From “The Lady of the Lake,” Canto I.
THE STAG at eve had drunk his fill,
Where danced the moon on Monan’s rill,
And deep his midnight lair had made
In lone Glenartney’s hazel shade;
But, when the sun his beacon red
Had kindled on Benvoirlich’s head,
The deep-mouthed bloodhound’s heavy bay
Resounded up the rocky way,
And...
From “The Seasons: Autumn”
THE STAG too, singled from the herd where long
He ranged, the branching monarch of the shades,
Before the tempest drives. At first, in speed
He, sprightly, puts his faith; and, roused by fear,
Gives all his swift aerial soul to flight.
Against the breeze he darts, that way the more
To leave the lessening...
From the German by Charles Timothy Brooks
A Song to Be Sung behind the Stove
OLD Winter is the man for me—
Stout-hearted, sound, and steady;
Steel nerves and bones of brass hath he:
Come snow, come blow, he ’s ready!
If ever man was well, ’t is he;
He keeps no fire in his chamber,
And yet from cold and cough is free...
From “The Seasons: Winter”
THE KEENER tempests rise; and fuming dun
From all the livid east, or piercing north,
Thick clouds ascend; in whose capacious womb
A vapory deluge lies, to snow congealed.
Heavy they roll their fleecy world along;
And the sky saddens with the gathered storm.
Through the hushed air the whitening shower descends...
From the German by Charles Timothy Brooks
SUMMER joys are o’er;
Flowerets bloom no more,
Wintry winds are sweeping;
Through the snow-drifts peeping,
Cheerful evergreen
Rarely now is seen.
Now no plumèd throng
Charms the wood with song;
Ice-bound trees are glittering;
Merry snow-birds, twittering,...
From “The Winter Morning Walk:” “The Task,” Bk. V.
’T IS the morning, and the sun with ruddy orb
Ascending fires the horizon; while the clouds,
That crowd away before the driving wind,
More ardent as the disc emerges more,
Resembles most some city in a blaze,
Seen through the leafless wood. His slanting ray
Slides ineffectual down the...
Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes;
Flow gently, I ’ll sing thee a song in thy praise;
My Mary ’s asleep by thy murmuring stream,
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.
Thou stock-dove whose echo resounds through the glen,
Ye wild whistling blackbirds in yon thorny den,
Thou green-crested lapwing, thy screaming forbear;...
’t Was morn, and beautiful the mountain’s brow—
Hung with the clusters of the bending vine—
Shone in the early light, when on the Rhine
We sailed and heard the waters round the prow
In murmurs parting; varying as we go,
Rocks after rocks come forward and retire,
As some gray convent wall or sunlit spire
Starts up along the banks,...
MY mule refreshed, his bells
Jingled once more, the signal to depart,
And we set out in the gray light of dawn,
Descending rapidly,—by waterfalls
Fast frozen, and among huge blocks of ice
That in their long career had stopt midway;
At length, unchecked, unbidden, he stood still,
And all his bells were muffled. Then my guide,...
O Reader! hast thou ever stood to see
The holly-tree?
The eye that contemplates it well perceives
Its glossy leaves
Ordered by an intelligence so wise
As might confound the atheist’s sophistries.
Below, a circling fence, its leaves are seen
Wrinkled and keen;
No grazing cattle, through their prickly...
