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With shady night. Soft airs, from shrub and flower,

Waft fragrant greetings to each silent grave; And while those lofty poplars gently wave Their tops, between them comes and goes a sky Bright as the glimpses of eternity,

To saints accorded in their mortal hour.

VIII.

COMPOSED AMONG THE RUINS OF A CASTLE
IN NORTH WALES.

THROUGH Shattered galleries, 'mid roofless halls,
Wandering with timid footsteps oft betrayed,
The Stranger sighs, nor scruples to upbraid
Old Time, though he, gentlest among the Thralls
Of Destiny, upon these wounds hath laid
His lenient touches, soft as light that falls,
From the wan Moon, upon the towers and walls,
Light deepening the profoundest sleep of shade.
Relic of Kings! Wreck of forgotten wars,
To winds abandoned and the prying stars,
Time loves Thee! at his call the Seasons twine
Luxuriant wreaths around thy forehead hoar
And, though past pomp no changes can restore,
A soothing recompence, his gift, is thine!

IX.

TO THE LADY E. B. AND THE HON. MISS P.

Composed in the Grounds of Plass Newidd, near Llangollen, 1824.

A STREAM, to mingle with your favourite Dee,
Along the VALE OF MEDITATION flows;
So styled by those fierce Britons, pleased to see
In Nature's face the expression of repose;
Or haply there some pious hermit chose
To live and die, the peace of heaven his aim ;
To whom the wild sequestered region owes,
At this late day, its sanctifying name.
GLYN CAFAILLGAROCH, in the Cambrian tongue,
In ours, the VALE OF FRIENDSHIP, let this spot
Be named; where, faithful to a low-roofed Cot,
On Deva's banks, ye have abode so long;
Sisters in love, a love allowed to climb,
Even on this earth, above the reach of Time!

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XI.

IN THE WOODS OF RYDAL.

WILD Redbreast! hadst thou at Jemima's lip
A half-blown rose had tempted thee to sip
Pecked, as at mine, thus boldly, Love might say,
Its glistening dews; but hallowed is the clay
Which the Muse warms; and I, whose head is
grey,

Am not unworthy of thy fellowship:
Nor could I let one thought-one motion-slip
That might thy sylvan confidence betray.
For are we not all His without whose care
Vouchsafed no sparrow falleth to the ground?
Who gives his Angels wings to speed through air,
And rolls the planets through the blue profound;
Then peck or perch, fond Flutterer! nor forbear
To trust a Poet in still musings bound.

XII.

WHEN Philoctetes in the Lemnian isle
Like a Form sculptured on a monument
Lay couched on him or his dread bow unbent
Some wild Bird oft might settle and beguile
The rigid features of a transient smile,
Disperse the tear, or to the sigh give vent,
Slackening the pains of ruthless banishmen
From his loved home, and from heroic toil.
And trust that spiritual Creatures round us
Griefs to allay which Reason cannot heal;
Yea, veriest reptiles have sufficed to prove
To fettered wretchedness, that no Bastile
Is deep enough to exclude the light of love,
Though man for brother man has ceased to feel.

move,

XIII.

WHILE Anna's peers and early playmates tread,
In freedom, mountain-turf and river's marge;
Or float with music in the festal barge;
Reign the proud steed, or through the dance
are led;

Her doom it is to press a weary bed-
Till oft her guardian Angel, to some charge
More urgent called, will stretch his wings at

large,

And friends too rarely prop the languid head.
Yet, helped by Genius-untired comforter,
The presence even of a stuffed Owl for her
Can cheat the time; sending her fancy out
To ivied castles and to moonlight skies,
Though he can neither stir a plume, nor shout:
Nor veil, with restless film, his staring eyes.

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Forth to her Dove, and took no further heed.
Her eye was busy, while her fingers flew
Across the harp, with soul-engrossing speed:
But from that bondage when her thoughts were
freed

She rose, and toward the close-shut casement
drew,

Whence the poor unregarded Favourite, true
What a
To old affections, had been heard to plead
With flapping wing for entrance.

shriek

XVIII.

TO ROTHA Q

ROTHA, my Spiritual Child! this head was grey

When at the sacred font for thee I stood:
Pledged till thou reach the verge of woman-

hood,

And shalt become thy own sufficient stay:
Too late, I feel, sweet Orphan! was the day
Yet shall my blessing hover o er thee still,
For stedfast hope the contract to fulfil;
Breathed forth beside the peaceful mountain
Stream*
Embodied in the music of this Lay,

Whose murmur soothed thy languid Mother's

ear

After her throes, this Stream of name more dear
Since thou dost bear it,-a memorial theme
For others; for thy future self, a spell
To summon fancies out of Time's dark cell.

XIX.

