CCXX HYMN BEFORE SUNRISE, IN THE VALE OF CHAMOUNI. Hast thou a charm to stay the morning star In his steep course? So long he seems to pause Rave ceaselessly; but thou, most awful Form! O dread and silent Mount! I gazed upon thee, Till thou, still present to the bodily sense, 5 10 Didst vanish from my thought: entranced in prayer 15 I worshipped the Invisible alone. Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody, So sweet, we know not we are listening to it, Thou, the meanwhile, wast blending with my thought, Yea, with my life and life's own secret joy, 20 Till the dilating soul, enrapt, transfused, Into the mighty vision passing-there, As in her natural form, swelled vast to Heaven! Thou owest! not alone these swelling tears, 25 Thou first and chief, sole sovran of the Vale! Oh, struggling with the darkness all the night, And visited all night by troops of stars, 30 Or when they climb the sky, or when they sink : And you, ye five wild torrents, fiercely glad! 35 40 Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your joy, 45 Unceasing thunder and eternal foam? And who commanded (and the silence came,) Here let the billows stiffen and have rest? Ye ice-falls! ye that from the mountain's brow Adown enormous ravines slope amain- 50 Who made you glorious as the gates of Heaven 55 59 Ye living flowers that skirt the eternal frost ! Ye wild goats sporting round the eagle's nest ! Ye eagles, playmates of the mountain-storm! Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the clouds ! 65 Ye signs and wonders of the elements, Utter forth God, and fill the hills with praise ! 71 Thou, too, hoar Mount! with thy sky-pointing peaks, Oft from whose feet the avalanche, unheard, Shoots downward, glittering through the pure serene, Into the depth of clouds that veil thy breast— Thou too again, stupendous Mountain! thou, That as I raise my head, awhile bowed low 75 In adoration, upward from thy base Slow travelling with dim eyes suffused with tears, Rise like a cloud of incense from the earth! 80 Thou kingly Spirit throned among the hills, Thou dread ambassador from Earth to Heaven, 85 Earth, with her thousand voices, praises God. CCXXI Samuel Taylor Coleridge. THE DANISH BOY. Between two sister moorland rills And in this smooth and open dell A thing no storm can e'er destroy, In clouds above the lark is heard, 5 1Ο Within this lonesome nook the bird Did never build her nest. No beast, no bird hath here his home; The Danish boy walks here alone: A Spirit of noonday is he, Yet seems a form of flesh and blood; 15 20 25 A regal vest of fur he wears, In colour like a raven's wing; It fears not rain, nor wind, nor dew; The lovely Danish boy is blest, And happy in his flowery cove: From bloody deeds his thoughts are far; That seem like songs of love, For calm and gentle is his mien ; 50 Like a dead boy he is serene. 55 William Wordsworth. CCXXII ON REVISITING THE BANKS OF THE WYE. Five years have passed; five summers, with the length These waters, rolling from their mountain springs 5 Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect These plots of cottage ground, these orchard tufts, These beauteous forms Through a long absence have not been to me ΙΟ 15 20 |