WHERE are they now, those wanton Boys?
For whose free range the dædal earth
Was filled with animated toys,

And implements of frolic mirth;
With tools for ready wit to guide;

And ornaments of seemlier pride,

More fresh, more bright, than princes wear;
For what one moment flung aside,
Another could repair;

What good or evil have they seen
Since I their pastime witnessed here,
Their daring wiles, their sportive cheer?
I ask but all is dark between!

They met me in a genial hour,
When universal nature breathed
As with the breath of one sweet flower,
A time to overrule the power

Of discontent, and check the birth

10

Of thoughts with better thoughts at strife,

The most familiar bane of life
Since parting Innocence bequeathed
Mortality to Earth!

20

Soft clouds, the whitest of the year,
Sailed through the sky-the brooks ran clear;
The lambs from rock to rock were bounding;
With songs the budded groves resounding;
And to my heart are still endeared
The thoughts with which it then was cheered;
The faith which saw that gladsome pair
Walk through the fire with unsinged hair.
Or, if such faith must needs deceive -
Then, Spirits of beauty and of grace,
Associates in that eager chase;
Ye, who within the blameless mind
Your favourite seat of empire find
Kind Spirits! may we not believe
That they, so happy and so fair

31

Through your sweet influence, and the care
Of pitying Heaven, at least were free
From touch of deadly injury?
Destined whate'er their earthly doom,
For mercy and immortal bloom!

THE PILGRIM'S DREAM

OR, THE STAR AND THE GLOW-WORM 1818. 1820

40

I distinctly recollect the evening when these verses were suggested in 1818. It was on the road between Rydal and Grasmere, where Glowworms abound. A Star was shining above the ridge of Loughrigg Fell, just opposite. I remember a critic, in some review or other, crying out against this piece. "What so monstrous," said he, as to make a star talk to a glowworm!" Poor fellow! we know from this sage observation what the "primrose on the river's brim was to him."

"Exalted Star!" the Worm replied,
"Abate this unbecoming pride,
Or with a less uneasy lustre shine;
Thou shrink'st as momently thy rays
Are mastered by the breathing haze;
While neither mist, nor thickest cloud
That shapes in heaven its murky shroud,
Hath power to injure mine.

But not for this do I aspire
To match the spark of local fire,
That at my will burns on the dewy lawn,
With thy acknowledged glories; - No!
Yet, thus upbraided, I may show
What favours do attend me here,
Till, like thyself, I disappear
Before the purple dawn."

When this in modest guise was said,
Across the welkin seemed to spread
A boding sound-for aught but sleep unfit
Hills quaked, the rivers backward ran;
That Star, so proud of late, looked wan;
And reeled with visionary stir
In the blue depth, like Lucifer
Cast headlong to the pit!

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40

50

Fire raged: and, when the spangled floor
Of ancient ether was no more,
New heavens succeeded, by the dream
brought forth:

III

Where the second quarry now is, as you pass from Rydal to Grasmere, there was formerly a length of smooth rock that sloped towards the road, on the right hand. I used to call it Tadpole Slope, from having frequently observed there the water-bubbles gliding under the ice, exactly in the shape of that creature.

HAST thou seen, with flash incessant,
Bubbles gliding under ice,

Bodied forth and evanescent,

No one knows by what device?

Such are thoughts! - A wind-swept mea

dow

Mimicking a troubled sea,

Such is life; and death a shadow From the rock eternity!

IV

NEAR THE SPRING OF THE HERMITAGE

TROUBLED long with warring notions,
Long impatient of thy rod,
I resign my soul's emotions
Unto Thee, mysterious God!

What avails the kindly shelter
Yielded by this craggy rent,
If my spirit toss and welter
On the waves of discontent?

Parching Summer hath no warrant
To consume this crystal Well;
Rains, that make each rill a torrent,
Neither sully it nor swell.

Thus, dishonouring not her station,
Would my Life present to Thee,
Gracious God, the pure oblation
Of divine tranquillity !

V

NOT seldom, clad in radiant vest,
Deceitfully goes forth the Morn;
Not seldom Evening in the west
Sinks smilingly forsworn.

The smoothest seas will sometimes prove,
To the confiding Bark, untrue;
And, if she trust the stars above,
They can be treacherous too.

The umbrageous Oak, in pomp outspread
Full oft, when storms the welkin rend,

Felt, and in a great measure composed upon the little mount in front of our abode at Rydal. In concluding my notices of this class of poems it may be as well to observe that among the "Miscellaneous Sonnets are a few alluding to morning impressions which might be read with mutual benefit in connection with these Evening Voluntaries." See, for example, that one on Westminster Bridge, that composed on a May morning, the one on the song of the Thrush, and that beginning While beams of orient light shoot wide and high."

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I

66

Of the fierce wind, while mid-day lightnings prowl

Insidiously, untimely thunders growl; While trees, dim-seen, in frenzied numbers, tear

The lingering remnant of their yellow hair, And shivering wolves, surprised with darkness, howl

As if the sun were not. He raised his eye
Soul-smitten; for, that instant, did appear
Large space ('mid dreadful clouds) of pur-
est sky,

An azure disc-shield of Tranquillity;
Invisible, unlooked-for, minister
Of providential goodness ever nigh!

THIS, AND THE TWO FOLLOWING, WERE SUGGESTED BY MR. W. WESTALL'S VIEWS OF THE CAVES, ETC., IN YORKSHIRE

1819. 1819

PURE element of waters! wheresoe'er Thou dost forsake thy subterranean haunts, Green herbs, bright flowers, and berrybearing plants,