But if the chain they bring thee ever,

Heavier, more fraught with weal or woe,
I’d then, Lisette, reproach thee never

If thou shouldst greater scruples show.

1775.*
-----
On the lake,

[Written on the occasion of Goethe’s starting with his friend Passavant on a Swiss Tour.]

I drink fresh nourishment, new blood

From out this world more free;
The Nature is so kind and good

That to her breast clasps me! 
The billows toss our bark on high,

And with our oars keep time,
While cloudy mountains tow’rd the sky

Before our progress climb.

Say, mine eye, why sink’st thou down? 
Golden visions, are ye flown?

Hence, thou dream, tho’ golden-twin’d;

Here, too, love and life I find.

Over the waters are blinking

Many a thousand fair star;
Gentle mists are drinking

Round the horizon afar. 
Round the shady creek lightly

Morning zephyrs awake,
And the ripen’d fruit brightly

Mirrors itself in the lake.

1775.
-----
From the mountain.

[Written just after the preceding one, on a mountain overlooking the Lake of Zurich.]

If I, dearest Lily, did not love thee,

How this prospect would enchant my sight! 
And yet if I, Lily, did not love thee,

Could I find, or here, or there, delight?

1775.
-----
Flower-salute.

This nosegay,—­’twas I dress’d it,—­

Greets thee a thousand times! 
Oft stoop’d I, and caress’d it,

Ah! full a thousand times,
And ’gainst my bosom press’d it

A hundred thousand times!

1815.*
-----
In summer.

How plain and height
With dewdrops are bright! 
How pearls have crown’d
The plants all around! 
How sighs the breeze
Thro’ thicket and trees! 
How loudly in the sun’s clear rays
The sweet birds carol forth their lays!

But, ah! above,
Where saw I my love,
Within her room,
Small, mantled in gloom,
Enclosed around,
Where sunlight was drown’d,
How little there was earth to me,
With all its beauteous majesty!

1776.*
-----
May song.

Between wheatfield and corn,
Between hedgerow and thorn,
Between pasture and tree,
Where’s my sweetheart
Tell it me!

Sweetheart caught I

Not at home;
She’s then, thought I.

Gone to roam. 
Fair and loving

Blooms sweet May;
Sweetheart’s roving,

Free and gay.

By the rock near the wave,
Where her first kiss she gave,
On the greensward, to me,—­
Something I see! 
Is it she?

1812.
-----
Premature spring.

Days full of rapture,