And Mendip's bleak and barren heights again enclosed me round, Like faces of forgotten friends met on forgotten ground. But heath and landscape, boundless once, were shrunken: all was changed : I felt I stood a stranger there, the place aud me estranged: Each glance was memory, each step a joy, a welcome sense Of gratitude's fine ecstasy, calm, voiceless, but intense. All stirring impulses of life were sobered by the scene, While staid Reflection looked within the glass of what had been; For not a mound I trod upon was unforgot, nor tree Rose in that surging scene whose image had not entered me. SHE THE SPRINGS OF DOVE. HE dwelt among the untrodden ways A maid whom there were none to praise, A violet by a mossy stone Fair as a star, when only one She lived unknown, and few could know When Lucy ceased to be; But she is in her grave, and oh! The difference to me! William Wordsworth. IN DOVEDALE. TSAAC! still thou anglest near me ISAAC By the green banks of thy Dove, Thou, whose ears drank in the warble O my kindly old piscator, See'st thou not these waters clear? Lo! at yonder bend he standeth, Where round rocks the wave bells out, See! with skilful touch he landeth 1 He is buried in Winchester Cathedral. Stream of beauty! winding, singing Learnéd in all honest learning, In life's fitful turmoil often Now a trout and now a grayling God's white clouds high o'er him sailing, All around the beautiful! Henry Glassford Bell. THE RETIREMENT. AREWELL, thou busy world! and may FAREW We never meet again! Here I can eat and sleep and pray, And do more good in one short day Where naught but vanity and vice do reign. Good God! how sweet are all things here! How cleanly do we feed and lie! What peace! what unanimity! O, how happy here's our leisure! By turns, to come and visit ye! Dear Solitude, the soul's best friend, That man acquainted with himself doth make, And, all his Maker's wonders to entend, With thee I here converse at will, And would be glad to do so still, For it is thou alone that keep'st the soul awake. How calm and quiet a delight Is it, alone To read and meditate and write, By none offended and offending none ! To walk, ride, sit, or sleep at one's own ease; And, pleasing a man's self, none other to displease. O my beloved nymph! fair Dove! Upon the flowery banks to lie, And, with my angle, upon them I ever learned industriously to try. Such streams Rome's yellow Tiber cannot show, The Maese, the Danube, and the Rhine Are puddle-water all, compared with thine; And Loire's pure streams yet too polluted are The rapid Garonne and the winding Seine Beloved Dove, with thee To vie priority; Nay, Thame and Isis when conjoined submit, O my beloved rocks! that rise To awe the earth and brave the skies; Giddy with pleasure, to look down, And from the vales to view the noble heights above! O my beloved caves! from Dog-star's heat |