A violet by a mossy stone
Half-hidden from the eye!
-Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.

She lived unknown, and few could know When Lucy ceased to be;

But she is in her grave, and, O!

The difference to me!

II

I travell❜d among unknown men
In lands beyond the sea;
Nor, England! did I know till then
What love I bore to thee.

'Tis past, that melancholy dream!
Nor will I quit thy shore
A second time, for still I seem
To love thee more and more.

Among thy mountains did I feel
The joy of my desire;

And she I cherish'd turn'd her wheel
Beside an English fire.

Thy mornings show'd, thy nights conceal'd

The bowers where Lucy play'd;

And thine too is the last green field

That Lucy's eyes survey'd.

III

Three years she grew in sun and shower; Then Nature said, 'A lovelier flower

On earth was never sown:

This child I to myself will take;

She shall be mine, and I will make
A lady of my own.

'Myself will to my darling be

Both law and impulse: and with me
The girl, in rock and plain,

In earth and heaven, in glade and bower,
Shall feel an overseeing power

To kindle or restrain.

'She shall be sportive as the fawn
That wild with glee across the lawn
Or up the mountain springs;

And her's shall be the breathing balm,
And her's the silence and the calm

Of mute insensate things.

'The floating clouds their state shall lend To her; for her the willow bend;

Nor shall she fail to see

E'en in the motions of the storm

Grace that shall mould the maiden's form

By silent sympathy.

'The stars of midnight shall be dear

To her; and she shall lean her ear

In many a secret place

Where rivulets dance their wayward round,

And beauty born of murmuring sound

Shall pass into her face.

'And vital feelings of delight

Shall rear her form to stately height,

Her virgin bosom swell;

Such thoughts to Lucy I will give

Where she and I together live

Here in this happy dell.'

Thus Nature spake-The work was done—

How soon my Lucy's race was run!

She died, and left to me

This heath, this calm and quiet scene;

The memory of what has been,
And never more will be.

396

IV

A slumber did my spirit seal;

I had no human fears:

She seem'd a thing that could not feel
The touch of earthly years.

No motion has she now, no force;
She neither hears nor sees;
Roll'd round in earth's diurnal course
With rocks, and stones, and trees.

THE INNER VISION

MOST sweet it is with unuplifted eyes

To pace the ground, if path there be or none
While a fair region round the Traveller lies
Which he forbears again to look upon;

Pleased rather with some soft ideal scene
The work of Fancy, or some happy tone
Of meditation, slipping in between
The beauty coming and the beauty gone.

-If Thought and Love desert us, from that day
Let us break off all commerce with the Muse:
With Thought and Love companions of our way-

Whate'er the senses take or may refuse,-
The Mind's internal heaven shall shed her dews
Of inspiration on the humblest lay.

397

BY THE SEA

It is a beauteous evening, calm and free;
The holy time is quiet as a nun
Breathless with adoration; the broad sun

Is sinking down in its tranquillity;

398

399

The gentleness of heaven is on the Sea:
Listen! the mighty being is awake,

And doth with his eternal motion make
A sound like thunder-everlastingly.

Dear child! dear girl! that walkest with me here,
If thou appear untouch'd by solemn thought
Thy nature is not therefore less divine:

Thou liest in Abraham's bosom all the year,
And worship'st at the Temple's inner shrine,
God being with thee when we know it not.

UPON WESTMINSTER BRIDGE Sept. 3, 1802

EARTH has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth like a garment wear

The beauty of the morning: silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky,

All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.

Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!

The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!

TO A DISTANT FRIEND

WHY art thou silent? Is thy love a plant
Of such weak fibre that the treacherous air
Of absence withers what was once so fair?
Is there no debt to pay, no boon to grant?
(N) HC XLI

400

401

Yet have my thoughts for thee been vigilant,
Bound to thy service with unceasing care-
The mind's least generous wish a mendicant
For nought but what thy happiness could spare.

Speak!-though this soft warm heart, once free to hold
A thousand tender pleasures, thine and mine,
Be left more desolate, more dreary cold

Than a forsaken bird's-nest fill'd with snow
'Mid its own bush of leafless eglantine-

Speak, that my torturing doubts their end may know!

DESIDERIA

SURPRIZED by joy-impatient as the wind-
I turn'd to share the transport-O with whom
But Thee-deep buried in the silent tomb,
That spot which no vicissitude can find?

Love, faithful love recall'd thee to my mind
But how could I forget thee? Through what power
Even for the least division of an hour
Have I been so beguiled as to be blind

To my most grievous loss-That thought's return
Was the worst pang that sorrow ever bore
Save one, one only, when I stood forlorn,

Knowing my heart's best treasure was no more;
That neither present time, nor years unborn
Could to my sight that heavenly face restore.

WE MUST BE FREE OR DIE

It is not to be thought of that the flood
Of British freedom, which, to the open sea
Of the world's praise, from dark antiquity

Hath flowed, with pomp of waters, unwithstood,'