns,
And blue-topped hills, behold him from afar;
In stately mien to sovereign Thames allied
Spreading his bosom under Kentish downs,
With commerce freighted, or triumphant war.

BUT

XXXIII

CONCLUSION

UT here no cannon thunders to the gale;
Upon the wave no haughty pendants cast
A crimson splendour: lowly is the mast

That rises here, and humbly spread, the sail;
While, less disturbed than in the narrow Vale
Through which with strange vicissitudes he passed,
The Wanderer seeks that receptacle vast
Where all his unambitious functions fail.
And may thy Poet, cloud-born Stream! be free-
The sweets of earth contentedly resigned,
And each tumultuous working left behind
At seemly distance-to advance like Thee;
Prepared, in peace of heart, in calm of mind
And soul, to mingle with Eternity!

XXXIV

AFTER-THOUGHT

I THOUGHT of Thee, my partner and my guide,
As being past away.-Vain sympathies !
For, backward, Duddon! as I cast my eyes,
I see what was, and is, and will abide ;
Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide;
The Form remains, the Function never dies;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise,
We Men, who in our morn of youth defied

The elements, must vanish;—be it so!

Enough, if something from our hands have power
To live, and act, and serve the future hour;

And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,

Through love, through hope, and faith's transcendent dower, We feel that we are greater than we know.

YARROW REVISITED, AND OTHER POEMS

COMPOSED (TWO excepted) during a tour in scoTLAND, AND ON THE ENGLish border, IN THE AUTUMN OF 1831

ΤΟ

SAMUEL ROGERS, ESQ.,

AS A TESTIMONY OF FRIENDSHIP AND ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF INTELLECTUAL OBLIGATIONS, THESE MEMORIALS ARE

AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED

RYDAL MOUNT, Dec. 11, 1834

THE following Stanzas are a memorial of a day passed with Sir Walter Scott and other Friends visiting the Banks of the Yarrow under his guidance, immediately before his departure from Abbotsford, for Naples.

The title Yarrow Revisited' will stand in no need of explanation for Readers acquainted with the Author's previous poems suggested by that celebrated Stream.

I

HE gallant Youth, who may have gained,

TH

Or seeks, a 'winsome Marrow,'

Was but an Infant in the lap

When first I looked on Yarrow;

Once more, by Newark's Castle-gate

Long left without a warder,

I stood, looked, listened, and with Thee,

Great Minstrel of the Border!

Grave thoughts ruled wide on that sweet day,
Their dignity installing

In gentle bosoms, while sere leaves

Were on the bough, or falling;

But breezes played, and sunshine gleamed—
The forest to embolden;

Reddened the fiery hues, and shot

Transparence through the golden.

ΙΟ

For busy thoughts the Stream flowed on

In foamy agitation;

And slept in many a crystal pool

For quiet contemplation:

No public and no private care
The freeborn mind enthralling,

We made a day of happy hours,
Our happy days recalling.

Brisk Youth appeared, the Morn of Youth,
With freaks of graceful folly,-

Life's temperate Noon, her sober Eve,

Her Night not melancholy;

Past, present, future, all appeared

In harmony united,

Like guests that meet, and some from far,
By cordial love invited.

And if, as Yarrow, through the woods
And down the meadow ranging,

Did meet us with unaltered face,

Though we were changed and changing;
If, then, some natural shadows spread
Our inward prospect over,

The soul's deep valley was not slow
Its brightness to recover.

Eternal blessings on the Muse,

And her divine employment!

The blameless Muse, who trains her Sons
For hope and calm enjoyment;

Albeit sickness, lingering yet,

Has o'er their pillow brooded;

And Care waylays their steps-a Sprite
Not easily eluded.

For thee, O SCOTT! compelled to change
Green Eildon-hill and Cheviot

For warm Vesuvio's vine-clad slopes;
And leave thy Tweed and Tiviot
For mild Sorento's breezy waves;
May classic Fancy, linking

With native Fancy her fresh aid,
Preserve thy heart from sinking!

20

30

40

50

Oh! while they minister to thee,
Each vying with the other,
May Health return to mellow Age,

With Strength, her venturous brother;
And Tiber, and each brook and rill
Renowned in song and story,
With unimagined beauty shine,
Nor lose one ray of glory!

For Thou, upon a hundred streams,
By tales of love and sorrow,
Of faithful love, undaunted truth,
Hast shed the power of Yarrow;

And streams unknown, hills yet unseen,
Wherever they invite Thee,

At parent Nature's grateful call,
With gladness must requite Thee.

A gracious welcome shall be thine,
Such looks of love and honour
As thy own Yarrow gave to me
When first I gazed upon her;
Beheld what I had feared to see,
Unwilling to surrender

Dreams treasured up from early days,
The holy and the tender.

And what, for this frail world, were all
That mortals do or suffer,

Did no responsive harp, no pen,
Memorial tribute offer?

Yea, what were mighty Nature's self?

Her features, could they win us,

Unhelped by the poetic voice

That hourly speaks within us?

Nor deem that localised Romance
Plays false with our affections;
Unsanctifies our tears-made sport
For fanciful dejections:

Ah, no! the visions of the past
Sustain the heart in feeling

Life as she is our changeful Life,

With friends and kindred dealing.

Bear witness, Ye, whose thoughts that day
In Yarrow's groves were centred;
Who through the silent portal arch

Of mouldering Newark entered;
And clomb the winding stair that once
Too timidly was mounted

By the last Minstrel,' (not the last!)
Ere he his Tale recounted.

Flow on for ever, Yarrow Stream!
Fulfil thy pensive duty,

Well pleased that future Bards should chant
For simple hearts thy beauty;

To dream-light dear while yet unseen,
Dear to the common sunshine,

And dearer still, as now I feel,

To memory's shadowy moonshine!

1831

II

ON THE DEPARTURE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT FROM ABBOTSFORD,

A

FOR NAPLES

TROUBLE, not of clouds, or weeping rain,
Nor of the setting sun's pathetic light
Engendered, hangs o'er Eildon's triple height:
Spirits of Power, assembled there, complain
For kindred Power departing from their sight;
While Tweed, best pleased in chanting a blithe strain,
Saddens his voice again, and yet again.

Lift up your hearts, ye Mourners! for the might
Of the whole world's good wishes with him goes;
Blessings and prayers in nobler retinue

Than sceptred king or laurelled conqueror knows,
Follow this wondrous Potentate.
Ye winds of ocean, and the midland sea,
Wafting your Charge to soft Parthenope!

Be true,

Sept. 1831

ΤΟ

III

A PLACE OF BURIAL IN THE SOUTH OF SCOTLAND

ART fenced by man, part by a rugged steep

PA

That curbs a foaming brook, a Grave-yard lies; The hare's best couching-place for fearless sleep; Which moonlit elves, far seen by credulous eyes,