XVII.

'Twas mist and rain, and storm and rain :
No screen, no fence could I discover;
And then the wind! in sooth, it was
A wind full ten times over.

I looked around, I thought I saw
A jutting crag,—and off I ran,
Head-foremost, through the driving rain,
The shelter of the crag to gain;
And, as I am a man,

Instead of jutting crag, I found
A Woman seated on the ground.

XVIII.

I did not speak-I saw her face;
Her face!—it was enough for me;
I turned about and heard her cry,
'Oh misery! oh misery!'

And there she sits, until the moon
Through half the clear blue sky will go;
And, when the little breezes make
The waters of the pond to shake,

As all the country know,

She shudders, and you hear her cry,

Oh misery! oh misery!""

XIX.

"But what's the Thorn? and what the pond?

And what the hill of moss to her?

And what the creeping breeze that comes

The little pond to stir ? "

"I cannot tell; but some will say

VOL. II.

She hanged her baby on the tree;
Some say she drowned it in the pond,
Which is a little step beyond:
But all and each agree,

The little Babe was buried there,
Beneath that hill of moss so fair.

XX.

I've heard, the moss is spotted red With drops of that poor infant's blood; But kill a new-born infant thus,

I do not think she could!

Some say,

if to the pond you go,

And fix on it a steady view,

The shadow of a babe you trace,

A baby and a baby's face,

And that it looks at you;

Whene'er you look on it, 'tis plain

The baby looks at you again.

XXI.

And some had sworn an oath that she
Should be to public justice brought;
And for the little infant's bones
With spades they would have sought.
But instantly the hill of moss
Before their eyes began to stir!
And, for full fifty yards around,
The grass-it shook upon the ground!
Yet all do still aver

The little Babe lies buried there,

Beneath that hill of moss so fair.

XXII.

I cannot tell how this may be,

But plain it is the Thorn is bound
With heavy tufts of moss that strive
To drag it to the ground;

And this I know, full many a time,
When she was on the mountain high,
By day, and in the silent night,

When all the stars shone clear and bright,
That I have heard her cry,

'Oh misery! oh misery!

Oh woe is me! oh misery!

1798.

XXIV.

HART-LEAP WELL.

[WRITTEN at own-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.]

Hart-Leap Well is a small spring of water, about five miles from Richmond in Yorkshire, and near the side of the road that leads from Richmond to Askrigg. Its name is derived from a remarkable Chase, the memory of which is preserved by the monuments spoken of in the second Part of the following Poem, which monuments do now exist as I have there described them.

.

THE Knight had ridden down from Wensley Moor With the slow motion of a summer's cloud,

And now, as he approached a vassal's door,

Bring forth another horse!" he cried aloud.

"Another horse!"-That shout the vassal heard
And saddled his best Steed, a comely grey;
Sir Walter mounted him; he was the third
Which he had mounted on that glorious day.

Joy sparkled in the prancing courser's eyes;
The horse and horseman are a happy pair;

But, though Sir Walter like a falcon flies,
There is a doleful silence in the air.

A rout this morning left Sir Walter's Hall,
That as they galloped made the echoes roar;
But horse and man are vanished, one and all;
Such race, I think, was never seen before.

Sir Walter, restless as a veering wind,

Calls to the few tired dogs that yet remain :
Blanch, Swift, and Music, noblest of their kind,
Follow, and up the weary mountain strain.

The Knight hallooed, he cheered and chid them on
With suppliant gestures and upbraidings stern;
But breath and eyesight fail; and, one by one,
The dogs are stretched among the mountain fern.

Where is the throng, the tumult of the race ?
The bugles that so joyfully were blown ?
-This chase it looks not like an earthly chase;
Sir Walter and the Hart are left alone.

The poor Hart toils along the mountain-side;
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 sleet.

Upon his side the Hart was lying stretched:
His nostril touched a spring beneath a hill,
And with the last deep groan his breath had fetched
The waters of the spring were trembling still.

And now, too happy for repose or rest, (Never had living man such joyful lot!)

Sir Walter walked all round, north, south, and west, And gazed and gazed upon that darling spot.

And climbing up the hill-(it was at least
Four roods of sheer ascent) Sir Walter found
Three several hoof-marks which the hunted Beast
Had left imprinted on the grassy ground.

Sir Walter wiped his face, and cried, “ Till now
Such sight was never seen by human eyes:
Three leaps have borne him from this lofty brow,
Down to the very fountain where he lies.