FLOOR IN THE
A GRAVE-STONE UPON THE
CLOISTERS OF WORCESTER CATHEDRAL.
"MISERRIMUS!" and neither name nor date,

Forced from that voice so lately tuned to a Prayer, text, or symbol, graven upon the stone;

strain

Of harmony!-a shriek of terror, pain,
And self-reproach! for, from aloft, a Kite
Pounced, and the Dove, which from its ruth-
less beak

She could not rescue, perished in her sight!

XVI.

HE INFANT MM

UNQUIET Childhood here by special grace
Forgets her nature, opening like a flower
That neither feeds nor wastes its vital power
In painful struggles. Months each other chase,
And nought untunes that Infant's voice; no

trace

cheek:
pure
Of fretful temper sullies her
Prompt, lively, self-sufficing, yet so meek
That one enrapt with gazing on her face
(Which even the placid innocence of death
Could scarcely make more placid, heaven more
bright)

Might learn to picture, for the eye of faith,
The Virgin, as she shone with kindred light;
A nursling couched upon her mother's knee,
Beneath some shady palm of Galilee.

XVII.

TO, IN HER SEVENTIETH YEAR.

SUCH age how beautful! O Lady bright,
Whose mortal lineaments seem all refined
By favouring Nature and a saintly Mind
To something purer and more exquisite
Than flesh and blood; whene'er thou meet'st
my sight,

When I behold thy blanched unwithered cheek,
Thy temples fringed with locks of gleaming
white,

And head that droops because the soul is meek,
Thee with the welcome Snowdrop I compare;
That child of winter, prompting thoughts that
climb

From desolation toward the genial prime;
Or with the Moon conquering earth's misty air,
And filling more and more with crystal light
As pensive Evening deepens into night.

Nought but that word assigned to the unknown,
That solitary word-to separate

From all, and cast a cloud around the fate
Of him who lies beneath. Most wretched one,
Who chose his epitaph?-Himself alone
Could thus have dared the grave to agitate,
And claim, among the dead, this awful crown;
Nor doubt that He marked also for his own
Close to these cloistral steps a burial-place,
That every foot might fall with heavier tread,
Trampling upon his vileness. Stranger, pass
Softly!-To save the contrite, Jesus bled.

xx.

ROMAN ANTIQUITIES DISCOVERED AT BISHOP-
STONE, HEREFORDSHIRE.

WHILE poring Antiquarians search the ground
Upturned with curious pains, the Bard, a Seer,
Takes fire:-The men that have been reap-

pear;

Romans for travel girt, for business gowned;
And some recline on couches, myrtle-crowned,
In festal glee: why not? For fresh and clear,
As if its hues were of the passing year,
Dawns this time-buried pavement. From that
mound

Hoards may come forth of Trajans, Maximins,
Shrunk into coins with all their warlike toil:
Or a fierce impress issues with its foil
Of tenderness-the Wolf, whose suckling

Twins

The unlettered ploughboy pities when he wins
The casual treasure from the furrowed soil.

XXI.
1830.
CHATSWORTH! thy stately mansion, and the
pride
present

Of thy domain, strange contrast do
To house and home in many a craggy rent
Of the wild Peak; where new-born waters
glide

Through fields whose thrifty occupants abide
As in a dear and chosen banishment,

* The river Rotha, that flows into Windermere from the Lakes of Grasmere and Rydal.

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A TRADITION OF OKER HILL IN DARLEY Dale, DERBYSHIRE.

'Tis said that to the brow of yon fair hill
Two Brothers clomb, and, turning face from
face,

Nor one look more exchanging, grief to still
Or feed, each planted on that lofty place
A chosen Tree; then, eager to fulfil
Their courses, like two new-born rivers, they
In opposite directions urged their way
Down from the far-seen mount. No blast
might kill

Or blight that fond memorial;-the trees grew,
And now entwine their arms; but ne'er again
Embraced those. Brothers upon Earth's wide
plain;

Nor aught of mutual joy or sorrow knew
Until their spirits mingled in the sea
That to itself takes all, Eternity.

XXIII.

LIAL PIETY.

(ON THE WAYSIDE BETWEEN PRESTON AND LIVERPOOL.)

UNTOUCHED through all severity of cold;
Inviolate, whate'er the cottage hearth
Might need for comfort, or for festal mirth;
That Pile of Turf is half a century old:
Yes, Traveller! fifty winters have been told
Since suddenly the dart of death went forth
'Gainst him who raised it,-his last work on
earth:

Thence has it, with the Son, so strong a hold
Upon his Father's memory, that his hands,
Through reverence, touch it only to repair
Its waste. Though crumbling with each
breath of air,

In annual renovation thus it stands-
Rude Mausoleum! but wrens nestle there,
And red-breasts warble when sweet sounds are

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Unrecognised through many a household tear More prompt, more glad, to fall than drops of dew

By morning shed around a flower half-blown;
Tears of delight, that testified how true
To life thou art, and, in thy truth, how dear!

