Stiff, land, and upright; a more meager man
  Was never seen before by night or day. 
  Long were his arms, pallid his hands; his mouth
  Looked ghastly in the moonlight:  from behind,
  A mile-stone propped him; I could also ken
  That he was clothed in military garb. 
  Though faded, yet entire.  Companionless,
  No dog attending, by no staff sustained,
  He stood, and in his very dress appeared
  A desolation, a simplicity,
  To which the trappings of a gaudy world
  Make a strange back-ground.  From his lips, ere long,
  Issued low muttered sounds, as if of pain
  Or some uneasy thought; yet still his form
  Kept the same awful steadiness—­at his feet
  His shadow lay, and moved not.  From self-blame
  Not wholly free, I watched him thus; at length
  Subduing my heart’s specious cowardice,
  I left the shady nook where I had stood
  And hailed him.  Slowly from his resting-place
  He rose, and with a lean and wasted arm
  In measured gesture lifted to his head
  Returned my salutation; then resumed
  His station as before:  and when I asked
  His history, the veteran, in reply,
  Was neither slow nor eager; but, unmoved,
  And with a quiet, uncomplaining voice,
  A stately air of mild indifference,
  He told in few plain words a soldier’s tale—­
  That in the Tropic Islands he had served,
  Whence he had landed scarcely three weeks past;
  That on his landing he had been dismissed,
  And now was traveling toward his native home. 
  This heard, I said, in pity, “Come with me.” 
  He stooped, and straightway from the ground took up,
  An oaken staff by me yet unobserved—­
  A staff which must have dropt from his slack hand
  And lay till now neglected in the grass. 
  Though weak his step and cautious, he appeared
  To travel without pain, and I beheld,
  With an astonishment but ill-suppressed,
  His ghostly figure moving at my side;
  Nor could I, while we journeyed thus, forbear
  To turn from present hardships to the past,
  And speak of war, battle, and pestilence,
  Sprinkling this talk with questions, better spared. 
  On what he might himself have seen or felt
  He all the while was in demeanor calm. 
  Concise in answer:  solemn and sublime
  He might have seen, but that in all he said
  There was a strange half-absence, as of one
  Knowing too well the importance of his theme
  But feeling it no longer.  Our discourse
  Soon ended, and together on we passed
  In silence through a wood gloomy and still. 
  Up-turning, then, along an open field,
  We reached a cottage.  At the door I knocked. 
  And earnestly to charitable care
  Commended him as a poor friendless man,
  Belated and by sickness overcome. 
  Assured that now the traveler would repose
  In comfort, I entreated that henceforth
  He would not linger in the public ways,