A cunning artist will I have to frame
        A bason 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 brute! 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,
        I will come hither with my paramour;
      And with the dancers, and the minstrel’s song,
        We will make merry in that pleasant bower.

      Till the foundations of the mountains fail,
        My mansion with its arbour shall endure;—­
      The joy of them who till the fields of Swale,
        And them who dwell among the woods of Ure!”

      Then home he went, and left the hart, stone-dead,
        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,
        A cup of stone received the living well;
      Three pillars of rude stone Sir Walter reared,
        And built a house of pleasure in the dell.

      And near the fountain, flowers of stature tall
        With trailing plants and trees were intertwined,—­
      Which soon composed a little sylvan hall,
        A leafy shelter from the sun and wind.

      And thither, when the summer-days were long,
        Sir Walter journeyed with his paramour;
      And with the dancers and the minstrel’s song
        Made merriment within that pleasant bower.

      The knight, Sir Walter, died in course of time,
        And his bones lie in his paternal vale.—­
      But there is matter for a second rhyme,
        And I to this would add another tale.”

PART SECOND.

      “The moving accident is not my trade: 
        To freeze the blood I have no ready arts: 
      ’Tis my delight, alone in summer shade,
        To pipe a simple song for thinking hearts.

      As I from Hawes to Richmond did repair,
        It chanced that I saw standing in a dell
      Three aspens at three corners of a square,
        And one, not four yards distant, near a well.

      What this imported I could ill divine: 
        And, pulling now the rein my horse to stop,
      I saw three pillars standing in a line,
        The last stone pillar on a dark hill-top.

      The trees were gray, with neither arms nor head;
        Half-wasted the square mound of tawny green;
      So that you just might say, as then I said,
        “Here in old time the hand of man hath been.”