In which the affections gently lead us on,-
Until, the breath of this corporeal frame
And even the motion of our human blood
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul:
While with an eye made quiet by the
power

Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,
We see into the life of things.

If this

Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft
In darkness and amid the many shapes
Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir
Unprofitable, and the fever of the world,
Have hung upon the beatings of my
heart

How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee, O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer through the woods,

How often has my spirit turned to thee! And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought,

With many recognitions dim and faint,
And somewhat of a sad perplexity,
The picture of the mind revives again:
While here I stand, not only with the sense
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing
thoughts

That in this moment there is life and food
For future years. And so I dare to hope,
Though changed, no doubt, from what I

was when first

I came among these hills; when like a roe I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, Wherever nature led: more like a man Flying from something that he dreads, than one

Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then

(The coarser pleasures of my boyish days, And their glad animal movements all gone by)

To me was all in all. I cannot paint What then I was. The sounding cataract Haunted me like a passion; the tall rock, The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,

Their colours and their forms, were then to

me

An appetite; a feeling and a love,

That had no need of a remoter charm,

joy

Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime,
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man;
A motion and a spirit, that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all
thought,

And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still

A lover of the meadows and the woods, And mountains; and of all that we behold

From this green earth; of all the mighty world

My dear, dear friend; and in thy voice I catch

The language of my former heart, and read My former pleasures in the shooting lights Of thy wild eyes. Oh! yet a little while May I behold in thee what I was once, My dear, dear sister! and this prayer I make,

Knowing that Nature never did betray
The heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege,
Through all the years of this our life, to
lead

From joy to joy: for she can so inform
The mind that is within us, so impress
With quietness and beauty, and so feed
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil
tongues,

Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish

men,

Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all
The dreary intercourse of daily life,
Shall e'er prevail against us, or disturb
Our cheerful faith, that all which we be-
hold

Is full of blessings. Therefore let the

moon

Shine on thee in thy solitary walk;
And let the misty mountain-winds be free
To blow against thee: and, in after years,
When these wild ecstasies shall be matured
Into a sober pleasure; when thy mind.
Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms,
Thy memory be as a dwelling-place

For all sweet sounds and harmonies; oh! then,

If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief, Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts

Of tender joy wilt thou remember me, And these my exhortations! Nor, perchance

If I should be where I no more can hear Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these gleams

Of past existence wilt thou then forget That on the banks of this delightful

stream

We stood together; and that I, so long
A worshipper of Nature, hither came
Unwearied in that service: rather say
With warmer love oh! with far deeper
zeal

The wretched parents all that night
Went shouting far and wide;

But there was neither sound nor sight
To serve them for a guide.

At daybreak on a hill they stood
That overlooked the moor;

And thence they saw the bridge of wood,
A furlong from their door.

They wept and, turning homeward, cried,

"In heaven we all shall meet;"

When in the snow the mother spied The print of Lucy's feet.

Then downwards from the steep hill's edge

They tracked the footmarks small;
And through the broken hawthorn hedge,
And by the long stone-wall;

And then an open field they crossed:
The marks were still the same;
They tracked them on, nor ever lost;
And to the bridge they came.

They followed from the snowy bank
Those footmarks, one by one,
Into the middle of the plank;
And further there were none!

Yet some maintain that to this day She is a living child;

That you may see sweet Lucy Gray Upon the lonesome wild.

O'er rough and smooth she trips along,
And never looks behind;
And sings a solitary song
That whistles in the wind.

SHE DWELT AMONG THE UN-
TRODDEN WAYS

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!

MICHAEL

A PASTORAL POEM

IF from the public way you turn your steps

Up the tumultuous brook of Greenhead Ghyll,

You will suppose that with an upright path Your feet must struggle; in such bold

ascent

The pastoral mountains front you face to face.

But courage! for around that boisterous brook

The mountains have all opened out themselves,

And made a hidden valley of their own.
No habitation can be seen: but they
Who journey thither find themselves alone.
With a few sheep, with rocks and stones,
and kites

That overhead are sailing in the sky.
It is in truth an utter solitude;

Nor should I have made mention of this
Dell

But for one object which you might pass by,

Might see and notice not. Beside the brook

Appears a straggling heap of unhewn

stones!

And to that simple object appertains
A story, unenriched with strange events,
Yet not unfit, I deem, for the fireside,
Or for the summer shade. It was the first
Of those domestic tales that spake to me
Of shepherds, dwellers in the valleys, men
Whom I already loved; not verily

For their own sakes, but for the fields and hills

Where was their occupation and abode.
And hence this Tale, while I was yet a boy
Careless of books, yet having felt the
power

Of Nature, by the gentle agency
Of natural objects, led me on to feel