XXV.

WHY art thou silent? Is thy love a plant
of such weak fibre that the treacherous air

Of absence withers what was once so fair?
Is there no debt to pay, no boon to grant?
Yet have my thoughts for thee been vigilant-
Bound to thy service with unceasing care,
The mind's least generous wish a mendicant
For nought but what thy happiness could spare.
Speak-though this soft warm heart, once free
to hold

A thousand tender pleasures, thine and mine,
Be left more desolate, more dreary cold
Than a forsaken bird's-nest filled with snow
'Mid its own bush of leafless eglantine-
Speak, that my torturing doubts their end may
know!

XXVI.

TO B. R. HAYDON, ON SEEING HIS PICTURE OF
NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE ON THE ISLAND OF
ST HELENA.

HAYDON! let worthier judges praise the skill
Here by thy pencil shown in truth of lines
And charm of colours; I applaud those signs
Of thought, that give the true poetic thrill;
That unencumbered whole of blank and still,
Sky without cloud-ocean without a wave;
And the one Man that laboured to enslave
The World, sole-standing high on the bare hill-
Back turned, arms folded, the unapparent face
Tinged, we may fancy, in this dreary place
With light reflected from the invisible sun
Set, like his fortunes; but not set for aye
Like them. The unguilty Power pursues his

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A POET!-He hath put his heart to school,
Nor dares to move unpropped upon the staff
Which Art hath lodged within his hand-must
laugh

By precept only, and shed tears by rule.
Thy Art be Nature; the live current quaff,
And let the groveller sip his stagnant pool,
In fear that else, when Critics grave and cool
Have killed him, Scorn should write his epitaph.
How does the Meadow-flower its bloom unfold?
Because the lovely little flower is free
Down to its root, and, in that freedom, bold;
And so the grandeur of the Forest-tree
Comes not by casting in a formal mould,
But from its own divine vitality.

XXVIII.

THE most alluring clouds that mount the sky
Owe to a troubled element their forms,
Their hues to sunset. If with raptured eye
We watch their splendour, shall we covet storms,
And wish the Lord of day his slow decline
Would hasten, that such pomp may float on

high?

Behold, already they forget to shine,
Dissolve-and leave to him who gazed a sigh.
Not loth to thank each moment for its boon

POEMS OF THE IMAGINATION.

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On ground yet strewn with their last battles

wreck;

Let the Steed glory while his Master's hand
Lies fixed for ages on his conscious neck;

But by the Chieftain's look, though at his side
Hangs that day's treasured sword, how firm a
check

Is given to triumph and all human pride!
Yon trophied Mound shrinks to a shadowy speck
In his calm presence! Him the mighty deed
Elates not, brought far nearer the grave's rest,
As shows that time-worn face, for he such seed
Has sown as yields, we trust, the fruit of fame
In Heaven; hence no one blushes for thy name,
Conqueror, mid some sad thoughts, divinely

blest!

XXX.

COMPOSED ON A MAY MORNING, 1838.
LIFE with yon Lambs, like day, is just begun,
Yet Nature seems to them a heavenly guide.
Does joy approach? they meet the coming tide;
And sullenness avoid, as now they shun
Pale twilight's lingering glooms,-and in the

sun

Couch near their dams, with quiet satisfied;
Or gambol-each with his shadow at his side,
Varying its shape wherever he may run.
As they from turf yet hoar with sleepy dew
All turn, and court the shining and the green,
Where herbs look up, and opening flowers are

seen;

Why to God's goodness cannot We be true,
And so, His gifts and promises between,
Feed to the last on pleasures ever new?

XXXI.

Lo! where she stands fixed in a saint-like
trance,

One upward hand, as if she needed rest
From rapture, lying softly on her breast!
Nor wants her eyeball an ethereal glance;
But not the less-nay more-that countenance,
While thus illumined, tells of painful strife
For a sick heart made weary of this life
By love, long crossed with adverse circumstance.
-Would She were now as when she hoped to

pass

At God's appointed hour to them who tread
Heaven's sapphire pavement; yet breathed well

content,

Well pleased, her foot should print earth's

common grass,

Lived thankful for day's light, for daily bread,
For health, and time in obvious duty spent.

XXXII.

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Who, yielding not to changes Time has made,
By the habitual light of memory see
Eyes unbedimmed, see bloom that cannot fade,
And smiles that from their birth-place ne'er
shall flee

Into the land where ghosts and phantoms be;
And, seeing this, own nothing in its stead.
Couldst thou go back into far-distant years,
Or share with me, fond thought! that inward
Then, and then only, Painter ! could thy Art
The visual powers of Nature satisfy,
Which hold, whate'er to common sight appears,
Their sovereign empire in a faithful heart.

eye,

XXXIII.

