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The loiterer, not unnoticed by his comrades. Lay stretched at ease; but, passing by the place On their return, they found that he was gone. No ill was feared; till one of them by chance Entering, when evening was far spent, the house Which at that time was James's home, there learned

That nobody had seen him all that day :

The morning came, and still he was unheard of: The neighbours were alarmed, and to the brook Some hastened; some ran to the Lake: ere

noon

They found him at the foot of that same rock Dead, and with mangled limbs. The third day

after

I buried him, poor Youth, and there he lies!

LEONARD.

And that then is his grave!-Before his death You say that he saw many happy years?

Ay that he did—

PRIEST.

LEONARD.

And all went well with him?

PRIEST.

If he had one, the youth had twenty homes.

LEONARD.

And you believe, then, that his mind was easy?

PRIEST.

Yes, long before he died, he found that time
Is a true friend to sorrow; and unless

His thoughts were turned to Leonard's luckless fortune,

He talked about him with a cheerful love.

LEONARD.

He could not come to an unhallowed end!

PRIEST.

Nay, God forbid !-You recollect I mentioned A habit which disquietude and grief

Had brought upon him; and we all conjectured That, as the day was warm, he had lain down On the soft heath-and waiting for his com

rades,

He there had fallen asleep; that in his sleep
He to the margin of the precipice

Had walked, and from the summit had fallen

headlong.

And so, no doubt, he perished. When the Youth

Fell, in his hand he must have grasp'd, we

think,

His shepherd's staff; for on that pillar of the

rock

It had been caught midway; and there for years It hung and mouldered there.

The Priest here endedThe Stranger would have thanked him, but he

felt

A gushing from his heart, that took away The power of speech. Both left the spot in silence;

And Leonard, when they reached the churchyard gate,

As the Priest lifted up the latch turned round,And, looking at the grave, he said, "My Brother!"

The Vicar did not hear the words: and now, He pointed towards his dwelling place, entreating That Leonard would partake his homely fare : The other thanked him with an earnest voice; But added, that, the evening being calm,

He would pursue his journey. So they parted.

It was not long ere Leonard reached a grove
That overhung the road: he there stopped short,
And, sitting down beneath the trees, reviewed
All that the priest had said :-his early years
Were with him: his long absence, cherished
hopes,

And thoughts which had been his an hour before,
All pressed on him with such a weight, that now,
This vale, where he had been so happy, seemed
A place in which he could not bear to live:
So he relinquished all his purposes.

He travelled back to Egremont: and thence,
That night, he wrote a letter to the Priest,
Reminding him of what had passed between
them;

And adding, with a hope to be forgiven,
That it was from the weakness of his heart
He had not dared to tell him who he was.
This done, he went on shipboard, and is now,
A Seaman, a grey-headed Mariner.

1800

SHE dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove,

A Maid whom there were none to praise
And very few to love :

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, oh,

The difference to me!

1799.

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