Gloomy and dark art thou-the crowded firs
Tower from thy shores, and stretch across thy bed,
Making thee doleful as a cavern-well :
Save when the shy king-fishers build their nest
On thy steep banks, no loves hast thou, wild stream!
This be thy chosen haunt-emancipate
From passion's dreams, a freeman, and alone,
'I rise and trace its devious course. O lead,
Lead me to deeper shades and lonelier glooms.
Lo! stealing through the canopy of firs
How fair the sunshine spots that mossy rock,
Isle of the river, whose disparted waters
Dart off asunder with an angry sound,
How soon to re-unite! They meet, they join
In deep embrace, and open to the Sun
Lie calm and smooth. Such the delicious hour
Of deep enjoyment, following love's brief feuds !
And hark, the noise of a near waterfall!
I came out into light-I find myself
Beneath a weeping birch (most beautiful
Of forest-trees, the Lady of the woods),
Hard by the brink of a tall weedy rock
That overbrows the cataract. How bursts
The landscape on my sight! Two crescent hills
Fold in behind each other, and so make
A circular vale, and land-lock'd, as might seem,
With brook and bridge, and grey stone cottages,
Half hid by rocks and fruit-trees. Beneath my feet,
The whortle-berries are bedewed with spray,
Dashed upwards by the furious waterfall.
How solemnly the pendent ivy-mass
Swings in its winnow! All the air is calm.
The smoke from cottage-chimnies, ting'd with light, Rises in columns: from this house alone,
Close by the waterfall, the column slants,
And feels its ceaseless breeze.
That cottage, with its slanting chimney-smoke,
And close beside its porch a sleeping child,
His dear head pillowed on a sleeping dog-
One arm between its fore legs, and the hand
Holds loosely its small handful of wild-flowers,
Unfilletted, and of unequal lengths.
A curious picture, with a master's haste
Sketch'd on a strip of pinky-silver skin,
Peel'd from the birchen bark! Divinest maid!
Yon bark her canvas, and those purple berries
Her pencil! See, the juice is scarcely dried
On the fine skin! She has been newly here;
And lo! yon patch of heath has been her couch-
The pressure still remains! O blessed couch!
For this may'st thou flower early, and the Sun,
Slanting at eve, rest bright, and linger long
Upon thy purple bells! O Isabel !
Daughter of genius! stateliest of our maids!
More beautiful than whom Alcæus woo'd
The Lesbian woman of immortal song!
O child of genius! stately, beautiful,
And full of love to all, save only me,
And not ungentle e'en to me! My heart,
Why beats it thus? Through yonder coppice-wood
Needs must the pathway turn, that leads straightway
On to her father's house. She is alone!
The night draws on-such ways are hard to hit—
And fit it is I should restore this sketch,
Dropt unawares no doubt. Why should I yearn
To keep the relique ? 'twill but idly feed
The passion that consumes me. Let me haste !
The picture in my hand which she has left;
She cannot blame me that I follow'd her:
And I may be her guide the long wood through
Not loving Oropeza. True, I woo'd her,
Hoping to heal a deeper wound; but she
Met my advances with empassion'd pride,
That kindled love with love. And when her sire,
Who in his dream of hope already grasp'd
The golden circlet in his hand, rejected
My suit with insult, and in memory
Of ancient feuds pour'd curses on my head,
Her blessings overtook and baffled them!
But thou art stern, and with unkindly countenance
Art inly reasoning whilst thou listen'st to me.
Anxiously,, Henry! reasoning anxiously.
Earl HENRY.
Blessings gather round her!
Within this wood there winds a secret passage,
Beneath the walls, which opens out at length
Into the gloomiest covert of the Garden-
The night ere my departure to the army,
She, nothing trembling, led me thro' that gloom,
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