ON THE SAME SUBJECT.
THOUGH I beheld at first with blank surprise
This Work, I now have gazed on it so long
O, my Beloved! I have done thee wrong,
I see its truth with unreluctant eyes:
Conscious of blessedness, but, whence it sprung,
Morn into noon did pass, noon into eve,
Ever too heedless, as I now perceive:
And the old day was welcome as the young,
As welcome, and as beautiful-in sooth
More beautiful, as being a thing more holy:
Thanks to thy virtues, to the eternal youth
Of all thy goodness, never melancholy;
To thy large heart and humble mind, that cast
Into one vision, future, present, past.

XXXIV.

HARK! 'tis the Thrush, undaunted, undeprest,
By twilight premature of cloud and rain;
Nor does that roaring wind deaden his strain
Who carols thinking of his Love and nest,
And seems, as more incited, still more blest.
Thanks; thou hast snapped a fire-side Prisoner's
chain,

Exulting Warbler! eased a fretted brain,
And in a moment charmed my cares to rest.
Yes, I will forth, bold Bird! and front the blast,
That we may sing together, if thou wilt,
So loud, so clear, my Partner through life's day,
Mute in her nest love-chosen, if not love-built
Like thine, shall gladden, as in seasons past,
Thrilled by loose snatches of the social Lay.
Rydal Mount, 1838.

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ness

Who meet most feelingly the calls of sadness.

XXXVI.

OH what a Wreck! how changed in mien and
speech!
mystery, spin
Yet-though dread

Powers, that work in

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O'er the chilled heart-reflect: far, far within
Hers is a holy Being, freed from Sin.
She is not what she seems, a forlorn wretch,
But delegated Spirits comfort fetch
To Her from heights that Reason may not win.
Like Children, She is privileged to hold
Divine communion; both do live and move,
Whate'er to shallow Faith their ways unfold,
Inly illumined by Heaven's pitying love;
Love pitying innocence not long to last,
In them-in Her our sins and sorrows past.

XXXVII.

| Reader, farewell! My last words let them be-
If in this book Fancy and Truth agree;
If simple Nature trained by careful Art
Through It have won a passage to thy heart;
Grant me thy love, I crave no other fee!

XL.

TO THE REV, CHRISTOPHER WORDSWORTH, D.D.
MASTER OF HARROW SCHOOL,

After the perusal of his Theophilus Anglicanus,
recently published.

ENLIGHTENED Teacher, gladly from thy hand
Have I rceived this proof of pains bestowed
By Thee to guide thy Pupils on the road

INTENT on gathering wool from hedge and That, in our native isle, and every land,

brake

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A PLEA FOR AUTHORS, MAY 1838.
FAILING impartial measure to dispense
To every suitor, Equity is lame :
And social Justice, stript of reverence
For natural rights, a mockery and a shame;
Law but a servile dupe of false pretence,
If, guarding grossest things from common claim
Now and for ever, She, to works that came
From mind and spirit, grudge a short-lived
fence.

"What! lengthened privilege, a lineal tie,
For Books!" Yes, heartless Ones, or be it

proved

That 'tis a fault in Us to have lived and loved
Like others, with like temporal hopes to die;
No public harm that Genius from her course
Be turned; and streams of truth dried up, even
at their source !

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The Church, when trusting in divine command
And in her Catholic attributes, hath trod:
O may these lessons be with profit scanned
To thy heart's wish, thy labour blest by God!
So the bright faces of the young and gay
Shall look more bright-the happy, happier
still:

Catch, in the pauses of their keenest play,
Motions of thought which elevate the will
And, like the Spire that from your classic Hill
Points heavenward, indicate the end and way.
Rydal Mount, Dec. 11, 1843.

XLI.

TO THE PLANET VENUS.

Upon its approximation (as an Evening Star)
to the Earth, Jan. 1838.
WHAT strong allurement draws, what spirit
guides,

Thee, Vesper! brightening still, as if the nearer
Thou com'st to man's abode the spot grew

dearer

Night after night? True is it Nature hides
Her treasures less and less. -Man now presides
In power, where once he trembled in his weak-

ness;

Science advances with gigantic strides ;
But are we aught enriched in love and meek-

ness?

Aught dost thou see, bright Star! of pure and wise

More than in humbler times graced human

story;

That makes our hearts more apt to sympathise
With heaven, our souls more fit for future

glory,

When earth shall vanish from our closing eyes,
Ere we lie down in our last dormitory?

XLII.

WANSFELL this Household has a favoured
lot,

Living with liberty on thee to gaze,
To watch while Morn first crowns thee with
her rays,

Or when along thy breast serenely float
Evening's angelic clouds. Yet ne'er a note
Hath sounded (shame upon the Bard!) thy
praise

For all that thou, as if from heaven, hast
brought

The Hill that rises to the south-east, above Ambleside.

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