The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth — Volume 1 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 540 pages of information about The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth — Volume 1.
prays, 200
  The kneeling peasant scarcely dares to gaze;
  By many a votive death-cross [Q] planted near,
  And watered duly with the pious tear,
  That faded silent from the upward eye
  Unmoved with each rude form of peril nigh; [52] 205
  Fixed on the anchor left by Him who saves
  Alike in whelming snows, and roaring waves.

    But soon a peopled region on the sight
  Opens—­a little world of calm delight; [53]
  Where mists, suspended on the expiring gale, 210
  Spread roof like o’er the deep secluded vale, [54]
  And beams of evening slipping in between,
  Gently illuminate a sober scene:—­[55]
  Here, on the brown wood-cottages [R] they sleep, [56]
  There, over rock or sloping pasture creep. [57] 215
  On as we journey, in clear view displayed,
  The still vale lengthens underneath its shade
  Of low-hung vapour:  on the freshened mead
  The green light sparkles;—­the dim bowers recede. [58]
  While pastoral pipes and streams the landscape lull, 220
  And bells of passing mules that tinkle dull,
  In solemn shapes before the admiring eye
  Dilated hang the misty pines on high,
  Huge convent domes with pinnacles and towers,
  And antique castles seen through gleamy [59] showers. 225

    From such romantic dreams, my soul, awake! 
  To sterner pleasure, where, by Uri’s lake
  In Nature’s pristine majesty outspread,
  Winds neither road nor path for foot to tread:  [60]
  The rocks rise naked as a wall, or stretch, 230
  Far o’er the water, hung with groves of beech; [61]
  Aerial pines from loftier steeps ascend,
  Nor stop but where creation seems to end. [62]
  Yet here and there, if ’mid the savage scene
  Appears a scanty plot of smiling green, 235
  Up from the lake a zigzag path will creep
  To reach a small wood-hut hung boldly on the steep. [63]
 —­Before those thresholds (never can they know [64]
  The face of traveller passing to and fro,)
  No peasant leans upon his pole, to tell 240
  For whom at morning tolled the funeral bell;
  Their watch-dog ne’er his angry bark foregoes,
  Touched by the beggar’s moan of human woes;
  The shady porch ne’er offered a cool seat
  To pilgrims overcome by summer’s heat. [65] 245
  Yet thither the world’s business finds its way
  At times, and tales unsought beguile the day,
  And there are those fond thoughts which Solitude, [66]
  However stern, is powerless to exclude. [67]
  There doth the maiden watch her lover’s sail 250
  Approaching, and upbraid the tardy gale;
  At midnight listens till his parting oar,
  And its last echo, can be heard no more. [68]

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The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth — Volume 1 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.