"I'll build a pleasure-house upon this spot, And a small arbour, made for rural joy; 'Twill be the traveller's shed, the pilgrim's cot, A place of love for damsels that are coy. "A cunning artist will I have to frame A basin for that fountain in the dell ! And they who do make mention of the same, From this day forth shall call it HART-LEAP WELL. "And, gallant stag! to make thy praises known, Another monument shall here be raised; Three several pillars, each a rough-hewn stone, And planted where thy hoofs the turf have grazed. "And, in the summer-time when days are long, "Till the foundations of the mountains fail Then home he went, and left the hart, stonedead, With breathless nostrils stretched above the spring. Soon did the knight perform what he had said, And far and wide the fame thereof did ring. Ere thrice the moon into her port had steered, And near the fountain, flowers of stature tall With trailing plants and trees were intertwined,— Which soon composed a little sylvan hall, And thither, when the summer days were long, The knight, Sir Walter, died in course of time, PART II. THE moving accident is not my trade, What this imported I could ill divine: The last stone pillar on a dark hill-top. The trees were grey, with neither arms nor head: I looked upon the hill both far and near, I stood in various thoughts and fancies lost, The shepherd stopped, and that same story told "You see these lifeless stumps of aspen wood— Some say that they are beeches, others elmsThese were the bower: and here a mansion stood, The finest palace of a hundred realms ! "The arbour does its own condition tell; "There's neither dog nor heifer, horse nor sheep, "Some say that here a murder has been done "What thoughts must through the creature's brain have past! Even from the topmost stone, upon the steep, Are but three bounds—and look, sir, at this last O master! it has been a cruel leap. "For thirteen hours he ran a desperate race; And in my simple mind we cannot tell What cause the hart might have to love this place, And come and make his death-bed near the well. "Here on the grass perhaps asleep he sank, Lulled by this fountain in the summer-tide; This water was perhaps the first he drank When he had wandered from his mother's side. "In April here beneath the scented thorn He heard the birds their morning carols sing; And he, perhaps, for aught we know, was born Not half a furlong from that self-same spring. "Now, here is neither grass nor pleasant shade; The sun on drearier hollow never shone; So will it be, as I have often said, Till trees, and stones, and fountain, all are gone." "Gray-headed shepherd, thou hast spoken well; Small difference lies between thy creed and mine : This beast not unobserved by Nature fell; His death was mourned by sympathy divine. "The Being that is in the clouds and air, That is in the green leaves among the groves, Maintains a deep and reverential care For the unoffending creatures whom He loves. "The pleasure-house is dust :-behind, before, This is no common waste, no common gloom; But Nature, in due course of time, once more Shall here put on her beauty and her bloom. "She leaves these objects to a slow decay, That what we are, and have been, may be known; But, at the coming of the milder day, |