VIII. SHE dwelt among the untrodden ways A Maid whom there were none to praise, A Violet by a mossy stone Half-hidden from the eye! -Fair as a star, when only one Is shining in the sky. She lived unknown, and few could know When Lucy ceased to be; But she is in her Grave, and, oh, The difference to me! IX. I TRAVELL'D among unknown Men, Nor, England! did I know till then "Tis past, that melancholy dream! Nor will I quit thy shore A second time; for still I seem To love thee more and more. Among thy mountains did I feel The joy of my desire; And She I cherished turned her wheel Beside an English fire. Thy mornings shewed, thy nights concealed The bowers where Lucy played; And thine is too the last green field That Lucy's eyes surveyed. I MET Louisa in the shade; And, having seen that lovely Maid, Why should I fear to say That she is ruddy, fleet, and strong; And down the rocks can leap along, And she hath smiles to earth unknown; Smiles, that with motion of their own Do spread, and sink, and rise; That come and go with endless play, And ever, as they pass away, Are hidden in her eyes. She loves her fire, her Cottage-home; Yet o'er the moorland will she roam And, when against the wind she strains, Oh! might I kiss the mountain rains Take all that's mine "beneath the moon," If I with her but half a noon May sit beneath the walls Of some old cave, or mossy nook, When up she winds along the brook, To hunt the waterfalls. XI. "Tis said, that some have died for love: And here and there a church-yard grave is found In the cold North's unhallowed ground, Because the wretched Man himself had slain, His love was such a grievous pain. And there is one whom I five years have known; He dwells alone Upon Helvellyn's side : He loved the pretty Barbara died, And thus he makes his moan: Three years had Barbara in her grave been laid When thus his moan he made; "Oh, move, thou Cottage, from behind that oak! Or let the aged tree uprooted lie, That in some other way yon smoke |