mood,

Not seldom did we stop to watch some tuft

Of dandelion seed or thistle's beard,

That skimmed the surface of the dead calm lake,

Suddenly halting now- - a lifeless stand! 20 And starting off again with freak as sudden; In all its sportive wanderings, all the while, Making report of an invisible breeze

That was its wings, its chariot, and its horse,

Its playmate, rather say, its moving soul. And often, trifling with a privilege Alike indulged to all, we paused, one now, And now the other, to point out, perchance To pluck, some flower or water-weed, too fair

30

Either to be divided from the place
On which it grew, or to be left alone
To its own beauty. Many such there are,
Fair ferns and flowers, and chiefly that tall
fern,

So stately, of the queen Osmunda named;
Plant lovelier, in its own retired abode
On Grasmere's beach, than Naiad by the
side

Of Grecian brook, or Lady of the Mere,
Sole-sitting by the shores of old romance.
So fared we that bright morning: from
the fields

Meanwhile, a noise was heard, the busy

And wasted limbs, his legs so long and lean
That for my single self I looked at them,
Forgetful of the body they sustained. -
Too weak to labour in the harvest field,
The Man was using his best skill to gain
A pittance from the dead unfeeling lake
That knew not of his wants. I will not say
What thoughts immediately were ours, nor
how

The happy idleness of that sweet morn,
With all its lovely images, was changed
To serious musing and to self-reproach. 70
Nor did we fail to see within ourselves
What need there is to be reserved in speech,
And temper all our thoughts with charity.
Therefore, unwilling to forget that day,
My Friend, Myself, and She who then re-
ceived

The same admonishment, have called the

place

By a memorial name, uncouth indeed
As e'er by mariner was given to bay
Or foreland, on a new-discovered coast;
And POINT RASH-JUDGMENT is the name
it bears.

V

TO M. H.

The pool alluded to is in Rydal Upper Park. OUR walk was far among the ancient trees: There was no road, nor any woodman's path;

But a thick umbrage-checking the wild growth

Written at Town-end, Grasmere. The first eight stanzas were composed extempore one winter evening in the cottage; when, after having tired myself with labouring at an awkward passage in "The Brothers," I started with a sudden impulse to this to get rid of the other, and finished it in a day or two. My Sister and I had past the place a few weeks before in our wild winter journey from Sockburn on the banks of the Tees to Grasmere. A peasant whom we met near the spot told us the story so far as concerned the name of the Well, and the Hart, and pointed out the Stones. Both the Stones and the Well are objects that may easily be missed; the tradition by this time may be extinct in the neighbourhood: the man who related it to us was very old.

The poor Hart toils along the mountainside;

30

I will not stop to tell how far he fled,
Nor will I mention by what death he died;
But now the Knight beholds him lying dead.

Dismounting, then, he leaned against a thorn;

He had no follower, dog, nor man, nor boy: He neither cracked his whip, nor blew his horn,

But gazed upon the spoil with silent joy.

Close to the thorn on which Sir Walter leaned,

Stood his dumb partner in this glorious feat; Weak as a lamb the hour that it is yeaned; And white with foam as if with cleaving