2. THE SOLITARY REAPER. Behold her, single in the field, Yon solitary Highland Lass! Alone she cuts, and binds the grain, No Nightingale did ever chaunt Of Travellers in some shady haunt, No sweeter voice was ever heard In spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird, Breaking the silence of the seas Among the farthest Hebrides. Will no one tell me what she sings ? For old, unhappy, far-off things, Or is it some more humble lay, Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain, That has been, and may be again! Whate'er the theme, the Maiden sung And o'er the sickle bending; 3. STEPPING WESTWARD. While my Fellow-traveller and I were walking by the side of Loch Ketterine, one fine evening after sun-set, in our road to a Hut where in the course of our Tour we had been hospitably entertained some weeks before, we met, in one of the loneliest parts of that solitary region, two well dressed Women, one of whom said to us, by way of greeting, "What you are stepping westward?" "What you are stepping westward ? ” "Yea." -'Twould be a wildish destiny, If we, who thus together roam In a strange Land, and far from home, The dewy ground was dark and cold; I liked the greeting; 'twas a sound The voice was soft, and she who spake Was walking by her native Lake: The salutation had to me The very sound of courtesy: It's power was felt; and while my eye A human sweetness with the thought |