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POEMS WRITTEN IN YOUTH.

EXTRACT

FROM THE CONCLUSION OF A POEM, COMPOSED UPON LEAVING SCHOOL.

DEAR native regions, I foretell
From what I feel at this farewell,
That, wheresoe'er my steps shall tend,
And whensoe'er my course shall end,
If in that hour a single tie
Survive of local sympathy,

My soul will cast the backward view,
The longing look alone on you.
Thus, when the sun, prepared for rest,
Hath gained the precincts of the west,
Though his departing radiance fail
To illuminate the hollow vale,

A lingering light he fondly throws

On the dear mountain-tops where first he rose.

WRITTEN IN VERY EARLY YOUTH.

CALM is all nature as a resting wheel.
The kine are couched upon the dewy grass;
The horse alone, seen dimly as I pass,
Is cropping audibly his later meal;
Dark is the ground; a slumber seems to steal
O'er vale, and mountain, and the starless sky.
Now, in this blank of things, a harmony,
Home-felt, and home-created, comes to heal
That grief for which the senses still supply
Fresh food; for only then, when memory
Is hushed, am I at rest. My friends! restrain
Those busy cares that would allay my pain;
Oh! leave me to myself, nor let me feel

The officious touch that makes me droop again.

AN EVENING WALK.

ADDRESSED TO A YOUNG LADY.

General Sketch of the Lakes-Author's regret of his youth which was passed amongst them-Short description of Noon-Cascade-Noontide Retreat-Precipice and sloping Lights-Face of Nature as the Sun declines-Mountain-farm, and the Cock-Slate-quarry-Sunset -Superstition of the Country connected with that moment-Swans -Female Beggar-Twilight sounds-Western Lights-Spirits-Night -Moonlight-Hope-Night-sounds-Conclusion.

FAR from my dearest Friend, 'tis mine to rove
Through bare grey dell, high wood, and pastoral cove;
His wizard course where hoary Derwent takes,
Thro' crags and forest glooms and opening lakes,
Staying his silent waves, to hear the roar
That stuns the tremulous cliffs of high Lodore;
Where peace to Grasmere's lonely island leads,
To willow hedge-rows, and to emerald meads;
Leads to her bridge, rude church, and cottaged grounds,
Her rocky sheepwalks, and her woodland bounds;
Where, bosom'd deep, the shy Winander* peeps
'Mid clustering isles, and holly-sprinkled steeps;
Where twilight glens endear my Esthwaite's shore,
And memory of departed pleasures, more.

Fair scenes, erewhile, I taught, a happy child,
The echoes of your rocks my carols wild:
Then did no ebb of cheerfulness demand
Sad tides of joy from melancholy's hand.
In youth's wild eye the livelong day was bright,
The sun at morning, and the stars at night,
Alike, when first the vales the bittern fills
Or first the woodcockst roam the moonlight hills.
In thoughtless gaiety I coursed the plain,
And hope itself was all I knew of pain;
For then, even then, the little heart would beat
At times, while young Content forsook her seat,
And wild Impatience, pointing upward, showed
Where, tipp'd with gold, the mountain summits glowed.
Alas! the idle tale of man is found

Depicted in the dial's moral round;

With hope reflection blends her social rays

To gild the total tablet of his days;

Yet still, the sport of some malignant power,

He knows but from its shade the present hour.

But why, ungrateful, dwell on idle pain?
To show her yet some joys to me remain,

These lines are only applicable to the middle part of that lake.

In the beginning of winter, these mountains are frequented by

woodcocks, which in dark nights retire into the woods.

Say, will my Friend, with soft affection's ear,
The history of a poet's evening hear?

When, in the south, the wan moon, brooding still,
Breathed a pale steam around the glaring hill,
And shades of deep-embattled clouds were seen,
Sporting the northern cliffs with lights between;
Grazing the tempting shades to them denied,
When stood the shortened herbs amid the tide,
Where from the barren wall's unsheltered end
Long rails into the shallow lake extend.
When school-boys stretched their length upon the
green;
And round the humming elm, a glimmering scene,
In the brown park, in flocks the troubled deer
Shook the still-twinkling tail and glancing ear;
When horses in the wall-girt intake* stood,
Unshaded, eying far below the flood,
Crowded behind the swain, in mute distress,
With forward neck the closing gate to press-
Then, as I wandered where the huddling rill
Brightens with water-breaks the hollow ghyllt
To where, while thick above the branches close,
In dark brown bason its wild waves repose,
Inverted shrubs, and moss of darkest green,
Cling from the rocks, with pale wood-weeds between;
Save that aloft the subtile sunbeams shine
On withered briars that o'er the crags recline;
Sole light admitted here, a small cascade,
Illumes with sparkling foam the twilight shade;
Beyond, along the vista of the brook,

Where antique roots its bustling path o'erlook,
The eye reposes on a secret bridget

Half gray, half shagged with ivy to its ridge.

Sweet rill, farewell! To-morrow's noon again
Shall hide me, wooing long thy wildwood strain;
But now the sun has gained his western road,
And eve's mild hour invites my steps abroad.

