Nor Hunger driven the herds from pastures bare,

To climb the treacherous cliffs for scanty fare.

Then the milk-thistle flourished through the land,

And forced the full-swoln udder to demand, Thrice every day, the pail and welcome hand.

Thus does the father to his children tell 399
Of banished bliss, by fancy loved too well.
Alas! that human guilt provoked the rod
Of angry Nature to avenge her God.
Still, Nature, ever just, to him imparts
Joys only given to uncorrupted hearts.
"Tis morn: with gold the verdant moun-
tain glows

More high, the snowy peaks with hues of

He, all superior but his God disdained, Walked none restraining, and by none restrained

Confessed no law but what his reason taught Did all he wished, and wished but what he ought.

As man in his primeval dower arrayed
The image of his glorious Sire displayed, 44
Even so, by faithful Nature guarded, here
The traces of primeval Man appear;
The simple dignity no forms debase;
The eye sublime, and surly lion-grace:
The slave of none, of beasts alone the lord
His book he prizes, nor neglects his sword
Well taught by that to feel his rights, pre
pared

With this "the blessings he enjoys t= guard."

And, as his native hills encircle ground For many a marvellous victory renowned, The work of Freedom daring to oppose, 45 With few in arms, innumerable foes, When to those famous fields his steps are led An unknown power connects him with the dead:

For images of other worlds are there; Awful the light, and holy is the air. Fitfully, and in flashes, through his soul, Like sun-lit tempests, troubled transport roll;

His bosom heaves, his Spirit towers amain Beyond the senses and their little reign. 46 And oft, when that dread vision hath pas

The sky-roofed temple of the eternal hills
Or when, upon the mountain's silent brow
Reclined, he sees, above him and below,
Bright stars of ice and azure fields of snow
While needle peaks of granite shooting bar
Tremble in ever-varying tints of air.
And when a gathering weight of shadow
brown

Falls on the valleys as the sun goes down: And Pikes, of darkness named and fear an storms,

Uplift in quiet their illumined forms,
In sea-like reach of prospect round him
spread,
Tinged like an angel's smile all rosy red-

Through Nature's vale his homely pleasures glide,

Unstained by envy, discontent, and pride;
The bound of all his vanity, to deck,
With one bright bell, a favourite heifer's
neck;

Well pleased upon some simple annual feast, Remembered half the year and hoped the rest,

500

If dairy-produce, from his inner hoard,
Of thrice ten summers dignify the board.
Alas! in every clime a flying ray
Is all we have to cheer our wintry way;
And here the unwilling mind may more than
trace

The general sorrows of the human race;
The churlish gales of penury, that blow
Cold as the north-wind o'er a waste of snow,
To them the gentle groups of bliss deny
That on the noon-day bank of leisure lie.
Yet more ;-compelled by Powers which
only deign

That solitary man disturb their reign,
Powers that support an unremitting strife
With all the tender charities of life,
Full oft the father, when his sons have
grown

511

To manhood, seems their title to disown; And from his nest amid the storms of heaven Drives, eagle-like, those sons as he was driven;

Now meet we other pilgrims ere the day Close on the remnant of their weary way; While they are drawing toward the sacred floor

Where, so they fondly think, the worm shall

gnaw no more. How gaily murmur and how sweetly taste The fountains reared for them amid the waste! 560

Their thirst they slake: - they wash their toil-worn feet

And some with tears of joy each other greet.
Yes, I must see you when ye first behold
Those holy turrets tipped with evening gold;
In that glad moment will for you a sigh
Be heaved, of charitable sympathy;

In that glad moment when your hands are prest

In mute devotion on the thankful breast!

Last, let us turn to Chamouny that shields With rocks and gloomy woods her fertile fields:

570