While, near the midway cliff, the silvered kite
In many a whistling circle wheels ber flight;
Slant watery lights, from parting clouds, apace
Travel along the precipice's base;

Cheering its naked waste of scattered stone,
By lichens gray, and scanty moss, o'ergrown;
Where scarce the foxglove peeps, or thistle's beard;
And restless stone-chat, all day long, is heard.

How pleasant, as the yellowing sun declines,
And with long rays and shades the landscape shines,

* The word intake is local, and signifies a mountain inclosure.

+ Ghyll is also, I believe, a term confined to this country: ghyll and dingle have the same meaning.

The reader who has made the tour of this country, will recognise, in this description, the features which characterize the lower waterfall in the grounds of Rydal.

To mark the birches' stems all golden light,
That lit the dark slant woods with silvery white;
The willow's weeping trees that twinkling hoar,
Glanced oft upturned along the breezy shore
Low bending o'er the coloured water, fold

Their moveless boughs and leaves like threads of gold;
The skiffs with naked mast at anchor laid,

Before the boat-house peeping through the shade;
The unwearied glance of woodman's echoed stroke;
And curling from the trees the cottage smoke.

Their panniered train a group of potters goad,
Winding from side to side up the steep road;
The peasant, from yon cliff of fearful edge
Shot, down the headlong path darts with his sledge;
Bright beams the lonely mountain-horse illume
Feeding mid purple heath, "green rings,"*and broom;
While the sharp slope the slackened team confounds,
Downward the ponderous timber-wain resounds;
In foamy breaks the rill, with merry song,
Dashed down the rough rock, lightly leaps along;
From lonesome chapel at the mountain's feet,
Three humble bells their rustic chime repeat;
Sounds from the water-side the hammered boat;
And blasted quarry thunders, heard remote!

Even here, amid the sweep of endless woods,
Blue pomp of lakes, high cliffs, and falling floods,
Not undelightful are the simplest charms,
Found by the grassy door of mountain-farms.

Sweetly ferocious,† round his native walks,
Pride of his sister-wives, the monarch stalks;
Spur-clad his nervous feet, and firm his tread;
A crest of purple tops his warrior head.
Bright sparks his black and rolling eye-ball hurls
Afar; his tail he closes and unfurls;

On tiptoe reared, he strains his clarion throat,
Threatened by faintly-answering farms remote.

Bright'ning the cliffs between where sombrous pine

And yew-trees o'er the silver rocks recline,
I love to mark the quarry's moving trains,

Dwarf panniered steeds, and men, and numerous wains;
How busy the enormous hive within,

While Echo dallies with the various din!

Some (hardly heard their chisels' clinking sound)
Toil, small as pigmies in the gulf profound;
Some, dim between th' aërial clifts descried
O'erwalk the slender plank from side to side;

"Vivid rings of green."-Greenwood's Poem on Shooting. "Dolcemente feroce."-Tasso.-In this description of the cock, I remember a spirited one of the same animal in "L'Agriculture, ou Les Géorgiques Francoises," of M. Rossuet.

These, by the pale-blue rocks that ceaseless ring,
Glad from their airy baskets hang, and sing.

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Hung o'er a cloud above the steep that rears Its edge all flame, the broadening sun appears; A long blue bar its ægis orb divides, And breaks the spreading of its golden tides; And now it touches on the purple steep That flings his shadow on the pictured deep. 'Cross the calm lake's blue shades the cliffs aspire, With towers and woods, a "prospect all on fire;" The coves and secret hollows, through a ray Of fainter gold, a purple gleam betray. The gilded turf arrays in richer green Each speck of lawn the broken rocks between. Deep yellow beams the scattered boles illume, Far in the level forest's central gloom: Waving his hat, the shepherd, in the vale, Directs his winding dog the cliffs to scale,That barking, busy 'mid the glittering rocks, Haunts, where he points, the intercepted' flocks. Where oaks o'erhang the road the radiance shoots On tawny earth, wild weeds, and twisted roots; The druid-stones their lighted fane unfold; And all the babbling brooks are liquid gold; Sunk to a curve, the day-star lessens still, Gives one bright glance, and drops behind the hill.* In these lone vales, if aught of faith may claim Their silver hairs, and ancient hamlet fame, When up the hills, as now, retreats the light, Strange apparitions mock the village sight.

A desperate form appears that spurs his steed Along the midway cliffs with violent speed; Unhurt pursues his lengthened flight, while all Attend, at every stretch, his headlong fall. Anon, in order mounts, a gorgeous show Of horsemen-shadows moving to and fro; And now the van is gilt with evening's beam; The rear through iron brown betrays a sullen gleam. While silent stands the admiring crowd below, Lost gradual o'er the heights in pomp they go, Till, but the lonely beacon, all is fled

That tips with eve's last gleam his spiry head.

Now, while the solemn evening shadows sail,
On red slow-waving pinions, down the vale;
And, fronting the bright west, in stronger lines,
The oak its darkened boughs and foliage twines;
How pleasant near the tranquil lake to stray
Where winds the road along a secret bay,
Along the "wild meandering shore" to view,
Obsequious grace the winding swan pursue;
* From Thomson.

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